AHS Comparative Government

An article in this week's issue of The Economist examines the emergence of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation as a pro-democracy, pro-human rights party, and as an increasingly serious locus of opposition to the government of Russian President Vladimir Putin:

https://www.economist.com/europe/2021/10/30/russias-once-tame-communist-party-is-becoming-an-opposition-force

The Economist reports this week that

[a] cyber-attack in Iran disrupted the sale of subsidised fuel, resulting in long queues at petrol stations. A group calling itself “Predatory Sparrow” claimed responsibility, but the authorities blamed an unnamed “state actor”. The hackers also took control of digital billboards, making them ask: “[Leader] Khamenei, where is our fuel?”

"Politics This Week." The Economist. The Economist Newspaper, Ltd., 30 Oct. 2021, https://www.economist.com/the-world-this-week/2021/10/30/politics. Accessed 31 Oct. 2021.

Xi Jinping, the President of China and the General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party, is not attending this week's COP26 Climate Summit in Glasgow. Xi, moreover, did not attend last week's G-20 Summit in Rome. Indeed, Xi has not left China in almost two years. Officially, Xi has stayed in China to manage the Covid-19 crisis, and because leaving China would subject him upon return to the extensive pandemic-related protocols for entering the country. The New York Times, however, posits that Xi's neglect of personal diplomacy reflects a shift in Chinese policy toward both greater isolation and a reduced willingness to compromise in negotiations with other countries:

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/30/world/asia/china-xi-jinping-g20.html

According to The Economist, much of Nigeria "is sliding toward ungovernability." The northeast continues to be torn apart by the violent insurgents of Islamic State West Africa Province. The northwest is plagued by kidnappings in which hundreds of students at a time are captured, beaten and held for ransom by gangs of criminals. Communal violence kills hundreds each year in the center of the country. Kidnapping and crude oil theft are rife in the Niger Delta, and pirates ply the waters just offshore. Secessionist agitation, some of it armed, is growing in Nigeria's southeast; the federal government's efforts to suppress it serve only to remind the region's Igbo-speaking population of their bitter experience of the Nigerian Civil War. Secessionist agitation is also growing in the southwestern, Yoruba-speaking part of the country.

The Economist summarizes the origins of Nigeria's insecurity succinctly:

Nigeria’s instability is largely born of poor governance. Britain, the colonial power, lumped together many groups in one country: Muslims in the north, Christians in the south, numerous and overlapping ethnic groups in different regions. Politics has long been a tussle to grab petrodollars, the source of about half of government revenues. All groups gripe that they are short-changed. Most are right—a corrupt elite grabs a huge portion, leaving only scraps for ordinary Nigerians of any group. Since politics is the swiftest route to wealth, it is a violent business, cursed by candidates who drum up ethnic or religious strife to win support. What has changed in recent years is that the government has grown so rotten that it struggles to control wide swathes of territory.

In Mexico, the birth rate has fallen dramatically and life expectancy has increased. This has led to a rapidly ageing population. Wealthy countries, including Japan and Germany, are having a hard time meeting the needs of their graying populations. The challenge of providing for the elderly in Mexico, a middle-income country, will be even greater:

https://www.economist.com/the-americas/2021/10/23/as-mexico-ages-public-services-are-not-keeping-up

The Russian government has ordered most workplaces in the country shut from 30 October to 7 November, in an effort to stem a surge in Covid-19 infections. The Moscow city government, moreover, has ordered all unvaccinated people over 60, and all people with chronic illnesses, to stay home for the next four months; people in those categories will be allowed to leave home only to exercise.

Russia is reporting more than 35,000 new Covid-19 cases, and more than 1,000 deaths from Covid-19, each day. This high rate of infection and death results from the fact that less than 30% of the Russian public has been fully vaccinated for Covid-19, even though Russia was one of the first countries to develop an effective vaccine for the disease. While production delays slowed the initial rollout of Russia's vaccination campaign, Russian authorities attribute the country's low vaccination rate to the public's suspicion of the government's vaccination program: Russians tend not to believe what their government tells them.

Covid-19 cases have increased dramatically in England in the past month. The opposition Labour Party has called for the reintroduction of mask requirements in indoor public places, and for restricting access to some public places to people who can show proof that they have been vaccinated. Devolved governments in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have already taken some of these steps, but Boris Johnson's Conservative government is reluctant to take them in England:

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-59027290

The United Kingdom withdrew from the European Union in January 2020; in December 2020, it concluded a free-trade agreement with the EU that does not cover trade in services and which complicates the export of British manufactured goods and agricultural products to the EU. The withdrawal and free-trade agreements that the UK concluded with the EU, moreover, treat Northern Ireland differently than the rest of the UK. In order to avoid the creation of a "hard border" between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland, Northern Ireland remains subject to EU single market and customs union rules even though the rest of the UK is no longer bound by those rules. This, in turn, means that many goods shipped between Northern Ireland and the rest of the UK are subject to inspection; the agreements avoid a hard border in Ireland by creating something of a border (for goods, if not for people) between Northern Ireland and Great Britain. 

The partial border between Northern Ireland and the rest of the United Kingdom has frustrated Northern Irish consumers and business owners, and has upset the region's Unionists (who resent anything that makes Northern Ireland seem less British and more Irish). Last week, representatives of the British government and the EU met once again to try to find a solution to the problems that Brexit has created in Northern Ireland:

https://www.economist.com/britain/the-northern-ireland-protocol-is-up-for-discussion-again/21805522

An article in this week's issue of The Economist examines the techniques used by the Chinese and Russian governments to stifle freedom of expression online, and how those techniques are currently being adopted to varying degrees by governments in other countries. Internet freedom declined in many countries last year, including the United States, Mexico and Nigeria:

https://www.economist.com/international/2021/10/16/governments-are-finding-new-ways-to-squash-free-expression-online

Sergey Savelyev, a former Russian inmate who leaked more than one thousand videos documenting the widespread and violent abuse of prisoners in Russia, has sought asylum in France. Savelyev fled Russia after allegedly receiving death threats from security personnel:

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-58978613

The Mexican Congress is currently considering a proposal made by President Andrés Manuel López Obrador to reserve lithium mining in the country to the government. Last week, López Obrador said that, if Congress does not give the government the sole authority to mine lithium, his government will reject any new bids by private enterprises to mine lithium under contract with the Mexican government:

https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/mexico-will-reject-private-lithium-deals-even-if-reform-bill-fails-president-2021-10-07/

López Obrador's lithium mining proposal is part of a larger piece of legislation that would restore the primacy of the Federal Electricity Commission (Comision Federal de Electricidad, or CFE) in producing electricity in Mexico. One especially controversial aspect of the legislation is that it would allow the CFE to feed electricity to Mexico's grid ahead of electricity generated at lower cost by private suppliers. Unfortunately, the power plants run by the CFE are older and far more polluting (per unit of electricity generated) than Mexico's privately owned power plants. Allowing the CFE to sell its electricity to the grid ahead of less expensive, privately supplied power would thus create more pollution, and result in more greenhouse gas emissions, than a system in which the least expensively generated electricity was sent to the grid before more expensively produced power.

A year ago, protests against police brutality broke out in Nigeria. The federal government promised reforms, even as security forces killed at least 56 protesters. A year on, the BBC asks whether the protests succeeded in changing things in Nigeria. On one hand, police brutality continues, and the federal government has banned Twitter and cryptocurrency trading, which were used to organize and fund demonstrations; on the other, the protests energized a generation of activists:

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-58817690

Following the defeat of Japan in World War II, civil war broke out in China between the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), led by Mao Zedong, and the Nationalist Party (KMT), headed by Chiang Kai-Shek (Jiang Jieshi). At the time, Chiang was the Chairman of the National Government of the Republic of China. After four years of fighting, the Communist forces defeated the Nationalists and, on October 1, 1949, Mao established the People's Republic of China. Chiang retreated with much of his army to Taiwan, an island slightly larger than Maryland, 112 miles off the coast of mainland China. On Taiwan, Chiang established a military dictatorship, which Chiang claimed was a continuation of the Republic of China and the rightful government of all of China.

In the 1980s and 1990s, Taiwan democratized and established a competitive two-party political system. Although Taiwan continues to style itself the Republic of China, it functions as an independent country of more than 23 million people. (A formal declaration of independence would almost certainly result in an invasion of the island by mainland forces). The government of the People's Republic of China has long sought what it calls "reunification" with Taiwan, promising that a Taiwan under the control of the People's Republic of China would be governed on the basis of the same "one country, two systems" principle under which Hong Kong is governed. (The fact that the "one country, two systems" principle now exists in Hong Kong in name only is not lost on anyone in Taiwan).

In recent years, the President of the People's Republic of China, Xi Jinping, has stated repeatedly that "reunification" of Taiwan with mainland China cannot wait forever and that the Chinese government is prepared to use force to take control of Taiwan. An invasion of Taiwan, however, would risk military conflict with the United States and an end to most Western trade with and investment in China. Nonetheless, in recent weeks, China has increased its military pressure on Taiwan:

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/09/world/asia/united-states-china-taiwan.html

Last week, the Norwegian Nobel Committee announced that the Nobel Peace Prize for 2021 would be awarded to two dissident journalists, Dmitry Muratov of Russia and Maria Ressa of the Philippines. Muratov is the editor-in-chief of Novaya Gazeta, the last remaining opposition newspaper published in Russia, in the Russian language. For more than twenty years, Novaya Gazeta has reported on human rights abuses in Chechnya and other parts of the Northern Caucasus, and has exposed corruption in Russian government and business. Since 2000, seven Novaya Gazeta reporters have been murdered in connection with their investigative journalism. The Russian government responded to the announcement by stepping up its repression of foreign news outlets operating in Russia:

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/08/world/europe/russian-media-repression.html

Ressa is the founder of Rappler, the best-known independent news outlet in the Philippines. Rappler has worked fearlessly to expose the use of murder and intimidation by the government of Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte.

Mexico's chief prosecutor has twice asked federal judges to issue arrest warrants for 31 of the country's research scientists. On both occasions, the judge refused to issue the warrants: the activity for which the prosecutor seeks to arrest the scientists (receiving research funds while serving on an advisory board) was legal at the time it took place. Undaunted, the chief prosecutor has pledged to make a third application for the arrest warrants.

Critics of Mexico's President, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, contend that the attempted prosecution of prominent scientists -- and the government's cuts in scientific research funding -- are efforts to silence the academic community's criticism of government policy, including López Obrador's handling of the Covid-19 pandemic:

https://www.theguardian.com/science/2021/sep/24/scientists-mexico-arrest-warrants

# posted by Kevin James : 5:04 PM  0 comments

 The Economist reports that

British motorists endured petrol queues [this week]. One cause was a shortage of lorry drivers to deliver the stuff, exacerbated by Brexit, which has made it harder and less attractive for foreign drivers to work in Britain. Another cause was panic-buying. Despite government assurances that there was plenty of fuel in depots, drivers flocked to fill their tanks. Other European countries also had fuel-supply problems, but Britain’s were especially severe.

"Politics This Week." The Economist. The Economist Newspaper, Ltd., 2 Oct. 2021, https://www.economist.com/the-world-this-week/2021/10/02/politics-this-week. Accessed 3 Oct. 2021.

The Chinese Communist Party holds a Party Congress every five year. The 20th Party Congress will be held in the fall of 2022. At that Congress, the Party is expected to break with recent tradition, which has limited Party leaders to two consecutive five-year terms, and elect Chinese President Xi Jinping to a third term as the Party's General Secretary.

The year before a Party Congress is invariably tense, as senior Party leaders decide who will be elected at the Congress to the Party's Central Committee and Political Bureau (Politburo). Even though Xi holds more power than any Chinese leader since Mao Zedong, Xi is moving decisively to strengthen his position ahead of the Party Congress. He is purging the security services. He is cracking down on politically unpopular business tycoons, particularly social media and online commerce entrepreneurs. Finally, he is championing a return to cultural conservatism, banning men deemed effeminate from television, moving to curb China's celebrity culture, and limiting the number of hours that minors may spend playing games online. Indeed, in some places the residents' committees of the Maoist era have been revived as "moral review councils," and are now "correcting" the social behavior of ordinary people:

https://www.economist.com/china/2021/10/02/xi-jinpings-clampdowns-herald-a-tense-political-year-in-china