Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Foreign Policy 2013-09-10
Foreign Policy 2013-09-10
net
TODAYTOMORROWBEYOND
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
LETTER FROM THE EDITORS
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
CONTENTS
S ep t e m be r | O c to ber 2 01 3
VICE
An FP Special Report
52 Straight Up
How Johnnie Walker conquered the world.
By Afshin Molavi
58 The FP Sindex
From sex to vanity, gluttony to sloth, FP takes
stock of the worlds vices.
71 Fluid Markets
Deep in Congos violent east, Heineken walks a ne
line between selling beer and sustaining a war.
By Jason Miklian and Peer Schouten
76 Cooking in Karachi
The worlds most dangerous megacity is the next
frontier in the global meth trade.
By Taimur Khan
4
Foreign Policy
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
10 LETTERS
19 IN BOX
THINK AGAIN
42 American Nuclear
Disarmament
By Matthew Kroenig
IN OTHER WORDS
C O LU M N
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
David J. Rothkopf
CEO & EDITOR AT LARGE
J. Peter Scoblic
Benjamin Pauker
Noah Shachtman
EXECUTIVE EDITOR
ANALYSIS AND COMMENTARY
MANAGING EDITOR
EXECUTIVE EDITOR
NEWS
Curtiss Calleo
ACTING CREATIVE DIRECTOR
Rebecca Frankel
SPECIAL PROJECTS EDITOR
DEPUTY MANAGING EDITOR Uri
MIDDLE EAST EDITOR David
Friedman
Kenner
ASSOCIATE EDITORS Joshua E. Keating, Ty McCormick, Isaac Stone Fish
ASSISTANT MANAGING EDITOR Margaret Slattery
ASSISTANT EDITORS Elias Groll, Neha Paliwal, J. Dana Stuster, Alicia P.Q. Wittmeyer
RESEARCHERS Park MacDougald, Suchi Mandavilli, Peter Sullivan, Lydia Tomkiw
COPY CHIEF
Preeti Aroon
John Reed
CONTRIBUTING EDITORS
Daniel Altman, John Arquilla, Peter Bergen, David Bosco, Ian Bremmer,
Rosa Brooks, Christian Caryl, Daniel W. Drezner, Mohamed A. El-Erian, Peter D. Feaver,
David E. Hoffman, William Inboden, Charles Kenny, Christina Larson, Colum Lynch, Marc
Lynch, Aaron David Miller, Thomas E. Ricks, James Traub, Stephen M. Walt, Micah Zenko
SENIOR VICE PRESIDENT, GLOBAL ADVERTISING SALES Amer Yaqub
ASSOCIATE PUBLISHER Aaron Finley
SENIOR ACCOUNT DIRECTOR Maria San Jose
SENIOR MANAGER, NATION BRANDING Emily Simon
SENIOR VICE PRESIDENT, CIRCULATION, DIGITAL STRATEGY AND OPERATIONS Christopher Cotnoir
ASSISTANT DIRECTOR, MARKETING RESEARCH AND AD TRAFFIC Matthew J. Curry
BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT MANAGER Tara Vohra
WEB DIRECTOR Tim Showers
WEB DEVELOPER Priya Nannapaneni
SENIOR VICE PRESIDENT, EVENTS Deborah Cunningham
VICE PRESIDENT, EVENTS Alex Glass
VICE PRESIDENT, COMMUNICATIONS
Jess Dillman
Chin
EDITORIAL BOARD
Morton Abramowitz, Jacques Attali, John Deutch, Jorge I. Domnguez, Lawrence Freedman, Yoichi Funabashi, Diego Hidalgo, Stanley Hoffmann,
Thomas L. Hughes, Karl Kaiser, Jessica T. Mathews, Donald F. McHenry, Cesare Merlini, Thierry de Montbrial, Joseph S. Nye Jr., Soli zel,
Moeen Qureshi, John E. Rielly, Gianni Riotta, Klaus Schwab, Strobe Talbott, Richard H. Ullman, Stephen M. Walt
Foreign Policy
GENERAL EXCELLENCE
2013 by The FP Group, a division of The Washington Post Company, which bears no responsibility for the editorial content; the views expressed in the articles are those of the authors. No part of this publication may
be reproduced in any form without permission in writing from the publisher.
Foreign Policy
WorldMags.net
Kennedy Center
WorldMags.net
IMF
State Department
World Bank
U.S. Institute
of Peace
ELLIOTT SCHOOL
National Academy
of Sciences
Executive
Ofce Building
White House
Treasury Department
OAS
Commerce
Department
wELCOMe To the
NEIGHBORHOOD
GWs Elliott School of International Affairs is just
steps from some of the most inuential U.S., international, and
nongovernmental organizations in the world. Our unique location
in the heart of Washington, D.C. enriches our teaching and
research by giving our students and faculty unparalleled
opportunities to engage with the international leaders who
walk through our doors on a regular basis.
Learn more about our innovative undergraduate and
graduate programs or view some of our superb special
events online at www.elliott.gwu.edu.
Now more than ever, there is no better place to study
global issues than GWs Elliott School of International Affairs.
connected
To the WORLD
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
CONTRIBUTORS
A veteran of the international development world, John Norris has worked for ngos,
the United Nations, the U.S. State Department, and now the Center for American Progress, traveling everywhere from Africa to the Balkans to South Asia for
his work on human rights, international aid, and emergency relief. In his more
recent trips abroad, Norris has observed a new problem in developing countries:
rising obesity, thanks to aggressive marketing by American junk food companies
that export their fatty and sugary snacks overseasoften with backing from U.S.
trade and agricultural policies. Now, Norris, who is working with a high-level U.N.
panel identifying new international development goals for 2030, says obesity, heart
disease, and other noncommunicable health problems will soon force themselves
onto the global development agenda, right alongside infectious disease, poverty,
and hunger. | 60
Foreign Policy
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
Micro-, small-, and medium-sized enterprises make up the vast majority of all businesses in Asia. In the APEC
region, more than 90 percent of businesses are MSMEs, and they employ roughly 60 percent of the workforce.
In ASEAN countries, they account for over 96 percent of enterprises and contribute up to half of each member
states GDP. The success of these businesses drives overall job creation and economic growth across
communities, countries, and the region, contributing to greater stability and prosperity.
www.asiafoundation.org
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
LETTERS
DEFINING
FAILURE
If you want to know how misguided Tyler Cowens arguments are in explaining the popularity of Mexican cuisine in
the United States, consider a word that he never uses in his
essay: immigration (The Cookbook Theory of Economics,
July/August 2013). Talking about the rise of margaritas and
moles in the United States without mentioning the immigrants
who brought these marvels to el Norte is like ordering a taco
without the tortilla.
I agree with Cowen that the modern-day ubiquity of Mexican food is helped by large-scale production, whether through
fast-food giants like Taco Bell or through the salsa industry,
whose annual sales have famously topped those of ketchup.
But Cowen ties this triumph to economic development in
Mexico. As I explain in my book, Taco USA: How Mexican
Food Conquered America, Americans, not Mexicans, are the
most enthusiastic acolytes of Mexican food, and it was Americans, including Mexican-Americans, who pioneered the in-
So apparently #Kenya
ranks above #Syria in
the failed states index.
Can anyone else smell
the BS?
@Nanjala1
The concept of the failed
state has never existed
outside a programme for
western intervention.
Elliot Ross, the
Guardian
The problem with a
Failed States Index is
that there arent enough
truly failed states to have
an index. Also, nobody
agrees what one is.
@texasinafrica
Foreign Policy welcomes letters to the editor. Readers should address their comments to fp.letters@ForeignPolicy.com.
Letters may be edited for length and clarity. For more debate and discussion of our stories, go to ForeignPolicy.com.
10
Foreign Policy
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
Thankfully, the American appetite
doesnt hew to such backward thinking.
The ceaseless waves of Mexicans to the
United States over the past century have
kept Americans intrigued with the cuisine
by introducing new items with such regularity that Mexican food is like a sevenlayer bean dip, with the most assimilated
items on the bottom and newer trends on
topeach of them authentically Mexican, each of them eagerly gobbled up by
Americans. Everything we now take for
granted, from guacamole to chili, tamales to Corona beer, was once considered
exotic, even foreign, until immigrants introduced it to los Estados Unidos. Witness the relatively recent success of burritos, a staple of northern Mexican cuisine
that has been in the United States since
the 1950s but that became popular only
after the rise of Chipotle in the 1990s. It
is Americans who decide whether these
newer meals will become commodified,
and it will be American companies, run
by gabachos and Mexicans alike, that
will be the beneficiaries of this decision,
not Mexico.
Finally, Cowen has the state of Mexican food in the United States all wrong.
He says Americans mostly get northern Mexican food, yet the only foodstuffs from northern Mexico that ever
penetrated the United States were burritos, flour tortillas, fajitas, and nachos
important contributions, yes, but they
pale in comparison with what central
and southern Mexico gifted the United
States: enchiladas, tequila, carnitas,
mescal, and so much more. And the
ubiquitous taco, that most iconic of
Mexican meals? It only entered mainstream American cuisine after the Mexican Revolution, brought forth from central Mexico bys, seorimmigrants.
GUSTAVO ARELLANO
Editor, OC Weekly
Costa Mesa, Calif.
It Takes a Village
WorldMags.net
11
LETTERS
WorldMags.net
As for the claim that I did not talk to Africabased leaders about MVP, that is also not true.
I interviewed a senior Kenyan government
ofcial, Charity Ngilu, who as health minister
worked closely with Jeffrey Sachs to launch
MVP in her country, and she is quoted in the
article. I also interviewed Bright Kanyontore
Rwamirama, a member of Ugandas parliament and a cabinet ofcial who is closely
involved with MVP in his country. In addition,
an Africa-based writer, Sam Rich, visited the
Ruhiira Millennium Village in Uganda and
talked to project leaders there, expressly for
the FOREIGN POLICY article.
It is understandable that Begashaw and
Niang take issue with pointed criticism of
MVP, but they have no basis for saying that
such criticism, as voiced in the article, is
ill-informed.
Promoting
Understanding
of Russia
Alfa-Bank and Cultural Vistas are pleased to
announce a call for applications for the Alfa Fellowship
Programs 2014-2015 Fellows. Now celebrating its
tenth year, the Alfa Fellowship Program is an 11-month
professional-level initiative designed to foster a new
generation of American and British leaders with
meaningful professional experience in Russia.
The Alfa Fellowship begins with language training in the
U.S. or U.K., followed by a language course in Moscow.
Throughout the summer and into the fall, Alfa Fellows
attend a seminar program with key public and private
sector ofcials to discuss current issues facing Russia.
Fellows then work at prominent organizations in Russia,
including private companies, media outlets, think tanks,
and foundations.
Eligible candidates must have a graduate degree
and professional experience in business, economics,
journalism, law, public policy or a related feld. Russian
language profciency is preferred, though not required
at the time of application. The Fellowship includes a
generous monthly stipend, housing, language training,
program-related travel costs, and insurance.
Applications must be
received no later than
December 1.
Program details and the
online application can be
found at:
www.culturalvistas.org/alfa
For more information,
please contact:
Cultural Vistas
Alfa Fellowship Program
440 Park Avenue South
2nd Floor
New York, NY 10016
Tel: (212) 497-3510
Fax: (212) 497-3587
alfa@culturalvistas.org
www.culturalvistas.org/alfa
Ottawa Is No Caracas
I wish I could turn a phrase like Andrew Nikiforuk, who makes the case
for Canada as a rogue petrostate
(Oh, Canada, July/August 2013).
No, you are not misreading thatit
is Canada he compares to Saudi Arabia or Venezuela. Instead, I have to
rely on evidence, and unfortunately,
the evidence in Nikiforuks case is far
from convincing.
Canada has not bet its entire economy on resource industriesfar from
it. In fact, the share of gdp from oil,
natural gas, and mining has, with a
few interruptions, largely decreased
since the 1960s. In April 2007 (the
earliest date for which the Canadian
government provides a direct comparison to current economic gures), oil,
gas, and mining collectively accounted for 8.34 percent of gdp. In April
2013, that number was 8.30 percent.
Nikiforuk would have you believe
that Canadas oil sands petroproject
has led to a rapid increase in economic dependence on unconventional oil.
Hes right in a sense: Dependence has
increased 40 percent since 2007but
from just 1.3 percent to just 1.8 percent of gdp. The share of Canadians
working directly in mining, oil, and
gas has also increased, from 1.1 percent of employment a decade ago to
1.5 percent today. Even if oil and gas
production were to increase drastically to account for half of export revenues, more than a fth of gdp, and
OJSC Alfa-Bank is incorporated, focused and based in Russia, and is not afliated with U.S.-based Alfa Insurance.
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
a quarter of government revenue, that
would put Canada on par with Norway, which could hardly be called a
petrostate in the pejorative sense.
Nikiforuk suggests that these small
increases, like a canary in a coal mine,
are but a preview of a disastrous future for Canada, carved out by policy
changes intended to ease access to the
resources driving this dependence.
Some laws have done so, but to focus
on them alone is to ignore many recent
decisions that have done just the opposite. For example, the federal government has curbed tax incentives for oil
and gas companies, placed further limits on asset sales to foreign companies
(including those from China), and refused, despite heavy lobbying from the
oil industry, to give favorable tax treatment to liqueed natural gas plants.
Alberta, home to Canadas oil sands,
has signicantly increased royalty rates
and even introduced a carbon-pricing
regime. These changes cost the industry
and those who invest in it.
Canadians could be forgiven for believing industry and government rhet-
ANDREW LEACH
Associate Professor
Alberta School of Business
Edmonton, Alberta
WorldMags.net
LETTERS
WorldMags.net
Congo Is Too
Big to Fail
WorldMags.net
For the past four years, political scientists Jeffrey Herbst and Greg Mills
have been pushing the idea that breaking up the Democratic Republic of
the Congo into smaller states would
make the country easier to govern.
Its an argument Herbst and Mills
an American and a South African, respectivelyhave repeatedly voiced in
Foreign Policy. See: There Is No
Congo (March 18, 2009), Time to
End the Congo Charade (Aug. 14,
2009), and most recently, The Invisible State, in the July/August 2013 issue. But as tempting as the Balkanization of Congo may be, its intellectual
foundation stands on lazy scholarship
and a misreading of Congos history
and people.
This approach is not new. It has been
tested in the past, and it failed. During
the secession movements of the 1960s,
the country became a mosaic of ma-
WorldMags.net
jorities and minorities. The secessionist, genocidal war that erupted in the
regions of Katanga and South Kasai
following their decisions to break off
from Congo proper in 1960 resulted in
an estimated 1 million deaths in four
years. Despite their mineral wealth,
neither region became a model of development, and today both should chasten
the idea of Congos breakup as a road
map to peace.
And consider the latest in a long
line of attempts to partition Congo:
the Rwandan-backed M23 rebellion.
Despite an aggressive public relations
campaign and impressive logistical
and political support, reportedly from
both Rwanda and Uganda, the monoethnic, Tutsi-supported initiative has
failed to rally Congolese support at
the local and national levels. In 2012,
M23s emergence caused thousands to
protest around the country. But the
protesters werent rallying in support
of M23; many were denouncing it as
another sham to break up the country.
Congo belongs to a sovereign people
who are proud of their nation and its
history, culture, and wealth. Taken in
full measure, Congos ethnic groups,
large and small, live peacefully together.
But a new crop of non-Congolese analysts peddles a Conrad-esque narrative
that portrays Congo as a primitive land
pulled straight from Heart of Darkness
and casts the Congolese people as incapable of determining their own destiny.
These analysts emphasize local conict,
militias, state failure, sexual violence,
and poverty. Their essays rarely mention Congos strong civil society and
resourceful population, instead relying
on surveys and rankings like Foreign
Policys Failed States Index. But Congo is not a string of statistics, and no
country can be reduced to such numbers. In fact, it is impossible to get a
meaningful reading of developments in
Congo through indices and surveys due
to lack of accurate data.
There is no easy solution to Congos
problems, and no one understands these
challenges better than the Congolese.
But each crisis has made Congo stronger and better and brings the Congolese
together as a nation. Analysts with no
greater stake in Congo than their careers ought to be mindful of the ramications of the narrative and solutions
WorldMags.net
15
LETTERS
WorldMags.net
The ongoing struggle for gender equality
in Norway will no doubt occur in the upper
echelons of the economy.
INGA MARTE THORKILDSEN
16
Foreign Policy
Getting to Equal
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
Understanding and insight are crucial to foreign relations and global business. Perspective on
globalization and knowledge of cross cultural issues will differentiate the leaders and innovators
of tomorrow. Inuence change, initiate dialogue and foster collaboration with Norwich Universitys
Master of Arts in Diplomacy. Concentrations available include International Terrorism, International
Conict Management, and International Commerce. Earn your degree in as few as 18 months
from a fully accredited university with nearly 200 years of academic heritage.
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
30 Years of
Celebrating 30 Years
as part of the
National Endowment for Democracy,
working with the private sector to
strengthen democracies that deliver.
An afliate of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
IDEAS PSYCH THE VOTE
U.S. NAVY PHOTO BY HMC JOSH IVES; SIM CHI YIN/VII; GETTY IMAGES;
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS
RETURN TO
SENDER
How to pack
up Americas
longest war. | 35
ANTHROPOLOGY
OF AN IDEA
OPENING GAMBIT
PICTURED
DAWNS EARLY
LIGHT IN BURMA | 40
WorldMags.net
IN
BOX
WorldMags.net
20
Foreign Policy
his early days in the White House, he left foreign envoys unimpressed. His conversation consists of vulgar anecdotes at which
he himself laughs uproariously, the Dutch ambassador griped.
Lincoln, at least on some level, shared the diplomats concerns.
I dont know anything about diplomacy, he told one acquaintance as he took ofce. I will be very apt to make blunders.
Even after a century and a half of mythmaking, Lincoln is not
often remembered as a great foreign-policy president. Yet he ultimately passed the most critical foreign-policy test of the Civil
War: He avoided European intervention on the side of the Confederacya development that could have irrevocably shattered
the Union. In the process, he proved that a popularly elected
government could hold its own on the world stage during an
acute crisis. (Alexis de Tocqueville, for one, was convinced that
democracies were decidedly inferior when it came to handling
foreign affairs.) All the while, Lincoln and his Republican Party
worked assiduously to build a centralized nationa critical
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
had been eroding U.S. power. Todays multipolar world of
prerequisite to the United States rise to power. Perhaps most
competing countries with vastly divergent interests looks
importantly, the Civil War forced Lincoln not only to rearrange
not all that different from the one that Lincoln faced. Such
the American diplomatic toolbox, but also to nd a workable
a world demands reasoned calculationnot self-righteous
middle ground between his universal moralism and the harsh
crusades. For most of its history, the United States was in
reality of the world around him.
fact a nation among others, not a preponderate superpowIt is fun but futile to wonder what Lincoln would have made
er, notes the dean of the realist school, Henry Kissinger.
of Syria, or Edward Snowden, or drones. Pundits have spilled
The era before the American century, he has argued, may
gallons of ink debating whether President Barack Obama is a
well be a more accurate predictor of what is to come.
Lincolnian gure. Yet such speculation largely misses the point.
Like ours, the 19th century was an information age, an
Obama, appealing to the idealism of an interconnected world
era of rapid liberalization and globalization. Steamships had
yet simultaneously constrained by the realities of the internacut the Atlantic passage to a little over a week, and telegraph
tional power grid, is operating on a globe that Lincoln helped
workers feverishly strung copper lines across continents and
shape. If the two men share similarities of temperament and
below the oceans. Driven by the invention of the steamcharacter, it is partly because a particular style of stolid forpowered press, American periodicals exploded in number from
bearance suited global politics in Lincolns era just as it does
850 in 1828 to more than 4,000 by the eve of the Civil War.
our own.
There has never been an age so completely enthralled by
In the wake of the Crimean War, which ended just a few years
newspapers as this, Lincolns personal secretary, John Hay,
before Lincoln became president, international politics evolved
observed in the fall of 1861. Karl
into a brutal competition for
Obama, appealing to idealism yet constrained Marx, a contemporary of Lincoln
power and resources. (A German
and himself a journalist, marveled
writer coined the term Realpolitik
by international forces, is operating on a
at the sheet lightning of the daily
to describe the phenomenon.) By
globe that Lincoln helped shape.
press and the other immensely
the mid-19th century, the world
facilitated means of communication. National differences,
was dominated by powerful, self-interested warriors. Britains
Marx believed, were daily more and more vanishing.
foreign policy was directed by Lord Palmerston, its shrewd, ruthThe new technologies revolutionized the practice of foreign
less prime minister. Dubbed Lord Pumicestone for his abrasive
affairs. Diplomacy has so few secrets nowadays, lamented
demeanor, Palmerston was perhaps best known for declaring
French Empress Eugnie as she tried to stay ahead of events.
that Britain had no eternal friendsonly national interests. The
(The 19th-century version of leaker Snowden was the acerbic
European continents leaders were no more charming. In Prussia,
Polish Count Adam Gurowski, who worked at the U.S. State
Otto von Bismarck saw Europes future emerging from the interDepartment and published his candid diary at the height of the
play of blood and iron. Foreign policy, he said, was the art of
Civil War.) The advances in communications, historian Daniel
the possible, the science of the relative. (Frances Napoleon iii
Walker Howe notes, certainly rivaled, and probably exceeded
was less competent, but no more warm and fuzzy. French writer
in importance, those of the revolutionary information highway
Victor Hugo described the emperor as a man of middle height,
of our own lifetimes. The same proliferating media empowered
cold, pale, slow, who looks as if he were not quite awake and
all types of preachers and reformers, lling the globe with a cawho was esteemed by women who want to become prostitutes
cophony of moral (and often self-righteous) appeals.
and by men who want to become prefects.)
In this changing world, Lincoln lifted a global megaphone.
Lincoln, too, could be cold and ruthless. He was better suited
By exploiting the newspaper culture and innovations like the
to the age of great-power politics than is often assumed. An avid
daguerreotype, he anticipated President Theodore Roosevelts
chess player, he was steeped in the rational philosophy and pobully pulpit by a generation. When the Unions blockade of the
litical economy of Enlightenment thinkers, and as a young poliConfederacy resulted in cotton shortages across the Atlantic,
tician, he gloried reasoncold, calculating, unimpassioned
Lincoln crafted messages designed explicitly for the consumpreason as necessary for peace and order. Lincoln, said his fortion of starving European mill workers, in the hopes of discourmer law partner, William Herndon, was a realist as opposed to
aging foreign intervention in the Civil War. The Emancipation
an idealist. He viewed the world without illusion. The future
Proclamation itself was partially a plea for propresidents mind crushed the unreal, the inexact, the hollow,
gressive European sympathies. Secretary
and the sham, Herndon recalled. Everything came to
of State William Henry Seward also
him in its precise shape and color.
seized the new tools of diplomacy,
Modern realists see strong similarities bepublishing his ofcial dispatches
tween our own time and the 19th-century
for their public relations value.
age of great powers. The post-Cold War
Yet for all the appeals that
landscape that left America as the
Lincoln and Seward made
worlds sole superpower no longer
to American soft power,
exists. Even before the recent credit
they were also driven by
crunch and stock market crash, emerga respect for the material
ing nations such as China and India
WorldMags.net
21
WorldMags.net
22
Foreign Policy
WorldMags.net
IN
BOX
WorldMags.net
THE L IONEL G ELBER
P R I Z E
Ca l l for s u b m i s s i o n s
The lionel Gelber Prize was founded in 1989 by Canadian diplomat lionel Gelber. The Prize is
a literary award for the worlds best non-fiction book in English on foreign affairs that seeks to
deepen public debate on significant international issues. a prize of $15,000 CDn is awarded to the
winner. The award is presented annually by The lionel Gelber Foundation, in partnership with
Foreign Policy Magazine and the munk school of Global affairs at the university of Toronto.
To be eligible for the 2014 lionel Gelber Prize, books must be published between 1 January 2013
and 31 December 2013. The deadline for submissions is 31 october 2013. manuscripts to be
published between 31 october and 31 December 2013 may be submitted in galley form. a $50 CDn
handling fee is required per entry. Please make all cheques payable to the university of Toronto.
Complete rules of eligibility are available on our website at www.utoronto.ca/munk/gelber.
The winner of the 2013 lionel Gelber Prize is Chrystia Freeland, for her book Plutocrats: The
Rise of the New Global Super-Rich and the Fall of Everyone Else, published by Doubleday
Canada and The Penguin Press.
For more information contact:
Prize manager, the lionel Gelber Prize
munk school of Global affairs,
at Trinity College, university of Toronto
1 Devonshire Place
Toronto, ontario, Canada m5s 3K7
Telephone: (416) 946-8901
Fax: (416) 946-8915
Email: gelberprize.munk@utoronto.ca
Website: www.utoronto.ca/munk/gelber
WorldMags.net
IN
BOX
WorldMags.net
Laggard
s the worlds power brokerswell, ministers and central bankers from 188 countriesgather in October for
the annual meetings of the International Monetary Fund,
they will again be confronted by evidence that the imf
is still in need of proper reform. This time, the evidence
comes not only in the form of continued global economic
malaise and nancial instability, but the imfs brutally
honest self-evaluation of its role in the insufcient Greek bailout (and, by implication, its involvement in other European
countries). On the heels of this disappointing performance, one
thing is clear: The imf is still stuck in the last century.
Nearly 70 years ago, the imf was created for what remains
a good and valid reason. Emerging from a world war that had
been fueled by a global depression, beggar-thy-neighbor policies, and inadequate economic coordination, visionary leaders
recognized that a well-functioning global economy requires a
strong, multilateral institution empowered to intervene and rescue countries from disaster.
On paper, the imf is well-equipped for the job. It commands
a virtually universal international membership. It has a highly
talented staff and a sizable budget. Its Articles of Agreement
24
Foreign Policy
WorldMags.net
SEBASTIEN PIRLET/REUTERS
WorldMags.net
Global nance is also increasingly vulnerable. Despite many
new regulatory reforms to make the system stronger and safer,
discomforting instability has returned to markets. Rather than
base investment and resource-allocation decisions on sound,
fundamental analysis, too many investors rely overwhelmingly on the articial support they receive from the experimental
policies pursued by Western central banks. No wonder the U.S.
Federal Reserves mere mention a few months ago that it might
reduce its monthly securities purchases led to dizzying asset
price drops, disrupted markets, and panic. These wild gyrations severely complicate policymaking around the world, adding to the headwinds facing growth and job creation.
Yet this is the type of world for which the imfs founding fathersparticularly British economist John Maynard
Keynes and his American counterpart, Harry White
created the institution. At minimum, the imf was built to act
as an effective, decisive crisis manager; more
ambitiously, it was to serve as a global police
force to prevent the emergence or persistence
of large imbalances that could imperil the economic and nancial well-being of countries,
including those behaving responsibly.
Meanwhile, emerging economies seethefrustrated by Europes dominance of the imf and, more generally, by an institution that still seems stuck in the 1970s. Yet no one really wants
to lead the reform movement, especially as this would involve
locking horns with some of the developed worlds big bulls (or,
perhaps, bears these days). Brazil has, more than once, accompanied its private advocacy for more equitable representation with
bold public statements. But to no avail.
Leadership on this urgent matter couldand shouldcome
from within the imf itself. Yet Christine Lagarde, the imfs wellliked and charismatic managing director, has essentially punted
on this issue. Rather than signal a steadfast willingness to pursue
reforms and take on Europes angry, misguided reactions to criticism, she has reverted to diplospeak, noting the imfs very unusual and very exceptional relationship with European institutions.
We shouldnt criticize her too muchit is not easy to bite the
hand that feeds you. In a selection process that
continues to place geography well ahead of merit and inclusiveness, Lagarde owes her appointment to European politicians. And long gone
are the days when these politicians would pick
an experienced technocrat such as the highly respected Jacques de Larosire or Michel Camdessus. Instead, since 2004, Europe has opted for
n practice, however, the imfs contribupolitical personalities for a job seen as a steption to a more stable and prosperous globping stone to presidencies and prime ministeral economy continues to be undermined by
Unsurprisingly,
ships at home.
long-standing structural and governance
Greece is still
This leaves only one player with the power to
decits. Perhaps nowhere is this clearer
struggling mightily
turn the tables: the United States. As the worlds
today than in the courageous report that
most powerful economy, the United States has
the imf has prepared on its involvement
three years and
the largest voting share of any country at the
and failures in the rst Greek bailout.
hundreds of billions
imf (16.8 percent). And it has been periodically
By the imfs own admission, the institution
of dollars later.
dismayed, if not irritated, by how Europe has
allowed itself to be overly inuencedsome
handled its nancial crisis.
would say outright bulliedby some of its
But Washington cannot leador even coordinatea deep,
partners (such as the European Commission) in supporting policomprehensive reform of the imf. In normal times, most Americies that were inadequately designed and whose implementation
can politicians are highly skeptical about the role, cost, and efwas insufciently owned by Greece. Specically, the imf ignored
fectiveness of multilateral institutions. And given todays polarits own assessment of nancial viability that pointed to the need
ized and dysfunctional Congress (not to mention many of its
for an early restructuring of Greek debt. It lent into a program
members poor grasp of what the imf does), any attempt by
that was not well-enough nanced, and its understanding of the
President Barack Obamas administration to rejigger the imfs
countrys growth and debt dynamics proved incomplete.
makeup could easily be misconstrued as selling out Americas
Unsurprisingly, Greece is still struggling mightily three years
European allies to less-reliable developing countries.
and hundreds of billions of dollars later, after a huge bailout opYes, the world urgently needs a more effective imf that can
eration and massive austerity program. Anywhere else, such a
reduce the global imbalances that undermine growth and jobs
costly, visible failure would prompt governing boards to conduct
in so many countries. But dont look to the upcoming gatherserious discussions and pursue reforms. Not at the imf.
ings in Washington to deliver the needed reforms. Instead, and
Despite more than two decades of talk about updating its repdespite yet another frank and well-documented self-evaluation,
resentation and voting, the imf is still overly inuenced by Euroit is likely that the imf will continue to be undermined by politipean politicians. Two reasons for this (among many) are that (1)
cal masters who lack courage and vision. Let us just hope that
the imfs top job is still unofcially reserved for a European, just
the global economy doesnt require saving soonbecause the
like it was back in 1944, and (2) Europe still holds about oneimf is not yet ready.
third of the seats on the executive board. No wonder European
leaders dont hesitate to push back hard when the imf offers conContributing editor Mohamed A. El-Erian is ceo and co-chief
structive criticism. As a case in point, within hours of the Greece
report going public, European ofcials rushed to the airwaves to
investment ofcer of global investment management rm Pimco
condemn it as plainly wrong and neither fair nor just.
and author of When Markets Collide.
WorldMags.net
25
WorldMags.net
WORLD CLASS
If your dream is a career in international affairs,
the Patterson School can put you on the right track.
www.PattersonSchool.uky.edu
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
THE T HIN GS T H EY CAR R IED
kira chiba has an odd job: explaining to the U.S. Congress why Japan owns eight small, uninhabited rocks in
the middle of the ocean. It might sound inconsequential,
but these rocksthe Senkakus to the Japanese, the Diaoyus to the Chineseare thought to sit atop huge energy
reserves and are now a dangerous territorial ashpoint.
Chibas experience with China stretches back to the 1980s,
when he studied Mandarin and worked in the Japanese Embassy in Beijing. He says he felt mistreated during his eight years
there not because I was a foreigner, but because everyone is
mistreated in that country. So I have no hard feelings.
While China argues that the Diaoyu Islands are an inseparable part of its territory and regularly sends ships to patrol the
Toothbrush:
Its from Japan Airlines,
business
class. Im a
minister, so
Im entitled
to y business class,
but I rarely
do because
of shortage
of funding.
I often have
lunch on the
Hill and dont
want spinach
sticking out of
my mouth!
Ties: I dont go to a
Republican ofce with a
blue tie on, just in case.
Most of the time I see
both sides, and so Ill
wear a purple tie instead.
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
ANTHROPOLOGY OF AN IDEA
GEOENGINEERING
or most of human history, weather control has been under the strict purview of
sky gods and science ction. But today, as superstorms ravage coastal cities and
pollution blankets entire countries, averting climate catastrophe has become a
serious foreign-policy issue. Not that it appears that the worlds major powers are making much headway in their diplomatic efforts to stop global warming.
Instead, it is falling to so-called geoengineers to game out strategies for deliberate,
large-scale interventioneverything from dumping iron slurry into the ocean in order
to create massive CO2-sucking algae blooms to bombarding the stratosphere with
sulfate-laced artillery to deect sunlight. With the worlds fate potentially resting on
the shoulders of these climate hackers, its worth recalling the dubious history of
weather manipulation. Ty McCormick
1841
1967-1972
1932
1974
1896
1965
Foreign Policy
WorldMags.net
December 1976
May 1990
WorldMags.net
August 2006
At a NASA conference
in Silicon Valley, Lowell
Wood, a former top weapons designer at
the Pentagon, lays out an instant climatic
gratication scheme to reverse global
warming. The plan involves using artillery
to re as much as 1 million tons of sulfate
aerosols into the Arctic stratosphere in
order to dull the suns rays and build up
sea ice that could then cool the planet.
Science historian James R. Fleming,
writing in Wilson Quarterly, likens
Woods plan to declaring war on the
stratosphere.
November 2006
August 8, 2008
October 2008
April 2009
A British academic
consortium called
Stratospheric Particle Injection for Climate
Engineering attempts to carry out the worlds
rst large-scale geoengineering eld test
aimed at reversing global warming. But the
experiment, a smaller version of the groups
grand plan to pump reective particles into
the atmosphere through a 20-kilometer-long
hose held aloft by a hot-air balloon, never gets
off the ground for political reasons.
September 2011
2012
March 2013
May 2013
April 2014
29
IN
BOX
IDEAS WorldMags.net
BY JOSHUA E. KEATING
THE GUN SHOW: A 2013 study in the journal Psychological Science found
that men with large biceps are more economically selfish than their scrawnier
counterparts. In other words, rich dudes with big guns opposed wealth
redistribution policies more strongly than rich but less ripped bros. Among poorer
guys, the men with bigger muscles were more likely to support redistribution. The
authors theorize that evolutionary factors are at work: Men with greater fighting
ability will more actively attempt to acquire or defend resources.
BECAUSE OF DIXIE:
The Confederate ag
provokes strong
opinions in the
United States,
whether as a symbol
of Southern pride or a
white supremacist relic.
But can just looking
at the Stars and Bars
subconsciously make
someone more racist? In
2010, researchers found
that study participants who
were shown a Confederate ag
reported less willingness to vote
for Barack Obama than those who
were shown a neutral symbol. The same
eect held true for a hypothetical
black candidate.
30
Foreign Policy
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
MOMS VS. MARKETS
nalysts often borrow from the vocabulary of disease to describe nancial crises, using words such as
pandemic and contagion to discuss how economic disturbances spread. But recent research suggests a
more literal connection between the two: In poor countries, actual disease can infect the nancial system.
In a study for the Journal of Banking & Finance, Patrick Leoni and Thomas Lagoarde-Segot of Kedge Business
School in France looked at tuberculosis outbreaks in 80
countries between 1995 and 2009. They found that spikes
in infections were correlated with reductions in banking
deposits, nancial system deposits, and private creditall
key indicators of nancial stability.
The problem is that in poor regions, people nd medical treatment expensiveand generally an out-of-pocket
expense. Once people get infected, theyre forced to
stop working and use their savings to pay for medical
care, Leoni says. When infection spreads, a lot of small
withdrawals can send ripples through a fragile nancial
sector. Bankers, fearing literal contagion, are then forced
to anticipate further withdrawals and start dumping
long-term investments and taking shorter-term positions.
Over time, this conservative behavior affects a countrys
growth prospects.
The authors note that richer countries with strong social
safety nets are more resistant to this phenomenon. But they
caution banks in developing countries against knee-jerk responses to health pandemics. Borrowing from the language
of medicine, they write that an essential prophylactic
measure is to increase bank reserves, and somewhat reduce
long-term risk when there are signs that a disease outbreak
is under way. Saudi bankers, get your mers reserves ready.
WorldMags.net
31
IN
BOX
WorldMags.net
THE OPTIM I ST | BY C HA R L E S K EN NY
Barriers to Entry
mericans spent much of this summer arguing over immigration reform, and South Africans spent much of
it contemplating Nelson Mandelas legacy. But the
link between the two went unnoticed: One of Mandelas biggest legacies was to show that immigration
reformon a scale hugely more ambitious than anything proposed in the halls of the U.S. Congresscan
benet everyone, in real economic terms.
One of the earliest acts of South Africas rst postapartheid government was to break down borders within
the country that had prevented members of the black African majority from choosing where they worked and lived.
In economic terms, this reform created a true single market, equivalent to what would happen if the United States
pulled down the border fence with Mexico and gave all
comers citizenship. To many Americans, thats a terrifying
32
Foreign Policy
thoughtas it was to white Afrikaners, who predicted economic collapse. But, instead, virtually everyone got richer
after borders were opened within South Africaand in
relatively short order. Mandelas government demonstrated
that large-scale border dismantling can be good for people
on both sides of the fence.
Among its litany of evils, the white South African government had declared that blacks were nationals of particular homeland states, or Bantustans, based on their
ethnicity. The apartheid regime drew up the borders of
these supposed states with little regard to economic rationality or practicality, let alone the views and concerns
of the proposed residents. In 1970, black South Africans
were issued papers for one of the 10 Bantustans, and many
were stripped of their South African citizenship. Millions
of blacks were forcibly resettled to their new homelands,
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
VAL LAWLESS/BIGSTOCK
IN
BOX
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
35
IN
BOX
WorldMags.net
cember 2011, the nal U.S. troop convoy simply rode across
the border under the cover of darkness.
Afghanistan is a different story, given its hostile terrain, unforgiving winters with temperatures that regularly drop well
below freezing, and the menace of being landlocked. The countrys well-worn reputation as the graveyard of empires is not lost
on todays logisticians. The Taliban often
point to Britains catastrophic 1842 defeat
in the First Anglo-Afghan War, when all but
a handful of Brits were massacred while retreating from Kabul. Although Moscows
1979 invasion of Afghanistan was a mere
road trip through Soviet Central Asia, its
exit almost a decade later, over the Sovietbuilt Friendship Bridge connecting Afghanistan and Uzbekistan, was harder to
pull off. Withdrawing troop convoys were
regularly ambushed while snaking through
the Salang Tunnel, the sole passage through
the Hindu Kush. The Soviets managed to
remove their helicopters and planes, but
the decaying superpower left behind as
many as half of its armored personnel
carriers and tanks, which are still strewn
across Afghanistan, frozen in moments of
abandonment by eeing soldiers. Just this
past January, a construction crew hit a Soviet tank that was buried underneath isafs
headquarters in Kabul.
Today, some nato equipment will intentionally be left behind in Afghanistan
as a gift for the 352,000-strong Afghan
forces, which took charge of the countrys
security in June. This bequest primarily
includes gear desperately needed to detect
and dismantle improvised explosive devices, as well as some hardened vehicles,
according to Lt. Gen. Nick Carter, who
stepped down as isafs deputy commander in July to become the British armys
commander of land forces. Empty shipping containers, battered vehicles, and the
metal skeletons of bases, meanwhile, are
destined for local scrap yards. Unlike the
Soviets, however, the Americans will take
home the bulk of their materiel, including high-value equipment
such as mraps (mine-resistant ambush-protected vehiclesthe
sand-colored monstrosities that roam Kabuls streets in trios)
and vehicle-mounted artillery used against the Taliban in places
such as Kandahar. At Bagram Aireld, an hour north of Kabul,
scores of mraps sit parked in neat rows, ready for their long
journey home to bases and depots across the United States.
For the most part, Pakistan is the way out, Shapiro says
(just as its been used to ship in materiel during the war). The
gear is conveyed initially by trucktraveling approximately
1,000 miles overland from the major bases in southern and
36
Foreign Policy
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
eastern Afghanistan, through large, often dangerous swaths of
the Pakistani countrysidebefore reaching the gang-plagued,
multicultural metropolis of Karachi on the Arabian Sea. The
gear is then loaded onto cargo ships that set sail for the Saudi
port of Jeddah and Egypts Port Said before crossing the Atlantic Ocean to the United Statessome 8,300 miles in total.
The trucking and shipping process is managed by U.S.
Transportation Command (Transcom), the Defense Department arm that oversees air, land, and sea transport for the military, and Transcom chief William Fraser makes routine trips
to Afghanistan from his Illinois headquarters to check on the
progress. I spoke with Fraser, a burly, no-nonsense general, on
the sprawling grounds of the military section of Kabuls international airport, where several C-5 Galaxy cargo planes, their
hulking gray bodies reecting the sunlight, sat in a row beside the runway. He explained that on an average day, major
global shipping rms, such as Singapore-based apl and U.S.
logistics giant Supreme Group, submit bids to move equipment from Afghanistan, via Karachi, to its nal destination.
Once the U.S. military agrees to a price, the contractor hires
Pakistani subcontractorstruckers and cleanersto move the
gear and prepare it for voyage.
But relying so heavily on Pakistan has worsened Americas
logistical headache. Oil tankers are frequently blown up by
militants in the country, while other trucks are attacked and
robbed, with their cargo making its way to black market ven-
dors like Sa. And agonizingly for the Americans, for seven
months starting in late 2011, the Pakistani route was closed,
a setback that still chills logisticians. After a U.S. air attack
accidentally killed 24 Pakistani soldiers along the border with
Afghanistan that November, Islamabad shut the supply lines,
abruptly halting all nato-led convoys coming in and out of
Afghanistan. (Expats in Kabul felt the closures shock waves
several months later when we suddenly found ourselves without any bootlegged alcohol.) In July 2012, supply lines were
reopened, and the following December, Washington and Islamabad reached a nal agreement that kept the routes open
in exchange for increased fees from the United States.
While the nato supply lines were closed, several months
worth of fuel, food, and weapons coming into theater
Fraser estimates about 7,000 shipments in Karachi alone
and military equipment heading out for retrograde piled up
at Pakistans main port and the Torkham border crossing. The
blockage has only recently started to clear, Fraser says. The
rst shipment of materiel to arrive on U.S. shores after the
border reopened, a consignment of several containers and vehicles, didnt reach its destination, Jacksonville, Florida, until
this past April. Pre-closure in Pakistan, I want to say we were
looking at about 3,500 to 3,600 crossings [across the Afghanistan-Pakistan border] a month, he says. And we are looking
forward to getting back to that level now. He wouldnt say
where the gure currently stands.
WorldMags.net
37
WorldMags.net
38
Foreign Policy
WorldMags.net
PERETZ PARTENSKY
IN
BOX
WorldMags.net
ALL ACCESS
Visit: http://foreignpolicy.com/ALLACCESS
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
PICTU RE D | S IM CH I YI N
Burma Illuminated
Advertisements for
Western-style clothes
tower over Yangon
food stalls selling
traditional noodles.
WorldMags.net
A young woman
uses her cell phone
on a ferry ride
across Lake Inle.
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
Passengers crowd
into a bus as dusk
falls in downtown
Yangon.
Children play in
a fountain at
Yangons Junction
Square, a brandnew mall.
WorldMags.net
THINK AGAIN:
AMERICAN NUCLEAR
DISARMAMENT
A smaller atomic arsenal
isnt just wishful thinking
its bad strategy.
BY MATTHEW KROENIG
WorldMags.net
IntroducIng
Lockheed MartIn InternatIonaL.
Partnering for Protection and ProsPerity.
Committed to advancing global security and strengthening local economies, Lockheed Martin has launched
a new organization dedicated to strengthening our global partnerships. From the F-35 Lightning II and
C-130J aircraft, to integrated air and missile defense, to commercial satellites and cyber security
Lockheed Martin International is devoted to helping our customers achieve their missions with proven
performance, key industrial partnerships, and an expanded base of operations.
www.lockheedmartin.com
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
44
Foreign Policy
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
for nuclear deterrence. Although secure and devastating are imprecise
terms, many analysts would say that a
few dozen submarine-launched ballistic
missiles, each with multiple warheads,
is plenty because at-sea subs are difcult to target in a rst strike and the
repower provided by, say, 200 nuclear
weapons is impressive. By their logic,
anything more is overkill that can be
cut with little loss to U.S. security.
Although it is possible that no sane
leader would intentionally start a
nuclear war with a state that possesses
even a small deterrent force, nucleararmed states still have conicting interests that can lead to crises. And it
turns out that, contrary to widely held
assumptions, the nuclear balance of
power is critically important to how
such disputes are resolved.
Recently, I methodically reviewed the
relationship between the size of a countrys nuclear arsenal and its security. In
a statistical analysis of all nuclear-armed
countries from 1945 to 2001, I found
that the state with more warheads was
only one-third as likely to be challenged
militarily by other countries and more
than 10 times more likely to prevail in
a crisisthat is, to achieve its basic political goalswhen it was challenged.
Moreover, I found that the size of this
advantage increased along with the
margin of superiority. States with vastly
more nukes (95 percent of the two countries total warheads) were more than
17 times more likely to win. These ndings held even after accounting for disparities in conventional military power,
political stakes, geographical proximity,
type of political system, population, territorial size, history of past disputes,
and other factors that could have inuenced the outcomes.
When the United States operated from
a position of nuclear strength during the
Cold War, it stopped the Soviet Union
from building a nuclear submarine base
in Cuba in 1970 and deterred Moscow
from increasing support to its Arab allies
in the 1967 and 1973 Arab-Israeli wars.
By contrast, when the nuclear balance
was less favorable to Washington, it was
unable to achieve clear victories in crises
against the Soviet Unionfor example,
failing to roll back Moscows 1979 invasion of Afghanistan.
In a game of chicken,
we should expect the
smaller car to swerve
first. The United States
has always driven
a Hummer, but it is
trading it in for a Prius.
In addition, qualitative evidence from
the past 70 years shows that leaders pay
close attention to the nuclear balance
of power, that they believe superiority enhances their position, and that a
nuclear advantage often translates into
a geopolitical advantage. During the
Cuban missile crisis, American nuclear
superiority helped compel Moscow to
withdraw its missiles from the island.
As Gen. Maxwell Taylor, then chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, wrote
in a memo to Defense Secretary Robert McNamara, We have the strategic
advantage in our general war capabilities. This is no time to run scared.
Similarly, Secretary of State Dean Rusk
argued, One thing Mr. Khrushchev
may have in mind is that he knows that
we have a substantial nuclear superiority, but he also knows that we dont really live under fear of his nuclear weapons to the extent that he has to live
under fear of ours.
We see similar patterns in South Asia.
When asked years later why Pakistan ultimately withdrew its forces from Indian
Kashmir during the 1999 Kargil crisis,
former Indian Defense Minister George
Fernandes cited his countrys nuclear
superiority. In the event of a nuclear exchange, he said, We may have lost a
part of our population [but] Pakistan
may have been completely wiped out.
This may sound crazy. To most people, But you should see the other guy
would be scant consolation for losing
perhaps millions of ones fellow citizens.
But the truth is that nuclear war might
well be more devastating for one country than for the other, even if both sides
can inict unacceptable damage. As
Cold War nuclear strategist Herman
Kahn wrote, Few people differentiate
between having 10 million dead, 50
WorldMags.net
45
46
Foreign Policy
But a Smaller
Arsenal Will Help the
United States Discourage
Nuclear Proliferation.
KEEP DREAMING.
Proponents of deep cuts claim that a
smaller arsenal will help the United
States stop the spread of nuclear weapons to rogue states and terrorists because
having so many nuclear weapons makes
it difcult (if not hypocritical) to tell, say,
Iran that it cannot have any or to convince non-nuclear countries (such as Brazil and Turkey) to help pressure Iran.
This argument makes sense at a supercial level, but on closer inspection it falls
apart. As Irans leaders decide whether
to push forward with, or put limits on,
their nuclear program, they likely consider whether nuclear weapons would
improve their security, whether they
have the technical capability to produce
nuclear weapons, whether they could
withstand economic sanctions or mili-
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
point, including when the United States
possessed more than 30,000 warheads.
Some advocates argue that many
states signed the npt only because it
mandates cuts to existing nuclear arsenals, but in fact the npt does not require cuts or disarmament. It simply requires all states to pursue negotiations
in good faith on measures relating to
disarmament. So though the United
States can by all means pursue negotiations, it should not come to a deal that
further reduces its nuclear stockpile
until the world has been made safe for
disarmamentand that, unfortunately,
will not happen anytime soon.
It would only be by failing to fully modernize the systems that deliver the warheadsintercontinental ballistic missiles,
bombers, and submarinesthat the United
States could hope to save money. But unless
it completely disarms or kills a leg of this
triad, the countrys aging missiles, bombers, and subs will need to be upgraded.
Delaying the modernization of delivery vehicles, as some have suggested, would save
only an estimated $3.9 billion annually
over 10 years, an amount that is nothing
short of trivial compared with the overall
U.S. defense budget, which is roughly $600
billion per year.
Over the long term, the budget-savings
argument becomes even less compelling.
Nuclear weapons provide a lot of bang for
the buck, literally and guratively. President Dwight Eisenhowers New Look
policy in the 1950s emphasized nuclear
weaponsas does current Russian military doctrinebecause they are less costly
than comparable conventional capabilities. If the United States continues to cut
its nuclear arsenal, it will need to develop
new conventional capabilities to ll the
roles and missions previously performed
Just War
Matthew Levitt
Intelligence and
Surprise Attack
Erik J. Dahl
FOLLOW US @GUPRESS
WorldMags.net
47
WorldMags.net
48
Foreign Policy
While it is fashionable
in Washington
to talk about nuclear
reductions, for the rest
of the world, nukes
are the new black.
nuclear weapons, including their rst use
early in a crisis, to compensate for its
weakened conventional military. Russia
is subject to the same strategic-warhead
limits that apply to the United States under New start, but it also maintains an
arsenal of 3,800 tactical nukessmaller
weapons intended for battleeld use.
Moscow is building a rail-mobile missile,
has commissioned new nuclear-capable
submarines, and plans to construct a next
generation of heavy intercontinental ballistic missiles (icbms).
Chinas nuclear weapons also serve as a
deterrent against Americas superior conventional power. During the Cold War,
China appeared content with a minimum
deterrenta result, experts speculated, of
Mao Zedongs strategic thinking. But recent scholarship suggests that Chinas nuclear arsenal was stunted by organizational and political pathologies. The kinks are
now out of the system and Beijing is going
bigger. According to the Pentagon, China
is expanding its arsenal of warheads,
building new nuclear-armed submarines,
and developing next-generation, roadmobile icbms with multiple independently targeted re-entry vehicle warheads. If
U.S.-China relations deteriorate, Beijing
might eventually leverage its massive
economy to match or surpass Americas
nuclear capabilities. Additional U.S. reductions would only make such a sprint
to parity all the more tempting.
At this very moment, India and Pakistan are engaged in the most intense
nuclear arms race the world has seen
since the Cold War. India needs nukes
to deter Chinas superior conventional
and nuclear might to its northeast and
to counter Pakistans nuclear weapons to
the northwest. New Delhis nuclear arsenal has grown by more than 200 percent
in the past decade and now includes an
estimated 100 warheads. It is developing
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
Nunna bipartisan group of minences grisesendorsed setting the goal
of a world free of nuclear weapons and
working energetically on the actions
required to achieve that goal. Their
article reinvigorated the nuclear disarmament movement and helped spark
an international Global Zero campaign that has drawn the support of
former generals, ambassadors, and political ofcials from the United States
and around the world. It is on the
wave of this support that Obama announced his intention to reduce nuclear arsenals radically and move toward
a world without nuclear weapons.
But it is not clear that a world without nuclear weapons would be desirable, and it certainly isnt feasible.
Only if we could fundamentally transform international politics such that
states no longer faced security threats
might there be reason to think that the
world could be made safe for global
zero. And even proponents admit this
day may never come. In his famous
Prague speech, Obama confessed, Im
to start trouble. Where this is not possible, the United States must aim for a
posture that limits damage to the U.S.
homeland to the greatest extent possible
and that at least ensures destruction of
an adversary.
That means the United States should
refrain from additional nuclear reductions and should maintain the hedge
force of weapons it keeps in reserve. The
Obama administration must also follow
through on its promise to fully modernize U.S. nuclear infrastructure. Finally,
the country must prepare for the possibility that if China or other strategic
competitors continue to expand their
nuclear arsenals, the United States might
once again have to build up its strategic
forces. You dont bring a knife to a gunght, and America shouldnt bring a
crippled nuclear arsenal to the second
nuclear age.
Matthew Kroenig is associate professor
and international relations eld chair in
Georgetown Universitys Department of
Government.
As a faculty member and senior research fellow at The Fletcher School, Kim Wilson challenges her students to
think critically about how market solutions can support economic and human development. Her work, like that
of others at Fletcher, hinges on the increasingly complex interplay between business and geopolitics.
From microfnance to the Euro crisis, todays headlines remind us how business is not only afected by change
but also vital to solving problems and unlocking opportunities. A business education from FletcherAmericas
oldest exclusively graduate school of International Afairsis now more essential than ever. The Master of
International Business integrates concrete business skills and nuances of geopolitics. Graduates launch careers
that span borders and disciplines, in consulting, fnance, policy, MNCs, NGOs, the UN, and more.
Change the world. Make the headlines.
WorldMags.net
49
WorldMags.net
THE GLOBAL
BUSINESS OF VICE*
Men are more easily governed through their vices than through their
virtues, Napoleon Bonaparte said. But for all his world-conquering
ambition, the French ruler never envisioned an empire like this. Where
once the commerce in humanitys baser instincts was conned to the
shadows, today the business of viceboth legitimate and altogether
illegalis a global enterprise, corporatized and commoditized by private
rms, governments, and nonstate actors alike. From drugs to gambling to
booze, fps rst vice issue takes a hard look at the business of sin. Whether
anyone can stop the marketing of decadence and debauchery isnt really
the question. Its whether anyone still wants to.
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
76
Whisky
Sugar
Gambling
Beer
Meth
58
64
The Sindex
The Snaxis of Evil
52
60
66
BERTRAND GARDEL/GETTY IMAGES; PHOTO ILLUSTRATION BY CURTISS CALLEO AND BILLY DAVIS
71
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
S,
0
ON 1 8 2
S
& OCK
G
I
A
R
T
E
T
H
P
U
.
d
l
r
o
w
he
t
d
ere
u
q
n
co
r OLAVI
e
k
l
a NM
W AFSHI
e
i
nn BY
oh
J
ow
GETTY IMAGES
R
KE
RN
AL LMA
W KI
N
J O HI S H E D
L
AB
ST
32
52
Foreign Policy
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
53
33
WorldMags.net
The television spot says nothing about the product but everything about the countrys long march from poverty toward
prosperity. In the advertisement, thousands of Mexicans, men
and women, young and old, are bound by chains to a massive
boulder. They trudge forward up a dusty mountain, faces contorted and blackened, eyes downcast. The boulder pulls them
back. A buzzard circles above. They push forward again, straining and wincing, and thenwith a crunchthe boulder slides
back downhill, throwing them to the ground.
But not so fast. One by one, they stand up and unchain themselves. Unburdened, they walk with gritted smiles and purpose
up the dusty talus slope, leaving the boulder behind. Cue the
soaring music. Cue the blue-sky vistas. Cue the tag line: Keep
Walking Mexico.
Its a brilliant ad, and youd be forgiven for not immediately
realizing its for Scottish booze. (Frankly, the Sisyphean strivers look like theyd prefer water.) The only hint is the familiar
Johnnie Walker logo, the stylized Striding Man, accompanying the tag line. The metaphor of national achievement is
clear, but the ad doesnt just tell the story of Mexico today. It
also highlights Johnnie Walkers aggressive push into emerging markets and the rush by multinational consumer-products
companies to catch the middle-class tsunami that is transforming the world.
The Brookings Institutions Homi Kharas estimates that the
global middle class will hit 4.9 billion people by 2030, growing by 3 billion from todayand theyll spend $56 trillion a
year, up from $21 trillion today. Virtually all that growth will
come from emerging economies. Thats a lot of people walking
upwardand a lot of potential Johnnie Walker drinkers.
Thats why executives from Starbucks to McDonalds to
Coca-Cola see their future in the global middle class, and
thats why Johnnie Walkers parent company, the booze behemoth Diageo, is pushing into liquor stores from Chile to
China. Paul Walsh, a Diageo board member and former ceo,
said in a statement about 2012 business results that the rms
expanding reach to emerging middle class consumers in faster growing markets was the key driver of our volume growth.
And Johnnie Walker, the worlds No. 1-selling Scotch whisky,
has been a crucial part of that growth. Today, four bottles of
Johnnie Walker are consumed every second, with some 120
million bottles sold annually in 200 countries. Five of Johnnie
Walkers top seven global markets are in the emerging world:
Brazil, Mexico, Thailand, China, and a region the company
calls Global Travel Asia and Middle East.
sk anyone who travels in emerging markets or developing economies, and chances are theyve been offered
Johnnie Walker. These are just some of the places Ive
seen it poured: at a Beijing gathering of techies, a fourday wedding in Jaipur, countless bars in Dubai, a Nile
cruise in Egypt, the home of an Arab diplomat in Bangkok, private homes in Tehran, a middle-class Istanbul house,
and diplomatic parties in Riyadh.
Journalists who spent time in Baghdad during the Iraq war
marveled at the easy availability of Johnnie Walker Black Label, even when food staples were scarce. The late writer Christopher Hitchenswho fondly referred to the drink as Mr.
Walkers amber restorativeaccurately noted that Black
Label was the favorite drink of the Iraqi Baath Party. In
Saddam Husseins era, a smuggler could make a good living
taking crates across the border for thirsty Iranians. On a trip
from Tehran to Irans Kurdish regions on the Iran-Iraq border
in the late 1990s, I stopped at the small city of Mahabad. A
local smuggler peered into the car window, saw a group of city
slickers from the capital, and asked simply in his Persian accent: Johnnie Valker? He, of course, offered us very good
price, my friend.
Its uncanny, the ubiquity of the striding Scot and his blended
whisky (no e for the Scottish kind). Its everywhere, particularly among the upper end of the middle classes that the worlds
corporations are chasing. In Thailand, businessmen place a
bottle of Black Label on the table before a closing negotiation.
In Japan, bottles have become an essential part of the ritualized
gift-giving culture. In India, one of Bollywoods most famous
comedians even took the name Johnny Walker. Its such a status
symbol in Asia that Johnnie Walker knockoffs arent hard to
nd. You probably wouldnt want to serve guests the counterfeit liquor, but the bottle looks good on the mantle.
And in Africa, the newest gold mine of emerging markets,
Diageo is cultivating a fresh generation of whisky drinkers. In
downtown Nairobi, a 20-story billboard of the Striding Man
towers alongside a skyscraper. African musicians and athletes
have been named brand ambassadors, and premium magazines are running a series of print ads that say simply: Step
Up. As in, step up to a better life, step up to the middle class,
step up from that stale beer to a higher state of being: Become a whisky drinker. The print advertisement hawks Red
54
Foreign Policy
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
o how did a little whisky company from a little country become the global brand of upward mobility? Or, to
repurpose a question once posed by Scottish judge Lord
Cockburn, no fan of his countrymens favored drink:
Whisky no doubt is a devil; but why has this devil so
many worshippers?
In 1819, a young John Walker, the son of a local farmer,
opened a small general store on King Street in Kilmarnock,
a town in Ayrshire, Scotland. A general grocer, Walker also
sold wines and spirits, including his own blended whiskies.
The author Robert Bruce Lockhart noted that Walkers capital was tiny and his business small and purely local, but he
had his full share of Ayrshire grit and thrift. For the rst 30
years, his business was steady but unremarkable and gave no
WorldMags.net
55
WorldMags.net
BEIRUT
oday, Diageo is walking toward India and the acquisition of United Spirits, the countrys largest alcoholic
drinks rm, with 60 percent of the market. In July, it
acquired a 25 percent stake in the company, and it aims
to own more than half. Indians consume more whiskey
than any other country in the world, and the distribution
network Diageo would get with the purchase of United Spirits
is akin to a raw materials producer gaining access to internal
rail networks or shipping ports. Diageo has also acquired Brazils Ypioca, the third-largest producer of cachaca, the popular sugar-cane-based spirit that adds the kick to caipirinhas
from Sao Paulo to San Diego. It also recently had its eyes on
Mexicos Jose Cuervo, the worlds top-selling tequila-maker.
China is the big prize, though. There alone the middle class
has grown to some 350 million people. According to consulting rm Ernst & Young, by 2030 China could see 1 billion
BEIJING
56
Foreign Policy
WorldMags.net
JOHNNIE WALKER
WorldMags.net
people in the middle classsome 70 percent of its projected
population. And theyll be toasting to their success: The market research company Euromonitor International predicts that
China alone will contribute 50 percent of the volume growth
of the spirits industry in coming years. China is already the
worlds largest spirits market, followed by Russia and then India, though the South Asian giant will move into the second
spot this year, according to industry estimates.
But will Chinese start quafng scotch? On a per capita basis,
whiskey consumption is still relatively low, with baijiu, a heady
clear-colored liquor distilled from sorghum, still the preferred
blend. But Johnnie Walker is striding ahead. In 2011, Diageo
acquired a controlling stake in Sichuan-based Shui Jing Fang,
a maker of baijiu, and the company has actively been courting
young, urban professional Chinesechuppieswith the familiar Keep Walking ad campaign. Since 2011, two Johnnie
Walker Houses have opened, in Shanghai and Beijing, offering tours that mix a dab of Scottish heritage, a dash of whisky
education, and a jigger of clubby exclusivity. On sale, of course,
is the full array of Johnnie Walker blends, including exclusive
limited-run editions of the super-high-end King George V Blue
Label, which can run north of $600 per bottle.
Admittedly, Johnnie Walker and Diageo have made a few
mistakes as well. A recent ad campaign for Blue Label, featuring a computer-generated Bruce Lee spouting inanities about
the good life in a Hong Kong penthouse, drew ire from devoted
fans of the martial artist, who was a teetotaler. The companys
2013
Todays faceless logo,
seen on Scotch whisky
bottles from Melbourne
to Mexico City.
WorldMags.net
33
WorldMags.net
Which country is the drunkest of them all?
The laziest? The fattest? Someone has
to ask the tough questions. Fortunately,
human vicesfrom vanity to gluttony to
slothare a favorite subject of organizations
around the world dedicated to exposing and
(sometimes) reforming our worst habits.
The result: FPs rst Sindex. We hope you
enjoyresponsibly, of course.
THE
X
E
D
N
SI
VANITY:
zzzz
z
z
zz
pla
surstic
ger
y
NEW
NOS
E
-$
zzzz
zz
TOOL
C
A
S
I
N
O
-$
J
8
Sources: International Society of Aesthetic Plastic Surgery, Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, H2 Gambling Capital,
Companies & Markets, Forbes, Adam & Eve, United Nations Oce on Drugs and Crime, World Health Organization Global Health Observatory
Data Repository, CIA World Factbook, U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization, Euromonitor International, World Bank.
WorldMags.net
GETTY IMAGES
SLOTH:
WorldMags.net
SEX:
$1
BILLION
RS
O
AT
IBR
XX
X
T
FAS
M
AL
RE
IT
BB
RA
IN
US
ALL
SM
S
OM
ND
CO
$430
MILLION
GA
ME
XL
M
XS
GA
ME
DRUGS:
bar
ALCOHOL:
South Koreans
drink the most hard liquor
(approximately 24 liters per
capita annually); the Cook
Islands qua the most beer (182
liters per capita); and France, no
surprise, imbibes the most wine
(55 liters per capita).
-$
GLUTTONY:
+$
WorldMags.net
GETTY IMAGES
WorldMags.net
32
60
Foreign Policy
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
partment. (At one point, the Mexican government began taxing drinks
sweetened with high-fructose corn
syrup, but the erce objections of
U.S. corn reners prompted Washington to complain to the World
Trade Organization and the tax was
eventually struck down.)
In many ways, Mexicos diet is
being devastated by Americas perverse economic incentives. The United States has long imposed relatively
high tariffs on sugar imports and
granted large subsidies for domestic
crops such as corn and soybeans.
In the 1970s, however, when sugar
tariffs rose even further and technological advances from Japan helped
perfect high-fructose corn syrup
production, agribusinesses use of
the sweetener exploded. Suddenly,
it was cheaper to put high-fructose
corn syrup in everything from spaghetti sauce to soda. Coke and Pepsi
swapped out sugar for high-fructose
corn syrup in 1984, and most other
U.S. soda and snack companies followed suit. U.S. per capita consumption of high-fructose corn
syrup spiked from less than half a pound a year in 1970 to a
peak of almost 38 pounds a year in 1999. As it did, American
obesity spiked as well.
The problem was not just that shoppers were more willing
to buy (and consume) a cheaper product, but also that highfructose corn syrup actually seems to be less healthy than natural sugar. Despite a multimillion-dollar advertising campaign
backed by corn producers, with gauzy pictures of mothers assuring us that high-fructose corn syrup is simply a form of
sugar made from corn, there do seem to be important differences. Yale University researchers released a study this past
January suggesting that fructose simply does not trigger the
same sense of being satiated as glucose does. This builds on
2010 research from Princeton University scientists who found
that rats ingesting high-fructose corn syrup gained signicantly
more weight than those eating sugar, in addition to experiencing abnormal increases in body fat. Research released this year
from Canadas University of Guelph found that a high-fructose
corn syrup diet in rats produced addictive behavior similar to
that from cocaine use.
Ill admit that an evil American plan to fatten the world
sounds like an outlandish conspiracy theory. But consider the
sad saga of Samoa and the American turkey tail. Turkey tails,
which can be some 40 percent fat, were long a largely unwanted byproduct of the U.S. poultry industry. James Sumner, president of the usa Poultry & Egg Export Council, acknowledged
this year that turkey tails would likely only be used for pet
food in the United States. But after World War ii, clever marketers began dumping them on Samoa, which enjoyed strong
WorldMags.net
61
WorldMags.net
NAGALAND, INDIA
62
Foreign Policy
WorldMags.net
AFP/GETTY IMAGES
WorldMags.net
from 42 to 18 percent. Economists have estimated that every 10 percent rise in the price
of a pack of cigarettes reduces cigarette consumption in the United States by as much as
5 percent, helping explain why American tobacco companies are looking more to China
and other less regulated and taxed markets
for future growth. It does not seem coincidental that Americas twin behemoth tobacco companies, R.J. Reynolds and Philip
Morris, moved into the food businessbuying up or merging with snack companies including General Foods, Kraft, and Nabisco
in the 1980sto diversify their portfolios as
domestic tobacco sales came under mounting
pressure.
The big players in the U.S. food industry
have certainly acted like the tobacco pushers
MEXICO CITY
as they have deployed an incredible array of
scientic and marketing research designed to
get people to eat more, often at the obvious expense of their
health. In his book, Salt Sugar Fat: How the Food Giants
Hooked Us, journalist Michael Moss offers a damning portrait of food companies that have entire research wings dedicated to creating the ideal bliss point so that brain receptors
crave a food without ever triggering a sense of being satiated.
More often than not, adding sweetness has been the easiest
way to fool the brain, resulting in products like Yoplait yogurt, which tries to project a healthy image but, as Moss notes,
has twice as much real sugar per serving as Lucky Charms
cerealthe poster child for an unhealthy breakfast when I was
growing up.
Taking another page from Big Tobaccos playbook, whenever
food companies and high-fructose corn syrup manufacturers
talk about obesity, they rely heavily on language stressing personal responsibility. They argue that kids around the globe just
arent exercising as much anymore and that consumers have every right to eat whatever they want to, using obvious truths to
gloss over the fact that they are ruthlessly maximizing science
and marketing to get people to embrace unhealthy lifestyles. As
the Center for Consumer Freedom exclaims, Eating a balanced
diet and getting plenty of physical activity is crucial. Unfortunately, Americans have been force-fed a diet of bloated statistics
hyping the problem of obesity. (The executive director of the
Center for Consumer Freedom also happens to run a Beltway
pr rm that specializes in defending corporate interests, and he
has acknowledged that the center has received signicant funding from food and restaurant companies.)
American consumers are wising up a bitin 2009, Kellogg
was forced to drop its claim that Frosted Mini-Wheats were
clinically shown to improve kids attentiveness by nearly 20
percent after a public outcrybut the costs of global obesity
are enormous and rising sharply. According to the who, many
low- and middle-income countries are, ironically, facing the
twin problems of obesity and undernutrition. More than 30
million overweight children now live in the developing world,
and many of themin a cruel trick of human biologyare
WorldMags.net
63
WorldMags.net
S
I
X
A
N
S EVIL
F
O
E
H
T
By Justin Rohrlich
Photographs by Lauren Coleman
64
Foreign Policy
The company behind the pitted, uneven surface and dry, waxy
consistency of this chocolate is Stella, a Cuban government venture
nanced in part with Italian capital. One bite was all Bittman
needed. Oh, thats not good chocolate was his rst reaction. But
it is chocolate. I mean, it tastes like chocolate. Its chocolate.
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
RYONGSONG ASIAN
PEAR JUICE AND
OMIJA SODA
NORTH KOREA
CHEE.TOZ
IRAN
CHEER UP SODA
PELLY PELLETS
CUBA
SYRIA
SHAM GARDENS
BREADSTICKS
SYRIA
IRAN
WorldMags.net
65
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
Matsu is best known in the
United States as a footnote
of Cold War history. China
and Taiwan fought a battle
there in 1958Chiang Kaisheks Nationalist forces had
held onto the islands in their
1949 retreat from the mainlandcausing U.S. Secretary
of State John Foster Dulles
to oat the idea of dropping
a nuclear weapon on the
Peoples Republic in order to
defend Matsu and the nearby island of Quemoy from communist incursion. As recently as 1999, tensions were high enough
that Taiwan, fearing an invasion, ordered troops stationed on
Matsu and Quemoy to cancel their holidays and remain at
their posts.
Relations between China and Taiwan have improved markedly since thenin June, the residents nally cleared the last
land mine from Matsuand so have prospects for holidays
on the islands. In 2009, in an attempt to encourage tourism
and revitalize economic growth, the Taiwanese legislature
passed a law allowing the outlying islands to vote on whether
to legalize gambling. The idea is to take what has historically
been one of the islands greatest vulnerabilities and turn it
into a strength: At its closest point, Matsu is just a few miles
from Chinaand its legions of big-spending gamblers.
Gambling is illegal in the Peoples Republic, but its residents
are some of the worlds highest rollers, both domestically,
where they wager billions of dollars annually on underground
games of chance, and abroad, where over the last decade a
growing number of increasingly wealthy Chinese have driven
a huge boom in casino construction and prot. Spurred by
the success of Macau, the worlds hottest gaming spot, casinos have mushroomed in Singapore, the Philippines, and Australia. The consulting rm PricewaterhouseCoopers forecasts
that the Asia-Pacic gaming market will net nearly $80 billion
in 2015, more than double its take in 2010and investors
and gaming companies are looking for the next best spot to
capture Chinese clientele.
William Weidner, owner of an eponymous resort development company and former chief operating ofcer for gambling
giant Las Vegas Sands, wants to make Matsu that spot. He
rst considered building a casino in Taiwans nearby Penghu
archipelago, but after that island countys referendum to allow
gambling failed, he turned his attention to Matsu. As part of
his charm offensive, Weidner has said he will spend $2.5 billion of the projects $8 billion budget to upgrade the islands
infrastructure and turn Matsu into a world-class resort. In
addition to a casino, the project envisions elevated causeways
linking Matsus two main islands, a university campus, a golf
course, a ferry terminal (complete with luxury high-speed ferries), an expanded airport built on reclaimed land, boutique
hotels, and Mediterranean-style villas for the visitors, the majority of whom the developers expect to be Chinese.
In April 2012, Weidner Resorts posted a slick Chineselanguage public relations video on its YouTube channel,
seemingly to impress upon
Matsus residents the ventures cosmopolitan nature.
The video features glamour
shots of Weidner with celebrities ranging from George
W. Bush to Sylvester Stallone
MATSU
and promises Matsu locals
the opportunity to realize
their dreams, create history and create wealth for their future generations. To sweeten the pot, Weidner said in July
2012 that if the casino opens and hits its targets, hell pay each
resident $609 a montha sum that will rise to $2,670 after
ve years. The Matsunese bought the pitch, and that month
the islands became the rst Taiwanese territory to approve
gambling.
Yang Sui-Sheng, the magistrate who oversees Matsu, is optimistic that the casino will be built, but he has no illusions as
to why Weidner chose his tiny corner of the Pacic. If casinos
were legalized in China, there would be no chance that investors
would come here, he says. This raises an interesting question:
Why doesnt China, with its growing wealth, consumptiondriven economy, and huge unmet demand, take advantage of
its own gaming market?
WorldMags.net
67
WorldMags.net
of the rectication of names. He believed that social disorder stemmed from the failure to accurately perceive reality,
and the solution was describing things as they are. Ever since
then, the Chinese have tried to subvert Confuciuss dictum:
Feet shaped by the excruciatingly painful process of footbinding, for example, were called golden lotuses. The communists under Mao were notoriously good at euphemisms. The
famine caused by the collectivist government program known
as the Great Leap Forward, which killed tens of millions of
people, is referred to as the three years of natural disasters.
And euphemism remains the key to vice in China. Because a
percentage of state lottery proceeds accrue to the Ministry of
Civil Affairs, the lottery is not considered gambling but a legal,
even benecial, social welfare project.
Foreign gaming companies have tried to use this trick in
their tful efforts to penetrate the Chinese market. In 1993,
for example, a Malaysian company opened a slot machine
parlor in the dreary northeast city of Harbin, but because it
paid out gifts, not cash,
it was licensed for entertainment, not gambling,
according to Hong Kongs
South China Morning Post.
Harbin tolerated foreign slot
machines for a little while
a 2010 article in a provincial
newspaper described 1994
and 1995 as the craziest era for gambling in the cityuntil
it formally banned the machines in January 1996.
In 1993, another Malaysian company said it had obtained
a license to operate electronic and electrical entertainment
machines in the nearby city of Dalianan experiment that
appears to have fared worse. Soon after the company announced the agreement, the citys then-mayor, Bo Xilainow
best known for a 2012 political scandal involving coup rumors, attempted defections, and murdersaid he was not
aware of any such deal. He added that gambling was strictly
prohibited and disapproved of by the central communist government, according to a report in the Straits Times, a Singaporean newspaper. If a club with betting machines should
open its doors in Dalian, it would be immediately closed, and
you can consider that an ofcial statement, a Bo aide said
in July 1993.
That doesnt mean that people in Dalian and Harbin actually stopped gambling or that enterprising businesspeople
stopped providing them with illicit opportunities to do so.
As Chinas economy has grown, however, the stakes have
gotten higher. In 2003, the disposable income of the average
urban resident was about $1,000; in 2012, it was roughly
$4,000. Chinese with the means to scratch the gambling itch
go overseas; last year, Chinese people took 83 million trips
abroad, on which they spent more than $100 billion. The
Chinese are now the partygoer everyone wants to invite,
says Ben Lee, managing partner at IGamiX, a gambling consultancy in Macau.
Macau has laid out the red carpetnearly 90 percent of
its visitors are Chinese, says Martin Williams, Asia editor of
GamblingCompliance, a market analysis rm. The tiny former Portuguese colony borders southern Chinas Guangdong
province; with the right travel permit, it is an easy ferry, rail,
or plane trip from the mainland or Hong Kong. Once a sleepy
backwater, Macau allowed foreign companies to open casinos
in 2002. In just a decade it has become the worlds undisputed
gaming capital, with revenue six times greater than Las Vegas. On the day that the Sands Macao, that territorys rst Las
Vegas-style casino, opened in 2004, more than 20,000 people
swept in, literally ripping the doors off their hinges. Over the
next three years, gaming companies will build at least six more
casino resorts in Macau, at a cost of $20 billion.
Most countries that abut China have built casinos to cater to
the countrys legion of gamblers. Myanmar, Vietnam, and Laos
host gaming resorts near the border that exist just because of
China, says Andrew Klebanow, co-founder of the consultancy
Gaming Market Advisors. Singapore, which only allowed casinos to open in 2010, already hosts the worlds two most protable, with 2012 gaming revenues of $5.9 billion driven
by Chinese puntersjust
under the combined haul of
all of Las Vegass dozens of
casinos. Even Kazakhstan
has gotten in on the game.
The Astoria Club, for example, a gambling resort in
a lakeside town outside Almaty, provides a Chinese-language
book of rules and tutorials, says the casinos event manager,
who asked to go by his rst name, Batikhan. Chinese visitors
are welcome here, for sure!
But Almaty is quite a trip for the roughly half of Chinas
population that lives along the countrys east coastthe Kazakh city is some 2,000 miles from Beijingand investors and
developers are looking for the next big opportunity to draw
those visitors. Major casino projects have recently been announced in the Philippines and Vladivostok, the largest city
in the Russian Far East, which is a short ight for many of
the 120 million people who live in northeast China. Currently, their nearest legal gaming option is in the basement of the
Yanggakdo International Hotel, on an island in a river in the
middle of Pyongyang, North Korea. (South Korean casinos
are somewhat farther but a lot more inviting.) If it is built,
Weidners Matsu casino would be the closest optionand a
much swankier onefor tens of millions of people in southeast China.
68
Foreign Policy
f course, building a casino in China would presumably be the most convenient option, but doing so has
proved difcult.
In 2005, fresh off the success of opening the Sands
Macao, American gaming magnate Sheldon Adelson announced in a statement that the nearby city of Zhuhai
had selected his company, Las Vegas Sands, to proceed with
master planning for a resort on the citys Hengqin Island, and
in January 2007 the company issued a news release noting that
the local government had formed a committee to advance
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
the development of the project. The island is right next to
Macau, but unlike its neighbor is part of mainland China, so
Chinese can y or drive there without having to worry about
Macaus sometimes onerous visa regulations.
The resort might have been a good testing ground, serving
as a beachhead that could eventually host a casino, if laws
changed. But by 2008, with the economic climate worsening
and the Hengqin project still not approved, Las Vegas Sands
announced it had suspended its plans for the resort. In August 2012, the New York Times reported that a contractor
hired by the Sands was the focus of a U.S. federal investigation for bribery; early this year, the companys annual regulatory report acknowledged that it may have violated the
Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, the U.S. law that prohibits
bribing foreign ofcials. The company remains under investigation by the U.S. Justice Department and the Securities
and Exchange Commission. (A Sands spokesman declined
to comment.)
Gambling operations in China may have a greater chance
of success a few hundred miles to the southwest in Hainan,
Chinas smallest provinceprincipally composed of a large
tropical island that administers the Spratlys and the Paracels, archipelagos whose ownership China disputes with
several Southeast Asian countries. Its a linchpin to Chinas
regional policies, says Lee, the IGamiX consultant, so the
central government wants it to be economically healthy.
They want to see Hainan succeed. Sanya, Hainan Islands
southernmost city, has a number of large resorts, says
Adam Pliska, president of World Poker Tour, which hosts
and manages poker tournaments. If you look [at them],
RIZWAN TABASSUM/STRINGER
MACAU
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
Two days after the Reuters story was published, Chinese
authorities said they had shut down the casino. We are investigating it, and so far it looks like they have violated their
operating regulations, Chen Guangfa, the deputy director of
the Sanya Culture and Sports Bureau, told the wire service
for a follow-up article. In a July 23 interview, Chen told Foreign Policy that Zhangs bar got shut down because it offered entertainments that went beyond what our permits had
allowed. Zhang declined an interview request. Chen added
that the bar is now closed and undergoing reorganization.
70
Foreign Policy
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
ts a june night in Kinshasa, and rapper jb Mpianas weekly vip bash is just starting to
heat up. Toned groupies splash like mermaids in a sunken pool. Middle-aged businessmen perch on the ledge above to watch. A minute before midnight, jb runs onstage
among a huge posse of gyrating dancers in sunglasses. He rips into some of his biggest
hits; a bombastic performer, he glides across the stage with a beefy grace, dressed in a
hunter-orange jumpsuit and matching cap.
Most songs deal with the usual material, girls and gangbangers, in the Democratic Republic of the Congos Lingala language. But when jb starts to chant the lyrics of his biggest
hit of the night, the real purpose of this partyfestooned with yellow-and-blue banners
advertising Primus, the beer that everyone would be drinking anyway, even at this lush
downtown wine barbecomes obvious.
I love my Priiimus! jb yells. The crowd yells back: I love my beer!
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
KINSHASA
72
Foreign Policy
WorldMags.net
JASON MIKLIAN
n 1923, a group of European investors founded one of Africas rst breweries, naming it Brasserie de Lopoldville
after Belgian Congos colonial-era capital. Primus, its inaugural brew, did not fare particularly well, with drinkers
preferring better-tasting and cheaper Dutch and German
beers until the 1950s, when the companyin which the
Netherlands-based Heineken purchased a minority stake in
the 1930sbegan expanding production. Over time, Primus
became Bralimas marquee beer and a source of national pride:
a workhorse pilsner with a taste satisfaction directly proportional to the bottles coldness and the degree of grime built up
inside your sinuses from a day of breathing Congos dieselfume-laden air.
Following Congos independence from Belgium in 1960, Primus played a central role in the new country, even basing its logo
on the national ag. Bralimaas the company was now called,
for Brasseries, Limonaderies et Malteries Africainesbrewed a
whopping 145 million gallons of beer in 1974, the year Muhammad Ali and George Foreman duked it out in the Rumble in
the Jungle. When dictator Mobutu Sese Seko banned imported
beer for a time in the 1970s, he kept the Primus owing, making
it a core policy to maintain local production, while other services
and infrastructure crumbled and the state went bankrupt. Beer,
he believed, was the magic ticket to keeping his citizens happy: If
it ever ran out, his days would be numbered.
Ultimately, it wasnt beer that toppled Mobutu but a 1997
uprising supported by neighbors Burundi, Rwanda, and Uganda. The country was given a new name, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, but its struggles continued. The current
government, under President Joseph Kabila, has faced monumental challenges, from entrenched corruption and nonexistent infrastructure to raging conict both within and around
the country. Bigger than the U.S. Midwest, the drc holds some
70 million people. But, by some estimates, nearly 10 percent
of its population has died as a result of a series of fratricidal
civil wars that began in 1996. Last years mutiny by the M23
rebel group in the eastern city of Goma, as well as the ongoing
violence since then, has displaced hundreds of thousands and
killed hundreds. Rebel offshoots are now stockpiling weapons for a potential showdown with the worlds largest U.N.
peacekeeping force, which has been in the country since 1999
but has just been given an unprecedented mandate to take offensive action against the rebels.
Heineken, which bought out Bralima in 1982, has maintained
its investment in the drc throughout the turmoil, anticipating
major shifts in the global spirits trade, as giant conglomerates like
Belgiums Anheuser-Busch InBev and Londons sabMiller have
moved away from reliance on stagnant European and American markets to snap up foreign brands. Heineken doesnt report
prots by country, but Africa and the Middle East accounted for
$873 million in prots and 14.4 percent of the companys revenue in 2012. Frontier beers like Bralima are emerging-country
lottery tickets, chances to buy into a market before the country
booms and drinkers develop new, more exotic brand loyalties.
China, the big success story, saw a 1,000 percent explosion in
beer sales in the 1990s that led to local brands like Tsingtao
and Kingway Brewery being acquired by foreign companies and
later encouraged odd imports like the luxury Chinese version of
WorldMags.net
Pabst Blue Ribbon that sells for $44 a bottle. Since taking over
Bralima, Heineken has acquired major stakes in other national
classics like Egypts Stella, Indias Kingsher, and Mexicos Sol.
Under guidance from Amsterdam, Bralimas market share
in the drc has rocketed from 30 percent in 1987 to 60 percent todaywith Primus as the agship brand. Bralimas main
plant in Kinshasa, one of its six in the country, churns out
up to a quarter-million of the football-sized brown, dimpled
bottles every day, alongside Heineken, Coca-Cola, Sprite, and
Fanta. (Bralima is also the countrys biggest soda distributor.)
In addition to its contracts with
celebrities, the brewery has exclusive deals with many bars in
Kinshasa, which are festooned
with Primus-branded tables,
chairs, and ashtrays. Handpainted signs for Primus seem to
paper every surface in the drc, many with the slogan Toujours Leader! (Always the Leader!).
can be a checkpoint rebel in the eastern drc, including lessthan-scrupulous police and armed forces trying to supplement
their anemic wages.
M23 is one of the major players in the blockade racket.
Formed by those unsatised with a 2009 peace deal that had
only nominally integrated the Rwandan-backed rebels into the
Congolese army, the group, which is estimated to have up to
6,000 members, wants greater autonomy in parts of North
Kivu province. The United Nations sanctioned M23 late last
year, accusing it of murdering, raping, and looting across
swaths of eastern Congo in an
attempt to intimidate its way
to power. Longtime RwandanCongolese rebel general Bosco
Ntaganda, currently at the International Criminal Court on
charges of war crimes, rape, and
use of child soldiers, is one of the founders.
Eastern Congos levy bosses arent exactly hiding from international retribution. In a surprisingly easy-to-arrange conversation, we spoke by cell phone in July with a taciturn Rwandan
calling himself Mr. Damien, tax collector for M23. Damien
said that he splits his time between M23s three primary checkpoints, overseeing operations at the Bunagana, Kibati, and Kiwanja stations. As matter-of-factly as if discussing tolls on the
New Jersey Turnpike, Damien explained that he charges $38
for a van to pass, $300 for a medium-sized goods truck, and
$700 for fuel tankers, handing out ofcial-looking receipts
for payment. The three main checkpoints bring in most of the
groups funding, enough money to purchase weapons, pay
salaries and bribes, and even occasionally dole out social aid
to eastern Congos poor.
Everyone gets stopped, even the Bralima trucks painted like
big yellow-and-blue drc ags. Damien explained that M23
takes $500 from the trucks hauling crates of Primus into rebelcontrolled areas: ngos pay. People carrying charcoal pay.
Women going to the market pay. Everyone pays! We dont do
preferential treatments. So, of course, those who transport beer
also pay. Drivers leaving for rebel areas are given extra cash to
cover the payments, a security ofcer at one of Bralimas main
distribution depots in eastern Congo told us. By the time the
brown glass bottles reach their remote village destinations, prices
can rise to four times the $1 they cost in Kinshasa.
We took Damiens numbers and multiplied them by the
thousands of trips per year that Bralima runs through eastern
Congos rebel-held regions. Extrapolating from Bralimas drc
WorldMags.net
73
WorldMags.net
market share and per capita rates of beer consumption elsewhere in rural Africa, we estimate that approximately 16 million bottles of Bralima beer, or about 2,000 transport vehicles
worth, must pass through checkpoints each year. Assuming,
based on our low-end estimates, that these trucks are fortunate enough to be stopped only once per journey at the dozens
of blockades along the regions few transport links, manned
not only by M23 but also other road and river rebel sentries,
Bralima distributors could be paying upward of $1 million a
year to rebel groups.
When we presented Heineken with our gure this summer,
John-Paul Schuirink, nancial communications manager, said
that due to the complexity of the situation in the drc and the
use of local distributors, the amount and the payments were
difcult for Heineken to verify. But Schuirink said that in response to Foreign Policys inquiry, the company was in the
process of investigating and, as a precaution, had immediately suspended all payment of third party distributor invoices
in the area. Schuirink also noted in an email that this area
represents far less than 1% of
our total volume in the drc and
that the vast majority of our deliveries in the area are outside
of the territories that are under
the inuence of M23.
Bralima outsources its distribution to local independent
operators, a common way for
corporations working in militia- or cartel-controlled zones to
keep space between themselves and the road. Heineken has
denied that it uses local distributors to immunize the company,
pointing out that it operated this way for decades before the
rebels occupied the area. But the structure has certainly allowed Bralima to keep running in the east as warlords have
come and gone.
Bralima had breweries in cities under control of the rebel group
rcd-Goma during its occupation of eastern Congo between 1998
and 2003, explained Jason Stearns, who in 2008 headed the U.N.
Expert Group on Congo, conducting a special investigation into
violence in the countrys east. So the choice they would have
had at that pointand that any local businessman had at that
pointwas to disengage and to leave and stop business, or to
continue, Stearns said. Bralimas decision, along with those of
other companies that continued to operate in the region, was extensively documented in the Lutundula Report, the Congolese
parliaments 2005 assessment of conict proteering. Although
the widespread payments to rebels are common knowledge, the
WorldMags.net
AUBREY GRAHAM
GOMA
WorldMags.net
social investment, part public relations campaign, and part
community integration effort, csr assumes that if big companies can align their self-interest with the interests of the
countries in which theyre investing, everyone benets. Early
versions, such as the charitable works of United Fruit, may
have appeared to be little more than smoke screens for bad
practices overseas. In 1970, Milton Friedman called mixing social welfare and prot little more than hypocritical
window-dressing, a suicidal impulse for businesses. But
csr is now a multibillion-dollar industry in its own right
and an essential component of many major corporations,
complete with beautifully designed websites and thick,
glossy annual reports.
The Heineken Africa Foundation, for example, spent more
than half a million dollars last year supporting programs
for prenatal care, sickle cell anemia clinics, blood banks,
and primary schools. Heinekens 304-page csr report lists
dozens of positive projects, ranging from its comprehensive
aids program to the local sourcing of rice used at its production facilities. Bralimas foundation recently spent $90,000
building an orphanage. Almost all other international food
and drink conglomerates operating in fragile countries, from
Kraft and Mars to Pepsi and Nestl, undertake similar outreach. I have always believed that business could be a force
for good, ceo Irene Rosenfeld said upon the release of
Krafts 2010 csr report.
The most recent thinking about csr holds that the mere
presence of a major corporation in an unstable region is benecial. A century of scholarship on the complicated ties between poverty and violence has argued that greater economic
integration can help bring peace to chaotic parts of the world.
According to the World Bank, this sort of corporate opening is crucial for countries coping with and emerging from
violence and can lead to a better future for local residents.
Having Bralima in eastern Congo, so the theory goes, is a
csr activity in itself. It means better economic opportunities,
better clinics, better educational prospectsand in the long
term, a less violent society as economic growth decreases the
motivation to ght.
In reality, having Heineken in eastern Congo may boost
gdp, but its payments to rebels fuel a conict that leads
the country in the wrong direction. Will Reno, of Northwestern Universitys Program of African Studies, succinctly
described the dilemma: Will you favor csr and economic
opening, or consider the payments a violation of legal statute? You have to pick. It cant be both. Heinekens troubles
in eastern Congo, where just the cost of driving through the
region poses ethical and legal questions, point out exactly
what makes even the most socially responsible economic
opening so fraught in vulnerable countries. Who will enforce international law if, as seems plausible, Coca-Colas
reopening of its plant in Mogadishu requires taxes paid on
al-Shabab-controlled roads, if farc offshoots in Colombia
collecting money from sabMillers Bavarian-beer distributors buy more guns with the funds, or if Boko Haram shakes
down trucks laden with Nestl and Unilever products in Nigeria? Companies expanding into post-conict Afghanistan
will almost undoubtedly nd militia checkpoints awaiting
WorldMags.net
75
WorldMags.net
By Taimur Khan
76
Foreign Policy
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
RAJA ISLAM
WorldMags.net
33
77
WorldMags.net
32
78
Foreign Policy
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
AFP/GETTY IMAGES
LYARI TOWN
WorldMags.net
79
WorldMags.net
80
Foreign Policy
ne year before Ali Musa Gilani was charged in Islamabad, another young Pakistani man was arrested for his
alleged role in selling ephedrine on the global black market. Shiraz Malik, then 34, was taken into custody last
year after landing at Pragues airport on a ight from
Dubai. He was later extradited to the United States,
where he awaits trial in a federal court in California. Malik
is accused of running a multimillion-dollar industrial scale
online narcotics and precursor business, according to the U.S.
attorney in Californias Eastern District.
Undercover dea agents found a website for a Karachi-based
pharmacy that offered to ship a number of prescription opiates
WorldMags.net
AFP/GETTY IMAGES
WorldMags.net
as well as ephedrine, according to a criminal complaint the
dea led against Malik. After agents emailed the pharmacy,
Malik is alleged to have written back offering to send samples
of his wares via express mail. Between 2008 and 2011, Malik
mailed everything from heroin to ephedrine powder to Ritalin. The agents wired tens of thousands of dollars to bank accounts associated with Malik in the United States and Europe.
After accessing his email account, the agents found that Malik
had done regular ephedrine business with customers in Mexico. (They also found photos of kilogram-sized bags of ephedrine packed in suitcases that were believed to be headed to
Mexican customers. The shipment never made it. A PakistaniAmerican mule was arrested with the cargo as he attempted to
y to Mexico City.)
Malik has pleaded not guilty. But there is still what appears
to be an online business directory listing for the pharmaceutical wholesalerShama Medical Storethat the dea alleges
was a front for Maliks operation. In the section for company
information, the site reads: we are abal to provide u any kind
of medicion and any kind of row matirial all our tha world
and we also doing drop shipping all or tha world. Theres
even a physical address, located in Karachis Hijrat Colony
neighborhood, which was described to me by an urban-rights
activist as a nursery of crime controlled by a powerful drug
gang known as the Hamid Terha Group (terha roughly
translates as crooked).
I decided to pay Shama Medical a visit this past spring and
see whether Id be able to get prices for ephedrine or bulk
amounts of cold medicine. I brought along a friend who covers
crime for a local newspaper, and we made our way to Hijrat
Colony slum, which is bordered by railway yards to the east
and a mangrove swamp to the west. We took a main thoroughfare near the port into the colony and were quickly squeezed
to a standstill by the suddenly winding, narrow streets. We
doubled back, stopping to ask for directions.
Finally, we pulled up to Street 56, got out of the car, and
walked into an alley.
After a couple of hundred yards we reached a four-story
concrete building with faded red paint that read, Shama
Hospital. Next door was Shama Medical Store. Both seemed
abandoned except for a group of young toughs loitering in the
shade outside. One of them, with a long beard and wearing a
white T-shirt and jeans, asked us what we were looking for;
the others just gave us hard stares. Shama Medical Storeis
it open? my friend asked haltingly. In the silence, I realized
that the street, in the middle of a densely packed slum, was
unnervingly empty.
Yeah, its here. But its been closed for a long time, the
bearded guy saidjust as an older man in a purple buttondown shirt, gray suit pants, and pointy black dress shoes that
looked to be made of imitation alligator stepped out of the
medical store. A cell phone was pressed to his ear.
We should go, I whispered under my breath. So we did
walking quickly back to the car and driving away, hoping we
wouldnt be followed.
Later, through a well-sourced local contact, I inquired about
whether the police and anf had investigated Shama Medical.
They said they had never heard of it.
Taimur Khan is a New York-based correspondent for the National
newspaper in Abu Dhabi. This article was reported in partnership
with the Investigative Fund at the Nation Institute.
AFP/GETTY IMAGES
KARACHI
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
IN OTHER
WORDS
A SyrianAmerican
writer
nds her
voice, with
help from
Libyas most
famous
novelist.
MUSE
OF THE REVOLUTION
By Amal Hanano
82
Foreign Policy
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
had two New Years resolutions in 2011: to read Leo Tolstoys Anna
Karenina and Marcel Prousts In Search of Lost Time. Anna was completed
by Jan. 25just when our lives turned into a 24-hour tv marathon tuned
to Cairos Tahrir Square as the world watched a dictator fall in 18 short
days. We Syrians knew our country was not Egypt or Tunisia, but when
even Libya ignited on Feb. 15, we collectively held our breath with hope. The
weeks passed, the uprisings around the Arab world grew larger and more determined, and the seven volumes of Proust slowly collected dust on my nightstand.
Another writer entered my life instead.
WorldMags.net
83
IN OTHER WORDS
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
IN OTHER WORDS
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
Continued from page 88
ow do you measure time during a revolution, during a war? The seasons pass, and no one places bets
on a date for Assads fall anymore. Syrian time is
measured by massacres and tragedies and the growing number of dead. Remember when it was 2,000?
10,000? 40,000? 70,000? 100,000? Remember?
Jaballa Matar once told his son, Knowing a book by
heart is like carrying a house inside your chest. If he only
knew how Ihow Libyans and Syrians and others like
mecarry his sons heavy words in our chests and how
they are more than a house. They are entire geographies
of belonging and loss. Two long years ago, I used to ask
Syrians: Have you read Hisham Matar? I used to press
paperback copies of In the Country of Men into peoples
hands and promise, It will change your life.
Books may change you, but beware in believing that you
can change anything just because of something you read
or something you write. Most times, words cant change
anything at all. All the truth and the stories and the dead
and the time lost cant save Syria. What remains is only
the question of whether we can pull ourselves out of those
spaces of despair that we constructed out of hope.
Some months ago, my friend Hisham, who has the rare
gift of saying much in so few words, messaged me: Remember my dear that revolutions exist both to save and
destroy us. In the name of perpetually living in hope, I
had forgotten what he had said until it was too late.
tools connecting them today can help them tap the resources already available to the literate. Thats why the growth
of cell-phone subscriptions from just 11 million in 1990 to
nearly 7 billion today is so promising.
Right now, according to the International Telecommunication Union, mobile-phone penetration is 128 percent in
the developed world (some people have multiple mobile devices) and 89 percent in developing countries. That means
global mobile-phone penetration has reached an astounding
96 percent. According to the same assessment, Internet penetration is currently 77 percent in the developed world and
31 percent in developing countries. That might not sound
so promisinghousehold penetration worldwide is only
41 percentbut consider that more than half the phones
sold worldwide this year will be smartphones. Who needs
desktop computers anymore? Access to essentially limitless
information will accrue to effectively everyone, and in very
short order.
On top of the entire planet becoming connected to one another and to a wealth of information, over roughly the past
quarter-century, the number of democracies in the world has
nearly doubled from the 66 that existed in 1987, according
to Freedom House. And despite some backsliding in recent
yearswitness Egypt and Bahraincountries that are not
nominally or actively democratic are now by far the worlds
outliers.
Beyond education and politics, the global growth driven
by new technologies and innovations is also producing an
extraordinarily positive outcome: real and tangible wealth.
In 1985, the global per capita income was around $6,200,
according to World Bank purchasing power parity-based estimates. By 2010, it was almost $10,000. To be sure, growth
rates have lagged in many low-income countries, and widening inequality between the top and bottom of the income
spectrum is an enormously troubling problem in many parts
of the world. Since 2000, however, global per capita income
has increased more than 25 percent. Any way you slice it,
that has to be a virtuous development.
In short, despite the headlines blaring warnings of dire
crises, gruesome developments, corrupt politicians, bullying
states, greed, lust, gluttony, and the global byproducts of all
seven deadly sins, its worth noting that the forces spreading
whats wrong with the world are simultaneously making it a
much better place to live. In fact, theyre doing it faster and
more pervasively than they are creating problems.
Dont let the media fool you. Progress, it seems, actually
is spreading.
David Rothkopf is ceo and editor at large of Foreign Policy.
FOREIGN POLICY (ISSN 0015-7228) September/October 2013, issue number 202. Published
seven times each year, in January, March, May, July, September, November, and December,
by The FP Group, a division of The Washington Post Company, at 11 Dupont Circle NW, Suite
600, Washington, D.C. 20036. Subscriptions: U.S., $35.99 per year; Canada, $47.99; other
countries, $53.99. Periodicals Postage Paid in Washington, D.C., and at additional mailing ofces. POSTMASTER: Send U.S. address changes to: FOREIGN POLICY, P.O. Box 283, Congers,
NY 10920-0283. Return undeliverable Canadian addresses to: P.O. Box 503, RPO West Beaver
Creek, Richmond Hill, ON L4B 4R6. Printed in the USA.
WorldMags.net
87
WorldMags.net
DAVID ROTHKOPF
88
Foreign Policy
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
Singapore?
Te Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy in cosmopolitan Singapore
ofers you an unparalleled opportunity to network with the future leaders
in Asia.
Our classrooms adopt case-teaching and interdisciplinary team-teaching
approaches that are designed to address real-world problems. Our
curriculum is an innovative amalgam of prevailing theories originating in
the West and best practices emerging in the East.
Te LKY School is a community that consists of faculty members, visiting
professors, leading practitioners and students from over 50 nations.
Often held up as a model of efciency and public service excellence,
Singapore in the heart of Asia presents valuable perspectives on the
dramatic changes taking place in the region.
www.spp.nus.edu.sg
WorldMags.net
WorldMags.net
The Josef Korbel School
has the best of many worlds: excellent
professors, a community of active
students, discussions with top experts
in the eld, and proximity to the
Colorado Rockies. I will use the
skills that I acquired at Korbel during
my Boren Fellowship next year in
Mozambique, and beyond.
- Laura Jagla
M.A., Global Finance, Trade, and
Economic Integration, 2013
David L. Boren Fellow, 2013 2014
www.du.edu/korbel
877.474.7236
WorldMags.net