These countries allow homosexuals to serve in the military: Australia, Austria, Bahamas, Belgium, Britain, Canada, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Lithuania, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Slovenia, South Africa, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland.
In a time when the U.S. needs as many military personnel and specialists as possible, why don't we join the list by repealing "Don't Ask, Don't Tell"?
Thursday, October 22, 2009
Friday, September 18, 2009
Generation Green
I was sitting in a square in downtown Amman, Jordan one evening this summer, observing as people went about their business. All of a sudden, a window opened on the third story of a building across the street. A woman peeked out her head, then took out a full trash bin and proceeded to dump it onto the side of the street below, where a pile had already formed from other residents doing the same thing.
Now, some older students may remember a time when Thurston residents would similarly throw various artifacts out of their own windows (though I wasn’t around back then). But more recently, GW’s environmental consciousness profile has changed. And it’s not just an institutional shift, as some recent articles in The Hatchet have reported about – it’s our generation.
My summer experience in Jordan taught me to value the evolving American attitudes on waste management, pollution and environmental preservation. Our parents and grandparents did not grow up in a society stressing lower carbon emissions and recycling. Being raised to value these initiatives as ways to help our planet, we have the ability to reach out to older generations, as well as set a positive example for developing countries and societies that may not place as much emphasis on saving the environment.
Sure, GW’s administration, its students and the US as a whole could show much more seriousness on this subject. Although GW did rise in the Sierra Club green rankings this year (to 81st out of 135), that still puts us in the list’s bottom 50 percent. New York University, an urban school like GW, beat us by 41 places.
But we can only get better from here. Our green generation is increasing in size, and as it grows it will help sharpen the sense of shared public space and concern for our natural surroundings among Americans, and hopefully also among our friends around the world.
Friday, July 31, 2009
Not a Global Green
Black clouds of pollution in China, overfishing off Japan, forest destruction in Brazil, poaching in Ethiopia. Worldwide, there is no doubt that there is substantial destruction occurring to the environment. This does not even factor in the impact of third world nations on global carbon emissions. We have to ask ourselves – what do we want to save? It is not possible to save everything; from an economic standpoint we are faced with a scarcity problem. With only a limited amount of resources and an unlimited demand something is doomed to be lost. The real question is what we want to save the most.
Unfortunately, this question is not being asked in the halls of the US congress, the UN, AU, or really any other governing body. Instead issue usually gets diverted to bickering about responsibility, blame, funding, etc. What really needs to be decided is not who caused the problems up until this point but rather which problems we want to solve in the future. Germany recently decided to phase out the use of nuclear power plants and there is fear this could set off another wave of anti-nuclear backlash across the globe. Yet there is an interest group that has a problem with everything. Coal and other fossil fuels have their obvious critics. But some dislike wind because is kills a few birds and solar because it is hard to dispose of the panels.
As can be seen, the lack of consensus is doing more harm to the environmental movement than good. The rise of globalization has only encouraged this problem with people being less able to focus on local problems which are actually solvable. Unless consensus grows in terms of which issues are most important to be solved the international community risks not solving anything - which could ultimately endanger us all.
Unfortunately, this question is not being asked in the halls of the US congress, the UN, AU, or really any other governing body. Instead issue usually gets diverted to bickering about responsibility, blame, funding, etc. What really needs to be decided is not who caused the problems up until this point but rather which problems we want to solve in the future. Germany recently decided to phase out the use of nuclear power plants and there is fear this could set off another wave of anti-nuclear backlash across the globe. Yet there is an interest group that has a problem with everything. Coal and other fossil fuels have their obvious critics. But some dislike wind because is kills a few birds and solar because it is hard to dispose of the panels.
As can be seen, the lack of consensus is doing more harm to the environmental movement than good. The rise of globalization has only encouraged this problem with people being less able to focus on local problems which are actually solvable. Unless consensus grows in terms of which issues are most important to be solved the international community risks not solving anything - which could ultimately endanger us all.
Monday, July 13, 2009
A New Direction For Africa
Africa has been known as a continent in peril since the independence of the first African nations fifty years ago. The following is a short list of the ideal goals each African nation should follow in order to achieve development, growth, and stability.
1. Stop supporting paramililitary actors in other countries.
African governments have a history of supporting guerrilla movements, financially and militarily, in neighboring countries for the purpose of destabilizing other African governments. Often, though, this support only causes more bloodshed, a degradation of nascent developmental projects, international criticism, and sometimes backlash.
2. Improve electoral practices.
Africa is known for having poor election history, with only four heads of government transferring powers peacefully over a 40 year period. An active government is known to bring stability, a sense of nationhood, and peace to countries, as long as elections are done in a fair and free manor.
3. Integrate with the global world and economy.
Over the last 50 years, Africa has been prone to resist integration with the world economy, not only because of corrupt leaders' tirades against Western "neocolonialism," but also because of the unwillingness of international corporations to invest heavily in the unstable countries of Africa. African leaders should make a commitment to liberalize trading policies and become open to imports from other nations. They should attempt to develop two or three "niche" market in which they have a competitive advantage. Also, as is already occurring, African leaders should continue the practice of bypassing old forms of technology for newer versions, to reduce expenses. For example, using cellphones as a means of telephone communications and building communication towers rather than laying phone lines.
4. Support and promote healthy practices.
African governments have been reluctant to promote health practice that are considered normal health procedures in the Western world. Especially with AIDS, African nations sometimes condemn the use of proven safety measures, such as wearing condemns. On other issues, some children are never taught of the importance of washing hands or following basic hygienic practices. African leaders need to promote these practices.
5. Focus funds and resources on developing rural areas.
Africa has a tradition of funneling money and attention to city centers, rather than rural areas. They do this because they know urban support is more valuable than rural support, and that an angry city populace has the potential to overturn a government. African governments should begin to focus on developing the agricultural sector so they not only can generate more food sources for the nation, but also to decrease the chance of violence from disenchanted farmers who join militias.
1. Stop supporting paramililitary actors in other countries.
African governments have a history of supporting guerrilla movements, financially and militarily, in neighboring countries for the purpose of destabilizing other African governments. Often, though, this support only causes more bloodshed, a degradation of nascent developmental projects, international criticism, and sometimes backlash.
2. Improve electoral practices.
Africa is known for having poor election history, with only four heads of government transferring powers peacefully over a 40 year period. An active government is known to bring stability, a sense of nationhood, and peace to countries, as long as elections are done in a fair and free manor.
3. Integrate with the global world and economy.
Over the last 50 years, Africa has been prone to resist integration with the world economy, not only because of corrupt leaders' tirades against Western "neocolonialism," but also because of the unwillingness of international corporations to invest heavily in the unstable countries of Africa. African leaders should make a commitment to liberalize trading policies and become open to imports from other nations. They should attempt to develop two or three "niche" market in which they have a competitive advantage. Also, as is already occurring, African leaders should continue the practice of bypassing old forms of technology for newer versions, to reduce expenses. For example, using cellphones as a means of telephone communications and building communication towers rather than laying phone lines.
4. Support and promote healthy practices.
African governments have been reluctant to promote health practice that are considered normal health procedures in the Western world. Especially with AIDS, African nations sometimes condemn the use of proven safety measures, such as wearing condemns. On other issues, some children are never taught of the importance of washing hands or following basic hygienic practices. African leaders need to promote these practices.
5. Focus funds and resources on developing rural areas.
Africa has a tradition of funneling money and attention to city centers, rather than rural areas. They do this because they know urban support is more valuable than rural support, and that an angry city populace has the potential to overturn a government. African governments should begin to focus on developing the agricultural sector so they not only can generate more food sources for the nation, but also to decrease the chance of violence from disenchanted farmers who join militias.
Wednesday, April 8, 2009
A Meeting With Professor Henry Nau on Poverty
On April 7th, four members of the Understanding Globalization LLC meet with Professor Henry Nau to discuss the problems and challenges that poverty presents in a globalized world. Previously, the LLC had watched and discussed Zana Briski's "Born into Brothels: Calcutta's Red Light Kids" as an examination of just how pervasively poverty can be interwoven into society.
Most astounding to the LLC was the poor technological resources that social workers in India used to keep tabs on these children. The systems were neither digitalized nor organized; the result was a wall of rotting papers and an overworked office.
When we approached Professor Nau with our opinions, he pushed us to the next level: was the real problem a lack of resources, or was it corruption in the bureaucracy supervising such offices? Furthermore, would more technological resources truly aide the societal ills that allowed the red light district in Calcutta to flourish? The human trafficking in the region along with widespread poverty were identified as two such factors. The professor pointed out that, in order to most effectively address the problem, there would be a need to examine all these variables and choose the best solution.
Professor Nau also emphasized a need in development to reconcile the macro with the micro, politically, socially and economically. Poverty and development, argued the professor, could not be addressed without making sure that the situation on the ground and governmental or inter-governmental agreements were synchronous. He used the Clinton Accords in the Palestinian conflict to illustrate this: although all major players have diplomatically accepted a fair two-state solution, the situation on the ground did not allow for a sustainable peace, allowing for Israel's enemies, such as Hamas, to gain strength. Until these two systems were reconciled, the professor contended, the problems would persist.
The discussion then changed to incorporate the ongoing global fiscal and economic crisis, particularly how they would affect development. The Professor was quick to defend the Washington Consensus (recently declared "dead" by British Prime Minister Gordon Brown), which he attributed to pulling millions of Indians and Chinese out of absolute abject poverty. The economic crises have largely been used as an excuse for government intervention in domestic economies along with consistent pushes for stricter regulation of finance at the global level. The Professor noted that such regulation was necessary, as risk taking had increased far too high during the lead up to the crisis. At the same time, he invoked the economic axiom that higher risk means higher rewards -- and that those rewards were what had done such wonders for the developing world. The professor remained optimistic that the spirit of the Washington Consensus would be preserved, and that the crisis would be an opportunity for improvement of international financial and economic institutions as opposed to a change of course that President Obama has called for.
The Understanding Globalization LLC would like to thank Professor Henry Nau for taking time out of his busy schedule to meet with our members: this discussion has given us a great deal to think about concerning the many aspects of poverty, which without a doubt will give us grounds for future discourses.
Monday, April 6, 2009
Thursday, March 12, 2009
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