Silk v Brief Contents Spring 2017

2 Edition Theme : Climate Change A Letter from the President A Comment from the Editor 3 The Benjamin Barsby Fund 4

Graphic Design & Editor: - Climate Change: Wildlife - Abdul-Halim Albasha - (Dis)pleased to be Chilling in the West Indies 7 Front Cover: - Bubble, Bubble, Oceans in Trouble 8 EJ Oakley Editorial Team: - Climate Change: People - Annabel Smith - Rising Seas: Pacific Small Island Developing States 12 Charles Jack - Desertification: A Cause of Mass Desertion 14 Kasim Ali - Global Warming Presents: The Sixth Extinction 16 Michael Stresing Francesca Alice Forzoni - Climate Change: Politics - - Trump’s War on Climate Change 20 - What Do You Truly Believe In? 22

Silk v Brief is the official magazine of the - Climate Change: Economy - UCL Law Society, edited by the Society’s - Is Nature Our Best Climate Tool? 26 Publications Officer and produced by the undergraduate Law students of University College London. - Climate Change: Technology - - Carbon Capture: An Extortionate Remedy to 30 The UCL Law Society is a non-profit Humanity’s Mistake? student organisation; any views expressed herein belong exclusively to the student writers and are not necessarily those held - Miscellaneous - or endorsed by the Society or the - Democracy: Becoming the Paradoxical Enemy of the 34 Publications Officer. People? - London Terror: Has the Tide Turned for our Security 36 Text, layout or image content may not be Services? copied, printed or otherwise disseminated - Chimeras: How Medicine Transformed Myth into 38 without authorisation from the UCL Law Society. Miracle - Would I Lie to You? Political Truth Telling in a Post- 40

Truth Era Advertising: For further information, including an advertising rate card, please - Modern Slavery: The Greatest Human Rights Issue of 42 contact the incumbent Publications Officer. our Time? - Romania Resists 44 2016/17: Abdul-Halim Albasha - Compulsory Voting: A Cure for All? 46 ([email protected]) - The Neverendum to End Them All 48 - My Genes Made Me Do It 50 Silk v Brief Magazine - The Bizarre Appeal of Emmanuel Macron 52 C/O UCL - Have More Kids; Save The Economy 54 Faculty of Laws Bidborough House - Works of Art - 38-50 Bidborough Street - EJ Oakley: Copic Marker & Biro on Paper 58 London - Ayat Alhaji: Oil on Canvas 60 WC1H 9BT

Silk v Brief | 1

Silk v Brief | Spring 2017 | A Letter From The President A Letter From The President

For the first time in the Society’s history, we were recognised as one of the top 10 university societies in the UK (NUE Awards) and nominated for ‘Best Law Society Overall’ and ‘Best Society for Aspiring Barristers’ (LCN Award).

It has also been a fantastic year in mooting, bearing testament to the calibre and dedication of some of Dear Benthamites, our best students. Our mooters have competed all around the UK in national competitions such as the It has been a pleasure to serve the UCL Law Society ESU-Essex Court Chambers Competition and the for the past two years, first as the Overseas Officer OUP-BPP Mooting Competition. We won both the and subsequently as your President. ‘UCL v LSE’ Eversheds Sutherland Cup and the ‘UCL v KCL’ Hogan Lovells Cup. Notably, our Philip C I thank the Faculty and our sponsors for working Jessup International Law Moot team excelled in the closely with me throughout this year, the Committee national rounds and will be flying to Washington in 2015/16 for teaching me the ropes, the DC to compete in the international rounds. Committee in 2016/17 for tirelessly supporting my presidency, as well as my family and friends for Besides mooting, our Pro Bono team won the constantly providing me with patience, generosity midway prize of the Law School Challenge and will and sound advice. be contending for the overall prize. Furthermore, we published three editions of Silk v Brief (one To the finalists: In September 2014, we were 175 more than last year), the second edition of Next strangers who came from all around the world to Destination (with a wider selection of firms and study what many have regarded as the best articles) and the UCL Law Society Applications discipline in the world – Law. 2,000 cups of coffee Guide. Lastly, our football team entered a league and 4,000 cases later, we have grown together, and performed admirably, while our rugby team, forged strong friendships, and are now heading into netball team and mixed running club have also our final undergraduate examinations. I wish all of gone from strength to strength. you the very best in the upcoming papers and look forward to graduating together in July. Benthamites, it was truly wonderful befriending so many of you through the Society. While all good To everyone else: Enjoy the rest of your time at UCL things must come to an end, I will always look back Laws and take full advantage of everything that UCL at my time at UCL Laws with fond memories. has to offer. While the journey will be challenging, it is also immensely rewarding! As it is often sung: Until we meet again, may God hold you in the palm of His hand. This is also the time for us to look back at our Society’s successes over the past year. It has been Yours truly, one of the busiest years in the Society’s history, and Godwin Tan I am glad that there are accolades to affirm the hard work of my committee members. President, UCL Law Society 2016/17

2 | Silk v Brief A Comment From The Editor | Spring 2017 | Silk v Brief A Comment From The Editor

Well, here it is; the last one.

It’s fitting that this should also serve as my farewell to the UCL Laws community and society; a precious three years in which I’ve learnt so much, an experience untradeable for any commodity.

This is the year Silk v Brief went through a transformation; a third edition, a sponsored writing award, and the foundations for an international readership. I stand very pleased to pass the mantle into the capable hands of Kasim as our incoming publications officer, with every confidence he will continue this pace of development.

As ever, it goes without saying all this could never have been possible without our sponsors; a special thanks to the solicitors and employees at Macfarlanes LLP for giving their sponsorship and for taking the time to judge the shortlisted articles for the Writing Award.

To Michael, Francesca, Charles, Annabel and Kasim; your counsel and aid turned an arduous task into a pleasure; many thanks over and again.

To UCL Laws, its faculty, society members, and committee; I bid thee farewell – catch you on the other side!

All the very best, Abdul-Halim Albasha

Outgoing UCL Law Society Committee 2016/17:

Godwin Tan Gelun (President) Zaal Cama (Overseas) Hyerin Park (VP and Careers) Alistair Ho (Final Year Rep) Jan-Alexander Greiwe (Treasurer) Ramsey El-Dabbagh (Second Year Rep) Gareth Deane (Social Sec) Oliver James (First Year Rep) Firoza Dodhi (Sec) Jasmine Castledine (Pro Bono) Amrit Singh Gill (Speaker Sec) Jack Helyar (Sports) Shemuel Sheikh (Bar) Abdul Albasha (Publications) Arthur Shin (Senior Moots) Michalis Ioannou (Vocations) Connor Gray (Junior Moots) Alex Kyriacou (Webmaster and Affiliate Rep)

Silk v Brief | 3 Silk v Brief | Spring 2017 | The Benjamin Barsby Fund The Benjamin Barsby Fund A UCL Law Society Charity Focus

Written by Godwin Tan & Arthur Shin

In March 2017, UCL Law Society started an initiative to He was a wonderful son, brother and partner - the best… donate a portion of the Law Society’s budget surplus to a small, local charity. Law Society members were invited to submit suggestions regarding which charity to support. Many UCL law students responded to the call for submissions, and the Law Society Committee received suggestions ranging from the Prisoners’ Advice Service to Laptops for the Homeless. A document describing the

different charities was circulated amongst Committee members, and in the final Committee meeting of the academic year, the Committee voted on which charity to support.

About the Charity

The charity that stood out was the Benjamin Barsby Fund. The Benjamin Barsby Fund is, amongst other things, dedicated to helping mental health charities in the name of a former UCL law student who sadly took his own life due to a battle with mental health issues. The Benjamin Barsby Fund has such a palpable connection with UCL Laws and the Law Society that it won the Committee’s unanimous vote. What led you to setting up the Benjamin Barsby fund? What does the charity aim to do? In addition to financially supporting the Benjamin Barsby Fund, the Law Society interviewed Benjamin’s mother, Keri, who We, Benjamin’s family, partner and friends were determined to kindly sent us photos and agreed to have her responses and the mark the loss of Benjamin by working towards helping and photos published to raise awareness of the charity and the creating a more positive outlook for others, including those importance of mental health. The Law Society thanks Keri for who are suffering whilst facing mental or emotional distress. her time and candidness. The Society’s donation to the Benjamin Barsby Fund is modest compared to the efforts of Keri Working with Nottinghamshire Community Foundation (NCF) and others, and we know that it will be put to very good use. we have created a charitable fund in Benjamin’s name, with a primary aim of growing it to build a permanent legacy in support of mental and emotional wellbeing and preventative To those who don’t know him, what was work in Nottinghamshire and the UK. sdsdsdsdsdsdsdsd Benjamin like? The Benjamin Barsby fund has already raised over £30,000 and Where do I start to describe my son? At the beginning I grants have been given to various local and national projects, suppose? Benji was born on 9 September 1993, but with an emphasis on young men’s mental health. unfortunately only lived for 21 years; his life was cut tragically short on 23 April 2015 whilst he was in the 3rd year of his Law The two main charities that we support are The Samaritans Degree at UCL. and MIND. Specific donations to date have been to:

He was a loving son, brother, boyfriend, grandson, nephew, ⤇ The Central London Samaritans Branch to deliver cousin, and friend, and is missed so very much by us all. He widespread training related to issues affecting male students & always filled me with pride, from the first moment he was establishing buddy mentoring schemes in partnership with the placed in my arms and that pride has never left me and never London Universities will. He had such hopes and ambitions and was so very pleased ⤇ Mansfield Samaritans Branch - to obtain a place to study Law at UCL. ⤇ National Mind ⤇ Nottinghamshire Mind However, university and life in general brought many other challenges for Benji. Early in his 3rd year though he was Additionally, in recognition of Benji’s love of his school, diagnosed with depression and, even though he actively sought Nottingham High School, and his lifelong passion for playing help from his GP and the UCL counselling service he lost the will cricket, two awards in Benjamin’s name have also been created to live; since then the lives of all that knew Benjamin have at the High School: changed dramatically.

4 | Silk v Brief The Benjamin Barsby Fund | Spring 2017 | Silk v Brief

⤇ The Benjamin Barsby Trophy: awarded at the Nottingham According to Mind, mental health problems are still surrounded Inner Schools cricket Tournament that is organised & hosted by by ignorance, prejudice and fear, and nearly nine out of ten the school at the Valley Road playing fields. - people with a mental health problem say they have faced stigma ⤇ The Benjamin Barsby Prize: given to a boy in year 7-9 for all and discrimination. - round contribution and achievement - Time to Change, England's biggest anti-stigma programme run Benjamin was an avid Harry Potter fan and in recognition of this jointly by Mind and Rethink Mental Illness, has been working we have donated sets of Harry Potter Books to local junior hard to improve attitudes and behaviour towards people with schools and to schools with connections to our family. mental health problems. -

The work of our charity is ever evolving, and we welcome More information regarding the stigma surrounding mental thoughts and suggestions in relation to any worthy causes. health and how to positively overcome this can be found on the link below: - What would you want to tell a student who might be struggling with mental health issues? www.mind.org.uk/about-us/our-policy-work/our-work- in-parliament/2015-election-what-we-achieved/mind- - To speak to someone about your worries as soon as possible – manifesto-2015-stigma/ family, a friend, a tutor, your GP, the Samaritans (Freephone 116123). Don’t bottle up your feelings, your worries, your How can people contribute to the Benjamin concerns; there is help available. Barsby fund?

The information found on the Mind website under Student Minds By following the link below: is very informative: - www.nottscf.org.uk/donate/the-benjamin-barsby-fund www.mind.org.uk/information-support/tips-for-everyday- living/student-life The Law Society is glad to assist Keri and Benjamin’s family and Other helpful information can be found at: - friends in their goals of promoting mental health and awareness of mental health issues. Mental health issues are, as Keri www.samaritans.org/how-we-can-help-you/contact-us? mentioned, more common than most people think. According to the UK Mental Health Foundation, it is estimated that 1 in 6 www.mind.org.uk/ people in the past week experienced a common mental health issue. It is important that we, as students, seek to break this What can we do to encourage students to talk stigma against mental health issues and begin to acknowledge that this is a problem faced by many in university. about mental health more openly without feeling the social stigma associated with it? If you are facing mental health issues, know that you are

Basically, create an environment where students feel able to not alone. There are many services that can help you, and speak openly about their mental health and well-being. Stigma your friends will accept you for who you are. and fear of prejudice definitely stops a lot of students, and people in general, from talking about their mental health; however, If you know of anyone who may be suffering from mental talking openly about these issues is the best way to start health issues, please reach out to them and guide them to decreasing the stigma. - -- the appropriate mental health resources and helplines.

Mental Health Resources and Helplines:

UCL Student Psychological Services Safety Card: www.ucl.ac.uk/student-psychological-services/UCL_SPS_Safety_Card.pdf

UCL Student Psychological Services: www.ucl.ac.uk/student-psychological-services/index_home

Nightline (available between 6 pm to 8 am): 020 7631 0101 & www.nightline.org.uk

HOPELineUK : 0800 068 41 41 & www.papyrus-uk.org/help-advice/about-hopelineuk

MayTree: 0207 263 7070 & www.maytree.org.uk

There are more resources and helplines listed on the Law Society’s website: www.ucllawsociety.co.uk/fahadscorner.php

Silk v Brief | 5 Wildlife Climate Change: Wildlife | Spring 2017 | Silk v Brief

(Dis)pleased to be Chilling in the West Indies

Antonio Beatrice between a rise in atmospheric temperature to increased earthquake magnitude and seismic activity below the earth’s surface. In principle, it can be argued that the absolute destruction to tropical wildlife (and human life) in Haiti in 2010 will become As the academic year draws to an end in the cool city of more frequent because of climate change. - London, I look forward to basking in the warm, tropical sun of the Caribbean. Few things on earth are as rejuvenating as the From an industrial perspective, it can be argued that climate crashing sound of crystal clear waves on the coast; the change as an end encourages deforestation in the south American succulent taste of diverse Afro - Caribbean cuisine on the Caribbean countries. Consider that the Canadian International beach and having a nice head under the palm trees from the Development Agency confirmed in an annual report that local rum shop’s finest liquor - oh yes! But, judging from the approximately 94,000 cubic metres of timber are exported out of exodus of tourists who arrive each year to observe it, perhaps Guyana to the European Union and other international trading an unsung hero in the Caribbean is the unique expression each partners each year - a figure which the United Nations Food and island gives to its lush and undisturbed wildlife. It is common Agriculture Organization considers as “extremely unsustainable.” to hear the proud reggae lyric: “I’m pleased to be chilling in This demand for timber fuels the world’s secondary manufacturing the West Indies / Jah provides all my wants and needs / I got processes involving wood, which stem ultimately from the the sunshine rivers and trees . .” accelerated industrialization movement that is associated with climate change. It goes without saying that the Amazon Rainforest, But are we really pleased? - along with its 40,000 plant species, 427 mammals (e.g. the jaguar, anteater and giant otter), 1,300 birds (e.g. the harpy eagle, toucan In light of the environmentally and ecologically crippling effects of and hoatzin), and 378 reptiles subsequently run the risk of climate change in the twenty-first century, we shouldn’t be. This extinction in the long term. - global phenomenon is caused primarily by greenhouse gases which function with each other to regulate the temperature and weather An unanticipated but very real risk of climate change is genetic of the earth within hospitable limits. However, mankind’s mutation in wildlife. Historically, mutations in animals manifest at exhaustive use of carbon and fossil fuel for industrialization has birth have been noted and studied. These include polydactylism in upset this delicate mechanism to the point that wildlife on earth is cats (i.e. having more toes than necessary); abnormally coloured finding it difficult to survive. Climate change has resulted in a range coats in animals, and even genetically built resistance to of problems in the Caribbean region. - - population endemics. In humans, it is well established that prolonged exposure to ultra-violet (UV) radiation (which plays a Firstly, climate change has led to an accelerated deterioration of major role in global warming) in the sunlight can cause certain the limestone landscape in Barbados. This global phenomenon is forms of skin cancer and spur genetic abnormalities in the future. primarily the result of increasing amounts of carbon dioxide in the Although UV induced mutation with respect to wildlife has not atmosphere due to mankind’s extensive use of industry in all its been thoroughly studied in the region, it logically follows that the forms. This environmentally useful gas, when present in excess, genes of animals and plants in the wild are just as affected by UV combines with rainwater to form a corrosive liquid known as rays as are human genes, since they both contain the same carbonic acid. As the laws of chemistry would (unfortunately) have constituent Deoxyribonucleic Acid (DNA) strands. - it, carbonic acid vigorously corrodes limestone - the very substance of which Barbados is entirely made. The result is that carbonic acid Proponents of climate change may argue that it is an unabatable - an agent of climate change - gradually destroys the mountains, side effect of the world’s desire to become more industrialized and hills and coastal area which are scattered throughout the land, and developed - something that ought to be to the benefit of our the animals, birds and insects which form their homes in them. At consumerist tendencies. Or even worse, they may argue (as a this rate, the infamous Harrison’s Cave and its wildlife in Barbados certain current President already has) that "the concept of global run the risk of slipping into non - existence in centuries to come if warming was created by and for the Chinese in order to make U.S. curative measures aren’t taken. - manufacturing non-competitive." In either case, the answer is that climate change does not facilitate the sustainable use of wildlife, This phenomenon poses an even more alarming threat to the which is doomed to destruction at this rate. It is impossible to Caribbean. Since the region sits squarely within the hurricane belt, disregard the pricelessness and usefulness of the Caribbean’s the islands of the Caribbean - from Suriname in the south to wildlife all in the name of profit. - Bahamas in the north - are already prone to being hit by tropical waves and storms of high intensity. Indeed, during the “Hurricane The tremendous damage caused by climate change, and all of its Season” period which lasts from July to November every year, the agents, is evidently obvious at this stage. It is also clear that this likelihood of the formation of a hurricane is greatly increased. This trend will continue unless something is done to address this issue is owed almost entirely to a 1 degree Celsius increase in on all fronts, and to especially preserve the environment. Perhaps temperature during this period. It follows that global warming, the most sustainable means to address this issue is by raising which is expected to lead to a 1 to 2 degree Celsius rise in awareness of this very real threat, and by helping tailor our temperature by 2060, will exponentially increase the region’s education systems around environment conservationism. To this likelihood of being hit by a tropical storm. In 2004, for instance, end, I unequivocally agree with Senegalese environmentalist, Baba Hurricane Ivan totally wiped out the region’s nutmeg trees, along Dioum: "In the end we will conserve only what we love; we will love with the insects, birds and squirrels which nest in them. only what we understand; and we will understand only what we are Connectedly, meteorologists have also been able to establish a link taught ...". -

Silk v Brief | 7

Silk v Brief | Spring 2017 | Climate Change: Wildlife Bubble, Bubble, Oceans in Trouble Riley Forson “Did you ever stop to notice this crying Earth, these As advertised by Lansdorp, the project is a global initiative, weeping shores?” and much of the research is crowdfunded; the vast majority of Mars One’s funds comes from private investors. These Oceans cover 71% of Earth’s surface yet we know so much investors get a stake in broadcasting rights for a Mars One more about the terrestrial impacts of climate change than reality show and get a return on their investment. Donations, we do about the watery world which surrounds us. The sponsorships, the candidates’ application fees, speaking oceans are the largest carbon storage units in the carbon engagements and the sale of merchandise also constitute cycle, with scientists from TeachOceanSciences predicting significant sources of money. that oceans have absorbed roughly 1/3 of CO2 produced from human activity since 1800 and ½ of all CO2 Climate change’s deadly talons do not end there for the turtle produced from fossil fuels. However, whilst on the surface though; increased temperatures and rising sea levels will every thing may seem swell, if we dive into the deep end damage the food chain that sustains the turtle as a primary we see that the impacts of climate change are more consumer. Sea turtles depend on sea-grass for the majority of threatening than Spielberg’s Jaws saga. Forthwith we shall their diet, but increased acidification of the sea through consider the impact of climate change on sea turtles, coral dissolving CO2 damages the sea-grass’ ability to absorb reef ecosystems and manatees. nutrients from the ocean floor, and rising water levels reduce its ability to photosynthesise. Subsequently, already 1/3 of all Turtles in Turmoil sea-grass has been destroyed, signalling another up stream struggle for the turtle. Rising temperatures also skew There are 7 different species of sea turtle, the Leatherback circulation patterns of ocean currents determined by the turtle being equivalent to a dinosaur which has surfed the Coriolis effect; the result is that Crush and his turtle friends waves of our oceans for centuries. Larry Crowder of Duke won’t be riding that ‘sweet East Australian Current’ to help University stated that these turtles could be extinct in the next find the Nemos of the future. 10-20 years “unless sufficient international co-operation is mounted” to reverse the dramatic effects climate change is So the turtle is a fascinating, yet ultimately tragic, indicator of having on the species. But why are turtles so affected by climate change; the pattern shows whilst climate change climate change? Turtles, like other reptiles, have rockets, the sea turtle plummets. environmental sex determination- this means that the sex of hatchlings is determined by the temperature of their nesting Coral Reefs Reeling from Climate Change: sites. Studies have found that temperatures above 30oC favour female hatchlings, whilst temperatures below 30oC favour Coral reef ecosystems (a community of living organisms male hatchlings. As a result, turtles have adapted their nesting interacting with other living organisms and their non living times to synchronise with times of the year where environment) are home to 25% of marine life, yet they cover temperatures are likely to produce a largely balanced just 1% of the ocean. Coral reefs are fragile ecosystems that male:female ratio. Then we add climate change to the mixture. are being fatally impacted by the impacts of climate change. WWF states findings from the Intergovernmental Body on The coral reef depends on a symbiotically mutual relationship Climate Change that predicts that if we do not adhere to the with an algae known as zooxanthellae. Whilst the coral desperate demands of the Convergence of the Parties 21 in provides the zooxanthellae with shelter and Paris to keep temperature increase to a maximum of 1.5oC, compounds for photosynthesis, the then global temperatures will increase between 1.4oC-5.8OC coral is supplied with the by- by the end of the century. The turtle nesting synchronisation products such as glucose system will be sent into meltdown. It has been suggested that and amino acids which are an increase of just 2oC will skew male:female sex ratios; add another 2oC on top, male turtle offspring would not stand the products such as glucose and heat. The result would be catastrophic to the turtle. amino acids which are products such as glucose and amino acids which Turtles in the “Scattered Islands”, in the Mozambique Channel, are essential for it to convert into are already faced with this climate change catastrophe calcium carbonate to strengthen according to the National Geographic. Southern islands, like its skeletal frame. The zooxan- Europa, are cooler and therefore peak nesting times are in the thellae is also responsible for summer, whereas in the warmer islands further north, like the kaleidoscope of colours Mayotte, peak nesting is in the winter. Whilst temperature in the coral reefs. However, increases could see the Europa turtles shift their nesting times when the coral becomes to the winter, the Mayotte island turtle’s nesting is already at distressed, due to increased the coolest time, they are faced with skewed sex ratios or temperature or increased acidity, forced migration from their habitual nesting zones; both it expels this life sustaining algae choices see the turtle stuck between a rock and a hard place. resulting in coral bleaching causing the coral to adopt a deathlike pallor. 8 | Silk v Brief Climate Change: Wildlife | Spring 2017 | Silk v Brief

If conditions return to optimal levels the zooxanthellae return the manatees from collisions with boats which is a main cause and the coral will resurrect, however as the climate change of fatality). Savethemanatee.org states: “Manatees will face clock is slow to wind back the coral is unable to sustain itself increased risks if they are forced to inhabit waterways which and dies. Richard Vevers, founder of the Ocean Agency (a non- are lacking in safeguards for their protection.” profit Australian organisation assisting in the 50 Reefs project) announced on March 3rd 2017 that 50 reefs will be Climate change increases the likelihood of erratic freak investigated on how they could combat climate change; weather conditions, such as hurricanes and storm surges. The speaking to Reuters he stated: “the latest bleaching has been storm surges can displace manatees, washing them into the worst die off ever recorded.” WWF has stated that roughly human settlements; scientists Langtimm and Beck in 2003 ¼ of all coral reefs have been damaged beyond repair, and found that manatees suffer delayed health and reproductive another 2/3 are under serious threat from increased issues as a result of the stress caused by the destructive temperatures which impairs their ability to fight disease and weather conditions. Climate change will also increase rainfall causes the expulsion of the zooxanthellae, as well as rising sea causing increased nutrient run-off into warmer coastal waters, levels which reduces the ability of the zooxanthellae to the prime conditions for “red tides”, caused by blooms of photosynthesise, effectively the coral will drown in darkening microscopic red algae known as Karenia Brevis. These algae seas. WWF predicts that coral reefs will disappear before produce toxins which affect the nervous systems of mammals 2050 if we make no significant effort to save them. like manatees who graze on the algae, it left 44 dead in 2005.

Acidification of the oceans is also having a devastating impact. So the manatees must migrate, starve or be blown on the crest Coral reefs need a stable environment to flourish in, but of a wave into human settlements by storms; the future seems climate change robs the coral of this stability due to the bleak unless climate change is halted. increased presence of CO2 lowering ocean pH levels which impacts their ability to absorb calcium carbonate to build strong structures. Scor 2009 released research which shows that the ocean pH has lowed by 0.11 units from 8.179 to 8.069, much closer to the acidic side of pH neutral, suggesting that the ocean is now 30% more acidic than in 1700. Whilst this may only seem minimal, don’t be so quick to forget it was the single straw which broke the camel’s back; translate that to 2 the ocean and it is the CO particle which collapses an ecosystem. The Royal Society in 2008 suggested that in 2100 if we do not take immediate, proactive and co-ordinated steps to lower the level of CO2 emissions, the pH of the oceans will drop to 7.8, a level which would send coral reefs to the realm of mythology, a watery wonderland long since lost.

Manatees Face a Morbid Future

Manatees live in shallow coastal areas and cannot survive in temperatures below 15oC. Manatees therefore might benefit from climate change if the result is increased temperatures in areas like Florida and Georgia, where there is an aggregation of manatees. But, climate change does not necessarily mean increased temperatures; consider the film 2012 where New York City froze into an icy wasteland. This means that manatees could be threatened if climate change flips the tropical paradise waters into freezing ice baths. Whilst A Manatee’s Revenge at a Public Pool warmer temperatures would be favourable for the manatees, climate change poses some more unique risks for their Nate Fakes survival.

Manatees are affectionately known as sea cows, they spend their idyllic days munching on pastures of sea-grass. As has already been stated, rising sea levels will have a significant impact on the ability of underwater vegetation’s ability to photosynthesise, the result being a decline in the availability of the staple food source for the manatee. Rising sea levels will Cry Me An Ocean also cause salt water to infiltrate areas of fresh water where the manatees graze on non halophyte species of plants that WWF states that climate change is one of the major drivers cannot adapt to increased salinity; this again causes further that is causing the ocean to change more rapidly than at any degradation in the simple diet that sustains the manatee. The other point in millions of years. Just focusing on the plight of result of rising sea levels will also encourage the building of three different species of sea-life out of a plethora of equally sea defences such as groynes and sea walls to protect the ever troubling pleas for help only highlights how much human encroaching coastal infrastructure. Manatees will be forced to activity is destroying its own home and how essential it is we alter their lifestyles and migrate further along the Atlantic or act immediately and effectively to prevent the destruction Gulf coasts. Whilst a change of scenery might sound pleasant, from progressing to a point where we cannot resuscitate our the forced eviction will push manatees out of coastal areas oceans and the marine life it sustains. where there are designated manatee speed zones (to protect Silk v Brief | 9

Silk v Brief | Spring 2017

Tokyo

Michael Stresing 2017

10 | Silk v Brief People Silk v Brief | Spring 2017 | Climate Change: People Rising Seas Pacific Small Island Developing States

Danielle Worden

With predictions of those displaced by climate change conversely strongly emphasised in contemporary discourse. Most reaching 200 million by 2050, the inadequate legal prominently, The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner protection afforded to displaced communities, such as for Human Rights “made an “unequivocal call for integration of Pacific Small Island Developing States (PSIDs), must be human rights” within the Paris Agreement of 2015. With the addressed immediately. With most being less than 3m agreement subsequently containing the first human rights above sea level, sea level rise, resulting from thermal reference in any international environmental agreement, this expansion and melting glaciers, is the crucial climate relationship is now firmly on the political agenda. change symptom driving PSID displacement. However, their displacement may become inevitable even prior to submergence. For example, salt water intrusion, resulting Countless human rights are threatened by climate-induced from sea level rise, threatens their food reserves and displacement. Submergence, for example, challenges the right to degrades their agricultural land. PSID displacement thus life, whilst the current protective gap risks rendering displaced mandates the international community’s immediate PSIDs stateless, threatening their right to self-determination. attention. Additionally, food and water reserve depletion infringes the right to food and water and, in turn, potentially affects the right to The international community must adopt an approach to PSID health. The right to a healthy environment is also undoubtedly displacement that accounts for climate justice. This notion engaged, enshrined in the Rio Declaration 1992 and recognised by recognises that climate-induced displacement, fuelled by the International Court of Justice as deriving from the right to life. anthropocentric over-consumption of greenhouse gases, Consequently, climate change indisputably threatens PSID human demands a human response. Moreover, it emphasises that, rights. whilst developed states are the greatest emitters, climate change disproportionality affects developing, low-emitting states such as PSIDs, whose emissions account for just 0.03% of the global stock. Accordingly, climate justice requires action from the greatest emitters directed towards alleviating the effects of climate change upon PSIDs.

However, PSIDs should not be recognised as climate refugees. On one hand, this notion was unquestionably once salient within popular discourse and at least attempts to address the current protective gap. Nevertheless, almost two decades after its emergence, its meaning unhelpfully remains elusive. Even if this definitional obscurity were remedied, it is conceptually impossible for the UN Refugee Convention 1951 to encompass PSIDs. For example, the requisite persecution, although undefined in the Convention, derives from the Latin “persequi”, meaning “to follow with hostile intent”, and thus requires intention. Whilst apathy to climate-induced displacement is morally condemnable, that climate change is PopularResistance largely attributable to emissions released prior to scientific Resisting nihilism, the human rights paradigm prioritises confirmation of their contribution to global warming makes mitigation and adaptation. Per the Submission, state obligations to even claims of negligence tenuous. As this model would thus mitigate and to “to ensure that all persons have the necessary require a new conceptual framework, political resistance capacity to adapt to climate change” to avert human right harms severely compromises this prospect. Prevailing depictions of are deducible from “existing human rights agreements, “climate refugees” predominantly depict them as security obligations, standards and principles.” With “small islands” threats, whilst Trump’s refugee ban and the EU refugee crisis explicitly noted, as sea-level rise will “continue for centuries to reflects the strong desire of numerous developed states to millennia” even if emissions are stabilised, ranging between 0.28m limit, rather than expand, their refugee intake. Conversely, the to 0.61m, this latter obligation is crucial. Instead of accepting notion is also politically resisted by PSIDs for abdicating displacement as inevitable, such duties provide the currently developed states of their responsibility to mitigate their lacking impetus for initiatives that minimise its likelihood. harmful emissions if they agree to facilitate resettlement. By pragmatically recognising its possible inevitability, this Alternatively, recourse to human rights to delineate the framework could also regulate PSID resettlement. Although they responsibilities owed by the international community to PSIDs do not make the connection, Methmann’s and Oels’ notion of is proposed. Whilst climate refugee rhetoric has declined, the “resilience…the ability of a social or ecological system to absorb relationship between climate change and human rights is changes and still persist”, provides a displacement model complementing the human rights framework. 12 | Silk v Brief

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Envisioning “climate-induced migration...as a means of improving boundaries”, extraterritoriality is not explicitly guaranteed in livelihoods” when mitigation and other adaptation techniques human rights instruments. Conversely, this effect is fail, “networks of resilience” are established under which initially academically disputed. With this model’s value depending upon only parts of communities migrate to both secure their own its capacity to oblige developed states to assume significant livelihoods and the livelihoods of islanders delaying resettlement. obligations to PSIDs, this issue should not be understated. Strikingly, this notion again has underpinnings in the Paris Agreement, with states being encouraged to facilitate the However, the “duty of international cooperation” alleviates this “resilience of communities, livelihoods and ecosystems.” Further, concern. Recognised within numerous human rights that “resilience” and human rights implicitly underlie existing instruments, i.e. Article 2 of the ICESCR, the OHCHR and the resettlement programmes illustrates this approach’s practical CESCR both explicitly recognise human rights’ viability. Whilst the $48 million granted to Isle De Jean Charles extraterritoriality. Similarly, the duty is prevalent within was explictly entitled a “climate resilience grant”, both human climate change discourse, confirmed in Article 7(6) of the Paris rights and “resilience” are implicitly promoted by the I-Kiribati Agreement and the UNFCC’s preamble. Ultimately, it underlies "Migration with Dignity". A voluntary labour migration all international agreements, accounting for mitigation and programme exemplifying a “network of resilience”, self- adaptation commitments benefitting other states, and has been determination is fostered through the initiative’s leadership by recognised by the UN as affording human rights some degree of the I-Kiribati government and its aim of securing the livelihoods extra-territoriality. Consequently, developed states are arguably of both voluntary resettlers and remaining islanders, whilst bound to guarantee PSID human rights through their climate “dignity” itself grounds human rights. Consequently, the human change initiatives. rights paradigm could embrace “resilience” as the principle underlying resettlement. Even if human rights are extraterritorial, this paradigm remains contingent upon its ability to oblige states to resettle PSIDs. Not Finally, this model alleviates climate injustice. The Mary explicit within any human rights instruments, this obligation Robinson Foundation, climate justice’s key proponent, include in has also not attracted the OHCHR’s interest so far. However, their “Principles of Climate Justice” respecting human rights as irrespective of these descriptive observations, the duty’s they provide “the supply of legal imperatives… to frame morally normative existence is inferable from human rights. For appropriate responses to climate change.” Admittedly, the example, the duty of international cooperation could require difficulty of proving that a particular state’s emissions directly facilitating resettlement when necessary to guarantee human caused a specific human rights harm, underlying the OCHCR’s rights. Furthermore, an obligation to grant residency when refusal to recognise climate change itself as a human rights deportation threatens the right to freedom from torture, violation, may suggest that this model cannot effectively attribute inhuman, or degrading treatment or to life, has been recognised responsibility to the greatest emitters. However, as all emissions repeatedly. As such rights would undoubtedly be violated by contribute to climate change, they all indirectly contribute to returning islanders to uninhabitable states, human rights also human rights harms. Further, if a state recognises human rights conceivably oblige the international community to facilitate norms, whether it “causes climate change is a separate question resettlement. from whether it has a duty to address the effects of climate change on human rights.” Accordingly, human rights Regardless of the rationale employed, any attempt to intensify undoubtedly require action from the greatest emitters. developed state obligations could be opposed. For example, Paris’ denial of any liability deriving from the provision for “loss More specifically, this model complements corrective justice. and damage” reflects the aversion of particular states to Logically, to avoid their emissions infringing human rights the accepting greater climate change obligations. Further, Russia, a greatest emitters must assume the most extensive mitigation and top ten emitter, has not ratified Paris, whilst the USA’s and the adaptation obligations. Controversially, it could also provide the UK’s future climate change policies, given Trump’s election and basis for compensation. With human rights violations requiring Brexit, are unclear. Moreover, Paris was ultimately limited in its effective remedies per the ICCPR, such remedies could receptiveness to human rights, referencing them only once and undoubtedly be monetary. For example, the European Court of failing to connect climate-induced displacement with human Human Rights has previously awarded compensation for breach rights. Whilst these observations cannot diminish the state of the right to private life to an applicant forced to move due to obligations normatively arising from human rights, they suggest pollution levels. Whilst securing access to effective remedies that retrieving international consensus recognising their simultaneously complements procedural justice, other human existence and implications may be difficult. rights further promote the effective participation of PSIDs. As the rights to “freedom of expression…freedom to seek, receive and However, this issue can be overcome. Given their increasing impart information and ideas of all kind” and to participate in coverage by the OCHCR, the international community cannot “public affairs”, per the ICCPR, are subject to the prohibition of refrain from addressing the threats posed to human rights by non-discrimination on race or national origin, their participatory climate-induced displacement indefinitely. Further, in contrast rights cannot be side-lined. With this prohibition also challenging to the predominantly negative refugee discourse, as human environmental racism, the right to self-determination rights have hegemonic status within all liberal democracies, unequivocally entitles everyone to pursue social and cultural alleged infringements are politically embarrassing. Moreover, development and can be substantiated by guarantees of minority as most are qualified and must be balanced against other rights rights. Consequently, human rights provide the normative basis engaged, this may encourage state receptivity. For example, justifying PSID demands for cultural preservation. resettlement initiatives must account for the right to property of national citizens. With recent calls by the UN for international The fundamental obstacle facing this model is that ascribing agreement on principles regulating climate-induced migration, extraterritoriality to human rights is controversial. Whilst the addressing such demands from a human rights perspective is Submission claims that the above obligations “extend to all thus both politically plausible and necessary. rights-holders and to harm that occurs both inside and beyond

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Silk v Brief | Spring 2017 | Climate Change: People Desertification: A Cause of Desertion

Annabel Smith

The World Health Organisation describes land degradation as beans across hectares of land; soil erosion / land degradation had caused by multiple forces, including extreme weather and meant they did not ripen. He was unable to sell them for human human activities that pollute or degrade the quality of soils consumption, severely impacting his revenue income. Relying on and land utility, negatively affecting food production, the land and natural resources in these regions of profound livelihoods, and the production of other ecosystem goods and desertification has proved too great a risk for some, with Lo’s own services. According to UNCED (1992) desertification is “land children heading to the country’s capital – Dakar – to seek degradation in arid, and semi-arid and dry sub humid areas employment. Whilst this migration may seem relatively localised resulting from various factors including climate variation and many people from his village and neighbouring villages have human activities”. Bearing this definition in mind it is worth travelled to Gabon, with others still planning to emigrate to noting that some 41% of the Earth’s surface is classified as Europe or Brazil. drylands, and home to an estimated two billion people, leaving them at great risk of the effects of desertification. Further to Whilst the problem is most obviously visible across Africa, this, specifically in Africa, three quarters of all agricultural desertification happens across all continents (apart from drylands are now degraded to some degree, meaning they are Antarctica). A report by Shestakov and Streletsky in 1998 highly susceptible to desertification if it hasn’t already explained that in Kazakhstan the main push factor for migration is occurred. This article explores the ramifications of the downwards spiral that starts at environmental deterioration; desertification on the livelihoods of affected populations. the degradation of pasture and arable lands causes a loss of income, subsequently impacting living standards and quality of In their study of the socio-economic impact of desertification life. Much like a cycle of poverty, those relying on the land for in Ganye Southeastern Adamawa State in Nigeria, academics agriculture as their main source of income in these arid / semi- Jamala, Mada, Abraham and Joel stated that desertification arid regions find themselves in this downwards spiral as a mostly affects rural households who are forced to depend on consequence of desertification. natural resources for their livelihood; the logic here follows that livelihood comprises of the capabilities assets (resources, Not only has desertification affected livelihoods directly, but also claims and access) and activities required for living. Clearly indirectly, with mass internal migrations into overcrowded with land degradation and desertification, the resources, and regions, causing further disputes over already limited natural access to those resources, become negligible; the livelihood of resources. Research in Ethiopia has found that individuals from those relying on such natural resources is severely poor households in ecologically fragile communities have a higher compromised. In essence, low agricultural yields as a result of propensity to migrate compared to those from wealthier poorer soil conditions can drastically reduce the household households in less ecologically vulnerable communities (Ezra income for families dependent on agriculture (Leighton 1997). 2001). The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies estimated in 2003 that 25 million of the world’s Perhaps the most notable example is the population of sub- migrants were environmental migrants fleeing natural disasters, Saharan Africa that has experienced the ramifications of including desertification, a figure exceeding all other categories of desertification. In Kenya, it was reported in 2013 by the global refugees. This problem has not showed any signs of slowing Environment Cabinet Secretary Judy Wakhunga that drought either, with studies estimating that global environmental change had eroded the country’s supply of natural resources to the could drive anywhere from 50 million to almost 700 million extent that they could no longer support many of its citizens’ people to migrate by 2050 – with the UN expecting 50 million livelihoods. This is of particular concern in Kenya, as pointed people being forced to leave their homes by as soon as 2020. out by the Nema Board of Management Chair Maluki Mwenda, given the fact that 80% of their land is arid or semi-arid land, hence the fact that desertification is rapidly spreading is cause for alarm for that 80%. The extent of desertification according to the UN suggests that 12 million hectares of land are lost each year, which is equivalent to an area in which 20 million tonnes of grain could have been grown.

On a small-scale case study, the BBC reported the effects of desertification in Louga, northern Senegal. A local cattle herder, Khalidou Badara, told of his childhood where he was cautious of venturing to certain surrounding areas due to the dense vegetation, which has since been taken over by winds and sand. He stated that currently there are very few trees left standing; stunted grassland growth has meant each year they have to travel further to find land on which their cattle can graze. Another local, Cheikhou Lo, had grown peanuts and Chris Madden 14 | Silk v Brief Climate Change: People | Spring 2017 | Silk v Brief

Oxfam

These predictions appear to be logical when we consider In 1970, China Daily reported an enormous sand dune on the empirical evidence. With regard to internal migration, southern edge of the Tengger desert, named Babusha, which desertification (couple with periodic droughts) across northeast had encroached south, threatening the region’s social and Brazil contributed to 3.4 million people emigrating between 1960 economic development as well as the livelihoods of those and 1980 (Sanders 1990-91). In terms of national migration, the people who lived there. Rather than becoming ‘climate UN have further reported that land degradation has been a major refugees’, six local farmers, including Guo Wangang, decided factor in rural-urban migration in Mexico and to Mexico-US to plant trees in the neighbouring area (now the Babusha migration streams with 700,000 to 900,000 migrating from Forest Farm in Gulang), to improve the soil absorption and Mexico’s drylands annually. Femia’s Centre for Climate and prevent the spread of the desert by fixing the sand in place. Security observed similar patterns to the UN suggesting After three decades, and the combined efforts of the farmers, continuing changes in weather patterns are likely to drive the desertification of the 75,000 square metre area has been farmers, fisherman and herders away from these areas affected reversed; Gulang has again become a thriving forest farm, by desertification and into urban hubs, as has been seen in Syria where produce is grown and sheltered under a canopy of prior to the outbreak of civil war. greenery. This small scale example has prompted China to vow to tackle desertification, with the government planning Time magazine reported that within one weekend in September on reclaiming 100,000 square kilometres of sandified land 2015, over 10,000 migrants travelled to Western Europe, with by 2020. scientists attributing climate change as a major factor for the migration. John Kerry (then the US Secretary of State) stated in a Whilst the effects of this new plan are yet to be seen, climate change conference in Alaska that these migrants were desertification and its effects on livelihoods and migration from a new class; he coined the phrase “climate refugees”. have been a cause for alarm for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and a report is due to be published Whilst desertification is causing this mass migration, some action in September 2019 with chapters addressing both is being taken to prevent its devastating effects. In China desertification and land degradation; it is without a doubt desertification is one of the most pressing problems in its now a global concern. Western Regions, claiming vast areas of land.

Silk v Brief | 15 Silk v Brief | Spring 2017 | Climate Change: People Global Warming Presents: The Sixth Extinction

JE Woo

In her Pulitizer Prize-winning book, Elizabeth Kolbert concludes that our planet is currently experiencing its sixth mass extinction. Much like fictional apocalyptic dystopias, Kolbert predicts a potential fifty percent loss of all flora and fauna by the end of the century. From her research, this extinction is a man-made eventuality closely resembling those of the previous phenomena, which rapidly and drastically decreased the world’s biodiversity.

Though The Sixth Extinction: An Unnatural History has received critical acclaim, current political trends have COP Paris hindered the progress of environmental efforts. With the The effect of global warming goes beyond hotter weather for the Trump administration’s denial of climate change and Earth’s inhabitants. Most immediately, higher temperatures result proposed budget cuts of 31% to the United States’ in longer heatwaves, which increases heat related diseases and Environmental Protection Agency, political decisions have deaths. According to NASA, excessive heat has been and will be a been threatening steady progress. Under President Obama’s contributor to higher mortality rates, but adaptive responses such era, he pushed forward the Clean Power Plan, a scheme which as air conditioning will become instrumental to protect humans aimed to close down many coal based plants under a promise from the harsher climate. Urban areas have been found to be more to cut US emission rates by 26 percent. However, with susceptible, especially with vulnerable populations. Those who President Trump’s latest executive order nullifying his will be affected will be people who cannot benefit from using air predecessor’s efforts, he has vowed to revive the coal industry conditioning, mainly lower income households. The economic in an attempt to bring back jobs to the local energy sector. imbalance could become a deeply alarming issue when outdoor Though yet to directly withdraw from the Paris Agreement, labor workers and households who are unable to afford air which is a multinational pledge to curb greenhouse gases in conditioning are struck with temperature related illnesses. 2016, this move has indicated the new administration’s stance Moreover, pregnant women, children, and elders are more toward climate change, relinquishing the United States’ susceptible to rising temperatures due to the relative difficulty of symbolic leadership. President Xi Jin Ping of China has pledged their bodies to adapt and respond to change, making it a more to lower emissions by 2030 and has reaffirmed this active dangerous environment for them. Connected to the heat waves is target since the revelation of the United States’ new attitude. the stagnant air that follows which creates air pollution and brings Even with other economic powerhouses willing to fill in as the along with it related health issues. figurative pilot, analysts such as Robert Stavins, professor of

environmental economics at Harvard University, fear that On a macroscopic level, global warming will pose as an extreme countries such as India and Brazil will follow in the United threat to ecosystems that are less prepared to cope with the States’ footsteps and perhaps halt, or at least slow down on, various environmental challenges ahead. As Northern places positive environmental progress. become warmer, not only will glaciers be melting, animals who

belong to the ecosystem and have adapted to the climate will lose Yet, to the layperson, the impact of climate change is not their natural habitat and disrupt its mode of life (EPA). This will readily tangible nor does it seem to pose as a direct or not only be detrimental to individual populations, since these immediate threat. Even with buzzwords like “global warming” organisms exist in food chains that will become crippled if one and “melting glaciers” circulating mainstream media, these species becomes extinct or less available, it will lead to a domino- issues are often related to as an afterthought, many times with style chain reaction that could adversely affect the entirety of the economic incentives or instantaneous comfort outranking natural world. environmental concerns. To understand climate change, we

must decipher one of the biggest contributing factors: global Furthermore, studies by scientists such as Sonia Alitzer of the warming. Global warming is a reflection of the gradual University of Georgia suggest the spread of infectious diseases that increase in the average temperature of the Earth that has comes with higher temperatures, leading to increasing amounts of generally caused unease within the scientific community. heat related infections including cases of dengue fever and malaria Rising temperatures has caused record-breaking statistics, in historically unaffected areas. However, research has also shown with 13 of the 15 hottest years being since 2000. Even with the undeniable influence of the socio-economic wellbeing of a the enormity of these alarming facts, the legislative reaction country in eradicating these diseases in places such as Singapore. has been lagging behind, potentially due to the abstract nature This raises the concern of whether more affluent countries will be of the issue. Perhaps the question that needs to be answered better equipped to respond to these illnesses, while developing is: what are the palpable consequences of this continuous rise countries will be enveloped by these diseases without proper in temperature? mechanisms in place.

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Christopher Adams of Colorado State University indicates Combatting climate change has been recurring on the agenda that this could foreseeably be worsened by the fact that for the past few decades. Even with the success of the Paris excessive temperatures would threaten the viability of Agreement, concrete plans to curb environmental issues established infrastructure. Energy transmission systems have been lacking, especially in developing countries that such as electricity would be in even higher demand in still rely on less progressive sources of energy. Michael order to run air conditioning and other cooling facilities. Metcalfe, a financial consultant, has delivered a TEDx speech Transportation mechanisms such as airplanes are not able on “a provocative way to finance the fight against climate to fly in high heat, along with other supporting change.” With the goals set in the Copenhagen Climate infrastructure that may not endure long periods of rising Summit to mobilize 100 billion dollars per year to help temperatures. Again, more developed countries will have developing countries depart from burning fossil fuels and the means to regenerate necessary responses, but those use more clean energy, there are present financial solutions governments that are already struggling to provide for that can be adopted. He proposes that international bodies their constituents will be overwhelmed by the incoming should adopt the style in which economies bounced back wave of problems. from the 2008 financial crisis. Member states of the International Monetary Fund could use their Special Drawing Beyond humans, wildlife and agriculture will also be Rights, quotas they have as part of their foreign exchange plagued by these invasive pathogens since they do not reserves, to dedicate resources to environmental issues and possess the adaptive facilities that humans have. Corals realise goals set in the Copenhagen Summit. He notes that who are stressed by rising sea temperatures are more the financial obligations could be readily met if governments vulnerable to infections from waterborne bacteria which were as dedicated to undo the harmful effects of climate could then quickly wiped out the species, a circumstance change as they were in 2008. that has already been observed. Many of the ocean’s ecosystems who have adapted to the cold temperatures Though this solution is merely theoretical at this point, it could become extinct. Biodiversity has been and will be reveals the different perspectives that could go into severely compromised. Agriculture will also be formulating a plan to avoid the aforementioned effects. If tremendously impacted, with crops such as wheat and rice more political efforts are going to be dedicated to which are sensitive to heat and have been genetically environmental concerns, there will have to be a balance modified to the current climate yielding less, which could between direct economic prosperity and long-term lead to a whole other series of biological problems. development. This could enlist many legal mechanisms to keep sources of climate change accountable. However, With all these implications affecting livelihood, why is the historically this has been countered by tremendous amounts loss of biodiversity such an important issue? According to of backlash from corporations benefitting from loose the Convention about Life on Earth, around 80 percent of environmental laws. This balance is still highly idealistic, as the resources of those in poverty and 40 percent of the prosperous economies and immediately tangible effects are global economy are derived from biological resources. what ensures successful reelections. But with such Biodiversity is pertinent in medical research and economic overwhelming evidence suggesting the detriment that rising growth, facilitating a wide range of nature-based remedies. temperatures and climate change would have, addressing climate change now through international cooperation would surely be much less challenging than a full blown sixth extinction.

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Politics Silk v Brief | Spring 2017 | Climate Change: Politics Trump’s War on Climate Change

Kasim Ali

I. Introduction III. Trump’s Rescission

A key part of Trump’s campaign was his promise to be It comes as no surprise that the energy lobby, Republicans and tough on climate change. A notorious climate change a handful of States were pleased with this executive order. denier or at least claiming there is “no scientific Trump took this as an opportunity to reiterate his ‘America consensus on the matter”, he promised to reverse the First’ policy. He claimed that by signing the order, he would Obama administration’s efforts to tackle the threat. This increase jobs in the sector, encourage further investment and appealed to previously disenfranchised and apathetic reduce America’s reliance on foreign fuel. voters who saw climate change policy as nothing more than restrictions on trade and job opportunities, which Of course, this was gobbled up by his supporters, claiming that were exploited by the likes of China. Trump had singlehandedly saved thousands of jobs and placed America in a stronger position by not relying on foreign Apart from appointing likeminded persons to his cabinet (e.g. providers for fuel. Rex Tillerson and Betsy De Vos), and taking steps to signal America’s withdrawal from the Paris climate deal, Trump’s However, Democrats and a number of environmentalists are latest move was his signing of the Energy Independence lining up to take the issue to Court. What they don’t realise, is Executive Order. that delay is exactly what Trump wants. While the issue ferments in Court, Trump’s administration will have the time The EIEO itself repealed a number of Obama’s climate change to produce a watered-down replacement of the Clean Power regulations. Most notably, it completely rescinded Obama’s Plan. Clean Power Plan. It serves as a stark reminder that, for at least the duration of Trump’s administration, America will not IV. What will be the impact? be leading the battle against what has been deemed as the “greatest threat to humanity”. The EIEO repealed more than the Clean Power Plan. For example, it also removed certain restrictions on methane II. What was the Clean Power Plan? produced by the energy industry. Essentially, Trump bought himself a boon with any Republicans who had been opposing The key premise underlying the plan was a commitment to these regulations under the Obama administration. This is reduce America’s greenhouse gas emissions by American important because Trump’s attempted Obamacare repeal power stations by a third over a period of 15 years. The plan failed in part due to Republican opposition. Now, with tax placed a heavy emphasis on increasing the use of renewable reform at the top of his agenda, Trump has the ability to call in power sources. It proposed to do this by imposing favours with any rogue Republicans hoping to disturb his requirements on individual states which they had to comply reforms. with. Second, the removal of these regulations will undoubtedly Obama faced massive opposition from the energy lobby, attract further investment. It likely was one of the biggest Republicans and a number of States where coal mining was reasons why the energy lobby opposed the regulations in the central to their economies. A number of Governors outright first place, and celebrated their repeal. Naturally, less claimed that they would ignore the regulation if they had to. regulation means less cost to providers, which in turn means Incidentally, of the top ten states where the percentage of coal increased profit. However, this has been viewed by many as generated electricity is the highest, nine of them voted Trump pandering to big business at the expense of the climate. Republican during the election. There was a widespread fear This raises even more questions concerning his possible that the Democrat focus on climate change policy would conflicts interest with regards to the presidency. eventually end up with fewer jobs and in turn weaker Third , in the long term at economies. least , this will stifle the global effort against Having unveiled the plan in 2015, the Obama administration climate change. Europe, had banked on a Democrat winning the election. Indeed, more or less, is united during the election, Clinton made an explicit promise pledging on the issue and the her support and continuation of the Clean Power Plan. The Paris agreement is polls at the time even seemed to suggest this was a good move comprised of 55 for her. For a moment, the Clean Power Plan looked like it other countries. could be one of Obama’s legacies.

20 | Silk v Brief Climate Change: Politics | Spring 2017 | Silk v Brief

V. Paris Agreement Whether the Paris agreement can be saved, on America’s side at least, is unclear. Trump may well withdraw within the next Though it hasn’t materialised, Trump pledged to pull out from 4 years in which case, the next administration (assuming the Paris agreement during his campaign – again something Trump does not win again) will have a mountain of work to popular with his voters. The agreement is characterised as catch up on in tackling climate change. If Trump doesn’t “urgent and comprehensive action to slash emissions and withdraw, and continues his agenda of moving away from build a low carbon future”. Given that Trump’s latest move tackling climate change, America may well be sanctioned at most likely will not be his last with respect to tackling the the first Paris agreement review in 2020. focus on climate change, it stands to reason that in the long- term America will violate its commitments under the VI. Conclusion agreement. By signing the EIEO, Trump has put in to motion the exact It is clear that Trump’s war on climate change is not one of opposite to what the Paris agreement stands for. This is not a betterment for the future. Rather, Trumps version of this war matter of whether climate change is an issue which merits is to destroy the restrictions put in place to combat climate being addressed, instead this is a matter of whether Trump change in the first place. The EIEO is only the first instance of needs to bother withdrawing from the agreement at all. By this, and we can expect similar moves by Trump as his terms acting against the grain of the agreement and with signals that moves forward. By pursing this agenda, Trump is threatening he doesn’t intend to change direction, Trump has effectively the wider global effort against climate change. After all, if torn up the Paris agreement. America won’t play by the rules and benefit from investment, why should any of the other countries?

President Trump Signs the Energy Independence Executive Order Associated Press

Silk v Brief | 21 Silk v Brief | Spring 2017 | Climate Change: Politics What Do You Truly Believe In? Systematic Reasons why Climate Change Efforts Lack Political Capital

Neo Wei Sheng

There is something a little odd about journalists who pen The most obvious impact of this kind of complacent mentality articles describing climate change as the most pressing is that there isn’t sufficient political capital to enact the kinds problem of our time— a problem which deserves the of radical change which are necessary in order to tackle a utmost urgency, a problem which ought to fill us with problem of this magnitude. In the status quo, the presence of terror and dread— and those same journalists then huge lobbying groups often make climate change action settling down on the couch to relax with some TV, or politically unpalatable. In order to counter-balance that, the rewarding themselves with a nice chai latte, or moving on electorate has to give government officials a large enough to their next viral-worthy article, maybe something about incentive to act otherwise. If climate change was the number the Kardashians? one issue upon which the electorate hinged their votes, then incumbent politicians would be put under tremendous I point out this discrepancy because I am beginning to suspect popular pressure to take action, even if their personal views that most people—myself included-- do not truly believe that were not aligned with the views of the electorate. But because climate change is a serious problem. We might think that we voters do not act as if climate change is an important issue, it believe it, we might say that we believe it, but if I truly thought often gets side-lined, and even those politicians who are that my species were on the brink of extinction, or that we sympathetic to the cause are willing to trade off climate were about to cross the point of no return, I’m not sure I change efforts for concessions on other issues which they would be spending most of my free time watching cat videos regard as more important. Furthermore, to the extent that and playing video games. If I were a journalist who truly their own science advisors do not treat climate change like the believed in the seriousness of climate change, I would be doomsday scenario that it is, politicians remain personally fighting for my newspaper to put climate change on the front unconvinced and do not feel compelled to act. page every single day, as if it were a war that was on our doorsteps. If I were a New Yorker who truly believed in climate change, I would be petitioning my state to build Netherlands-style dikes along the borders of Manhattan. But we do none of those things. The only reasonable conclusion is that we do not believe as strongly in the climate change problem as we think or say we do.

This is especially egregious on the part of the scientific community, who are at the epicentre of any knowledge that we have on climate change, and yet have limited themselves to bland, formalized statements on this topic. If the end were really nigh, we would expect scientists to be aggressively trying to educate the populace or win over sceptics through public debates, open lectures, and town-hall discussions. If scientists themselves do not act as if they believe their own research, how can we expect anyone else to do the same?

There are plausible reasons for why we do not accord climate change the urgency it deserves. For one thing, the problem Patrick Chappatte doesn’t feel urgent. Unlike an impending tsunami, or an asteroid hurtling towards Earth, the dangers of climate change seem far-off, like getting killed by some perverse Rube Goldberg machine, like being told that if you fail to stop a But I suspect that there is a second, more subtle impact to the marble from rolling across the floor in the next three seconds, current complacency. Part of the reason why so many people you will be beheaded by a guillotine five hours from now. refuse to believe in climate change is because those who do Furthermore, because the effects of climate change accrue to fail to act the part. How can we expect climate change deniers society so far in the future, fixing it is a burden which we will to believe our claims that this is an urgent problem if our own have to bear, but for which we reap no rewards. It is the next actions actively contradict that claim? The fact that a large generation who will benefit. This means that the selfish proportion of the electorate actively denies the seriousness of incentives which have driven so much of our progress over the climate change problem once again stymies any political the past few centuries, through things like economic growth efforts, and it is incumbent upon us to convince this large and innovation, are unlikely to be of much use here. swath of the population that we are right.

22 | Silk v Brief Climate Change: Politics | Spring 2017 | Silk v Brief

This problem is made far worse by the fact that our belief in Furthermore, clean technologies cannot simply be “as good climate change seems, from an outsider’s point of view, to be as coal”; they have to be far better than coal in order to based on a kind of blind faith. Very few people who claim to justify the high cost of overhauling current energy believe in the seriousness of climate change are capable of infrastructure. explaining the exact mechanism by which it happens, or why the impacts will be as large as we say they will be. Very few Subsidizing technological development on a large enough people have actually made an effort to read the scientific scale to accomplish this within a reasonable amount of time literature on this issue. Because we ourselves are incapable of is a venture which remains politically unpopular, since such explaining climate change effectively, we often resort to a sort an endeavour would be highly speculative, with no of frustrated insistence that it must be true because the immediate results and no guarantee that it will succeed. This scientists say it is true. would require a high level of concerted public support, something unlikely to happen in the status quo. But this goes back to the problem that scientists do not act as if it is true. Furthermore, among many climate change deniers The third complicating factor is that we are unlikely to come there is a deeply held opposition to the perception of experts anywhere close to preventing climate change entirely. This is as authority figures, and so “scientists said it” is often not something we often forget, partly because (as discussed enough; a deeper explanation is necessary. The inconsistency above) we do not truly perceive the threat as real, but also between what scientists say and how they behave only because there is an element of belief that this problem will reinforces the distrust felt by these denial groups. It seems be magically solved. After all, humanity has always found a slightly unreasonable to demand that someone buy into a way to survive. But the threat we face is unprecedented, and narrative on blind faith alone, and this lack of engagement the present complacency means that we have ignored the with climate change deniers means that there is a huge base of importance of mitigating the harms of climate change. Most voters who will vehemently oppose political efforts at every solutions today assume we will stop climate change, and turn. Ted Cruz himself has accused climate change advocates there is not enough political attention given to mitigating and as being a kind of “religion”, predicated upon faith. adapting to the worst of its impacts. This is problematic because the majority of adaptive projects require that we act All the problems discussed above are compounded by three now, today. Most of these projects, such as damming the things. Firstly, developing nations such as China and India will Strait of Gibraltar, involve large-scale infrastructural never be willing to sacrifice economic growth for the climate, solutions, which tend to take decades just to plan and reach and any attempt to make them do so will look like an act of consensus on. By the time we get started on them, it might economic warfare. Furthermore, it would be perfectly well be too late. legitimate for them to insist on this economic growth. While it is true that in the long-term, preventive action against climate The unfortunate truth of the world we live in is that facts and change will save more money than it costs, these countries figures are not enough. Movements that change the world cannot afford to wait for the long-term. Living standards in are built upon emotions and passions which resonate deeply many of these countries are suboptimal, and it is hard to with the core of our being; climate change does not inspire justify letting millions of people go without electricity, clean that same fervour, even among adherents of the faith. water, or basic sanitation. As a result, climate change policies Perhaps our primeval animal brains are simply incapable of are, at the moment, politically unfeasible in any country conceiving of the future as it is: a slow, towering behemoth outside of the developed world. that threatens to one day bowl us over and grind us to dust. Is the end upon us? Maybe— but it sure doesn’t feel like it There is a second complicating factor, which flows from the right now. first. If it is true that developing nations will not sacrifice the short-term, then we need to give them a viable means of protecting the climate without sacrificing growth, and the only way to do so is through the development of clean technologies as an alternative to coal.

Mike Keefe

Silk v Brief | 23 Economy Projected Climate Change Effects on European Economic Regions EEA

Silk v Brief | 25 Silk v Brief | Spring 2017 | Climate Change: Economy Is Nature Our Best Climate Tool?

Sioned Davies

It was one of the most significant legal moments for our This is also a practice which is widely criticised however for climate on record. The COP 21 Agreement, signed in Paris its trivial and rather meaningless contribution to climate in 2015, was the clearest indication yet of the urgency change mitigation efforts. with which climate change mitigation and adaptation needs to be strengthened to reduce the risk of exceeding The commitment to restoring natural carbon capturing the 2-degree limit (above pre-industrial levels, and the facilities is however, not a new one. Following the oft-cited impacts arising therefrom). degradation of forests in Costa Rica, the UN responded with a certified system of credits to encourage investment in There’s just one problem. To reach this goal the world restoring forests through the REDD and REDD+ schemes. would need to shut down all of its coal-fired power These enabled governments or private entities to exchange stations by 2025 and ditch the combustion engine entirely money for credits which would ensure that funding was used by 2030. To reach its own targets, the UK will need to to replant (responsibly) areas of forest degraded through decarbonise the vast majority of its electricity supply intensive forestry; similar efforts were made with agricultural within a mere 15 years. Eliminating fossil fuels this way is land, the produce of which was used in many Western going to be extremely challenging. This surely requires countries. additional leverage, but where that potential can arise from remains to be seen. The principles of this scheme however could bear some significance for the UK going forward. Firstly, the process of The answer, many say, is now to use nature itself as climate certification enabled private individuals to use the labelling to technology. Technical carbon-capture is still very much in the enhance their corporate image and increase shareholder R & D stage, and will be extremely difficult to scale up quickly, value. Secondly, the regulation in itself ensured that the with much of the testing for its unintended consequences on- planting was responsible and managed, paying a degree of going. There are however significant resources at our disposal attention to the areas which required reforesting and which with billions of years of R & D behind it already; that is had biodiversity and indigenous peoples hardest hit by through the soil, peatland, wetlands and grasslands. If these deforestation practices. Thirdly, tighter regulation over were better managed, restored and protected, these replanting meant that measuring peak carbon capture was ecosystems could provide more than a third of the carbon considerably easier, and that led ultimately to its use within reductions needed by 2030 to keep to the 2°C limit. more formalised trading regimes.

The latest announcement of the Heathrow 2.0 plan, with its Most developed nations operate a carbon trading scheme, and commitment to a “zero carbon” third runway is both striking in the EU that operates as a “cap and trade” system. This and ambitious. This is, in part, to be achieved through means that the use of carbon by heavy polluters is capped considerable investment in peatland restoration in the UK, (they are not allowed to use any more than a certain level set thereby offsetting the environmental degradation associated by the Commission). If they exceed the pollution level, then with increased aviation. This is a practice which is not they must either decarbonise (by running more energy uncommon in the sector, with airlines planting trees to efficient systems perhaps), buy up permits (permission to “capture” some of the atmospheric carbon, one of the causes of pollute) or they must “offset” (invest in schemes which reduce climate change. atmospheric carbon).

Peatland Restoration; Wales The Wildlife Trusts 26 | Silk v Brief Climate Change: Economy | Spring 2017 | Silk v Brief

However, following Brexit, we may have our own opportunity This is a scheme which is being lobbied for by the Green to stimulate private investment in carbon sinks in the UK. The Alliance who want a replacement for CAP premised on a new Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) is a controversial payment mechanism which is market linked; land managers instrument, which has been brought under closer scrutiny in and farmers are able to produce environmental goods, the UK, post Brexit, given the vast dedication of the EU budget package them and sell them on to the private sector within to it. As net beneficiaries of the policy, which will not apply in which there may be interest in buying these services. the UK after full exit negotiations, the UK is likely to have considerably less to spend on Agricultural and Environmental Why Would Buyers Be Interested? affairs. Throughout its history, the CAP has shifted from being a market regulatory tool focused on providing subsidy for There is increasing awareness of the importance of regulating agricultural produce, to funding environmentally friendly climate change; those who have the most to lose might be works in the countryside, as well as climate mitigation work. interested in mitigating against its impacts. These for example Brexit may therefore leave a funding lacuna for many rural could include insurance companies interested in mitigating communities in the UK. against flood risks from climate change by paying land managers to retain water in the uplands by planting trees. Without funding, however, the potential for nature to mitigate This could involve water companies paying for positive against climate change with grasslands, woodlands and environmental conditions to be maintained upstream to recognised sinks will not be realised. Without funding from improve water quality downstream. If UK restrictions are the CAP, the ‘business as usual’ position is likely to lead to lifted post Brexit, then this could involve major swathes of the reduced work in preserving habitats, environmental countryside being used as “recognised sinks” for participants degradation and no climate change mitigation in the of emissions trading schemes or reporting schemes to the countryside. In addition, the great reliance of rural UNFCCC. For now, however, it will simply be a matter of communities on funding from the CAP is creating great improving corporate image through Corporate Environmental concern particularly in the Uplands, and for those Responsibility programmes, like that of Heathrow. communities, new opportunities will be sought. A Legal Response? Perhaps for the first time we will see rural communities looking at the range of services that they are able to provide; A legal instrument to encourage this type of investment (for to reforest, or to restore peatlands and grasslands in remote example through trading, or obligatory reporting) are perhaps areas. Perhaps this will lead to a greater number of not best suited for nature, given their rigidity. However, in the “Heathrows” seeking to invest in such works. past through trading, reporting and certification, the law has

created a demand for natural resources overseas. That The Problems With Nature approach has not yet been taken in the UK. Until now, there have been very few payments made by polluters to manage The law is often a rigid structure, and fitting natural systems nature and harness its climate mitigation potential. Brexit, within such defined parameters is often a tall order. The same however, could provide a real opportunity. problems exist with its incorporation into trading regimes, where carbon sinks would need to offset carbon emitted, tonne-for-tonne. This is not always easy and is a problem highlighted by Sagoff, who argues that nature cannot and should not be compartmentalised. He points to a more fundamental problem with funding nature in this way; it could involve putting a price on trees and on peatland bogs, something which is inherently difficult to fit to free market economics and discards the inherent value of nature.

Dieter Helm’s research and discussion within the Natural Capital Committee of Government suggests that the “natural capital” approach will be taken to shaping a Natural Infrastructure Plan; this means quantifying nature in such a way that can be used by companies, to ensure that all environmental externalities are internalised. His theory is underpinned by an economic understanding of the environment; where man does not value nature, then his profit made comes at the cost of the natural world. Thus, climate change is a result of a series of market failures; years of successive failures of the market to take account of the environmental “cost” of their activities.

His solution to this is that by translating nature into economic terms then the “environmental cost” can be internalised into spreadsheets and business formulae. This, over time, should ensure that the “environmental cost” is taken account of. This Reforestation; Wales might mean not using the natural world; where it is used Brother Industries however, an equal value is restored.

Silk v Brief | 27

Technology Silk v Brief | Spring 2017 | Climate Change: Technology Carbon Capture An Extortionate Remedy to Humanity’s Mistake?

Nicola McMullen

Climate change is perhaps one of the biggest problems We would expect there would have to be an excellent reason facing the world today, yet with some of the biggest to warrant such a hasty and unforeseen end to a scheme of deniers of this global phenomenon sitting in the most this nature, taking into account the expenditure already powerful positions, it is difficult to envisage how it can be invested and the advances made. Of course, what constitutes rectified. Of course, scientific advances are plenty, with an ‘excellent reason’ is a matter of personal judgement and perhaps one of the most effective methods invented – opinion, but essentially the scheme’s collapse can be namely that of Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) – finding attributed to a lack of agreement between government its way into the plans presented by numerous government departments; namely, a failure on the part of the Treasury to environmental departments. comply with the Department for Energy and Climate Change. This is worrying. Evident to this event is that the Treasury did However, with many of these plans being quashed – be it not see the project as worth the cost, nor important enough to through a lack of funding, or Donald Trump’s attempt to stop resolve any issues with other governmental departments, the ‘hoax’ that was ‘created by and for the Chinese in order to even at the time of a breakthrough. It is hard to look past such make U.S. manufacturing non-competitive’ (known to the an event as anything but an example of the lack of priority majority as “climate change”) – the future potential for test shown to giving practical effort to combat climate change. driving CCS on a large scale seems bleak, despite the enormous contribution to cutting greenhouse gas emissions it Worse than the fact that the UK lost the perfect opportunity to would bring. This therefore begs the question: is the price of secure a sustainable future for the North Sea (given that its CCS really so exorbitant that it cannot be used in competition mature North Sea oil and gas basin offers the ideal geology to with more mainstream sustainable technologies, such as develop sub-sea storage facilities to trap the waste carbon nuclear and offshore wind power, or is it merely the attitude dioxide emissions before they have the chance to enter the of those in power that presents a bar to developing such atmosphere) is that officials believe funding such a scheme crucial technology? must always come with a hefty, eye-watering price tag.

CCS is arguably the most effective sustainable technology to have been invented. With carbon dioxide emissions being captured from the source either pre or post combustion, the system is carbon negative; meaning that the process has the overall effect of actually removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. Since most technologies are merely carbon neutral, it is easy to see that CCS is comparatively far more effective in its removal of carbon dioxide emissions. Moreover, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change concluded that in storage sites which have been carefully selected and managed, the fraction of carbon dioxide retained is likely to exceed 99% over 1000 years, making this an extremely reliable method of removing this greenhouse gas from the atmosphere.

Also unsurprising, therefore, is that auditors believe it would cost the UK £30 billion to meet targets to cut greenhouse gases by 2050 without CCS. However, while officials from the National Audit Office have warned that it is ‘currently inconceivable’ that such technology would be developed without government support, this is not apparent from the attitude or actions of the UK government: in a disappointing turn of events, a publicly funded scheme to reduce carbon emissions via carbon capture and storage collapsed, despite having already run up costs of £100 million.

The scheme was, as the chair of the public accounts committee, Meg Hillier, admits, ‘hugely ambitious and expensive’, but crucially was in sight of a breakthrough when European CEO it was abruptly put to a stop.

30 | Silk v Brief Climate Change: Technology | Spring 2017 | Silk v Brief

CO2 Volcanic Injection; Iceland Juerg Matter, Science

This is not the case. The UK’s extensive, safe and secure carbon Fast decay of the tea inside the bag equates to more carbon dioxide storage capacity available offshore in the rocks deep being released, whereas slower decay means the soil is holding beneath its territorial waters actually represents the least costly the carbon – the latter of course indicating a more ideal space in form of storage at the scale required to have a tangible impact; which to store carbon dioxide. Peter Macreadie, leader of the CCS technology could become cost competitive with nuclear and project, points out that important lesson to learn from this is offshore wind power in the 2020s. that “people think of innovation as involving fancy new technology, but sometimes the best ideas are the most simple In a recent report produced by the Parliamentary Advisory ones”; food for thought for UK ministers before they cancel Group on CCS, led by the former Shell director and geologist future projects, although it’s unlikely they will sacrifice their Lord Oxburgh, it was found that, once up and running, gas or morning cuppa any time soon. coal-fired power stations equipped with CCS equipment could produce electricity at a cost of £85 per megawatt hour; a All this creativity and innovation will be in vain if countries significantly smaller figure than the £92.50 promised to EDF for who produce some of the greatest quantities of carbon dioxide power from the proposed Hinkley Point nuclear power station do not adopt such methods, or invent their own, to combat that has been under government consideration and review. It is climate change. Most disheartening is Donald Trump’s recent also important to realise that any cost incurred during the reversal of his predecessor’s climate change plan through the process of kick-starting the CCS technology would be far signing of an executive order at the Environmental Protection outweighed by the economic benefits it would deliver in the Agency, despite the US being the second biggest emitter of long run, thus making such an investment worthwhile. carbon dioxide. If the world needed any country on board to Crucially, Lord Oxburgh has pointed out that the UK tackle the issue, America would certainly be a top choice. It does government may not even need to provide subsidies. “What we appear as though there may be some progress being made on need is investment to get the technology and infrastructure to a the part of the UK government, with the new Parliamentary commercial scale”. A viable option would be to offload the cost report for the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial by selling captured carbon dioxide to oil producers, who can Strategy giving strong support to developing CCS technology. use it to force recalcitrant oil out of wells. However, this is purely advisory. With ministers from the Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy using Significant progress and ideas surrounding CCS technology phrases such as ‘We haven’t closed the door to carbon capture have stemmed from Scandinavian countries. Norway is a prime and storage technology in the UK’, it is difficult to find any active example of how CCS can be made less expensive, predominately enthusiasm for developing this technology, but merely a passive through its performance of carbon capture at sources that compliance with the fact they probably should keep it open as produce a more concentrated stream of carbon dioxide. In an option, simply so they can be seen to be doing something addition, Reykjavik Energy’s CarbFix Project in Iceland has been about the issue. It is unclear at the moment whether the injecting carbon dioxide and water deep underground. Here, the government will take heed of the advice given in this report. For two react with the abundance of volcanic basalt rocks found in the time being, all we can do is wait to see whether the UK the region, and the greenhouse gas mineralises as a result. This learns from their previous blunder. method now appears more promising than initially believed: an analysis published in Science discovered that 95% of the carbon There is no escaping the harsh reality that humans are the dioxide had mineralised in less than two years – much faster largest contributors for the obvious damage caused to our than the hundreds of thousands of years the majority of atmosphere, the effect of which can be devastating. Man-made scientists had expected. Providing even more reassurance as to global warming is very much a real issue that we have to face up the effectiveness of this idea is that the rocks do not appear to to, and I am left in very little doubt that Carbon Capture and be leaking out greenhouse gases: the process could be both Storage is one the principle ways in which to do so; it is not an cheaper and more secure than existing burial approaches. extortionate remedy to our mistakes. It is a solution for many These ideas have been tested for years in these countries, only areas where very few other solutions exist. It is time that those adding to the disappointment that the UK could not even in positions which afford to them the greatest opportunity to manage to agree on funding for one CCS project. make a material difference to the war on climate change stop merely paying lip service to the issue at hand. Climate change One issue is that further research will be required to see how has severely changed our environment, now it is time it well this works in other areas, and this can be costly. Yet even changed our perspective. here, Australian scientists have come up with a highly innovative solution, by burying teabags in wetland areas and measuring the rate at which they decay. Silk v Brief | 31 Silk v Brief | Spring 2017

Spring; Seville

Jasmine Castledine 2017

32 | Silk v Brief Misc. Silk v Brief | Spring 2017 | Miscellaneous Democracy: Becoming the Paradoxical Enemy of the People?

Caroline Jixin Goa

As Goldfinger wisely stated, “Once is happenstance. Twice We would expect there would have to be an excellent reason is coincidence. Three times is enemy action”. In less than a to warrant such a hasty and unforeseen end to a scheme of year, we have witnessed the shocking United Kingdom’s this nature, taking into account the expenditure already (UK) Brexit referendum outcome on 23 June 2016. Second invested and the advances made. Of course, what constitutes came Trump’s equally surprising win in the United States’ an ‘excellent reason’ is a matter of personal judgement and (US) presidential elections, given his purported anti- opinion, but essentially the scheme’s collapse can be establishment overtones. And thirdly, when Renzi’s attributed to a lack of agreement between government referendum faltered in Italy on 4 December 2016, leading departments; namely, a failure on the part of the Treasury to him to soon follow in Cameron’s footsteps in resigning comply with the Department for Energy and Climate Change. from his office, the turn of events in fact no longer seemed This is worrying. Evident to this event is that the Treasury did as startling. No other circumstances have been a greater not see the project as worth the cost, nor important enough to onslaught on our democratic institutional framework resolve any issues with other governmental departments, than these. even at the time of a breakthrough. It is hard to look past such an event as anything but an example of the lack of priority Democracy has always touted the benefits of giving voice to shown to giving practical effort to combat climate change. the majority and the decentralisation of political power. This granted political legitimacy for populism, which culminated in Worse than the fact that the UK lost the perfect opportunity to the two referendums. Rarely have the criticisms of democracy secure a sustainable future for the North Sea (given that its occupied a greater position than a passing footnote in the mature North Sea oil and gas basin offers the ideal geology to Western political landscape. Criticisms that either warn of the develop sub-sea storage facilities to trap the waste carbon dangers of populism, or problems such as the marginalisation dioxide emissions before they have the chance to enter the of the minority, are often relegated to the backseat and dealt atmosphere) is that officials believe funding such a scheme with remedially. But, the latter criticism is especially glaring, must always come with a hefty, eye-watering price tag. given that this minority is not minor, but an extremely sizeable one. Whether it were the referendums or the US presidential election, all three merely required a simple majority. Yet in Brexit, people whom voted to Stay was 48.11%. In the US presidential elections, the vote calculation system required the winning candidate to win a majority of the states weighted upon the debated Electoral College System, leading to a Trump win, despite that quantitatively, the losing candidate Clinton received a greater total number of votes compared to her adversary. And lastly, in Italy, the percentage whom voted against the majority for reforming the constitution, was 40.89%. It almost seems like a paradox for democracy, to be turned into an excuse that effectively ignores almost half of the population, given that the very tenets of democracy are to represent the wider populace.

In a close breath, capitalism, which calls for vesting the ownership of economic resources in private entities and individual persons, rather than the state, is an accompanying hallmark of democracy. And pure unadulterated capitalism is often characterised by free movement of goods and the globalisation of economic activities, as opposed to autarky- where the state remains closed off to foreign trade and Angelo Lopez becomes self-reliant. However, if we imagine capitalism and autarky to be opposing ends on a continuum, then trends like Brexit and the nationalist rhetoric of Trump, seem to be definitive movements towards the “autarky” side of the continuum spectrum.

34 | Silk v Brief Miscellaneous | Spring 2017 | Silk v Brief

Get Out The Vote - AIGA

Conversely, are these populist trends a threat to globalisation dynastic cycle, in which each political dynasty will peak and and capitalism? Whilst they do not seem binary opposite decline, eventually supplanted by a new dynasty which simply concepts, the economy certainly seems to think so. The ensuing repeats the same cycle. volatility of the global markets, with the plunge of the pound to its lowest value for 31 years, to the record gains registered in In politics, the only constant is change, and Obama’s 2008 the US stock markets due to Trump’s win. This outlines the campaign rhetoric of “Change we can believe in” played into precarious nature of the current political status quo now, such a common desire of the public, which greatly aided him in lending itself to much economic uncertainty. his win.

And uncertainty is a quality which is unconducive to The very social contract in democratic regimes is such that it commercial contracts. This holds true, whether it is allows the people to take down a government they find commodities, which is highly reliant on futures contracts for its incompetent or unfavourable, in a politically least damaging energy projects; or international real estate investment, where way possible- by voting them out. In autocratic regimes, you the determination of value-for-money is greatly dependent on have to resort to violent means to effect political change, and the stability of the foreign exchange rate. Institutions such as past events such as the Arab Spring bring this to light. And one city law firms to investment banks, which often pride would certainly agree that the lesser the socio-political damage themselves on their international network of offices, global to the country, the better. Perhaps, the trio of outcomes in cross-jurisdictional deals and ambitious expansion plans, have a Brexit, Trump’s win, and Italy’s referendum, are merely a result right to be worried. In a positive economy, work comes in the of the relative malleability in politics as afforded by democracy, form of IPO deals to preparing joint venture contracts. In a a reformation of the establishment according to the will of the negative economy, work comes in the form of debt people. restructuring to insolvency advice. But in an uncertain economy? Clients end up sitting on their hands, and firms must Or maybe, it is a simpler proposition- the appeal of the wait it out. underdog. Hilary Clinton undoing could in fact be her consistent portrayal of herself as an insider and a more practical choice, If the economy stops moving, investment dries up, and we go whether from 2008 against Obama’s relative foreign policy further down the slippery slope of trickle-down economics, a inexperience and political idealism during the commencement natural consequence is a rise in unemployment rates. And of his presidential term; or in 2016, against Trump’s often eventually, it is still the people whom suffers. obtuse and inflammatory impressions. Should we have given That is, if you believe in the proposition that the economic gains greater credence to the workings of human psychology, then will trickle down to the common man. However, this very Hilary’s double defeats at both the 2008 and 2016 elections may proposition is being thrown into question by the masses whom in fact be anticipated. voted against the establishment. In addition, we probably should give the underdogs more credit. Going back to the Goldfinger quote, one may question if it is Rather than destroying the establishment, maybe the turn of really the uncertainty of the populist vote at play. Or, is it an events may in fact transform it. Whilst we ponder at the unwritten, but natural trend of events that led us to such a possible disintegration of the EU, we should recall the EU was quandary? It is no coincidence for an anti-establishment not part of the status quo in the mid-20th century. The EU outcome to emerge thrice, in separate socio-political contexts. started off as an ambitious economic experiment that somehow The winning margin of votes might be slim, especially in Brexit, worked. And not too far back ago, during her 2007 campaign, but nevertheless substantial. Hilary Clinton was quoted at an interview with Quad-City Times, saying that Obama “was irresponsible and frankly naïve” After all, each political system has its limits, and regimes do not about his foreign policy. What a long way he had come, given last forever. Just like the dualistic exchange of power between the acclaim Obama has achieved to date. the Republicans and the Democrats in the US every few Perhaps, democracy merely makes it easier for the underdogs. elections; the ancient Chinese believed in the theory of a Silk v Brief | 35 Silk v Brief | Spring 2017 | Miscellaneous London Terror: Has the Tide Turned for our Security Services?

Charles Jack

22nd March 2017 saw London fall victim to its first major Yet, in an age of instant-messaging, and technological indiscriminate terror attack since 7th July 2005 (7/7). For advancements in the name of privacy and data security, an years since, the public have been living in relative interesting dilemma between two conflicting ideals arises. As ignorance both to the significance, immanency and WhatsApp Founder Jan Koum announced in November 2014, volume of the threats we face; couple this with with the global update to provide ‘End to End Encryption’ complacency in the efficacy of our police, Security (E2EE), this provided an unreadable, guaranteed method of Services and international partners in their ability to communication; privy to no third party-including the provider prevent and thwart such depraved attacks. Contextualised of the platform. This clearly presents numerous benefits for and framed in a society with rapidly expanding and personal security and the prevention of hacking from advancing technological advancements in how people organised crime; there are rogue governments across the operate and communicate with one-another, traditional world where such interceptions can be used for ulterior methods of policing, detecting and ultimately preventing objectives or oppression. these attacks and their perpetrators has become marginalised.

The Paris Attacks of 13th November 2015, along with with the Nice Lorry Attack 2016, poignantly illustrated the threat of so called ‘lone wolf terror attacks’ and the fact they are significantly more difficult to both detect and prevent versus sophisticated ‘organised terror acts’. Of notable concern to Britain, is the potential future occurrence of a ‘Marauding Terrorist Firearms Attack’ (MTFA), as reflected by numerous training exercises in densely populated parts of the Capital such as Oxford Circus and Kings Cross Station with Counter Terrorism Specialist Firearms Officers (CTSO) in wake of the Paris attacks. These both pose significant problems for the Security Services to overcome, notably the fact that there is no ‘plot’ or ‘plan’ to foil, with little to no network to penetrate or elaborate plan to intercept or raise red flags. They require a lone individual to acquire easily accessible items, such as what unfolded last month with a car and a knife, all the way to slightly more difficult (albeit not impossible) to acquire items within Britain, such as a firearm. When Britain’s most Senior There are however many drawbacks as the Home Secretary Counter-Terrorism Police Officer, Assistant Commissioner Amber Rudd identified; considering the London Attacks, it Mark Rowley, identified that since 2013 Security Services and provides a shroud of secrecy and an unhindered platform for Police have thwarted 13 terror attacks, it exemplifies the terrorists and organised criminals alike to plan, discuss and regularity and constant threat the public faces which has no express such ideas and actions with other individuals with sign of faltering within the near future. impunity. This also extends to other platforms such as Apple’s own iMessage along with further third party applications. Considering these threats, and the heightened awareness of Reports have emerged of Daesh (ISIS/ISIL) and other groups this, what can be done? In Britain specifically, daily life no using these platforms exclusively, even as far as within Syria longer enjoys the same tangible freedoms that previous itself, whereby these groups purposely only use WhatsApp to generations may have enjoyed. Seeing routinely heavily armed conduct communications and to coordinate operations with police patrolling key areas defies previous modus-operandi of one another. This is problematic as it is currently British policing and airport security, not least when impenetrable to Security Services and Intelligence Agencies, considering the recent US/UK Laptop Ban from certain Middle when in decades past, mail interception, wire-tapping, human Eastern destinations. The enhanced monitoring of public surveillance and other conventional means of intelligence social media activity shows an adaptation of enforcement and gathering have proved successful. Would it be unreasonable to societal expectation of what is required to keep Britain safe at allow or expect the law to advance in harmony and lockstep the expense of both convenience and a psychological with how society operates? Whilst the merits of E2EE perception of freedom. As such, Britain may well have some of undoubtedly have its place; in an era of increasing data, from the best response mechanisms in place should such an personal information, to banking details and platforms for incident occur, along with physical prevention procedural users to truly express themselves without fear of interception, methods implemented with exceedingly competent security safeguards have a place. This therefore leads to the academic and intelligence agencies. debate between privacy versus security. 36 | Silk v Brief Miscellaneous | Spring 2017 | Silk v Brief

It seems however that within Britain, with the faith and trust of exist, it became clear that the public generally possess what the judiciary, coupled with adequate procedural requirements could be perceived as a hyperbolic sensitivity when it comes to (such as a warrant being approved for the interception, storage internet and data privacy contrasted to other areas of life which or otherwise acquisition of records); enhancing means of are or could be subject to a similar level of scrutiny. surveillance could be a balanced and proportional legislative response, contrary to popular opinion. Could it be that erosions of freedoms in other areas of societal life do not elicit such visceral opposition when contrasted to It therefore seems a logical contention that there is potential personal data and internet related activities? The overwhelming hysteria surrounding the collation of such data. As the message being conveyed is that in an age of near constant threat Investigatory Powers Act was passed in 2016, there appeared to from incognito sources determined to attack our way of life, hit be many knee-jerk reactions to the legislation, with little or no the front-page news with catastrophic acts showing no sign of actual understanding of the procedural implements in place to relenting, steps must be taken. The question must be asked, just safeguard privacy (most notably storage for 12 months upon how much are the public willing to accept and sacrifice to which the data is destroyed). However this legislation ensures preserve and maintain our way of life to the best it can be? tools are in place should certain requirements be met to Consequently, with the sacrifices that have been made in other prevent law enforcement and Intelligence Agencies from being areas without public uproar, it seems a fallacy to leave such a handicapped with investigations. Similar reactions were gaping void in our intelligence agency and law enforcement’s espoused by the unfortunate Edward Snowden leaks of June arsenal creating an untouchable underworld for these groups 2013, with the alleged ‘PRISM Program’ whereby the NSA of the and individuals to operate. If Britain fails to legislate at an US cooperated with Britain’s GCHQ to collate internet data on according pace to technological advancement and how society users from leading sites such as Facebook and Google. Whilst operates, not only is this a disservice to the safety and many potentially legitimate questions over accountability, protection of millions, but needlessly handicaps law overreaching and legal basis for conducting such a programme enforcement and entire organisations from being able to do the exact job the public has mandated them to do.

Associated Press

Silk v Brief | 37 Silk v Brief | Spring 2017 | Miscellaneous Chimeras: How Medicine Transformed Myth into Miracle

Ashley Van De Casteele

The chimera: a fire-breathing abomination with the face therapy and the understanding of diseases and their genetic of a maned lion, a horned goat’s head rising from its torso causes. It is notable, however, that the final bill contained the and a scaly serpent with venomous fangs for a tail. express provision that human-animal embryos cannot be Fantastically implausible? Think again. Scientists are once allowed to develop beyond two weeks. In the United States, again pushing boundaries and turning fantasy into fact. the very prospect of such chimeras is enough that the National However, the real-life chimera may be just as fascinating, Institute of Health has in place a ban on public funding of if not disturbing, as its mythological namesake. chimera research. This most recent development has only been made possible through private donations. 26th January this year marked the creation of a wholly new form of life ; scientists in the US managed to build the first Chimeras with cells of two different species have existed for truly successful human-animal hybrids. A chimera in the form years but this recent breakthrough, involving human cells of a pig embryo fused with human cells marked the first growing in a wholly different organism, raises new ethical instance of human cells being introduced into a different dilemmas. Of course, developing the procedure further in species, surviving and successfully growing inside of its host. order to be more useful for human organ generation would The international team of researchers behind the ground- entail increasing the proportion of human cells and allowing breaking project are based at the Salk Institute, a privately- the embryos to develop fully, rather than being extracted at funded biological research group in La Jolla, California. four weeks. This indicates progression towards a far blurrier line between pig and human. However, the strict legislation The promising, or troubling; procedure involved injecting put in place in the US and UK is an attempt to prevent such an human stem cells into extracted pig embryos before inserting event taking place. The great promise this research shows in these into adult pigs, who carried them for up to four weeks the field of organ transplants, as well as the breakthroughs of before being removed and analysed. A grand total of 186 late- privately-funded scientists making their way around US stage chimeric embryos survived, each harbouring funding bans and the success of international scientists in approximately 100,000 human cells . Though that may sound countries without such bans, mean a debate must be had like a lot, it is a markedly low percentage. Stem cell experts surrounding the ethical ramifications of fully-developed note that with such a low proportion of human cells, any chimeras. Furthermore, it may well be essential to modify organs developed had the pigs been allowed to grow fully existing statute or to establish anticipatory legal regulations to would likely be rejected by human bodies due to the quantity ensure ethical standards are maintained, while allowing for of pig tissue. Nonetheless this research has stirred up excited continued research. chatter in the scientific, and wider, community for the promise One of the major arguments is that chimeras amount to it holds. scientists meddling in nature. Whether this rests on the idea that God created the different species as they are, or that the It is the Salk Institute’s tagline, ‘where cures begin’, which forces of nature and evolution are being subject to human offers a clue as to the compelling goals of the research. One interference, there are many who take this line of reasoning. major benefit is the ability to study the genetic basis for different diseases as well as methods of stem cell therapy that could treat them. Further, the Institute notes that the demand in organ transplants in the US is currently four times the supply, while the NHS released figures in 2015 showing that in the previous 10 years, over 6000 people in this country had died while on the waiting list for an organ transplant. The ability for human cells to grow successfully in pig embryos, corroborated by successful experiments in Japan growing rat pancreatic tissue in healthy mice, suggests that we are not too far away from creating our own new source of harvestable organs. This would require increasing the percentage of human cells within the pig embryos to the point that human bodies could accept the resulting organs. This has raised expectations, as well as alarm bells.

In that vein, the House of Commons passed the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act in 2008. The House’s Science and Technology Committee was unequivocal in its support of Jacopo Ligozzi allowing such embryos to exist for their promise in cell-based

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Human-Pig Embryo Associated Press

In the context of using human cells, the argument gains force – Just like the mixing of organs in a body leads to no real change the accusation is that these scientists are defacing human in a human being a human, nor can the mixing of cells within an dignity. For religious or ethical reasons, we are argued to have organ. The confusion, caused potentially by processes involving special moral significance by virtue of being human and such embryos and stem cells, is based on the notion that something experiments are marring this supposedly fundamental idea. else is being tampered with. What that ever-important substance is can be thought of as the final frontier in such It must be noted, however, that these are some of the same matters – DNA. This may be the polar opposite to the last ‘final arguments that were raised against the now common procedure frontier’, space, because it is so tiny but, importantly, so of transplanting pig heart valves into humans. This, a form of fundamental to who we are. It is this that determines ‘xenotransplantation’, was subject to intense scrutiny at the everything from our eye colour to our cognitive development to, time but, ultimately, the Nuffield Council on Bioethics in 1997 yes, our species. It is the interference with DNA that represents approved such procedures on the basis that doing so would the contentious line. Cellular exchange, on the other hand, is ‘significantly supplement the present inadequate supply of simply what we are already doing with organs but on a smaller human organs for transplantation’. Such operations now take scale. place regularly in the UK, as well as the US. So, if we have been willing to allow the implanting of pig parts into humans to save Whether we can intermingle our DNA with other that of other the lives of those in urgent need of organs in the past, is it so species, something which scientists have already done, is a unlikely that, for the same cause, we will go an extra step by separate debate to be had. For the moment, however, Chimeras growing those organs with human cells? The argument that present a situation which is not quite as novel, or shocking, as it chimeras cross a species barrier ignores the extent to which we may initially seem. Whilst pictures of a human face with the have already done so. nose and ears of a pig posted by blogs of a certain, conservative persuasion may seem twisted and horrifying, they are just as While this argument makes a valuable point, it must be much the work of pure imagination as the chimeras of ancient recognised that chimeras imply a far more fundamental level of mythology. Legislators would do well to ensure that the line inter-species crossing, through the inserting and growing of beyond cellular experimentation, and into meddling with our human cells inside the tissue of the other species. Perhaps this genetic material, is not crossed until that separate debate is had. is going a step too far, to a line that we may have been In doing so, they can rest assured that allowing these unique approaching but certainly one that we have yet to cross. This organisms to grow fully will not cause an unprecedented ethical reasoning brings into sharp relief the question behind all of nightmare. They will do so with the knowledge that steps are this- where do we draw the line between species? And for that being taken to solving a very real issue, that of a scarcity of matter, where do we draw the line of humanity? The answer, healthy organs available for transplant, without smudging the rather scientifically, seems to lie at the cellular level. For the parameters of what it means to be human. In so doing, the moment. chimera of myth and legend will have made the transition from a creature inspiring dread and fear into a medical miracle of This distinction between the two, however, is one based on a transformative healing. misconception.

Silk v Brief | 39 Silk v Brief | Spring 2017 | Miscellaneous Would I Lie To You? Political Truth Telling in a Post-Truth Era

Angela Scicluna

Shall we play a game of two truths and a lie? I’ll start:

1) “The human influence on climate change is clear” Joe Dater 2) “The concept of global warming was created by and for the Chinese in order to make U.S. manufacturing non- The answer is complex. competitive ” Continuous economic and social change has disrupted the 3) “Warming of the climate system is unequivocal, and status quo of almost every nation. There has been an increase since the 1950s, many of the observed changes are social disquiet since the Global Financial Crisis; this has been unprecedented over decades to millennia ” in part due to the rise in unemployment during the recession; increasingly, unemployment rates are being aggravated by the So, which one is the truth and which one is the lie? advent of Artificial Intelligence which has disrupted the traditional categorisation of sectorial employment. As Lahcen This should be an easy question to answer: 97% of climate Haddad, professor at Mohamed V University writes, the scientists believe climate change is real; the increase in unemployment has “exacerbated the recourse to Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has emphatically irrational fears and reactions to a gloomy politico economic stated statistics show that it is “extremely likely” that reality”. Therefore, it has become easier for politicians to prey humanity is the dominate cause of global warming. Therefore, on people’s fears of socio-economic decline by wielding the number 2 must be the lie; right? spectres of selfish Wall Street wolves, corrupt politicians, ‘nasty women’ and so called ‘illegal immigrants’ (though in However, my dear reader, you are forgetting an important many circumstances, politicians are referring to those seeking point: we live in a post-truth era. Now, we are afforded the asylum- a legitimate right under the 1951 Geneva unfortunate luxury of choosing between facts and alternative Convention). facts. Double speak in politics and media runs rife; it appears that Orwell’s dystopian novel 1984 is no longer situated as Perhaps the shift towards alternative facts is best summarised firmly in the category of science fiction, as the parallels the declaration that “[we] can’t handle the truth”; the harsh between the politics of Air Strip One and modern states are reality of a rapidly shifting world order has almost certainly becoming increasingly more pronounced. fanned the fear within society; particularly in blue collar individuals who face redundancy due to shifting demand. A 2014 Global report by Ipsos Mori found that 24% of Britons Distorted or ‘subjective’ truths-which in a more traditional surveyed did not believe that current climate change trends vernacular would be placed somewhere on the scale between are largely the result of human activities, with a further 12% white lies and ‘whoppers’- therefore act as a safety blanket stating that they were unsure. This places Great Britain in and provide temporary comfort from persistent and relentless second place for the largest number of climate change deniers, change. with the US topping the chart with 34% of respondents denying humans contributed to global warming. Yet, it is important to note that this does not necessarily mean that a cognitive dissonance exists in the mind of every Therefore, it seems the game of ‘two truths and a lie’ is not as individual. During the 2016 campaign, 70% of the Trump simple as it first appears. In the post truth era, the line has statements reviewed by PolitiFact were false, 4% were been blurred between truth and lies; fiction and non-fiction; entirely true, 11% mostly true. Voters were not deceived: facts and so-called alternative facts. Which ‘side’ a person nearly two-thirds said that Trump was not trustworthy, picks has become increasingly influenced by their background, including nearly a third of the people who voted for him socio-economic status and personal affiliations. anyway.

This tendency is not unique to the topic of global warming. In Indeed, Trump’s blatant, as opposed to concealed, dishonesty 2016, the Oxford English Dictionary selected ‘post-truth’ as distinguished him from the traditional “swamp” of word of the year: this term denotes the circumstances in Washington politicians. To the amazement of political pundits, which objective facts are less influential in shaping public and most voters, Trump’s shameless disregard for the truth opinion that appeals to emotion and personal belief. became his distinguishing feature which set him apart as a “disruptor”. Whether this disruption would provide for a But this begs the question: how and why has the modern positive or negative outcome was seemingly immaterial; for conception of Truth moved beyond the traditional binary of weary middle class Americans, a change was better than no true and false? change. And they saw Trump as their Messiah.

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Yet the tendency towards a looser conception of the truth is not just Yet ‘fact-checkers’ in the traditional media were both unequipped an American phenomenon, Western politics has been gripped by a and lacked the incentive to persistently hold Trump to the move towards populist politics- exemplified by the success of the objective truth. As Michelle Amazeen, Communications Professor Brexit campaign in Britain and the rise of Le Pen’s Front Nationale in at Rider University states, “Fact checking rains on the parade of the France. Indeed, on being challenged in the Brexit campaign that [commercial media] revenue model”. “experts” found his conclusion untenable, Michael Gove infamously responded: “people in this country have had enough of experts” The implications of providing consumers with an array of content to confirm their personal fears are far reaching. Nevertheless, politicians do not bear all the blame for the post-truth era. Frustratingly for the lawyers (or lawyers in training) among us, the rule book for argumentation seems to have been thrown out the In recent decades, the way in which citizens consume their news window. There seem to be an absence of non-partisan arbiters who has rapidly changed: whereas once a broadsheet newspaper was the the public deem qualified to judge a dispute. The creator of the only way to learn about current affairs, the development of term ‘post-truth’, Ralph Keyes has noted that “these days there are information technologies has increased the availability of no more referees. There are only players”. This gives rise to the information and has made it easier for individuals to publish their major issue that nobody is trusted enough or able to define the opinions. This has displaced the position of traditional publications factual basis upon which a collective discussion is based. Thus, as the main source of news. though the volume of political debate has arisen in the past few years, warring factions are shouting at each other to no avail. The obvious issue that arises from these developments is that people are now able to choose from a range of sources, a large The frightening result is that now even when appointed or elected proportion of which are false or merely opinion based. A Buzzfeed judges step in to make a legal judgement, one side will rush to News analysis found that top fake news engagement stories discredit the judgement and the judge. Two such high profile generated more total engagement on Facebook than the top election instances made headlines recently: first, when the British tabloid stories from 19 major news outlets combined. The public’s newspapers labelled the high court judges who ruled on the predilection for false sensationalist stories- such as one which pivotal Brexit judgement, ‘enemies of the people’; and second, claimed “Clinton sold weapons to ISIS”- shows a willingness to when President Trump tweeted that America was to “blame judge connect with emotion rather than reason; a key feature of the post and court system” for putting America in “peril” after suspending truth phenomena. the travel ban on citizens from several Muslim majority countries. When emotion causes the public to question the validity of the And social media provides the perfect way to spread these legal system, it is an ominous portent of the crumbling in trust one falsehoods quickly and effectively. In a new joint study titled “The of the most important pillars of modern democracy. Generational Content Gap”, Fractl and BuzzStream it was found that Facebook remained the preferred content sharing platform among Considering these developments, what is the prognosis for liberal Millennials, Baby Boomers and Generation-X. However, as a news democracy? outlet Facebook may not be the most reliable: firstly, it allows self- publishing, while this certainly aids free speech it also allows fake In his book On Tyranny, Timothy Synder argues that “to abandon news to be published. The problem is that Facebook currently facts is to abandon freedom.” Snyder argues, that citizenship provides no way to distinguish between verified news stories and requires an individual to engage — with the world, with other fake news. Thus, many people indiscriminately read news sourced people, with the truth. He continues that “you submit to from Facebook and- perhaps naively- accept most content at face tyranny…when you renounce the difference between what you value; this in turn alters public perception of key issues. This trend want to hear and what is actually the case.” I believe that care has prompted calls from German politicians for a €500 fine to be needs to be taken before one confidently announces that Trump’s instituted against Facebook if they fail to remove fake news stories election confirms the post-truth era and the emergence of fascism within 24 hours. in the Western world. However, as Fareed Zakaria of CNN and Time Magazine reminds us, we must be careful not to assume that The rise of fake news may also be symptomatic of a deeper societal history only moves forwards; like everything else, history is in flux. issue: the increasing commercialisation of the media coupled with While we might be tempted to ‘ostrich’ our way through the post- the trend towards deeper and more divisive partisan politics that truth era and to ignore the developments around us, we must has led to the creation of self-perpetuating ‘thought bubbles’. People resist this urge: from the Satyagraha movement in India to the civil are naturally drawn to the version of events which best affirms their rights movement in America, history has shown the vast impact existing belief system. There is economic incentive for media that human agency has on political developments. The price of companies to pick a ‘side’ and stick to it. Consumer behavioural apathy is simply too high. patterns confirm that people crave consistency and predictability. Therefore, it is in Fox News’ interest to present facts to appeal to a It may be too early to burden Western Politics with a ‘terminal’ Republican audience; and similarly, CNN has an incentive to appeal prognosis. However, it is up to each individual to administer the to liberal factions. This desire coupled with a need to boost profits cure. Eminent Holocaust scholar Deborah Lipstadt argues that “you reduces the incentive for media organisations to flag potential defeat [Nazis] and liars” by “Focusing on the people in earshot”. I inconsistencies or untruths. Indeed, according to a search through agree with her. In my opinion, in order to remedy the post-truth the Internet Archive, a non-profit library database, false tweets were era, we must engage in difficult conversations with people outside quoted on television an average of 31 times, more than twice as our traditional circles. If we include another in our game of two often as other tweets. truths and a lie and they vehemently assert that number 2 is the Truth, engage with them, question them and - most importantly - In addition, a desire for ratings boosts fuels a predisposition consider the wise words of oft honoured UN civil servant Robert towards sensationalism. As a proud former ‘reality’ TV host Trump Muller- “what the world needs most is openness: Open hearts, has capitalised upon this fact by trading in outrageous-often open doors, open eyes, open minds, open ears, open souls”. unverified ‘facts’ and earning an estimated $2 billion (USD) of free media coverage in the process. Silk v Brief | 41 Silk v Brief | Spring 2017 | Miscellaneous Modern Slavery: The Greatest Human Rights Issue of Our Time?

Ben Cartright

Despite having been formally abolished in all countries, combatting modern slavery, does not alone increase slavery persists to the extent that the abolition of de facto awareness of the issue with the public, who are rarely aware modern slavery is included in the United Nations of its extent. Slavery is thus a “hidden crime”, as the 2015 UK Sustainable Development Goals 2015. Bales (2004) Government report on slavery referred to it: victims of slavery defines a slave as someone whom is compelled to work, are frequently ignored, “[finding] themselves in the musty through force of fraud, for no pay beyond subsistence shadows between the visibility of the spotlights shone on level. Although commonly perceived as a human rights homelessness and poverty” (Spiro, 2016). issue of the past, it is estimated that up to 45.8 million people worldwide currently live in such circumstances; two-thirds of whom are in Asia. More striking is the extent to which modern slavery lingers in developed, democratic nations, such as the United Kingdom: in 2013, it was estimated that there were up to 13,000 victims of slavery in the UK.

These victims are often those most marginalised by society and usually live in poverty, thereby making them more susceptible to exploitation through slavery and forced labour. With a global economy which has entrenched economic disparity, the conditions upon which slavery thrives, such as poverty and inequality, have been exacerbated, to the extent that modern slavery has, to a large extent, become a product of the modern economy. Bales (2000) estimated that, as a result of endemic global exploitation of minorities and vulnerable groups in supply chains, “[t]he direct value of slave labour in today’s economy is estimated between thirteen and twenty billion dollars.” Since he wrote this, it is likely that such a value has increased, as the global population has increased. Hence, whereas other contemporary human rights issues, such as entrenched racism and discrimination, may be combatted by legislation (see the Equality Act 2010, for instance), the issue of modern slavery can only be combatted by a change in attitudes among states and in the business Getty Images community. Given the international scope of modern slavery in global supply chains, and that the products of slavery What is even more startling about modern slavery is that, include “the food we consume and the goods we purchase” “[u]nlike other worldwide epidemics such as malaria and (Bales), it is arguably the human rights issue that has the most HIV/AIDS, slavery is a human condition of our own making.” significant impact on people’s lives. It is only with a global (Mineroo Foundation, 2016). Many scholars regard it as effort to eradicate modern slavery that success may be inherently connected with the modern system of capitalism, achieved. with its emphasis on “big profits” and “cheap lives” (Bales). It is submitted that the extent of modern slavery, particularly in The sheer variety of economic sectors which are reliant on the developed nations, derives from the desire for low-cost goods work of slaves is startling. In the UK, and indeed much of the and services, as employers often take advantage of vulnerable developed world, hundreds of slaves (and forced labourers) workers to force down wages to maintain profits, whilst have been recorded as working in sectors as diverse as ensuring an obedient workforce. Indeed, because of desires to construction, fishing, and the illegal sex industry. Even in minimise production costs, companies often passively ignore countries like the UK, ‘hidden’ slavery is common: in 2016, a potential issues of modern slavery in their own supply chains. man was convicted for two years for holding his wife in The recent addition of a textile protocol to the EU-Uzbekistan domestic servitude – he tortured her and did not allow her to Partnership and Cooperation Agreement, despite proof of leave the home. The essence of slavery, that of the total control widespread slave-like practices and forced labour in the and dehumanisation of other individuals, is fundamentally Uzbek cotton industry, is evidence of such passive ignorance, inconsistent with the principles of liberal democracy. and indicates that the EU is willing to forego the elimination of Notwithstanding this, illegal practices persist in ‘liberal’ slavery in return for economic benefit. The apparent support nations like the UK. Legislation such as the Modern Slavery Act for such practices appears to encourage countries whose 2015, whilst committing the Government to actively primary industries are reliant on slavery and forced labour. 42 | Silk v Brief It is therefore evident that modern slavery is intrinsically linked Progress thus far has been somewhat encouraging. For with the world economy. Guay (2014) argues that it “firmly instance, Goal 8.7 of the UN Agenda for Sustainable rests” on the “modern set of economic conditions … Development commits its signatories to the abolition of slavery [determined by] capitalism and free trade.” Given that the by 2030. At national level, the Modern Slavery Act 2015 global economic framework appears to permit and encourage commits the UK Government to the abolition of slavery, and the growth of international (and intra-national) wealth provides for greater enforcement proceedings against inequality, in order to lower prices and increase profits, slaves slaveholders and human traffickers. Likewise, regular reviews are consequentially regarded, “in purely economic terms”, as by companies such as Nestlé regarding the extent of slavery and “short-term, low-capital investments with incredibly high rates slave-like practices in their supply chains indicates that there of return” (Guay). Bales emphasises it thus: the expansion of indeed has been at least notional progress towards the international trade effectively destroys small-scale farming and elimination of modern slavery. the rural communities that surround family farms. As a result, these workers converge on the cities where they seek work. However, one must acknowledge that the above ‘progress’ is However, given that they have no support network (having largely theoretical, and that, on a practical basis, there are abandoned their former communities), they are liable to fundamental impediments to the total abolition of modern exploitation by groups who often form part of the supply chains slavery. Indeed, it has been contested that the number of slaves of companies. For instance, many Asian countries, often those is currently increasing, despite measures taken to limit modern countries where modern slavery is prominent, provide low- slavery (Bales, 2004). The assertion by Skinner (2008) that skilled labour “for the production stage of global supply chains there are now more slaves in the world than at any time in for various industries” (Mineroo Foundation). This only further history is a harrowing conception. It is evident, therefore, at a entrenches the interrelatedness of slavery and the modern time where the extent of other human rights issues is economy. diminishing, that progress regarding modern slavery has been lacklustre. Indeed, for as long as unabated free trade is Given the large proportion of the global economy that is reliant championed as fundamental to the global economy, it is on modern slavery, it is hardly surprising that the issue remains submitted that exploitation of the most vulnerable in society, endemic. Whereas other human rights issues can be defined as ultimately culminating in variants of slavery and forced labour, unwelcome consequences of global capitalism, such as poverty will continue. Thus, where other human rights issues can be and homelessness, modern slavery as an economic notion is a resolved, or at least mitigated, by the efforts of the international factor spurring global economic growth. Moreover, slavery community, much of modern slavery will persist unless there entrenches other associated human rights issues, such as racial are fundamental structural changes to the global economy discrimination and human trafficking. It must, however, be which protect the poorest and most vulnerable. reiterated that the wholesale abolition of the practice of modern slavery would only be feasible if a co-ordinated effort by states and companies were to be taken.

Silk v Brief | 43 Silk v Brief | Spring 2017 | Miscellaneous Romania Resists How One Controversial Piece of Legislation Awoke 28 Years of Frustration

Luana David

Photo: Dragoș Bucurenci

Midday in Victoria Square, home to the Romanian That evening, the Grindeanu Cabinet adopted a new ordinance Government. A handful of people raise their posters and bill essentially repealing the original one, but the harm had voices and chant: ‘Resign! Resign! Resign!’ as efforts already been done. The Minister of Justice resigned, and continue albeit incomparable to those exhibited in February protesters were now calling for a new Prime Minister and new of the same year. The manifestation is aimed at the current elections, not backing down from the fight. Completely defying Prime Minister, Sorin Grindeanu, as well as the left-wing the protesters, Grindeanu announced that measures contained Social Democratic Party, PSD, which won the elections in the amnesty bill would be put up for discussion in months prior to a decisive majority. Two months before, at Parliament, where PSD has a comfortable majority. the height of the protests in Romania, over 300,000 people stood in the same square, lifting flags and singing the n 8th February, the Constitutional Court ruled that there was national anthem, in memory of those fallen in the 1989 no existing constitutional conflict between the Executive and Revolution and in the hope that their efforts will never be Legislative branches, as the decision to adopt the bills forgotten. regarding the modification of the Penal Code and Procedural Code is not qualified as an act of arrogation of the legislative The protests started in January 2017, days after the newly power that belongs to Parliament. It was found that the elected government was sworn in over an ordinance bill Government acted in accordance with its competences as proposed by the Ministry of Justice, led by Florin Iordache, provided for in Art.117 of the Constitution. Moreover, it was regarding the pardoning of certain crimes and amendment of the found that a constitutional conflict did not exist between the Penal Code, especially related to abuse of power. The ordinance executive and the Supreme Court of the Magistracy because bill, OUG 13/2017, was backed by the Government for reasons of the Government does not have a legal obligation to request prison overcrowding and avoidance of being fined by the approval for such ordinances. European Court of Human Rights. The main reason behind the protests and turmoil that ensued Although there was initial denial of any ordinance bills was that the bill was essentially seen as decriminalizing much pardoning committed crimes, after a meeting on 18th January of the political class, as it intended to abolish criminal between the President, Prime Minister and Minister of Justice, convictions for abuse in office if sums were lower than two bills were announced, not to be passed without a $48,000. The decree would stop all investigations for pending transparent process. Less than two weeks later, after having corruption offences, free officials imprisoned for corruption received negative opinions from the High Court of Cassation and and block further investigations related to those offences. An Justice and the Superior Council of Magistracy and incited obvious beneficiary would be Liviu Dragnea, the president of smaller protest throughout the country, the aforementioned PSD, who was blocked from becoming Prime Minister due to ordinances were secretly introduced and passed in a corruption charges of defrauding the state of $26,000. The government meeting. Neither was the discussion announced on people perceived this as an act against integrity and took it the official meeting agenda nor on the supplementary one, upon themselves to voice their disapproval, as Romania needs causing people to feel as if they were being played and left out of more urgent and important change in the area of healthcare the process. A protest started taking place within half an hour for example, fact proven by the tragedy of October 2015 when and peaked on 5th February with over half a million people a club fire took the death of 64 young adults, some due to protesting nationally and gaining support overseas in London, inappropriate medical equipment and facilities. Paris, Munich, Brussels, Dublin, Copenhagen and Stockholm.

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Photo: Dan Mihai Balanescu

In the Western sphere this was seen as a huge step back from Lesser known to Western media, there is a face of the anti- the anti-corruption fight, which many leaders of the EU, US and corruption battle that comes across just as corrupt as their such had praised in recent years for convicting around 2,000 investigated counterparts, thus complicating the current hot people of abuse of power through the National Anticorruption waters that the politics in Romania find themselves in. In an Directorate (DNA). The embassies of Belgium, France, Canada, address by Liviu Dragnea, as a reaction to the protests, he Germany and the Netherlands as well as the US released pointed out the increasingly high number of those investigated statements against the passing of the ordinances in any way, by the DNA, which are part of the PSD, by comparison to any condemning their content and the way they were passed, as it other political parties. To this, some say it is due to the genuine undermined the rule of law and stifled the fight against corrupt culture in the PSD, while others contend that it is rather corruption led by the DNA. due to their political enemies trying to diminish what was clearly a domination in popularity during the election. Despite widespread praise from Western news outlets such as Whichever way it may be, the importance of this stands in The Guardian, New York Times or The Economist, the DNA and highlighting the downfalls of the anti-corruption battle and the its efficiency in battling corruption would be better placed complexity that is democracy in a post-communist state. under a question mark. Amongst Romanians, and especially those whose career paths have crossed anywhere close to the In conclusion, what the Government and Parliament will political sphere, it is a well-known practice that the DNA leans proceed to enact in relation to the proposed changes to the heavily on information received by a successor of the Secret Penal Code and the imprisonment system cannot be predicted, Service in communist years. as the political situation in Romania remains unstable and full of mistrust towards the Executive. Currently, there is consensus The SRI, by its full name the Romanian Intelligence Service, is a that the Government will indeed try to incorporate some of its tangled web of accusers and scapegoats, whose informers measures into an act, to be passed by a PSD-majority strategically rid themselves of business competition, gain Parliament, as Sorin Grindeanu remains Prime Minister. political influence or even freedom to conduct their interests without fear of legal repercussions. Tapping mobile phones or However, beyond what the protests meant for the future of the recruiting insiders to follow those targeted are practices dating OUG 13/2017, the result of half a million Romanians voicing back to the pre-revolutionary era, which the SRI has adapted their unhappiness is to be found in encouraging our Balkan into their daily activities. neighbors to voice theirs. Albania, Bulgaria, Serbia and Bosnia, as Balkan Insight reports, have felt a surge in popular movement, a hope given by the hundreds of thousands that chanted #Rezist in the cities of Romania 28 years after the fall of the communist regime.

Silk v Brief | 45 Silk v Brief | Spring 2017 | Miscellaneous Compulsory Voting: A Cure For All?

Mikolaj Orzazewski

Democracy has undoubtedly served us the as the primary While true that not all youth voted to Remain, or voted herald of change; a constant struggle of ideals ultimately Democrat, age has constituted, among socio-economic status, decided by the voter. However enlightened and preferable level of education and family political leanings, the primary democracy is to some of history’s alternatives, it fails determinant of a voter’s political inclination. For example, spectacularly for it functions on a misconceived 64% of the 18-24 age bracket voted to remain in the EU. In assumption of zealous and unanimous participation that comparison, 45% of 25-49 year olds, 35% of 50-64 year olds, seldom conforms to reality. What we’re left is a system of and 33% of 65 year olds and up voted to remain. Clearly, had governance giving force to the will of the people, or just the youth come out in greater numbers, the EU referendum the few that come out and vote. If only people went out to may have gone a great deal differently. vote. Voter turnout is an inherent reality that we have seen to be Such has been a complaint echoed time and time again and not historically static, one with which we must come to grips with. uncommonly by the loser, a fact that fortunately doesn’t make And surely, you cannot force someone to vote. Or can you? the claim any less alarming or true. Look no further than the Voting is a civic duty, yet despite the inefficiency that two grey elephants in the room: Brexit and the 2016 US voluntarism produces, only a handful of modern day Presidential Election. Whichever way your political compass jurisdictions have turned to compulsory voting. According to aligns, the outcome of each can be directly linked to the typical the OECD, only 25 countries have compulsory voting, with voter turnout, and the lapses we expect to see. And as is to be Australia, Belgium, Luxembourg, Argentina, Brazil, Peru, expected, the youth is to blame. Mexico, and Singapore among them. Why so few?

Historically, there has always been a positive correlation It is hard to deny the broader benefits of compulsory voting. If between age and voter turnout. Since 1964, UK elections have we find the preference for democracy to stem from its seen youths between 18-24 lag in participation between any inclusionary nature of the electorate in governance, putting age bracket anywhere from 10% to almost 40%. In the US, a into force the will of the people if you will, compulsory voting similar gap between the youth, those aged 18-29, is seen in the can only strengthen the democratic mandate and more period between 1984 and 2012. Brexit and the US elections accurately reflect the will and desire of the electorate. Thus, were no different. Brexit saw a turnout of 36% among youth democracy inches closer to its ideal. Everyone votes, everyone compared to the US elections’ 50%. Failure of the youth then wins. Vive la democratie! has therefore been cited as critical to the failure of both ‘Remainers’ and Democrats. So, it seems despite the ardent - To look through such shutters ignores inherent pitfall of and often faintly substantiated - activity that the youth has democracy in its assumption of competence; a supposition displayed through social media and elsewhere, it didn’t that the run-of-the-mill voter has the necessary awareness translate onto the ballots. and knowledge to gauge and decide on dense matters of individual and public good. To say that people are stupid would be steep, yet the modern democracy acts as so. Modern democratic models are usually representative models, with career servants acting on behalf of an electorate. However necessary they are for sheer impossibility of individual involvement in government, they constitute filters between the electorate and the government, a fear openly advocated in the early years of democratic thought. We need not look further than the Federalist Papers and Alexander Hamilton’s concerns over handing people direct influence over government. After all, it is him, among others, we have to thank for the caricature that is the Electoral College System within the United States.

While extreme, the principle is nonetheless transferable to the discussion at hand. A large portion of the population is simply uninformed or misinformed about the political climate. This

New York Times argument is double-edged; many voters who cast their ballots are equally as uninformed or misinformed as anyone who never has. However, despite the extenuating circumstances for which individuals do not vote, it is often disinterest, reluctance or responsible abstention.

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Compulsory voting has the potential to force a proportion of the According to the Pew Research Centre, most recent estimates, populace to vote on issues they do not care or know about, Belgian voter turnout is measured at an impressive 87.4%, admittedly or not. And in an era where media sensationalism compared to US’s 53.6% and UK’s 61.1%. Of course, when it dictates much of the political coverage, with pinnacles in isn’t strictly enforced, we see that the voter turnout matches journalism like Washington Post’s ground-breaking piece about that of certain voluntary voting jurisdictions, like that of Greece Trump eating his steaks with ketchup - this is the paper that who despite having a compulsory voting mechanism, has seen a broke Watergate - and BuzzFeed’s fad with a shirtless Justin 62% voter turnout. So, enforced compulsory voting has a Trudeau, we can only wonder what sort of metrics some voters positive effect on voter turnout but given the fears of an may turn to. While it is easy to make a civic duty a legal one, to uninformed voter, it is not the means by which the immediate rouse interest is a far more challenging. state of voter turnout can be solved. To put this into perspective, Belgian voter turnout has had time to accustom Irrespective of what an uninformed voter might bring to the itself to compulsory voting, which was introduced in 1894. table, the effectiveness of compulsory voting is nowhere so clear-cut. First, consider the degree of sanctions that The better alternative is to treat compulsory voting as a compulsory voting does impose in some of the implementing symbolic enforcement of the drive for exercise of jurisdictions. Most commonly, we see the use of nominal fines, franchisement; a civic duty via social pressures and greater with several jurisdictions, like Belgium and Singapore political education. We cannot expect for Parliament or disenfranchising voters for repeated offences, Peru barring Congress to introduce compulsory voting and immediately see access to certain public services, Brazil withdrawing associated the extent of voter participation that Belgium has cultivated for Passport rights, and Bolivia going as far as restricting the more than a century. Where society does not itself exert retrieval of salaries. The state should strike a balance between pressure on its members, it would take extensive periods of introducing an effective mechanism to induce voting without time to have compulsory voting to do so and that would not be bearing substantive costs, so rarely is imprisonment a utilized satisfactory either in the absence of a widely politically sanction. And while some of the aforementioned sanctions are informed and interested population. And where there would be debilitating, they may not always be effective enough when the no societal pressure and expected dissent, enforcement would state recognizes, rightly, exceptions to its own rules, like lax. Argentina, Australia and Belgium which excuse a non-voter provided a formal excuse can be provided. If we want to see voter turnout reflect more accurately the entire electorate, the state must ensure that political education Assuming that the sanctions are sufficient in weight the is an element present spanning the entirety of education that difficulty historically and in practice is that enforcement by the goes beyond what and how government works, but how state is often lax. In almost half of the major jurisdictions with individual rights fit into actions of government. That in turn compulsory voting, like in Bulgaria, Mexico or Greece there is must be matched by a social pressure, moving from the state no official enforcement. And where it is enforced in statute with down, to vote and exercise one’s civic duty. Let us not forget too strict consequence, as is the case of Belgium, prosecution and that many barriers to voting can be - especially the case in the sanctions rarely follow. Compulsory voting is enforced with the US - remedied by simple measures like making election days a same fervour as jaywalking - the prevalence of the offense, cost public holiday or reassessing voter registration laws. of enforcement and diversion of resources are just too great. Once we find those ideals firmly entrenched, only then, if truly necessary, can we consider the introduction of compulsory The painted picture of compulsory voting is nowhere near the voting. Icing on the cake. There is little sense to whip up icing ideal of what it hopes to remedy. That is not to say that for an unbaked cake. compulsory voting doesn’t work.

Silk v Brief | 47 Silk v Brief | Spring 2017 | Miscellaneous The Neverendum To End Them All

James Witherspoon

A monumental tide of political change is now upon us, and with it a new barrage of threats of more division from the Scottish Nationalist Party – which has once again reared its ugly head in seeking another costly referendum of the people of Scotland on whether to leave the UK. The key problem that Nicola Sturgeon faces this time around, however, remains broadly the same: there is no reason Nicola Sturgeon whatsoever for Scotland to become an independent Photo: Andrew Milligan country. Indeed, try as they might, the SNP have not been able to come up with convincing arguments to sway public more than a little hypocritical. Thirdly, independence voters opinion and have instead relied on a particular brand of can also be ‘Brexiteers’. Looking at the spread of the 2014 borderline offensive, fervent nationalism. vote, in general, the large cities provided the most resistance to Alex Salmond’s proposed withdrawal. Business types, as In writing this article I’m assuming that the only new will become clear when we analyse the remainder of the SNP’s argument the SNP are bringing to the table is that England has arguments, are far more savvy to the facts, and less swayed by dragged Scotland out of the EU against their will – and that meaningless rhetoric, than those more withdrawn from the therefore the people of Scotland should be able to choose commercial world. And, in fact, the same was true of Brexit. whether to return to the community or not. Therefore, I will The vast majority of major cities in the UK all voted to remain analyse both this argument, and the arguments posed in the in the EU, whilst the more rural areas voted to leave. These 2014 referendum, to demonstrate that there is no power in two trends perfectly align – the values of patriotism, ‘taking any of the arguments put forward by the party – and that they back control’, and the abuse of power flourished on both the subsist solely on a misplaced brand of patriotism. Yes and Leave sides; whilst economic intelligence, social awareness, and global citizenship perforated the No and When discussing the EU argument, I feel like it’s important to Remain campaigns. Therefore, it seems sensible to conclude frame the debate. In 2014, the people of Scotland voted to that at least many Yes voters also voted Leave – how would remain in the United Kingdom under the (apparently false) they feel about a second referendum to re-join the EU? pretence that they were making a ‘once in a generation’ decision. I believe any sensible person would conclude that But, social situations aside, there are indeed other problems this entails Scotland voting as part of the UK, continuing to be with Sturgeons plan. Most devastatingly, there is no indication represented in Westminster, and remaining in many respects that Scotland would even be able to re-join the EU after a Yes subservient to the UK parliament. It is also important to note vote. It’s more than likely that no country would veto the that Westminster serves the needs of the UK, and not the Article 49 call for membership – but countries such as Spain needs of England – as Mrs. Sturgeon would have her electorate may provide tough opposition (Spain sees Scotland as an believe. And in fact, it’s more than clear that Scotland has a ideological risk for supporting Catalonian nationalists). If it special constitutional status in the United Kingdom – with the was to be allowed to join the EU, and meet all the criteria further devolution brought in by the Scotland Act 2016, and (which is, again, another subject of close scrutiny), then the tools such as the Sewell Convention assuring that the country bloc has concurred that Scotland would still need to be ‘at the is autonomous where appropriate. With this in mind, I back of the queue’ as it were – potentially taking many years conclude that such a rational person would thus reason that to reach the membership stage, by which point the UK’s remaining part of the United Kingdom would entail following economy will likely have recovered substantially, to the point the United Kingdom in any international decisions they were where there is no economic gain in Scotland being in Europe, to take. Thus, the decision of the United Kingdom (not just and the UK not. And, of course, there are other problems with England) to leave the European Union – a decision backed by joining the EU in 2017. We don’t have enough space to discuss 52% of the electorate, and 38% of Scots – is a decision that them all here, but one that stands out is the requirement to Scottish people were implicit in, and a decision that they take up the Euro – an unstable and crisis-riddled currency that should have to bear. no respectable country would want to take part in.

Secondly, it’s also important to note two things. Firstly, in With all these points circulating, the EU point in Mrs. 2014 it was acknowledged that if Scotland were to become Sturgeon’s campaign seems more than a little flawed. So, with independent, the country would likely have to leave the EU. that we turn to the SNP’s arguments from 2014, to once again This effectively means that the 45% of Yes voters in that revisit the nonsense claims and poor logic that penetrated the referendum conceded to probably leaving the European Yes campaign. The ‘Wee Blue Book’ – the main resource for Union. The SNP campaigning for another roll call on Yes voters in 2014 – still displays its site from 3 years ago. I’m independence after the UK has left the bloc, therefore, feels taking the arguments from the ‘basic case for independence…. boils down to five key points’ section. 48 | Silk v Brief Miscellaneous | Spring 2017 | Silk v Brief

Firstly, Scotland’s economy is distilled into just one substance: But I think it is important with these last words to briefly oil. With the benefit of hindsight, we can clearly see that this discuss what the UK does for Scotland. was a misplaced projection (as almost every single expert told Salmond at the time) – and, in fact, it has been proven that It’s no secret that countries are better together – forging Scotland would now, as of 2017, be bankrupt if it was taken out alliances and trade partnerships with minimum litigation or of the UK 3 years ago. This, combined with the fact that most fuss. Scotland and the rest of the UK are no different – it goes major companies have already withdrawn from Aberdeen and without saying. Secondly, the UK is a reasonably big influencer North Sea oil prospects, and the falling oil price, means that the in the world – being part of NATO, the commonwealth, G7, G8, oil case does not stand for the SNP. There is indeed another and G20. This allows the UK to safeguard and represent the economic point about exports and trade partnerships – but, interests of Scotland on a global scale – which would again, it’s not needed to be discussed given that we now know presumably be lost if Scotland was to leave the UK (we don’t that the plan would have failed. meet the requirements for most of these organisations). On those same grounds, the UK actively supports Scottish exports The next set of points that are made on the website focus solely (such as whisky) in the wider world – this support would again on a base of patriotism – a base, I may add, that is surely be lost if we were to leave the union. unstable. For a start, given the whole host of reasons against independence, and the complete failure of other arguments put Scotland’s public spending under Westminster is around 10% forward by the SNP, patriotism is simply not a valid higher than the UK average. Without the financial support consideration. Prioritising the ‘love of your country’ or provided from the UK, it’s very unlikely that Scotland would be autonomy over prosperity is hypocritical in that you are able to maintain that level of investment – leading to poorer handicapping your country under the pretence that you want it public service. There are also over 200 public institutions to prosper. This makes simply no sense whatsoever. But also, on shared between the UK and Scotland (including the Passport another level, following the reports of the Smith Commission Office, and Research Councils UK) that facilitate a lot of the and the Scotland Act 2016, Holyrood now has a whole set of everyday lives of Scottish people – replacements would have to income taxation powers (among many others) that make its be funded by Holyrood, and have infrastructure built up which status far stronger in the UK. And, given the Sewell Convention, would be costly and time-consuming. And, finally, the financial the Scottish government is virtually free to do as it pleases. In standing of the UK means that loans and utilities can be kept at fact, the loan given from Westminster to Scotland can be a lower rate. An estimate by the energy sector in 2014 held that adjusted in various ways – but the SNP have always avoided bills would be, on average, £189 higher a year for electricity if doing this. Why? Because not doing so makes it look as if they Scotland was not in the UK – a drastic rise for almost no benefit have little power – and as if Westminster is an overbearing whatsoever. bully. Exactly what more do the SNP want from Westminster before they will be satisfied? Currently, they’re one step off And therein lies the ultimate problem. It is a problem that was complete devolution – a step with little gain but with potentially faced with Brexit, and a problem that correlates with the rise of huge loss. the far-right across the globe. No matter how much sense that people talk; no matter how much intelligent debate goes on; and The final set of points that are made are a series of ‘don’t be no matter how much the rational decision is clear cut – some afraid’ points that suggest Scotland will probably not have to people just can’t be persuaded. The Scottish National Party surf leave the EU (defunct given current arrangements), that the UK on a tide of hypocritical nationalism: sweeping up those who are unlikely to make things hard for Scotland, and that Scotland feel disenfranchised from society, and those with little political would be able to continue using the pound as currency. There is or economic awareness. They have an unmoveable 40% (at no reason why the UK would want to make it easy for Scotland least) of Scottish voters who will never be swayed, and who will to leave the UK. The SNP has caused many problems with its refuse to listen to any alternative. These are the people who naive, abrasive approach in parliament – and Nicola Sturgeon’s Westminster must contend with over the coming years. And, devious referendum timeline (colliding with Brexit thus, the future of Scotland is in a precarious state. Let’s just negotiations) only serves to wind up the tension even further. hope that the majority realise the light at the end of the tunnel There’s a high possibility that the UK would want to see is merely a lightbulb. Scotland suffer for the instability and conflict that they’ve brought to the union. But even if this wasn’t the case, what justifies taking the risk? Hopefully, so far, I’ve shown you that there is no such reason. Secondly, the almost surreal debate over whether Scotland could keep the pound. In 2014, Westminster informed Alex Salmond without any ambiguity that an independent Scotland would not be able to keep the pound. This was, indeed, a statement of fact rather than some sort of projection or opinion. The very fact that the SNP are willing to argue that this was a government lie, shows their unstable and childish nature.

I hope that I have shown you that there’s no reason to leave the UK through exploring the Yes campaign’s main arguments. And, indeed, although we have no time with which to discuss them (and there is no real need, given that the arguments for changing the status quo are moot), there are a whole host of reasons why leaving would detriment the UK (lowered world standing, potential loss of NATO membership, economic destruction, lower prospect of bailout etc). Bob Lawton Silk v Brief | 49 Silk v Brief | Spring 2017 | Miscellaneous My Genes Made Me Do It

Julia Wyszomirska

On 16th October 2006 Tennessee police arrived at However a biological basis for acts of violence is bound to Bradley Waldroup’s trailer home. The crime scene generate a myriad of problems for scientists, ethicists and resembled a war zone. There was blood on the walls, lawyers alike. For the former, it is clear that genetics does not floor, outside the trailer and even on the bible Bradley stand as a lone actor in relation to human behaviour. had been reading shortly before attempting to murder his Environmental factors are crucial in the way that genes are wife and barbarically killing her friend. For the expressed, which is easily seen for example in the fact that prosecution this was a straightforward case. Bradley’s having a gene linked to schizophrenia does not guarantee its behaviour flowed from consciously-made choices; telling development. As D. Weinberger, a researcher at John Hopkins his children to say goodbye to their mother because he University, points out “If you inherit small glitches, little pieces was going to murder her was a particularly disturbing yet of noise, this sets you on a path. But it doesn’t determine that forceful illustration of this. Yet contrary to common you will end up with mental illness. These glitches aren’t fate. practice, the jury decided otherwise, their verdict having They are for risk. Environmental factors are at play too.” The lowered charges from death row to prison time. Legal extent to which such external elements impact volition and an theoreticians and the prosecution alike were in disbelief individual’s control over their genetic makeup remains because of the prime mitigating factor that had influenced unclear. the jury: genetics. Another major problem with the claim that the warrior gene Bradley’s defence was centered around the discovery of a impairs volition is that not every person with MAO-A gene high-risk version of the MAO-A gene in his genetic makeup. deficiency commits violent crimes. The implication? Control is Nicknamed the “warrior gene”, its correlation with aggression possible. It is therefore difficult to justify showing empathy and violence has provoked heated debate, especially when towards the warrior gene carrier who committed a crime if studies of the gene have led to many controversial conclusions there are others capable of resisting such seemingly inherent such as a claim made by geneticist Rod Lea that its frequent temptations. The question to be asked is whether we are occurrence in Maori genetics could explain their higher violent simply giving the accused an easy way out at trial, a scapegoat crime rates. Though it is generally accepted that variety in our to pin (at least part of) the blame on. gene pool helps us to understand for example why certain people are endowed with greater musical talent or are more successful in sports than others, its interconnection with an internal predisposition to criminal activity is a disputed and highly controversial area of study.

Scientific rationale links deficient MAO-A genes with the part of the brain that is responsible for inhibiting antisocial impulses. The correct version of the gene controls critical neurotransmitters, which would otherwise be prone to accumulation thereby triggering loss of impulse control as well as violence. For such effects to occur, a history of child abuse is also necessary. The latter environmental factor is of little normative relevance if used as a single argument to shift blame away from the accused, yet it seems that a combination of the two is of enough weight to constitute a mitigating circumstance - in the United States that is.

The attraction behind such a line of defence is unequivocal medical proof. Whilst evidence of an uncontrolled emotional explosion may be subject to dispute and doubts, the results of a genetic test are printed in black and white for all to see. Red Brick Debby Beaty, a juror in the Waldroup trial, confirmed that the hard evidence presented to her was crucial in concluding a milder charge, despite the prosecution’s attempts to side-line the defence’s submission on the basis of absurdity. “A diagnosis is a diagnosis, it's there” says Beaty. “A bad gene is a bad gene.”

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Chris Madden

An issue which flows from this logic is that of prevention. It The law at present seems unable to adequately respond to what could be argued that these findings should lead to the screening can be labelled as qualified consciousness. It would need to of genetic makeup at birth. It may even seem desirable to create recognise that due to genetics we are not all granted the same a system of prevention via education and protection through amount of control over our actions. As a result, the assignment standardised control of factors such as stability of family of blame and criminal punishment must be modified to reflect environment from an early stage, in order to avoid such horrific this to give everyone an even playing-field before the law. The scenes as those in the Waldroup case. After all, preventing a problem lies in determining a scale that can reflect such a crime is always preferable to waiting for it to happen. But we qualification. Since it is the interplay between genetics and must remember that such prevention systems involve intrusion external factors that affects the ultimate quality of volition, only into the sphere of private life of people, a significant proportion a case-by-case approach could give just results. Bearing in mind of whom would not have ended up committing crimes at all. the complex nature of neuroscience, this would doubtlessly Bearing in mind that statistics in this area are far from stable, result in very high litigation costs and at the end of the day, a we are effectively prevented from determining whether, on a battle between experts as to proportions of influence, which balance of interests, the benefit of introducing such schemes one will never be able to determine with precision. would justify an intrusion into the life of every single person with MAO-A gene deficiency. The amount of studies that has been carried out in this field thus far is insufficient for our understanding of the warrior It should also be noted that from a psychological point of view a gene to conclusively establish whether we are the slaves or the system of early identification could, paradoxically, become masters of our genes. Furthermore, the interconnection counterproductive with regards deterrence. Knowledge of an between genetic makeup and life experiences, other external internal, genetic predisposition for violence may lead an factors and pure chance is far from defined. Neuroscience is individual to feel more morally justified when committing a seeping into the landscape of criminal systems around the crime. world and casting doubt over the legal responsibility of people like Bradley Waldroup. Defence lawyers are taking their From a legal perspective, the issue becomes problematic in that creative blame game to extremes and only time will tell it blurs the definition of free will. Finding a guilty mind in these whether or not “my genes did it” will be recognised as a valid scenarios is becoming intrinsically involved with the latest excuse in the eyes of the law. developments in neuroscience that seem to go against the common perception that a division between conscious and unconscious choices is clear cut.

Silk v Brief | 51 Silk v Brief | Spring 2017 | Miscellaneous The Bizarre Appeal of Emmanuel Macron

Adel Mubarak

“Vive la République, vive la France!” screeches Emmanuel Graduate of the École Nationale d’Administration (ENA), Macron, voice-breaking with emotion as he brings his Macron became a senior civil servant, before then leaving to Versailles rally to a close. Stretching his arms out wide, work as an investment banker, then becoming deputy the exalted Macron prepares to ascend to the Élysée secretary-general of the Élysée before finally becoming Palace, a messianic figure ready to be the providential minister of the economy. Macron is as much a part of the leader France has lacked since De Gaulle, ready to restore establishment as Bootstrap Bill Turner was a part of the Flying a golden age not seen since the age of Louis XIV. For Dutchman. indeed, Macron believes that what France craves above all else is a monarchical figure, and only under the Yet this fact has not appeared to hinder Macron in the least. stewardship of Napoleon and De Gaulle was this thirst for Rather than running in the Socialist Party primaries he chose authority quenched. This rather self-confident 39 year old to create his own party, En Marche!, a transpartisan burst into the public consciousness in France fewer than 3 movement which will present candidates in the 2017 years ago and now envisions himself filling that void. If legislative elections. The fact that it is very unlikely that polls are to believed, for which recent history has shown; Macron would obtain a majority in these elections to help him they are not, he is now tipped to be the new French govern has not stopped his formidable ascension, nor has the president. For a man with no defined programme and no fact that he has until recently been reluctant to clarify his traditional party support, this is some feat. policies. The reason none of this has mattered is that Macron’s main appeal is himself. Charming and cultured, his cross- Macron is rather incongruously labelled as anti-establishment partisan support stems largely from his character and his because he is an independent candidate. Yet this man is the ability to convince people to believe in him, and by extension very embodiment of all the criticisms levelled at the French what he calls his “vision”. political elite. There is mounting criticism of what is perceived as an interconnected politico-administrative technocracy He does not believe manifestos are particularly important, which governs the country. There is a sense that the political, preferring to focus instead on his abstract project. He goes so administrative and financial elites all come from the same far as to describe an election as “mystic”. If that sounds highly selective grandes écoles and that the osmosis between worrying, it’s nothing particularly new. During his last years in them is too great, allowing them to switch back and forth office Mitterrand began to rely more and more on an between positions in the senior civil service, positions in astrologist, to the extent that he trusted her to foretell events government, and directorships of large multinationals. The relating to the Gulf War. De Gaulle too, sought the advice of an sociologist Catherine Gremion calls this “the triangle of astrologer. power” and no-one better represents this concept than Macron.

Emmanuel Macron Le Parisien

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Yet Macron denies any supernatural belief, and is perhaps best Hamon is further weakened by the presence of Jean-Luc compared to Valery Giscard d’Estaing, France’s President from Mélenchon, a candidate even further left than Hamon with 1974 to 1981. Both attended l’ENA, both went on to join the whom no electoral agreement was reached, meaning the two Inspectorate General of Finances, both were ministers of the will fight it out for whatever remains of the left-wing vote in economy and both believed themselves to be providential France. figures, sweeping in the winds of change and progress (Giscard came to power modestly declaring a new era of French politics). With the presumed collapse of left-wing politics, it was For Macron to bring about this change he claims to represent, expected that the right would prosper in the French tradition of he may need to introduce some detail into his manifesto. alternance. The winner of the Républicains primaries, François Fillon, was the favourite to win the election not long ago. True, even in France, where manifestos are minutely Composed, experienced and seemingly beyond reproach but scrutinised for hours on end, there is no denying the appeal of unashamedly conservative and likened to Thatcher, the right the style over substance approach. Chirac owes his victory in saw him as a more palatable Sarkozy. They were wrong. For 1995 to his key campaign theme, the “social fracture”. Every Fillon, who extolled the virtue of honest, hard work like a ailment in French society was imputable to this undefinable modern day Inspector Javert, was revealed to have paid his wife notion which struck a nerve with the intangible idea that all was hundreds of thousands of euros of taxpayers’ money for what not well. Hollande meanwhile, won in 2012 on the very simple appears to have been a non-job. Other scandals have followed, platform of not being Sarkozy. Yet during the debate between and he was put under investigation. Unlike Javert, Fillon chose the main candidates on 20th March, Macron seemed ill at ease. not to throw himself in the Seine when confronted with his own He sought to show his centre-ground credentials by agreeing immorality. Instead he, who had repeatedly insisted he would with both the arch-conservative Fillon and the socialist Hamon, not run if put under investigation, reneged on his promise and but this merely made him look indecisive. Hollande was given vowed to fight on even as his supporters deserted him. the unkind sobriquet of Flanby (a kind of Crème caramel flan) because he was seen as soft and pliable. Macron may not be And so Macron, remarkably, may well charm his way to the quite there yet, but his performance was doubtless presidency. Indeed it is expected that whoever makes the disappointing. Between this and the fact that he does not have a second round with Le Pen will comfortably win the election. majority to rely on, it seems odd that Macron is tipped as When Jean-Marie Le Pen shocked France by reaching the Flanby’s successor. second round in 2002, the so-called front républicain saw everyone unite against Le Pen, allowing Chirac to win with a Of course, much of Macron’s appeal is circumstantial. At a time staggering 82.2% of the vote, the biggest landslide in a when Marine Le Pen is almost guaranteed to reach the second presidential election. The rallying cry at the time was mieux round of the election, the question is who is best equipped to vaut un escroc qu’un facho; better a crook than a fascist (music beat her in the second round. That excludes just about everyone to Fillon’s ears). to the left of Macron. After a dysfunctional five years marred by infighting, ministerial scandals and a President of frankly The key vote will therefore be on 23rd April, to see who joins impressive incompetence and unpopularity, the absence of any Marine Le Pen in the second round. Of the two left-wing left-wing candidate in the second round has been accepted candidates, the charismatic Mélenchon probably has the better wisdom for several years. chance but may struggle to siphon enough votes off his Socialist opponent. With the scandals surrounding Fillon showing no The sacrificial lamb chosen from a field of mediocrities in the signs of abating, Macron may be France’s best hope of avoiding Socialist primaries is Benoît Hamon, a man who envisions a 32 a Le Pen presidency. There is an apt French proverb for this hour week and a universal basic income. A frondeur (socialist rather sorry situation: au royaume des aveugles, les borgnes rebel) who resisted Hollande’s right-wing veer circa 2014 and sont rois (in the kingdom of the blind, the one-eyed are kings). refused to toe the party line now finds himself shocked when Macron, armed with no defined programme and with no clear the social-democratic wing of the party refuses to endorse him, majority to rely on, could be the one-eyed man France will have most notably former Prime Minister Manuel Valls. to settle for.

En Marche! Silk v Brief | 53 Silk v Brief | Spring 2017 | Miscellaneous Have More Kids; Save The Economy Demographic Change; The Biggest Threat to China’s Growth

Charlene Phua

The average age of the world is rising – and quickly, but Healthcare costs alone are estimated to demand 20 trillion none quite as dramatically as in China, where USD (16 trillion pounds) from Asia’s economy over the next 15 experimental family planning policies have prematurely years , and the fear, same as in the western world, is that there aged its population. It took France over a century (1865 – simply will be neither the resources nor the infrastructure to 1980) for its 60 and over population to double from seven support elderly dependents. This fear is especially acute in to 14%, and 45 years for the UK (1930 – 1975) to age China, however, as the most common family structure, thanks similarly, but China is predicted to do so in just 20 years to the one-child policy, is 4-2-1 (four grandparents, two (2017 – 2027). UN statistics project that by 2050, China’s parents, one child), and the social security net is poor. dependency ratio for retirees (defined as the total Economic development began in the 1970s under Deng number of those aged 65 and older divided by the total Xiaoping’s programme of liberalisation, but investment in number of workers) could rise to 44%, or up to 330 healthcare and other domestic social security systems did not million retirees – larger than the entire current properly begin until the 1990s and early 2000s . The great population of the USA. irony is that China’s current impressive economic state was achieved by actively lowering population growth and holding Why is China aging so rapidly? One answer is that a higher back on domestic welfare investment. However now, as the average age is a natural corollary of development. As the government has realised, the only way to preserve China’s economy of a country develops, so too does its healthcare and position as the world’s second largest economy is to welfare systems, which serve to extend life expectancy. This completely reverse the government’s position on both logically results in less young people proportionately to population growth and the country’s welfare net. elderly than there were in the past. Decreasing fertility, the other driving force behind population aging, can also be attributed in large part to better access to contraceptives, and a more highly educated population; in particular, a more highly educated female population whom increasingly have the option to delay having children, or not have children at all.

Another key factor, which has heightened these natural trends, is China’s one-child policy, introduced in 1979 and enforced as a means of population control for 36 years. Academics have cautioned against scapegoating the policy for all of China’s demographic woes , however, the extent to which it contributed to China’s sharp fertility drop also cannot be downplayed. One census estimated the one child policy prevented some 400 million births. Coldly speaking, that is 300 million workers the Chinese economy was deprived of. The one-child policy can also in large part be blamed for China’s disproportionately male population. Traditionally in China, sons are preferred to daughters (重男轻女). Faced with the prospect of only having one child, gender selective abortions and abandonment spiked, forcing the government to make amendments to the policy, such as allowing families in certain regions to have a second child if the eldest was a girl. Put together, the policy and its amendments helped produce a population that had 33 million more men than women in 2014, which has not helped balance demographics.

China faces the prospect of an economic slowdown. After all, the conventional wisdom is that a higher proportion of elderly means more people making pension and welfare claims at the same time that the workforce, taxable income, and presently productivity as well, shrinks. Asia in general, faces a Business Insider phenomenon of populations aging before they can get rich enough to cope with the socioeconomic demands of a disproportionately elderly population.

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Columbia University

How will that be achieved?

The gradual phasing out of the one child policy, which began in Too little too late seems to be the general consensus on China’s late 2015, is clearly a step in the right direction. Early reports response to its aging population. “It really doesn’t matter what from China’s National Health and Family Planning Commission happens now with the fertility rate,” says a demographer at the were optimistic. They said in January that 18.5 million children, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. “The old people of 12% more than in 2015, were born in the last year, almost half tomorrow are already here.” And more importantly, China is of which were second children. The Chinese government is not ready. Japan, the only country aging at a comparable rate, confident that the rising trend will continue through to 2020, has a solid social security system in place to respond to according to Wang Peian, vice-minister of the Commission. demographic changes, but even with comprehensive care Later reports, however, suggest that the dampening impact of insurance and innovative robotic solutions, they are struggling the policy on families’ desire to have children, is posed to carry to cope . China has no such waiting safety net, and the prospect over into the era after its repeal. Rough birth rates in the Jiangxi of poverty amongst the expanding elderly population is a and Shaanxi provinces increased, but barely, while in Guangxi problem China must find a solution to quickly. and Gansu birth rates seemed to have actually gone down. Sources also suggest the mini-spike in 2016 could also be To end on a positive note, however, one unexpected but major attributed to couples waiting to have children in the auspicious result of China’s rapid aging is peace. China’s quest to overtake Year of the Monkey, or for policy change to avoid being the USA in wealth and military pre-eminence – a quest that can penalized, rather than an overall sustainable desire for more be directly linked to China’s increasing aggressiveness as an children . international player, and friction between the two countries, and many of the nation’s geographic neighbours – may have to Cultural norms have changed, points out Jiang Quanbao, take a backseat to coping with demographic change, says Mark professor at Xi’an Jiaotong University’s Institute for Population L. Haas, a Duquesne University political scientist. We might be and Development Studies. No longer do women have the looking at the rise of ‘geriatric peace’, says Haas, as China traditional mindset that ‘more children means more happiness’, becomes too busy handling the domestic challenges brought on and no longer do families require many children to provide for by an exploding elderly population to truly challenge the USA’s them in old age as they did in the past, ironically, because they pre-eminence. think the modern social security system will. Disallowed from having many children under the one-child policy, couples To Chinese couples then, have more children and save your turned to investing time and money into other forms of life economy, but do not have children, and… preserve the peace? enrichment instead; a normative shift that will not be as easily reversible as the formal one-child policy.

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Spring; South Africa

Annabel Smith 2017

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Copic Marker & Biro on Paper

“Cubs”

EJ Oakley

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Copic Marker & Biro on Paper

“Mind Mischief”

EJ Oakley

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Oil on Canvas

“West Marries East”

Ayat Alhaji

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Oil on Canvas

“New Life”

Ayat Alhaji

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Bondi Beach; Sydney

Michael Stresing 2017

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