[Apr 13th 2024]

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The world this week

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The Economist :: How we saw the world

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The world this week

Politics
Apr 11th 2024 |

Japan’s prime minister, Kishida Fumio, visited Washington for talks with
Joe Biden and to address Congress. America and Japan are strengthening
their military alliance, which includes closer co-operation between their
command structures. Japan is also to join an American mission to the Moon,
meaning a Japanese astronaut will be the first non-American to walk on the
lunar surface. America, Japan and the Philippines then prepared for their first
trilateral summit. The Philippines’ coastguard has recently clashed with
Chinese vessels in the South China Sea.

China’s leader, Xi Jinping, met Ma Ying-jeou in Beijing. Mr Ma served as

president of Taiwan from 2008 to 2016, establishing friendlier ties with
China. The relationship grew colder after he left office. China is trying to
court friendly Taiwanese politicians, while freezing out independence-
minded officials, such as the incoming president, Lai Ching-te.
South Korea’s liberal opposition parties won the most seats in
parliamentary elections, trouncing the conservative party of President Yoon
Suk-yeol. The liberals fell short of a super-majority, however.

In a tense phone call between Joe Biden and Binyamin Netanyahu the
American president warned the Israeli prime minister that Israel must do
more to protect civilians and negotiate a ceasefire with Hamas. America’s
policy, Mr Biden said, would be determined by Israel’s “immediate action”.
Israel said it would open the Erez crossing and allow in direct shipments
from Ashdod, an Israeli port, opening major new conduits for aid into Gaza.
The following days saw a big increase in the number of trucks entering Gaza
with humanitarian aid. Mr Biden later offered “ironclad” support to Israel if
Iran attacks it.

Israel withdrew its ground troops from Khan Younis, leaving just one
brigade deployed in Gaza. The remaining troops will try to prevent
Palestinians from leaving the south, now home to almost 90% of Gaza’s
2.2m people, and returning to the north.

Ismail Haniyeh, the leader of Hamas, who is based in Qatar, said three of his
sons were killed in Israeli strikes. Israel said that the three men were
members of Hamas’s military wing.

Jacob Zuma, a disgraced former president of South Africa, won a court case
allowing him to run for office in a general election on May 29th. Mr Zuma
had been barred by electoral officials because of a conviction for contempt
of court and prison sentence of 15 months. His new party, known by its
initials, MK, is polling above 10% of the national vote.

An overcrowded ferry capsized off Mozambique, killing at least 96 people

who had been trying to flee an outbreak of cholera. Separately, at least 38
migrants, including children, died in a shipwreck off the coast of Djibouti.

Zimbabwe introduced a new gold-backed currency in a bid to contain

inflation after a collapse in the value of the Zimbabwean dollar, which was
only reintroduced in 2019 after being scrapped during an earlier bout of
hyperinflation. It said the new currency would be backed by reserves of gold
and precious metals.
Climate-change activists won their first-ever case in the European Court of
Human Rights. The court ruled that Switzerland had failed to protect its
citizens’ rights in a case brought by a group of women in their 70s, who
argued that old people were particularly vulnerable to intensifying
heatwaves. The judges established a right to protection by the state “from the
serious adverse effects of climate change on lives, health, well-being and
quality of life”. Forty-six countries are covered by the ECHR’s jurisdiction.
Dicing with danger

Russia and Ukraine blamed each other for drone strikes on the Zaporizhia
nuclear plant, which is in Ukraine but controlled by Russian forces. It was
the first time the facility had been attacked directly since November 2022.
The International Atomic Energy Agency said such attacks increased the risk
of a nuclear accident and called an emergency meeting.

Seven people were killed in a Russian drone strike on Kharkiv, Ukraine’s

second-most-populous city. Russia has stepped up its attacks on the city in
recent months, which Ukrainian officials think may be a prelude to a new
Russian incursion. Kharkiv lies just 30km (19 miles) from Russia.

The European Union’s top diplomat, Josep Borrell, warned that Russia’s
ambitions to expand its reach outside Ukraine meant that “a high-intensity,
conventional war in Europe is no longer fantasy”. He described the situation
as “existential”, and said Europe may find it cannot count on America to
defend it for the first time since the cold war.

A court in Russia increased the prison sentence handed down to a former

aide to Alexei Navalny, the opposition leader who died in an Arctic penal
colony in February. Liliya Chanysheva ran Mr Navalny’s office in the
Bashkortostan region and had been imprisoned for seven and a half years
when his organisation was outlawed. Her sentence has now been increased
to nine and a half years after a state prosecutor asked for it to be raised.

Britain, Belgium, Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands and Norway signed a

pact to co-operate on protecting underwater pipelines and other
infrastructure in the North Sea. The sabotage of the Nord Stream pipeline in
2022 and damage to a pipeline in the Baltic Sea in 2023 are still
unexplained. Some suspect Russian involvement; others have fingered
Ukrainian agents.

Iceland is to have a new prime minister. Bjarni Benediktsson, who leads the
conservative Independence Party, was chosen by the ruling coalition to lead
the government after Katrin Jakobsdottir, of the Left-Green Movement,
resigned to run for the mostly ceremonial post of president.

A scathing report into transgender health care for children was published
in Britain. The Cass Review recommended moving away from a model of
medical intervention for trans-identifying children to one based on therapy.
It also criticised the “toxicity” of the debate on gender for inhibiting open
discussion.

Mexico suspended diplomatic relations with Ecuador, after Ecuadorean

police stormed the Mexican embassy in Quito to arrest a former Ecuadorean
vice-president. Jorge Glas took refuge in the embassy last December after he
faced an arrest warrant for corruption (he has already served prison time on
similar charges). He says he’s innocent. Mexico said it had granted him
asylum.

The first parents in America to be held criminally responsible for a mass

shooting carried out by their child were sentenced to between ten and 15
years in prison. Their 15-year-old boy shot dead four fellow pupils at his
school in suburban Detroit in 2021. The parents were found guilty in
separate trials earlier this year of involuntary manslaughter. Their son was
sentenced to life in prison.

Arizona’s Supreme Court banned abortion in the state, reviving a law from
1864 to justify its ruling. The order was put on hold for two weeks, but the
decision has already had political reverberations. Arizona is one of the swing
states on which the presidential election in November hinges.
Moonlight shadows
Tens of millions of people in Canada, the United States and Mexico turned
out to watch a solar eclipse. Some of the regions where a total eclipse was
viewable included parts of southern Ontario and Quebec, upstate New York,
Indiana and Texas and Sinaloa and Durango. The event drew hordes of
eclipse-tourists, who booked 92% of Airbnb listings within the zone of
totality.
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week/2024/04/11/politics

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The world this week

Business
Apr 11th 2024 |

The Biden administration said it would provide $6.6bn in direct funding to

TSMCto support its facilities in Arizona for manufacturing the world’s most
advanced semiconductors. TSMC, based in Taiwan and the world’s largest
contract chipmaker, will have three sites in Phoenix when it completes a new
factory there. It is increasing its investment to $65bn, the largest-ever
foreign direct investment in a “greenfield” project, meaning built from
scratch, in America. TSMC supplies chips to Apple and Nvidia for use in
smartphones and artificial intelligence.

Intel unveiled its Gaudi 3 chip for AI, which it claims is faster and more
power-efficient than Nvidia’s H100. It tested the chip on two open-source
large language models: Llama, which is run by Meta, and Falcon, a project
backed by Abu Dhabi. Intel also announced a plan to create, with other tech
companies, an open platform for enterprise AI that will “accelerate
deployment” of secure generative AI systems.

Disney is to crack down on users who share passwords to its streaming

services. Bob Iger, Disney’s chief executive, said the crackdown would be
gradually rolled out to different countries starting in June. Netflix
implemented a similar policy last year, and it has since reported a surge in
subscribers.

Boeing’s safety record was in the spotlight again. An engineer at Boeing

alleged that the company took shortcuts on quality and safety when it
manufactured 787 and 777 jets, leaving them with potential structural flaws.
Boeing described the claims as “inaccurate”. And the Federal Aviation
Administration investigated yet another incident involving a Boeing plane,
this time an engine panel that fell off a 737-800 during take-off from Denver.
Meanwhile, Alaska Air received $160m in compensation from Boeing for
the panel that fell off one of its aircraft in January, leaving a gaping hole in
the plane. The airline said it expects further payments.

Tesco, Britain’s biggest supermarket chain, reported a big rise in pre-tax

profit to £2.3bn ($2.9bn) for the 12 months ending February 24th. It expects
higher profits this year, as inflationary pressures have “lessened
substantially”. Meanwhile, John Lewis, a troubled department-store and
supermarket chain, appointed Jason Tarry, a former senior executive at
Tesco, as its new chair. Dame Sharon White held the position for five years,
the shortest-ever tenure in the job.
A victory, of sorts

The EU’S General Court ruled that sanctions imposed on Mikhail Fridman,
a Russian investor, and Petr Aven, his business partner, between February
2022 and March 2023 must be annulled. The court found that the EU had not
“sufficiently substantiated” its reasons for linking Messrs Fridman and Aven
to Vladimir Putin’s regime after Russia invaded Ukraine. Mr Fridman is one
of Russia’s most prominent businessmen. Both men are still subject to
sanctions not covered by the judgment.
Two bits of economic data changed market calculations about the Federal
Reserve’s path towards interest-rate cuts. America’s annual inflation rate
rose again, to 3.5% in March from 3.2% in February. And American
employers created 303,000 jobs in March, the highest number since last
May, suggesting that the economy remains red-hot. Stockmarkets sagged
and the yield on government bonds jumped in response to both sets of data.
Investors have narrowed their bets on when and how the Fed will cut this
year, though some of those bets, of up to seven cuts, were wildly optimistic.
https://t.me/+Z6Sv8oUmW0pkMjI5

The European Central Bank left interest rates on hold, keeping the deposit
facility at 4%, but indicated that it would raise rates at its next meeting in
June. Many investors now think the ECB could cut rates before the Fed
does.

Fitch reduced its outlook for China’s sovereign credit-rating from stable to
negative, but retained the country’s A+ rating (Moody’s took similar action
in December). Fitch forecasts that China’s central- and local-government
debt will rise to 61.3% of GDP this year. In 2019 it was 38.5% of GDP.

HSBC decided to sell its business in Argentina, and will book a $1bn pre-
tax charge in its first-quarter earnings related to the sale. The bank said it
would also have to acknowledge $4.9bn in losses on its books linked to the
falling value of the peso when the deal closes, though this would neither
affect its financial strength nor its tangible net asset value. HSBC has been
gradually pulling back from markets outside Asia in order to focus on its
business there.
Serenity and strife

“We’ll have AI that is smarter than any one human probably around the end
of next year,” predicted Elon Musk in an interview. Mr Musk’s prophesy is
conditioned on the continuing supply of chips and electricity. Meanwhile,
Mr Musk had more earthly matters to consider when he caused a huge
political row in Brazil by calling for the resignation of a Supreme Court
judge whom he suspects of ordering a block on certain right-wing accounts
on his messaging service, X.
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week/2024/04/11/business

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The world this week

KAL’s cartoon
Apr 11th 2024 |

Dig deeper into the subject of this week’s cartoon:

The Kremlin wants to make Ukraine’s second city unliveable

Charlemagne: If Ukraine loses
Mike Johnson may have to choose between Ukraine aid and his job

KAL’s cartoon appears weekly in The Economist. You can see last week’s
here.

This article was downloaded by calibre from https://www.economist.com/the-world-this-

week/2024/04/11/kals-cartoon
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The Economist

This week’s covers

How we saw the world

Apr 11th 2024 |

IN MOST of the world this week we consider the effects of global warming
on housing, the world’s biggest asset class. About one-tenth of the world’s
residential property by value is under threat. Homeowners face a $25trn
reckoning. Who will end up footing the bill?
Leader: The next housing disaster
Briefing: Homeowners face a $25trn bill from climate change

In Britain, we look at assisted dying. Though still controversial, it is no

longer a fringe issue. The public is already supportive and politicians are
catching up. Britain may be on the verge of its next big social reform.
Leader: The rights and wrongs of assisted dying
Further reading: Britain is moving towards assisted dying

For subscribers only: to see how we design each week’s cover, sign up to our
weekly Cover Story newsletter.
This article was downloaded by calibre from https://www.economist.com/the-world-this-
week/2024/04/11/this-weeks-covers

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Leaders
Global warming is coming for your home
A $25trn hit :: Who will pay for the damage?

True swing voters are extraordinarily rare in America

Four-leafed voters :: We have found some

America should follow England’s lead on transgender care

for kids
The Cass Review :: Its approach is neither as harsh as in red states nor as lax as in blue states

The short-sighted Israeli army

War in Gaza :: Force alone cannot bring security

In praise of Peter Higgs

What’s in a name :: The particle named after him became a selling point. For the man, it was a
bit of a pain

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A $25trn hit

Global warming is coming for your home

Who will pay for the damage?

Apr 11th 2024 |

THINK ABOUT the places vulnerable to climate change, and you might
picture rice paddies in Bangladesh or low-lying islands in the Pacific. But
another, more surprising answer ought to be your own house. About a tenth
of the world’s residential property by value is under threat from global
warming—including many houses that are nowhere near the coast. From
tornadoes battering midwestern American suburbs to tennis-ball-size
hailstones smashing the roofs of Italian villas, the severe weather brought
about by greenhouse-gas emissions is shaking the foundations of the world’s
most important asset class.

The potential costs stem from policies designed to reduce the emissions of
houses as well as from climate-related damage. They are enormous. By one
estimate, climate change and the fight against it could wipe out 9% of the
value of the world’s housing by 2050—which amounts to $25trn, not much
less than America’s annual GDP. It is a huge bill hanging over people’s lives
and the global financial system. And it looks destined to trigger an almighty
fight over who should pay up.

Homeowners are one candidate. But if you look at property markets today,
they do not seem to be bearing the costs. House prices show little sign of
adjusting to climate risk. In Miami, the subject of much worrying about
rising sea levels, they have increased by four-fifths this decade, much more
than the American average. Moreover, because the impact of climate change
is still uncertain, many owners may not have known how much of a risk they
were taking when they bought their homes.

Yet if taxpayers cough up instead, they will bail out well-heeled owners and
blunt helpful incentives to adapt to the looming threat. Apportioning the
costs will be hard for governments, not least because they know voters care
so much about the value of their homes. The bill has three parts: paying for
repairs, investing in protection and modifying houses to limit climate
change.

Insurers usually bear the costs of repairs after a storm destroys a roof or a
fire guts a property. As the climate worsens and natural disasters become
more frequent, home insurance is therefore getting more expensive. In
places, it could become so dear as to cause house prices to fall; some experts
warn of a “climate-insurance bubble” affecting a third of American homes.
Governments must either tolerate the losses that imposes on homeowners or
underwrite the risks themselves, as already happens in parts of wildfire-
prone California and hurricane-prone Florida. The combined exposure of
state-backed “insurers of last resort” in these two states has exploded from
$160bn in 2017 to $633bn. Local politicians want to pass on the risk to the
federal government, which in effect runs flood insurance today.
Physical damage might be forestalled by investing in protection in properties
themselves or in infrastructure. Keeping houses habitable may call for air
conditioning. Few Indian homes have it, even though the country is suffering
worsening heatwaves. In the Netherlands a system of dykes, ditches and
pumps keeps the country dry; Tokyo has barriers to hold back floodwaters.
Funding this investment is the second challenge. Should homeowners who
had no idea they were at risk have to pay for, say, concrete underpinning for
a subsiding house? Or is it right to protect them from such unexpected, and
unevenly distributed, costs? Densely populated coastal cities, which are most
in need of protection from floods, are often the crown jewels of their
countries’ economies and societies—just think of London, New York or
Shanghai.

The last question is how to pay for domestic modifications that prevent
further climate change. Houses account for 18% of global energy-related
emissions. Many are likely to need heat pumps, which work best with
underfloor heating or bigger radiators, and thick insulation. Unfortunately,
retrofitting homes is expensive. Asking homeowners to pay up can lead to a
backlash; last year Germany’s ruling coalition tried to ban gas boilers, only
to change course when voters objected to the costs. Italy followed an
alternative approach, by offering extraordinarily generous, and badly
designed, handouts to households who renovate. It has spent a staggering
€219bn ($238bn, or 10% of its GDP) on its “superbonus” scheme.

The full impact of climate change is still some way off. But the sooner
policymakers can resolve these questions, the better. The evidence shows
that house prices react to these risks only after disaster has struck, when it is
too late for preventive investments. Inertia is therefore likely to lead to nasty
surprises. Housing is too important an asset to be mispriced across the
economy—not least because it is so vital to the financial system.

Governments will have to do their bit. Until the 18th century much of the
Netherlands followed the principle that only nearby communities would
maintain dykes—and the system was plagued by underinvestment and
needless flooding as a result. Governments alone can solve such collective-
action problems by building infrastructure, and must do so especially around
high-productivity cities. Owners will need inducements to spend big sums
retrofitting their homes to pollute less, which benefits everyone.
Wie het water deert

At the same time, however, policymakers must be careful not to subsidise

folly by offering large implicit guarantees and explicit state-backed
insurance schemes. These not only pose an unacceptable risk to taxpayers,
but they also weaken the incentive for people to invest in making their
properties more resilient. And by suppressing insurance premiums, they do
nothing to discourage people from moving to areas that are already known to
be high-risk today. The omens are not good, even though the stakes are so
high. For decades governments have failed to disincentivise building on
floodplains.

The $25trn bill will pose problems around the world. But doing nothing
today will only make tomorrow more painful. For both governments and
homeowners, the worst response to the housing conundrum would be to
ignore it. ■

For subscribers only: to see how we design each week’s cover, sign up to our
weekly Cover Story newsletter.
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Four-leafed voters

True swing voters are extraordinarily rare in

America
We have found some

Apr 11th 2024 |

THE BIGGEST question in American politics today is why Joe Biden’s

support is so soft. Although there are plenty of theories—ranging from Mr
Biden’s age to petrol prices to the withdrawal from Afghanistan—it is hard
to be confident about an answer. A standard poll of the type quoted in news
reports may be based on a sample of 1,000 people. A poll that asks questions
of voters in a swing state might have half that number. These yield useful
information, no doubt, but if you want to look within those polls at what,
say, Hispanic Protestants think of President Biden, the numbers are too small
to draw conclusions. We found a way round this problem. Over the past year,
YouGov has posed questions to a total of 49,000 Americans of voting age. If
you pool their answers, as we have this week, you can discover what is
really going on.

Because most American voters are partisan and opinions about the two
candidates are so calcified, very few people who voted for Joe Biden in 2020
will vote for Donald Trump in November, or vice versa. In a tight election,
swing voters have double value because they subtract from one side and add
to the other. Finding them, though, is like hunting for four-leafed clovers.

Mr Biden and Mr Trump are close to tied in national polls (Mr Trump is
doing better than that in the swing states). Overall, compared with 2020,
there has been a shift of two percentage points in Mr Trump’s favour. This
change has two sources.

The first is made up of people who voted for Mr Biden in 2020 and now say
they are either undecided, supporting a third party or planning not to vote.
This is a reminder that if Robert F. Kennedy junior makes it onto the ballot
in swing states he could tip the election. Mr Kennedy, whom we profile this
week, refuses to be drawn on whether Mr Biden or Mr Trump would be
worse for America and says his internal polling shows him mainly attracting
independent voters, rather than from one particular candidate. Other polls,
however, suggest that higher third-party support has done more harm to Mr
Biden.

The second source of weakness for Mr Biden is genuine swing voters, who
have deserted him for Mr Trump. Among our 49,000, just 465 voted for Mr
Trump last time and say they will now back Mr Biden. There are 632 Biden-
to-Trump voters. Many people who recall the chaos of Mr Trump’s
presidency and its riotous conclusion, and have seen recent jobs data, will be
wondering what on Earth these folk are thinking. Our mega-sample has
some answers on that, too.

Swing voters do not view this year’s election as Republicans would like
them to: immigration is not the most important issue for them. Neither do
they view it as Democrats wish. Their most important issue is not the
defence of democracy, climate policy, or abortion. It is inflation, which
remains sticky , followed by the economy. Politics is less central to the lives
of swing voters than it is to news hounds and committed partisans. They may
not know much about Mr Biden’s position on natural gas or North Korea,
but they do know that eggs are expensive and driving to work costs too
much.

The other, perhaps more surprising, finding is who these swing voters are.
Those most likely to have swung from Mr Biden to Mr Trump are non-white
parents of school-age children. That may reflect abiding fury at over-long
school lockdowns during the pandemic. It also reflects a notable trend: that
race and voting are becoming unstuck. In the short term this is troubling,
because it makes Mr Trump’s return to the White House more likely.
Looking further in the future, however, it promises to be a blessing. A
multiracial democracy in which everyone votes according to their race is a
nightmarish prospect. Politics should be a competition between ideas rather
than identities. America is swinging in that direction. ■
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rare-in-america

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The Cass Review

America should follow England’s lead on

transgender care for kids
Its approach is neither as harsh as in red states nor as lax as in blue states

Apr 10th 2024 |

CALM DISCUSSIONS of transgender medicine are rare. “There are few

other areas of health care where professionals are so afraid to openly discuss
their views,” argues Hilary Cass, a British doctor. On April 9th she published
a 388-page report, commissioned by England’s National Health Service,
assessing the evidence for and against treatments for children who identify
as transgender. Its conclusions will reverberate on both sides of the Atlantic,
where standards of care differ wildly.

The treatments at issue include puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones and

(rarely) surgery. Puberty blockers are drugs that delay the onset of puberty.
Cross-sex hormones stimulate the development of opposite-sex
characteristics: oestrogen causes males to grow larger breasts, testosterone
gives females bigger muscles and deeper voices, among other things. “There
is not a reliable evidence base” to show that the benefits of offering such
treatments to children outweigh the harms, says the Cass Review. Many
studies have been published, but they are often of “poor quality”. Some draw
conclusions from tiny samples. Some lack control groups, so that outcomes
for patients receiving treatment are not compared with outcomes for those
who do not. Far too little effort has been made to observe long-term effects.
Some clinics even resisted attempts to gather such data. “It is unusual for us
to give a potentially life-changing treatment to young people and not know
what happens to them in adulthood,” Dr Cass told the BBC.

In the rich world, approaches to transgender care for children now fall into
three broad categories: laissez-faire, draconian and cautious. The laissez-
faire approach, common in blue states in America, argues that if children
identify as the opposite gender and desperately want to adjust their bodies to
align with that feeling, they should be allowed to do so. If denied such
“gender-affirming care”, their lives will be blighted and they may consider
ending them, proponents say. Some activists add, in forceful language, that
only transphobes could possibly object. The American Academy of
Pediatrics, a national body, supports the provision of puberty blockers and
cross-sex hormones to minors, while evaluating new evidence.

The draconian approach is that such treatments should simply be banned.

This is common in red American states, where some politicians stir up
antipathy towards transgender people to win votes. Some states combine
bans on treatment with harsh penalties for doctors who offer it. Florida
threatens them with five years in prison; Idaho, ten. Texas has tried to
investigate whether parents who seek such care for their children are fit to be
parents; though this is now tied up in court. In all, 22 American states have
outlawed or restricted transgender care for adolescents, most of them
recently.

The cautious approach, which informs policy in Denmark, Finland, Norway,

Sweden and now England, stresses that more evidence is needed. No one is
sure why the number of children who identify as transgender has exploded in
the past decade. Before giving them drugs which can make them
permanently sterile and unable to experience an orgasm, medics should
explore other interventions. Many trans-identifying children are on the
autism spectrum. Many suffer from depression, and should be offered
counselling. Many eventually desist, sometimes realising that they are gay,
not trans. Health providers should not rush into invasive treatments even if
the child demands them. Thus, the NHS in England now offers puberty
blockers only as part of a clinical trial. Cross-sex hormones should be
provided only to children over 16, and with “extreme caution”, says the Cass
Review.

port/

As The Economist has argued before, the cautious approach is the wisest.
Transgender people should always be treated with respect and kindness, and
adults should be free to make their own decisions about their bodies. But as
Dr Cass concludes, it is essential to guard against “the creep of unproven
approaches into clinical practice”. This may be hard in an area that has
become so politically contentious. It may also be harder in health systems
where private doctors are paid for each intervention, and thus have an
incentive to give patients what they ask for. Nonetheless, it is the
responsibility of medical authorities to offer treatments based on solid
evidence. ■
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transgender-care-for-kids

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War in Gaza

The short-sighted Israeli army

Force alone cannot bring security

Apr 11th 2024 |

THE STORY of the Israel Defence Forces is the story of Israel itself. From
the creation of the state in 1948, the IDF has repeatedly fought and won wars
with Arab countries that were bent on destroying it. Israelis see their army as
the best of themselves—tough, shrewd and innovative. Despite the IDF’s
terrible failure to predict or prevent the incursion from Gaza on October 7th
2023, many Israelis think their army has gone on to have a good war. A
former Israeli general and national security adviser this week said that
Operation Swords of Iron would come to be viewed as an exemplar of how
to conduct urban combat.

As our reporting makes clear, the reality in Gaza is different. The campaign
against Hamas is justified, but it has been marred by the IDF’s over-reliance
on technology and a lack of strategic thinking. Most of all, the army has
suffered from the self-serving rivalries and cramped vision of Israel’s
political leaders. As so often, Palestinians have paid the price. In this, too,
the story of the IDF is the story of Israel.

Two areas where the IDF has fallen short are its responsibilities as an
occupying power and its duty to minimise civilian deaths. Some 1.7m people
have been displaced; many lack adequate food, water or medicine. For
months, a few hundred lorry-loads of food have been getting into Gaza, far
below the 500 or so a day that is the minimum needed. Outraged, some
countries have resorted to dangerous, costly air drops.

Israel insists that it has done all that humanitarian law demands, but
persistent and seemingly arbitrary blockages of aid contradict that. So do
Israel’s own belated efforts in recent days, under great pressure from
America, its main ally, to prevent a looming famine. IDF officers have
blamed politicians for shortages, but at the very least they should have
foreseen how these would come to define their operations.

The civilian death toll is also of grave concern. To many people, tens of
thousands of deaths and injuries and the destruction of so much of Gaza
could never be justified. Israeli officials retort that war is harsh and the ratio
of civilian deaths to combatants is about 2:1, a figure that roughly matches
independent studies and is similar to Iraq when an American-led coalition
struck Islamic State in Mosul in 2016-17.

Comparisons are hard and figures are inexact, but even if that is true, many
armies would find Israel’s rules of engagement disproportionate and hence
illegal. The IDF is reported to have set the threshold of civilian deaths in
justifying decisions to strike a junior Hamas fighter at 20:1 and a senior
leader at 100:1. For Saddam Hussein, Iraq’s dictator, America set a threshold
of 30:1. The IDF may also have been indiscriminate, which would be illegal
too. A report from inside Israel claims that early in the war, when the army
was determined to take vengeance for October 7th, it assembled target lists
using artificial intelligence and that the pressure to move ahead was so great
that humans gave the system only cursory oversight. Israeli officials
vehemently deny this, but it would not be the first time in war that, without a
clear sense of what counts as victory, kill rates became the measure of
progress.

Amid these excesses, the IDF risks falling short in its chief aim of destroying
Hamas. After six months, the terrorist group’s most senior leaders remain
alive and over 100 hostages are still in captivity. The IDF talks of attacking
four remaining Hamas battalions in Rafah, in the south of Gaza, but that is a
formula for disaster. About 1.5m people are sheltering near Rafah and Israel
has yet to produce a plan for protecting them. Israel appears to have no
strategy for preventing Hamas or something like it from rising from the
rubble. Without one, it will be subject to the devastating mathematics of
insurgency, in which operations designed to reduce the number of terrorists
attract more than enough recruits to replace them.

It is not too late to change course. Yet Israel’s politicians—former IDF

officers among them—want bombs and bullets to substitute for a political
vision of the war’s end. Without a plan for peace, Israel will end up as an
occupier or repeatedly striking Gaza. Either way, it will pay a high price
militarily, economically and diplomatically. The IDF depends on outside
countries, especially America and Germany, to supply vital weapons. If
Western voters rejected the idea of supporting an unending conflict, their
politicians would eventually follow.

Our proposal for peace is built on a temporary ceasefire in exchange for a

hostage release. That would lead to a regional deal involving Arab money
and, possibly, security. Just now, neither Israel nor Hamas is interested. That
makes sense for Hamas, which thrives on conflict and Palestinian suffering.
For Israel and its citizen army it makes no sense at all. ■
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What’s in a name

In praise of Peter Higgs

The particle named after him became a selling point. For the man, it was a
bit of a pain

Apr 11th 2024 |

IF IT HAD been up to Peter Higgs, the world would have taken no heed of
his death on April 8th—nor, for that matter, of the 94 years of life which
preceded it. He valued the respect of his colleagues and treasured his
occasional “bright ideas” about the way the universe worked. The fact that
one of those bright ideas ended up boiled down into an object bearing his
name, which became the subject of a world-encompassing multi-billion-
dollar “quest”, was a source of some exasperation. The Higgs boson’s
discovery, he said, “ruined my life”.

Dr Higgs’s best-known bright idea was arcane but crucial. There are two
types of fundamental particles, fermions and bosons. The symmetrical nature
of the equations which describe bosons implies that they should be massless.
By the 1950s, though, it seemed that some bosons did have mass; some
fundamental symmetries were in practice “broken”. Untangling the maths of
broken symmetries became a preoccupation of particle physicists. Dr
Higgs’s contribution, made over a few weeks in the summer of 1964, was a
mathematical description of a new boson that could give mass to bosons in
need of it.

In 1983 a daring modification of a particle accelerator at CERN, the

European physics lab near Geneva, produced direct evidence of three
massive bosons—two Ws and a Z—predicted by the theory which unified
electromagnetism and the weak nuclear force. This boson bonanza left some
American physicists miffed. They told the government which funded them
that America was losing an important race. The proposed comeback was the
Superconducting Super Collider (SSC), a particle accelerator of
extraordinary power that would be 87km in circumference.

The Higgs boson was a key part of the pitch. The particle’s existence was
predicted by theory but, as had been the case with the Ws and Z, its
discovery was impossible without a powerful enough machine. The SSC
would be that machine. Journalists grasped that if there was a Higgs particle
there must also be a Higgs; 24 years after writing his original paper, Dr
Higgs found himself doing his first interview. Leon Lederman, a champion
of the SSC to whom press availability was a joy, not a chore, dubbed the
Higgs “The God particle”, thereby increasing the hype and the sales of his
thus-titled book.

In 1993 Congress cancelled the SSC. Its European rival, CERN’s LHC,
carried on. Physicists there thought that the Higgs was a “known unknown”
which their machine, though smaller, still stood a good chance of producing,
and it was central to the way it was sold to politicians and the public.

The LHC delivered the goods in 2012, and the Nobel prize committee
followed suit the next year. Dr Higgs grinned (sometimes) and bore the
attention. It was not just that the particle carried his name. Their story was so
beguiling: the humble theorist in his garret (actually a third-floor flat in
Edinburgh’s New Town) who goes unheralded for decades but whose ideas
eventually change the world—how’s that for the untrammelled power of the
singular mind? But it was never really true. Dr Higgs, as he always made
clear, was one of many scientists coming up with similar ideas at a time
when using soundbite-friendly baubles to win funding for city-sized
accelerators was still unthinkable.

It might have been best had it stayed so. What scientists actually want from
big science rarely boils down to a single thing; they want the means with
which to explore widely. The public wants to know that new discoveries are
being made. Casting scientific projects as quests for some pre-ordained grail
(dread word), be it a single boson or a single human genome, may make the
story simple, but it underplays the true ambition and delight of creating tools
that make new types of science possible. And it makes the chance of
disappointment greater. More than a decade after its discovery, it is hard to
argue that finding the Higgs particle has changed the world, or for that
matter physics, all that much. It is worth remembering, as Dr Higgs always
knew, that what really matters is the process, not the prize. ■
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Letters
Letters to the editor
On management consultants, Hong Kong, Jonathan Haidt, underpants, describing X, three-
letter acronyms :: A selection of correspondence

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On management consultants, Hong Kong, Jonathan Haidt, underpants,

describing X, three-letter acronyms

Letters to the editor

A selection of correspondence

Apr 11th 2024 |

Management consultants

Over the past two years The Economist has asked “Are management
consultants useful?” (October 8th 2022) and have they got too big (“The lost
art of self-management”, March 30th)? On the first point, ask the 10,000-
plus clients in Britain we serve across the private and public sector and for
the second take a look at our data.

Our industry in Britain, the second-biggest in the world, experienced double-

digit growth last year and is forecast to achieve 9% this year and 11% next.
Growth has not been “soggy” in this market in recent years and artificial
intelligence is not leading consultants to irrelevance. Far from it: 94% of
consultants we surveyed across Britain believe client services related to AI
and emerging technology will provide the biggest opportunity for expansion
in consulting.

This constant evolution of the industry is nothing new. Our responsibility, as

ever, will be focused on helping our clients, with the appropriate use of
technology, seizing maximum advantage and efficiencies while managing
data and confidentiality.

TAMZEN ISACSSON
Chief executive
Management Consultancies Association
London

Bill Fold, your Chief Growth Hacker, is working for the right firm if it
delivers PDQ results (“Consulted”, March 30th). A bit of chatter with the
Chief Client Crusader might reveal that the clients are part of the problem.
They employ you looking for the minor miracle they have not stumbled
upon. Consultants on the ground get little direction from either their clients
or their senior partners. And if they chance upon the miracle, clients get
precious little tough-love to follow through. After all, future revenue
depends on the Groundhog Day phenomenon of continued billing.
As for “lack of strategic focus”, Peter Drucker would have said there is only
one focus: your customer. That is why you exist. What do they need?
Certainly not consultants in perpetuum.

But instead of doom, the traditional self-serving business models have

opened the door for relative newcomers: firms that use newer business
models, do not burn out their staff and leave after solving problems for their
clients.

Bill Fold, there is cash to grab with these newcomers. And satisfaction from
helping your customers.

STEVE TARR
Fellow
Drucker School of Management
Claremont, California

Hong Kong’s new law

It is ironic that you slam Hong Kong for passing a new national-security law
in fulfilment of its constitutional, legal and moral obligation to protect its
country and city, when the British Parliament enacted a sweeping and far
more stringent National Security Act last July to counter “hostile state
threats” (“So much for autonomy”, March 23rd).

There is no overlap between our new law and the national-security law
enacted by Beijing. Offences like treason, sedition, the theft of state secrets
and espionage are not covered in Beijing’s law. They have actually been on
our statute books for decades in localised versions of British laws. The
British government under its National Security Act rejected a “public-
interest defence” for people (especially in the media) vulnerable to
prosecution for disclosing vaguely defined “protected information”. Yet our
new law provides a defence for persons who are compelled to disclose “state
secrets” without authority where there is a serious threat to public order,
public safety or public health, among other circumstances.

Britain’s National Security Act introduced the new offences of “sabotage”

and “foreign interference”. Similar new offences in our national-security law
are closely modelled on the United Kingdom’s.

You also completely disregard that we have a robust rule of law in Hong
Kong, and our courts have ruled against the government in many cases. No
court observers have been able to find fault with our transparent court
proceedings or the learned judgments handed down by our courts.

REGINA IP
Member of the Legislative Council
Hong Kong
The kids are not alright

It is mostly correct to say that today’s youth are much less tolerant of
prejudice than earlier generations (“The young and the relentless”, March
23rd). And it is true that “fighting, juvenile crime, drug use and teenage
pregnancy are all retreating in America.” But your book review missed the
mark in important ways.

In “The Anxious Generation”, Jonathan Haidt says that “the environment in

which kids grow up today is hostile to human development.” His main point
is that the use of smartphones among teenagers is rewiring and harming
them. Their social skills, literacy, mental health and ability to focus are all
being eroded. He submits that since most of the instant entertainment that
teens consume is generated by other teens, they are often cut off from the
sum of human wisdom, the influence of their elders and ideas about how to
live a good life of meaning and purpose.

After more than 20 years of working with teenagers, I fully agree with Mr
Haidt that something fundamental has shifted on adolescence. We
underestimate the consequences of this social experiment at our peril. You
concluded that “the generation that is now young will eventually grow up,
get jobs, form relationships and have children.” Mr Haidt’s data suggest that
an unprecedented number of young people are looking for ways to prolong
adolescence and opt out of independence and responsibility. Today’s adults
owe them a better preparation for the future. This is not a case of the old
“fretting” about the young.

COLIN MCLEAN
Vancouver

I enjoyed your review. I am reminded of this quote: “Children today are

tyrants…they contradict their parents, gobble their food and tyrannise their
teachers.” Socrates.

MICHAEL CRICK
Bellevue, Washington

The wrong underpants

Your piece on the history of Marks & Spencer gave us the fact that a corpse
was able to be identified in 1994 because it was wearing the retailer’s
underwear (“This is not just an archive”, March 30th). This brought to mind
the story of Operation Mincemeat in 1943, when the British created a
fictitious identity for a cadaver that was set afloat off the coast of Spain in
order to mislead the Germans about the allied invasion of Sicily.
The difficulty of finding clothing for the corpse during war rationing meant
it had to be kitted out with underwear owned by H.A.L. Fisher, an Oxford
academic and author of a remarkable history of Europe, who had died in
1940.

DAVID CUNNINGHAM GREEN

London
Xcellent suggestions

Regarding The Economist’s description of X (Letters, April 6th), perhaps the

best way to move forward on this problem is to have “X, soon to be known
as Insolvent”.

RUPERT HIGGINS
Poole, Dorset

Noting that The Artist Formerly Known As Prince eventually reverted to

being called Prince, might we hope that the same happens to Twitter?

TOM HAYHOE
London
Three-letter acronyms

LOL. Really enjoyed your online leader about the explosive growth of
TLAs. THX. (“It’s time to curb triple-digit inflation”, March 30th).

JEM ESKENAZI
London
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By Invitation
Steven Levitt and John Donohue defend a finding made
famous by “Freakonomics”
Abortion and crime :: Links between abortion and falling crime discomfit many but are clear,
say the economists

Ekrem Imamoglu on Turkey’s renewed faith in democracy

Erdogan humbled :: Recent elections have upended the country’s politics, says Istanbul’s
mayor

Russia is sure to lose in Ukraine, reckons a Chinese expert

on Russia
A Chinese view of Russia :: Feng Yujun says the war has strained Sino-Russian relations

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Abortion and crime

Steven Levitt and John Donohue defend a finding

made famous by “Freakonomics”
Links between abortion and falling crime discomfit many but are clear, say
the economists

Apr 8th 2024 |

MORE THAN two decades have passed since we published an academic

paper linking the legalisation of abortion to the enormous decline in
American crime since the 1990s. The underlying theory is straightforward.
Children who are unwanted at birth are at risk of a range of adverse life
outcomes and commit much more crime later in life. Legalised abortion
greatly reduced the number of unwanted births. Consequently, legalised
abortion will reduce crime, albeit with substantial lags.

Our paper created much controversy, which was further stoked by a chapter
on the topic in the best-selling book “Freakonomics”, written by one of us
with Stephen Dubner, published in 2005. For many, it was more important to
spin a political response to our hypothesis than to evaluate whether it was
correct.

The data available at the time strongly supported our hypothesis. We

showed, for instance, that crime began falling sooner in the five states that
legalised abortion in advance of Roe v Wade, the US Supreme Court decision
that made abortion available legally nationwide. We documented that crime
in states with high and low abortion rates followed nearly identical trends for
many years, then suddenly and persistently diverged only after the birth
cohorts exposed to legal abortion reached the age at which they would
commit crime. Consistent with our theory, looking at arrest data, which
reveal the age of the offender, the declines in crime were concentrated
among those born after abortion became legal.

These data patterns do not, of course, make an open-and-shut case. No

randomised experiment has been conducted on this topic. We also didn’t
help our own case by mislabelling the set of control variables included in
one of the specifications in one of our tables—a regrettable mistake (later
corrected) which led some people to dismiss all of the paper’s findings. One
of the most vocal and consistently sceptical voices arguing against our
findings has been The Economist, which has written about our study on three
occasions (most recently last month), each time taking a critical and
dismissive stance.

We concede that reasonable people could disagree about how convincing the
findings were in our initial paper. The analysis was retrospective, and there
is always the concern that researchers have cherry-picked their findings, or
that perhaps it was just pure coincidence that the patterns emerged.

There is, however, something unique about our hypothesis, which allows a
second test of the theory that is far closer to the ideal of the scientific
method. There is a long lag between abortions being performed and the
affected cohort reaching the age at which crime is committed. Thus, we
could already at the time of our first academic paper in 2001 make strong
predictions about what our theory would predict should happen to future
crime. Indeed, at the end of that paper, we made the following prediction:
“When a steady state is reached roughly 20 years from now, the impact of
abortion will be roughly twice as great as the impact felt so far. Our results
suggest that all else equal, legalised abortion will account for persistent
declines of 1% a year in crime over the next two decades.”

It is rare—almost unprecedented—in academic economics to be able to

make a testable prediction and then to go back and actually test it decades
later. That’s what we did in a paper published in 2020. Our methodological
approach was straightforward: mimic the specifications reported in our
original paper, but limit the time period to the years that were out of sample,
ie, those after our original data ended.

The results provided stunning corroboration of our predictions. For each of

the seven different analyses we had presented in the initial 2001 paper, the
results for next two decades of data were at least as strong as the results in
our initial dataset, and in most specifications even stronger. This included
what the main critics of our 2001 paper called the “crucial” test, showing
that the abortion rate at the time of any birth cohort negatively correlated
with the age-specific arrest rate for that cohort years later as it moved
through ages 15–24, while perfectly controlling for whatever other factors
were influencing crime in a given state and a given year. We would argue
that, short of a randomised experiment, this is some of the most compelling
evidence one could present.

The magnitude of the implied impacts we are talking about is huge. If you
look over the entire sample, violent-crime rates fell by 62.2 percentage
points in high-abortion states whereas they rose by 3.1% in low-abortion
states.

Though there is not complete acceptance of our hypothesis among

academics, all agree that if our paper is not correct, then there is no viable
explanation for the enormous drop in crime in America that started in the
early 1990s. Indeed, there is not even an arguable theory to supplant the
abortion-crime link. Exposure to lead in the environment might, perhaps, be
the next best hypothesis. But as we showed in our 2020 paper, when one
controls for both environmental lead and abortion, the coefficient on
abortion remains large while the coefficient on environmental lead is greatly
reduced and loses statistical significance.
It seems fair to ask why, in spite of strong supporting evidence, no academic
contradiction of any of the findings of our 2020 paper and support for the
abortion-crime link from international evidence, so many observers remain
sceptical of the hypothesis. Not surprisingly, those whose livelihoods came
from fighting crime during the great crime drop were not keen to conclude
that their approaches—whether more police, more incarceration or particular
social programmes—however important they might have been, were not the
dominant factor in the decline. Another possible explanation is that people
across the political spectrum were uncomfortable with our conclusions.
Many people would prefer that our hypothesis not be true—perhaps not
recognising that the core finding is that when women can control their
fertility the life outcomes of their children are greatly enhanced.

History is full of instances where new scientific theories were resisted by

those who found them inconvenient. By and large, history hasn’t been kind
to the resisters.■

Steven Levitt is an economics professor at the University of Chicago and the

co-author of “Freakonomics” (with Stephen Dubner). John Donohue is a
professor at Stanford Law School.
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Erdogan humbled

Ekrem Imamoglu on Turkey’s renewed faith in

democracy
Recent elections have upended the country’s politics, says Istanbul’s mayor

Apr 10th 2024 |

THE RESULTS of the local elections held on March 31st are a milestone in
Turkey’s history. With most local power now entrusted to the political
opposition by voters, Turkey is no longer devoid of options; its trajectory is
firmly set towards democracy again.

Despite unfair competition, especially in the allocation of state resources to

the ruling party and its candidates and government control of the media, the
opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), of which I am a member,
emerged victorious. In Istanbul, government officials and the president
actively campaigned to support my opponent in the mayoral election. We
won even though other opposition parties, which had allied themselves with
the CHP in last year’s elections, abandoned our coalition and ran their own
candidates.

This victory showed that true democratic power lies in the hands of the
people. This was a vote of confidence in a new form of municipal
governance that we have termed the “Istanbul Model”. This model
prioritises equality, civic participation in the democratic process and more
effective economic and social-development policies at the local level.

On March 31st voters elected social-democratic candidates not only in

Istanbul and its districts but across Turkey, redrawing the electoral map.
Their message is clear. From now on they want to see a country governed by
the rule of law and democracy. They reject divisive policies and
authoritarianism. They envision a united Turkey, not one torn apart by
polarisation. Furthermore, this election result was a protest against the
deepening economic crisis: soaring inflation, rising unemployment and a
cost-of-living squeeze.

The current government, which has held power for 22 years, has seen a loss
of support from key voter groups including young people, women, blue-
collar workers and pensioners. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his
Justice and Development (AK) party suffered heavy setbacks in major cities,
with their support concentrated mainly in rural areas. Conversely, the CHP
won unprecedented support in central and eastern Anatolia, signalling a shift
in political dynamics across Turkey.

The electoral outcome has infused the democratic opposition with new
energy. Just a year ago voters narrowly supported Mr Erdogan in the
presidential election. Since then the CHP has made leadership changes and
launched a process to radically revamp its programme. The people of Turkey
have recognised and welcomed this shift in direction. They have a strong
desire for change.

The election has also shown that citizens can form much stronger alliances
than political elites. Even if parties and political leaders lose hope in
democracy, citizens do not. As the democrats of Turkey, we are committed to
expanding this grassroots alliance. The future of Turkish democracy and the
country’s prosperity hinges on it.
The past two decades have seen a crisis in democracy, with authoritarian
governments coming to power around the world. Driven by populism and
polarisation, this upheaval has stoked global uncertainties, prompting people
to question whether the end of the democratic era is near.

For Turkey, however, March 31st marked the opposite: the end of the
erosion of democracy. It is a turning-point that carries profound implications,
not only for Turkey but also for its immediate region and beyond. It shows
how authoritarian tendencies can be challenged and serves as an example to
the world. In many countries voters are entrenched in their partisan
affiliations. Turkey has demonstrated that this need not be the case. When
coherent and credible alternatives for governance are presented, voters are
willing to change their preferences and reject populist authoritarianism.

The task now for elected mayors, including myself, is to ensure that a
common set of rules for accountable local governance is consistently
implemented. This approach will require reliable internal monitoring and
assessment of public services in CHP-held jurisdictions.

At the same time, we will look to co-operate with the government to address
our cities’ and the wider country’s chronic problems, particularly in
earthquake and disaster preparedness and management. We will take
measures to bolster our economy, democracy and legal system by
developing a comprehensive set of reform proposals.

The CHP has now emerged as the strongest alternative to Mr Erdogan’s AK

for the leadership of the country. Over the next five years social-democratic
mayors will govern municipalities that account for more than 70% of
Turkey’s population and almost 80% of its economy. As we move towards
the next presidential and parliamentary elections, changes at the local level
will lay the groundwork for broader changes on the national stage.

Regardless of future efforts by Mr Erdogan’s populist regime, Istanbul and

Turkey will stand as symbols of freedom, democracy and social harmony. A
new political ethos that puts the people first will prevail over authoritarian
populism. Following a generation marked by democratic decay and
economic decline, the Republic of Turkey enters its second century with a
renewed faith in democracy. ■
Ekrem Imamoglu is the mayor of Istanbul and a member of the Republican
People’s Party.
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A Chinese view of Russia

Russia is sure to lose in Ukraine, reckons a Chinese

expert on Russia
Feng Yujun says the war has strained Sino-Russian relations

Apr 11th 2024 |

THE WAR between Russia and Ukraine has been catastrophic for both
countries. With neither side enjoying an overwhelming advantage and their
political positions completely at odds, the fighting is unlikely to end soon.
One thing is clear, though: the conflict is a post-cold-war watershed that will
have a profound, lasting global impact.

Four main factors will influence the course of the war. The first is the level
of resistance and national unity shown by Ukrainians, which has until now
been extraordinary. The second is international support for Ukraine, which,
though recently falling short of the country’s expectations, remains broad.
The third factor is the nature of modern warfare, a contest that turns on a
combination of industrial might and command, control, communications and
intelligence systems. One reason Russia has struggled in this war is that it is
yet to recover from the dramatic deindustrialisation it suffered after the
disintegration of the Soviet Union.

The final factor is information. When it comes to decision-making, Vladimir

Putin is trapped in an information cocoon, thanks to his having been in
power so long. The Russian president and his national-security team lack
access to accurate intelligence. The system they operate lacks an efficient
mechanism for correcting errors. Their Ukrainian counterparts are more
flexible and effective.

In combination, these four factors make Russia’s eventual defeat inevitable.

In time it will be forced to withdraw from all occupied Ukrainian territories,
including Crimea. Its nuclear capability is no guarantee of success. Didn’t a
nuclear-armed America withdraw from Korea, Vietnam and Afghanistan?

Though the war has been hugely costly for Ukraine, the strength and unity of
its resistance has shattered the myth that Russia is militarily invincible.
Ukraine may yet rise from the ashes. When the war ends, it can look forward
to the possibility of joining the European Union and NATO.

The war is a turning-point for Russia. It has consigned Mr Putin’s regime to

broad international isolation. He has also had to deal with difficult domestic
political undercurrents, from the rebellion by the mercenaries of the Wagner
Group and other pockets of the military—for instance in Belgorod—to
ethnic tensions in several Russian regions and the recent terrorist attack in
Moscow. These show that political risk in Russia is very high. Mr Putin may
recently have been re-elected, but he faces all kinds of possible black-swan
events.

Adding to the risks confronting Mr Putin, the war has convinced more and
more former Soviet republics that Russia’s imperial ambition threatens their
independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity. Increasingly aware that a
Russian victory is out of the question, these states are distancing themselves
from Moscow in different ways, from forging economic-development
policies that are less dependent on Russia to pursuing more balanced foreign
policies. As a result, prospects for the Eurasian integration that Russia
advocates have dimmed.

The war, meanwhile, has made Europe wake up to the enormous threat that
Russia’s military aggression poses to the continent’s security and the
international order, bringing post-cold-war EU-Russia detente to an end.
Many European countries have given up their illusions about Mr Putin’s
Russia.

At the same time, the war has jolted NATO out of what Emmanuel Macron,
the French president, called its “brain-dead” state. With most NATO
countries increasing their military spending, the alliance’s forward military
deployment in eastern Europe has been greatly shored up. The addition of
Sweden and Finland to NATO highlights Mr Putin’s inability to use the war
to prevent the alliance’s expansion.

The war will also help to reshape the UN Security Council. It has
highlighted the body’s inability to effectively assume its responsibility of
maintaining world peace and regional security owing to the abuse of veto
power by some permanent members. This has riled the international
community, increasing the chances that reform of the Security Council will
speed up. Germany, Japan, India and other countries are likely to become
permanent members and the five current permanent members may lose their
veto power. Without reform, the paralysis that has become the hallmark of
the Security Council will lead the world to an even more dangerous place.

China’s relations with Russia are not fixed, and they have been affected by
the events of the past two years. Russia’s foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov,
has just visited Beijing, where he and his Chinese counterpart once again
emphasised the close ties between their countries. But the trip appears to
have been more diplomatic effort by Russia to show it is not alone than
genuine love-in. Shrewd observers note that China’s stance towards Russia
has reverted from the “no limits” stance of early 2022, before the war, to the
traditional principles of “non-alignment, non-confrontation and non-
targeting of third parties”.

Although China has not joined Western sanctions against Russia, it has not
systematically violated them. It is true that China imported more than 100m
tonnes of Russian oil in 2023, but that is not a great deal more than it was
buying annually before the war. If China stops importing Russian oil and
instead buys from elsewhere, it will undoubtedly push up international oil
prices, putting huge pressure on the world economy.

Since the war began China has conducted two rounds of diplomatic
mediation. Success has proved elusive but no one should doubt China’s
desire to end this cruel war through negotiations. That wish shows that
China and Russia are very different countries. Russia is seeking to subvert
the existing international and regional order by means of war, whereas China
wants to resolve disputes peacefully.

With Russia still attacking Ukrainian military positions, critical

infrastructure and cities, and possibly willing to escalate further, the chances
of a Korea-style armistice look remote. In the absence of a fundamental
change in Russia’s political system and ideology, the conflict could become
frozen. That would only allow Russia to continue to launch new wars after a
respite, putting the world in even greater danger.■

Feng Yujun is a professor at Peking University.

This article was downloaded by calibre from https://www.economist.com/by-
invitation/2024/04/11/russia-is-sure-to-lose-in-ukraine-reckons-a-chinese-expert-on-
russia

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Briefing
Homeowners face a $25trn bill from climate change
Risk of subsidence :: Property, the world’s biggest asset class, is also its most vulnerable

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Risk of subsidence

Homeowners face a $25trn bill from climate

change
Property, the world’s biggest asset class, is also its most vulnerable

Apr 11th 2024 | MIAMI

THE RESIDENTS of northern Italy had never seen anything like the
thunderstorm that mauled their region last summer. Hailstones as big as
19cm across pummelled Milan, Parma, Turin and Venice. Windows were
broken, solar panels smashed, tiles cracked and cars dented. The episode
cost the insurance industry $4.8bn, making it the most expensive natural
disaster in the world from July to September (the figures exclude America,
which collates such data separately).

Yet insurance executives, although smarting, were not surprised. Climate

change is making such incidents much more common. In the decade from
2000 to 2009 only three thunderstorms cost the industry more than $1bn at
current prices. From 2010 to 2019 there were ten. Since 2020 there have
already been six. Such storms now account for more than a quarter of the
costs to the insurance industry from natural disasters, according to Swiss Re,
a reinsurance firm. In Europe, not known for extreme weather, losses have
topped $5bn a year for the past three years.

Climate change is doing vast damage to property all around the world, and
not always in the places or the ways that people imagine. Hurricanes,
wildfires and floods are becoming more common and more severe—but so
are more mundane banes. In London, for instance, the drying of the clay on
which most of the city stands during summer heatwaves is causing
unexpected subsidence, landing homeowners with big bills. A similar
problem afflicts Amsterdam, where many older buildings are built on
wooden piles inserted into the boggy soil in lieu of conventional
foundations. Extended dry spells in summer are lowering the water table,
drying out the piles and exposing them to the air. This allows the piles to rot,
prompting the buildings above to sag. Unlucky homeowners can be saddled
with bills of €100,000 ($108,000) or more for remedial work. And on top of
the expensive repairs climate change is foisting on homeowners comes the
likelihood that governments will oblige them to install low-carbon heating
and cooling, or improve their homes’ energy efficiency, adding yet more to
their costs.
Money pit

The upshot is an enormous bill for property-owners. Estimates are

necessarily vague, given the uncertainties not just of the climate but also of
government policy. But MSCI, which compiles financial indices, thinks that
over the next 25 years the costs of climate change, in terms both of damage
to property and of investments to reduce emissions, may amount to almost a
tenth of the value of the housing in institutional investors’ portfolios. If the
same holds true of housing in general, the world is facing roughly a $25trn
hit.

The impending bill is so huge, in fact, that it will have grim implications not
just for personal prosperity, but also for the financial system. Property is the
world’s most important asset class, accounting for an estimated two-thirds of
global wealth. Homes are at the heart of many of the world’s most important
financial markets, with mortgages serving as collateral in money markets
and shoring up the balance-sheets of banks. If the size of the risk suddenly
sinks in, and borrowers and lenders alike realise the collateral underpinning
so many transactions is not worth as much as they thought, a wave of re-
pricing will reverberate through financial markets. Government finances,
too, will be affected, as homeowners clamour for expensive bail-outs.
Climate change, in short, could prompt the next global property crash.

At present the risks of climate change are not properly reflected in house
prices. A study in Nature, a journal, finds that if the expected losses from
increased flooding alone were taken into account, the value of American
homes would fall by $121bn-237bn. Many buyers and sellers are simply
unaware of the risks. When these are brought home, prices change. A study
published in 2018 in the Journal of Urban Economics found a persistent 8%
drop in the price of homes built on flood plains in New York following
Hurricane Sandy, which caused widespread flooding in 2012. Properties just
inside zones in California where sellers are required to disclose the risk of
wildfires cost about 4% less than houses just outside such zones.

In many cases, the risks climate change poses to property are only slowly
becoming apparent—as with London’s geology. The distinctive yellowish
bricks with which many houses in the city are built are made from the clay
on which the houses stand. It is good to build with, but recently has proved
not so good to build on. During the now-milder winters, there is higher
rainfall, since warmer air can hold more moisture. As the clay absorbs the
rain, it expands. Warmer summers then dry it out again, causing the ground
to contract. That would not be a problem if the expansion and contraction
were uniform, says Owen Brooker, a structural engineer. But they are not,
owing to trees, which suck up moisture in their vicinity. The resulting
variation in the accordion effect causes the ground to buckle and twist in
places, and the houses above to list and crack.

Two-fifths of London’s housing stock, 1.8m homes, will be susceptible to

subsidence by 2030, according to the British Geological Survey. Other
nearby cities, such as Oxford and Cambridge, are also at risk (see map).
Remediation, often by installing concrete underpinning, typically costs
around £10,000 ($12,500) but can be much more. PwC, a consultancy,
estimates that British home insurers will be paying out £1.9bn a year on
subsidence claims by 2030. “To be honest the insurance companies would do
themselves a good service by making people aware,” says Mr Brooker.

Analysts call the direct impacts of climate change, such as this “shrink-
swell” effect, physical risks. Some, like shrink-swell, are chronic. Others are
acute, such as hurricanes, floods and wildfires. In either case, not only can a
house be completely destroyed, but the ongoing risk of further such
calamities can make it hazardous to rebuild in the same place. Even the
simplest of changes in the weather can make houses uninhabitable: only a
small minority of Indian homes have air conditioning, so if the temperature
rises much, many become unbearably hot.
Physical risks are growing everywhere (see chart 1). The problem is not
limited to dry, thundery summers in Europe. According to the National
Centres for Environmental Information, a government agency, America
suffered 28 natural disasters that did more than $1bn of damage last year,
exceeding the previous record of 22 in 2020. Meanwhile Typhoon Doksuri,
which hit the Philippines and then southern China last year, was the most
costly typhoon in history.
The risks are not spread evenly, however. Research conducted by the Bank
of England in 2022 found that just 10% of postcode districts, each roughly
the size of a small town, would account for 45% of the mortgages that would
be impaired if average global temperatures reached 3.3°C above pre-
industrial levels, largely because of the increased risk of flooding in those
places. For similar reasons, a back-of-the-envelope calculation suggests that
roughly 40% of the value of property in Amsterdam could be wiped out by
physical risks compared with just 7% for Tokyo.

Data are scarcest for the impact on poorer countries, but many of the world’s
most populated cities are coastal. A study published in 2017 by Christian
Aid, a charity, suggests that in terms of population Kolkata and Mumbai in
India and Dhaka in Bangladesh are the most exposed to rising sea levels. In
terms of the value of property at risk, the most vulnerable are Miami,
Guangzhou and New York.
Tokyo rose

But the risks are not fixed. They can be reduced, most obviously through
private and public efforts to improve preparedness. Part of the reason that
the risks to Tokyo are low is that it dramatically improved drainage and
flood defences after Typhoon Kit hit in 1966, flooding 42,000 buildings.
When Typhoon Lan brought similar amounts of rain in 2017, only 35
buildings were swamped.

In theory, house and insurance prices should provide a clear market signal
about the risks of climate-related harm to any given property. But even in
places obviously in harm’s way, such as Miami, the signal is often distorted.
For one thing, it was only in March that Florida’s legislature approved a bill
requiring those selling a property to disclose if it had previously flooded.
Worse, there is good reason to think that home insurance in Florida is
underpriced. Most Floridians would gasp at such a notion: according to
Insurify, an insurance company, the average annual premium for a typical
single-family home in the state is likely to hit $11,759 this year. Yet even
with such swingeing rates, several private home insurers have gone bust or
withdrawn from Florida in recent years.
The state government, however, shields homeowners from the market
through a state-owned insurer of last resort, which provides policies to
homes that private insurers will not cover. Citizens Property Insurance
Corporation has become Florida’s largest home insurer (see chart 2). Its
exposure is now $423bn, much more than the state’s public debt—and all on
houses that, by definition, other insurers deem too risky to cover. This
suggests that Citizens has been providing a big subsidy to homeowners from
taxpayers. Flood insurance underwritten by the federal government suffers
from similar flaws. First Street Foundation, which aims to track the threats to
American property from climate change, calculates that home values in West
Palm Beach, a glitzy city up the coast from Miami, would fall by 40% if
owners had to pay the true cost of insuring against hurricanes and floods.
That would wipe out many homeowners’ equity and leave lots of mortgages
without adequate collateral.

Yet Miami’s property market is booming. A forest of apartment buildings is

rising around the city. Over the past five years house prices have leapt by
79%, according to the Case-Shiller index. If the market is sending any signal
about the risks of climate change to property, it is to relax.

To make matters even worse, physical risks are not the only peril climate
change presents to property-owners. There is also “transition risk”, which
refers to the possibility that governments may oblige homeowners to
renovate in ways that reduce the carbon footprint of their properties. Such
policies can lead to substantial costs. Germany’s coalition government, for
example, had planned to ban new gas boilers from the beginning of this year,
which would have landed lots of homeowners with costs of €15,000 or more,
even after subsidies. (The policy caused such an uproar that the changes
were watered down and delayed last year.)

If governments stick to their emissions targets, costly mandates will return.

Buildings account for 18% of the world’s energy-related emissions, largely
through heating in winter and cooling in summer. The International Energy
Agency, a watchdog, estimates that annual investment of $574bn will be
needed for energy efficiency and clean technologies in building by 2030,
more than double the $250bn invested in 2023. Environmental policies can
also raise electricity bills, increasing homeowners’ costs in a different way.
 It wouldn’t happen in Tokyo

Quantifying transition risks is tricky. It is hard to know how much residential

property there is in the world, says Bryan Reid of MSCI, let alone how green
policies may affect its value. His firm’s modelling suggests that, if
governments imposed policies intended to limit the rise in temperatures
above the long-term average to 1.5°C, the costs would amount to 3.4% of
the value of housing held in investment portfolios. That is lower than the 6%
toll that MSCI’s modelling suggests physical risks will take, but still
substantial.

The more serious governments become about curbing emissions, the greater
the transition risks (although in the long run, such policies should reduce
physical risks). At the climate summit in Dubai last year Emmanuel Macron,
France’s president, called for the European Central Bank to introduce two
separate interest rates, one for “brown lending” for investments in fossil
fuels and one for “green lending”. Banks that have committed to reducing
the emissions associated with their lending will need to ensure that their
portfolio of mortgages aligns with their targets. Draughty, natural-gas-
guzzling homes could face a higher cost of finance than greener ones and
consequently sell for a discount.
In the long run there is a good chance that both physical and transition risks
will land with governments. Carolyn Sousky, of the Environmental Defense
Fund, a pressure group, imagines a scenario in which multiple natural
disasters strike different parts of America at the same time. That could lead
to a sudden increase in insurance prices across much of the country and a
slide in property values. Homeowners unwilling to pay a fortune to keep
living in a disaster zone might simply hand the keys to their houses back to
their mortgage-providers, which could in turn face losses owing to the fall in
prices.

America’s state-backed mortgage giants, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac,

require borrowers to have home insurance. If their customers cannot afford
it, the pair could suffer a wave of defaults. “We’re acutely aware of it,” says
Dan Coates, the acting chief of staff at the Federal Housing Finance Agency,
which oversees Fannie and Freddie. “There are plenty of stopgaps in place to
keep that cascade of bad events from having the consequences that we all
worry about,” he adds, pointing to federal disaster-relief payments and a
potential repeat of the forbearance that Fannie and Freddie offered
homeowners during the covid-19 pandemic. But such measures would in
effect transfer risks from homeowners to the federal government.
Mortgaging the future

In democracies where most voters own their homes, politicians have an

incentive to shield homeowners from the bill from climate change for as
long as possible. Germany’s coalition government, which has struggled to
recover from the row over gas boilers, is considered a cautionary tale.
Procrastination is also a reflection of the global logic of climate change:
even if a government introduces stringent measures to cut emissions in its
own country, that does not necessarily reduce global emissions and therefore
physical risks. No amount of investment in energy efficiency in German
homes, for instance, would have prevented the floods in 2021 that caused
more than $40bn of damage.

Yet the longer governments protect homeowners from the risks the larger
they become. Vulnerable places like Miami grow even as climate change
intensifies, with new arrivals assuming that taxpayers will defray the
ballooning future costs. At some point, that assumption will become
untenable, with unpredictable consequences. Climate change is often cast as
something happening to other people, in faraway places and in desperate
circumstances. But for much of the rich world, the costs are starting to come
home. ■

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fortnightly subscriber-only newsletter, or visit our climate-change hub.
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Asia
America’s Asian allies are trying to Trump-proof their
policies
Indo-Pacific statecraft :: Kishida Fumio meets Joe Biden in Washington, DC, to shore up
deterrence

How India’s imports of Russian oil have lubricated global

markets
Usefully oleaginous :: But as the country’s importance in the global oil market grows, risks
loom

Myanmar’s junta is losing ever more ground

After the fight, then what? :: Our correspondent spent three days with one rebel group

Some Australians are increasingly sceptical of AUKUS

Banyan :: The government needs to sell its ground-breaking security pact much harder

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Indo-Pacific statecraft

America’s Asian allies are trying to Trump-proof

their policies
Kishida Fumio meets Joe Biden in Washington, DC, to shore up deterrence

Apr 9th 2024 | MANILA, SEOUL and TOKYO

THE PRIME MINISTER of Japan, Kishida Fumio, is keeping a laser-like

eye on conflicts around the world—and the implications for his country’s
security. If Russia is allowed to prevail in Ukraine, “it will send the wrong
signal to Asia,” Mr Kishida told The Economist and other reporters in a
wood-panelled room at the Kantei, the prime minister’s office, on April 5th.
The desire to strengthen Japan’s security alliance explains why he went to
the White House on April 10th for a state dinner with Joe Biden, America’s
president. The two leaders announced a host of measures to deepen defence
and security co-operation between their countries.
Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos, president of the Philippines, another ally,
was due to join Mr Biden and Mr Kishida the following day. American
officials tout the gatherings as evidence that its Asian alliances are evolving.
What they do not say, but is implied, is that they are also trying to protect the
relationships from the damage Donald Trump could do if he wins again.

America’s alliances in Asia have helped keep the peace in the region for
decades. In contrast to Europe, where NATO binds dozens of nations into a
mutual defence pact, America has discrete bilateral treaties with Japan,
South Korea, Australia, the Philippines and Thailand, in a “hub-and-spokes”
system. Under Mr Biden, America has sought to foster links between the
spokes in the hope of countering China’s rise. America’s allies have largely
embraced the effort—especially Japan.

Working together with “like-minded countries” on security issues “will lead

to the establishment of a multilayered network, and by expanding that we
can improve deterrence”, says Mr Kishida. Hewing closely to prepared
notes, he appeared solemn in his interview as he spoke of his belief that the
world is at a “historic turning-point” and faces a “very complex and
challenging security environment”.

What lies behind such talk of a “network” is a collection of smaller

groupings that collaborate on security. America, Japan and South Korea now
hold regular high-level meetings in a trilateral format; so too do America,
Japan and the Philippines. AUKUS, a defence pact signed in 2021, brings
together America, Australia and Britain. On April 8th the three countries’
defence ministers announced they are “considering co-operation” with Japan
through AUKUS.

The result is greater integration between armed forces across the region. In
recent years joint exercises have expanded to include a wider range of
partners. America, Japan, Australia and the Philippines trained together for
the first time in the South China Sea on April 7th, amid continuing Chinese
provocations there. Intelligence-sharing is expanding, too: America, Japan
and South Korea now share data in real time when North Korea launches
missiles (which is happening more often). Mr Biden and Mr Kishida
announced a new air-defence initiative between America, Australia and
Japan.

Talk of a more multilateral approach to Asian security long predates Mr

Biden. In the early 1950s, America mooted a NATO-esque “Pacific Pact”,
but encountered resistance, both from Japan, which wanted to focus on its
post-war recovery, and from Japan’s neighbours, which harboured deep
concerns about its rearmament.

The current context is different. Many in Asia now worry more about
Chinese aggression. Under Abe Shinzo, Japan’s prime minister from 2012 to
2020, the country loosened its constitutional restrictions on the use of force
and expanded defence spending. Mr Kishida has accelerated that approach:
Japan’s defence budget grew by 50% between 2022 and this year. The
country aims to nearly double spending on defence activities to 2% of GDP
by 2027, up from 1.2% in 2022.
Defensive postures

Yet for all of these developments, the only formal treaties that exist are still
those each country has with America itself. The distinction is meaningful. As
the war in Ukraine shows, there is a stark difference between the kind of
support given to treaty allies and to a wider category of “partners”. Although
Taiwan is the most dangerous regional flashpoint, it has no guarantees of
security assistance. It has small training exchanges with America’s forces but
no joint exercises with any country in the region. America has promised to
help Taiwan defend itself but has no legal obligation to fight on Taiwan’s
behalf.

There are limits to how deep the ties between America’s allies in Asia can
become. “There’s not going to be an Asian NATO,” says one official from an
allied nation. Domestic political realities create barriers. In Japan, for
example, a pacifist constitution still makes it difficult to enter into new treaty
alliances with mutual defence requirements (its pact with America requires
America to come to its defence, but not the other way around).

And Japan looks unlikely to formally join AUKUS anytime soon. Shortly
after the defence ministers’ statement on April 8th, Anthony Albanese,
Australia’s prime minister, clarified there were no plans to add new members
to the pact. Mr Kishida reiterated this on April 10th. Australia worries about
Japan’s ability to protect sensitive information and technology; unlike the
current members of AUKUS, Japan does not belong to the Five Eyes
intelligence-sharing pact. Japan is wary of provoking China, its biggest trade
partner.

Another problem is that some allies, such as Thailand, are glaringly absent
from the picture. The current governments of South Korea and the
Philippines are largely of like minds with those of America, Australia and
Japan. But under different leaders, they could again diverge.

The biggest potential problem, however, surrounds American leadership. Mr

Trump’s first term shook allies’ confidence in America’s reliability. While
Mr Biden has done much to repair the security relationships, he has
continued his predecessor’s protectionist, anti-trade ways, much to his Asian
allies’ dismay—as with his decision to oppose the takeover of US Steel, an
American firm, by Nippon Steel, a Japanese one. America’s deep internal
divisions raise questions about its ability to maintain its global obligations in
the long run. “It all depends on America, on whether they want to continue
playing that role,” says a senior official from another ally. If Mr Trump is re-
elected, those worries would become more acute.

In Japan, the fears are captured in the phrase moshitora, an abbreviation that
means “What if Trump?”, or its more fretful variants, hobotora (“probably
Trump”) and moutora (“already Trump”). Some are optimistic that even if
Mr Trump returns, America’s allies in Asia will face fewer problems than
those in Europe. They point to the fact that America First types see China as
a key adversary. There will be “continuity” in how the Biden and Trump
administrations see the situation in the Indo-Pacific, Alexander Gray, who
served on Mr Trump’s National Security Council, told a recent conference in
Tokyo.

Even so, America’s allies are bracing themselves. Diplomats are scrambling
to make inroads with Mr Trump’s current crop of advisers. Politicians are
working to reinforce relationships on Capitol Hill and in state governments.
Mr Kishida was due to address a joint session of Congress on April 11th and
visit a Toyota factory in North Carolina on April 12th to highlight Japanese
investment into America.
Officials in Asia have several sets of fears. For one thing, if Mr Trump
abandons Ukraine, it matters to the Indo-Pacific too. Newer multilateral
initiatives in Asia may wither under Mr Trump. In Australia some sceptics
worry that Mr Trump would refuse to sell submarines to Australia on the
basis that America is not producing enough for its own needs, which could
undermine AUKUS.

Trade tensions will rise alongside American tariffs. Mr Trump will probably
put pressure on allies to spend even more on defence than they already do. In
particular Mr Trump may demand more of Taiwan, which raised defence
spending from 1.8% of GDP in 2016 to 2.5% in 2024, but has yet to reach a
target of 3%. At the same time, he may also be less careful about keeping
America’s military support for Taiwan quiet, raising the chances of a
confrontation over the island.
Exit America

Among America’s formal allies in Asia, South Korea probably faces the
most danger. During his previous term, Mr Trump halted large-scale military
exercises as a gesture of good faith during negotiations with Kim Jong Un,
North Korea’s leader. Former advisers say he was fixated on drawing down
America’s 28,500 troops on the peninsula. Christopher Miller, a former
acting secretary of defence, recently spoke about reducing America’s troop
levels in an interview with a Korean newspaper. That might prompt South
Korea to pursue its own nuclear deterrent, a step that over 70% of the public
already supports.

While the chances of Mr Trump retreating from Asia may be lower than the
chances of him abandoning Europe, allies in Asia would be in a weaker
position if he did. Even if America left NATO, the other 31 members could
remain, including France and Britain, which have nuclear arsenals
themselves. Asian allies would be on their own, and face nuclear-backed
threats from China and North Korea. The combined GDP of the remaining
NATO members is equivalent to ten times that of Russia; the combined GDP
of America’s Asian allies is roughly half the size of China’s. “They cannot
balance Chinese power without America in the mix,” says Richard Samuels
of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. In short, spokes without a hub
still cannot get very far. ■
This article was downloaded by calibre from
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Usefully oleaginous

How India’s imports of Russian oil have lubricated

global markets
But as the country’s importance in the global oil market grows, risks loom

Apr 11th 2024 | Singapore

IN FEBRUARY AMERICA slapped new sanctions on Sovcomflot, a

Russian state-owned shipping firm responsible for carrying around 15% of
Russian oil exports to India. Almost immediately, Indian importers stopped
taking shipments from Sovcomflot tankers. But that did little to stem the
flow of Russian crude to India, the world’s third-biggest consumer of oil.
Deliveries increased by 6% in March, compared with February. Exporters
arranged alternative transport to India—probably through the shadow fleet
that helps them bypass sanctions. India has also bought Russian crude at
prices below the $60-per-barrel price cap imposed by the West. Taken
together, these purchases have helped make India the second-biggest
importer of Russian oil, behind China.
The immediate impact has been to help India to meet demand at a lower
cost. In 2023 nearly 90% of India’s oil consumption was sourced from
abroad. Roughly 34% of those imports came from Russia. The discount on
Russian crude has narrowed over time, from 20% at the start of last year to
around 5% in December, but it still yields significant savings on India’s oil
imports, which were worth $181bn last year, around 27% of the country’s
total import bill.
Cheaper imports have helped India’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)
government. On the government’s instructions, oil firms kept the prices of
petrol and diesel unchanged in 2022, even as global oil prices surged in the
aftermath of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The price freeze helped insulate
India from the type of fuel inflation that ravaged neighbouring Pakistan and
Sri Lanka. Last month, with an eye on the upcoming general election,
retailers cut petrol and diesel prices for the first time since the war began.
Less costly oil has also given the BJP more fiscal room by shrinking the
fuel-subsidy bill. That has helped it extend a popular subsidy for liquefied
petroleum gas by a year.

Globally, Indian buying of Russian oil has been important. It has helped
prevent a supply crunch. India’s petroleum ministry claims that global oil
prices could have shot up by about $30-40 per barrel were it not for India’s
trade with Russia. On April 4th an American official visiting Delhi
encouraged India’s imports of discounted Russian oil, as it was important to
“keep oil supply on the market” while ensuring the Kremlin’s profits were
being hit.

India has also rewired energy markets by processing Russian crude and
shipping it back to the West. European countries have led the enforcement of
sanctions on Russia, but remain connected to Russian oil. In 2023 they
imported roughly 225,000 barrels per day (b/d) of Indian petrol and diesel
products, up from an average of 120,000 b/d in the previous five years,
according to the International Energy Agency (IEA). These exports have
boosted India’s trade balance and are another illustration of India’s growing
clout in the market. In 2023 oil-related exports were worth $85bn, around
60% more than in 2021.

India’s influence on global oil markets will only increase. The IEA expects
India to be the single largest source of growth in global demand between
2023 and 2030. Growth and urbanisation are expected to drive oil
consumption up by 20% by 2030, to roughly 1.2m barrels per day,
accounting for more than a third of the projected global increase. To meet
the boom in demand, Indian refineries are expected to increase processing
capacity faster than any country in the world besides China.

Much of the oil will have to come from abroad. Production from Indian oil
reserves is declining. It accounted for just 13% of the country’s supply in
2023. An import-dependent strategy is always vulnerable to risks, such as a
wider conflict in the Middle East.
Ultimately, the most powerful way to reduce India’s oil imports is to reduce
demand for the stuff itself. In last year’s budget India allocated $2.6bn
towards programmes in green sectors. But that is a trifle compared with the
$20bn annually that the Council of Energy, Environment and Water, a think-
tank, estimates is needed for India to reach net-zero emissions by 2070, as it
has promised to do. ■

Stay on top of our India coverage by signing up to Essential India, our free
weekly newsletter.
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lubricated-global-markets

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After the fight, then what?

Myanmar’s junta is losing ever more ground

Our correspondent spent three days with one rebel group

Apr 11th 2024 | Daw Noh Kue

ACROSS MYANMAR, the three-year war to overthrow the military junta

that seized power in a coup in 2021 is far from won. But the popular uprising
the coup provoked has attracted a new generation of fighters, who are
making ground throughout the country. The junta has reportedly lost control
of another part of its border with Thailand to armed rebels. The checkpoint
at Myawaddy, an important land crossing, is thought to have fallen into the
hands of Kayin (also known as Karen) militias. This is a setback for the
regime as it is close to Yangon, the economic capital.

In the west, Rakhine and Chin militias control a key border trade-post with
India and a checkpoint with Bangladesh, while in the north Kachin soldiers
are getting close to capturing the last major land crossing with China. Your
correspondent spent three days with the Karenni Army (KA) in a remote part
of Kayah state in eastern Myanmar. It was clear that these forces are now
thinking beyond the battlefield, to what happens if, improbable as it may
seem, they win.

Rugged and landlocked, and with a population of just 300,000, Kayah (also
known as Karenni) is the smallest and least developed of Myanmar’s seven
ethnic states. The Kayah are used to war. They have been fighting for the
right to self-determination ever since Myanmar’s independence from Britain
in 1948. The Kayah launched their latest campaign on November 11th. Since
then they boast of having captured 65 Myanmar army posts.
“Our army now controls more than 70% of Karenni state,” says Major-
General Aung Mynt. He is in charge of the KA and the Karenni National
Defence Force (KNDF), a 10,000-strong combined force formed after the
coup. Recently they captured Shardaw, a strategic township on the Thai
frontier. They now control the border.

The war has taken its toll on the population. Hundreds of civilians, mainly
women and children, have been killed. Airstrikes and shelling by the armed
forces have displaced more than 80% of Kayah’s population. Many people
have sought refuge in Shan state or in nearby forests. Some make the four-
day hike to Daw Noh Kue, a village near the Thai border which has become
a refugee camp for thousands of displaced people. The camp is run by the
Karenni National Progressive Party, the KA’s political wing.

Despite the hardship that comes with war, tiny Kayah is ahead of the curve
not only militarily, but also in preparing for the future. It was the first state in
Myanmar to establish an Interim Executive Council (IEC). Made up of
political, civil-society and militia leaders, the IEC aspires to join a
democratic federal union to be set up as soon as the military regime is
toppled. In the meantime it is co-ordinating and organising civil
administration for the townships conquered by the KA and its allies.

“We are well aware that the international community may worry about a
power vacuum and warlordism,” says Khu Tor Reh Est, who heads the IEC’s
justice department. He says the council is making preparations to forge “a
federal army” out of the myriad armed groups now active in Kayah and “to
offer education opportunities to the youth who have joined the fight and
choose to return to civilian life”.

This drive by armed rebels to future-proof their territorial gains could be

glimpsed in a dusty field in Kayah, where 40 young men and women took
part in drills such as push-ups and planks. They were training not for the
battlefield, but for the courtroom. After breakfast the students trooped into a
hall where a judge from neighbouring Shan state taught them about marriage
law. Once they pass their exams, these students will hike back over the
mountains to take up their new jobs as lawyers and judges—in what they
hope could soon be a free country. ■
This article was downloaded by calibre from
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Banyan

Some Australians are increasingly sceptical of

AUKUS
The government needs to sell its ground-breaking security pact much harder

Apr 11th 2024 |

THE DEFENCE pact known as AUKUS and reached in September 2021

between Australia, America and Britain is a huge project. But it is intended
to counter an even bigger one. China is bent on reshaping the Indo-Pacific
region on its own terms, using force if necessary, notably against Taiwan.

At the pact’s heart is a promise to help Australia build at least eight nuclear-
powered attack submarines using British designs and American technology.
These will start to come into service after 2040. As a stop-gap, from around
2027 America will rotate up to four of its Virginia-class submarines through
HMAS Stirling, a naval base in Western Australia. Australia itself will buy
three to five Virginia-class subs in the early 2030s. Fast and stealthy, they
will project power far from Australia’s shores. However, the deal is not only
about subs, but also collaboration on technology such as quantum sensing
and hypersonic missiles.

A decades-long commitment, then, with a big price tag—the subs alone are
expected to cost Australia up to $368bn. In return, AUKUS ties Australia’s
security more closely to America’s and, Australia hopes, ties America more
securely into the Indo-Pacific region. On April 8th the defence ministers of
the three countries released a cautious statement saying they were
“considering co-operation” with Japan, too.

Not everyone in Australia is pleased. Indeed an AUKUS awkward squad,

with varied political persuasions and an assortment of not always cohering
grievances, is dropping what one AUKUS backer calls “depth charges of
dissent”. The critics include Paul Keating and Malcolm Turnbull, two former
prime ministers, Gareth Evans, a former foreign minister, and Hugh White, a
strategist.

Criticisms start with practicalities—above all, whether America can deliver

the Virginia-class subs. It is struggling to ramp up production, and in March
the Pentagon asked Congress to fund just one new sub rather than an
expected two. Mr Turnbull says Australia may see no Virginias “simply
because the US Navy won’t be able to spare them”. That would leave
Australia less secure, not more.

Others question reliance on Britain’s defence capacity, with its

underwhelming record for delivering on time, at cost or up to standard.
Meanwhile, Mr White contends, Australia will get suckered into subsidising
the other two members’ defence industries. For all the talk of defence
integration among the three countries, he says, in the politicised world of
defence procurement integration American and British contractors are more
likely to benefit than Australian ones.

Add to that the risk of Donald Trump’s possible return to the White House.
If Mr Trump saw America as spending money on Australian interests, Mr
Evans argues, he could nix the whole thing. Australia, he points out, has no
plan B. But the strongest criticisms of AUKUS have to do with a loss of
sovereign agency—hitching Australia’s fortunes to an ever-less dependable
superpower, as Mr Turnbull sees it, or one liable, as Mr Evans argues, to
drag Australia into a war over Taiwan that is counter to Australia’s interests.

For now bipartisan support for AUKUS remains strong. Yet the pact will
have few concrete results to show for years to come. The risk is that all the
griping will start to erode public confidence. From the start AUKUS’s
backers have not made a frank enough case for it. The deal was negotiated in
secrecy. Anthony Albanese, then leader of the opposition, was given only
hours to throw his support behind it. Now prime minister, he paints AUKUS
chiefly as a jobs scheme rather than as a project of vital deterrence.

Rather, Labor and the conservative opposition should better highlight the
progress made so far. This includes making HMAS Stirling a useful pit-stop
for friendly subs, and new American and Australian money being allocated
to building up a submarine industrial base.

Above all, they should talk of the challenge posed by Chinese ambitions.
They should be clearer about the importance of Australia’s contribution to
deterrence. And they should be upfront both about the financial costs and,
more grimly, the human ones.

If Australia’s politicians do not come clean and seek support for AUKUS on
honest terms, the sceptics may well erode the consensus for it. That also
poses grave consequences for Australia’s own security. For if the point of
deterrence is to prevent a war, then you have to be seen to be ready to fight
one. ■

Read more from Banyan, our columnist on Asia:

For a glimpse at Japan’s future, look at its convenience stores (Apr 4th)
Vietnam’s head of state leaves under a cloud (Mar 27th)
A string of setbacks for the junta in Myanmar presents an opportunity (Mar
21st)

Also: How the Banyan column got its name

This article was downloaded by calibre from
https://www.economist.com/asia/2024/04/11/some-australians-are-increasingly-
sceptical-of-aukus
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China
China’s high-stakes struggle to defy demographic disaster
An ageing autocracy :: The Communist Party puts its faith in robots, gene-therapy and bathing
services

Will China’s ties with Israel survive the Gaza war?

A relationship under fire :: Some Israelis are rethinking the country that refuses to call Hamas
a terrorist group

What Ramadan is like in Xinjiang

Chaguan :: Our columnist visits a harshly controlled region

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An ageing autocracy

China’s high-stakes struggle to defy demographic

disaster
The Communist Party puts its faith in robots, gene-therapy and bathing
services

Apr 9th 2024 | BEIJING

IF CHINA’S OLD people formed their own country, it would be the fourth
most populous in the world, right behind America. This silver-haired state
would be growing fast, too. China’s over-60 population sits at 297m, or 21%
of the total. By 2050 those figures are expected to reach 520m and 38%. Yet
demographers describe China’s future as greyer—and smaller. While its
older cohorts are growing, younger ones are not (see chart). China’s total
population declined for the second year in a row in 2023. Its labour force has
been shrinking for most of the past decade.
This article was downloaded by calibre from
https://www.economist.com/china/2024/04/09/chinas-high-stakes-struggle-to-defy-
demographic-disaster

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A relationship under fire

Will China’s ties with Israel survive the Gaza war?

Some Israelis are rethinking the country that refuses to call Hamas a
terrorist group

Apr 10th 2024 | JERUSALEM

THERE IS LITTLE doubt which side China favours in the Gaza war. Its
muted response to the October 7th attacks on Israel—in which it failed to
condemn the perpetrator, Hamas—stands in sharp contrast to its
denunciation of Israel’s actions since then. Just days after the war began, the
Chinese foreign Minister, Wang Yi, said that Israel had already gone
“beyond the scope of self-defence”.

But China’s criticism belies a more complicated relationship with Israel, one
that leaders in Beijing have long tried to cultivate. Israel has reciprocated,
with its prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, once calling their ties a
“marriage made in heaven”. The war is not the first test of that bond. Now,
though, Israelis are asking new questions about their putative partner.
This article was downloaded by calibre from
https://www.economist.com/china/2024/04/10/will-chinas-ties-with-israel-survive-the-
gaza-war

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Chaguan

What Ramadan is like in Xinjiang

Our columnist visits a harshly controlled region

Apr 11th 2024 |

CHINA’S COMMUNIST PARTY has a message for Muslim citizens. It

holds their religious freedoms dear—with a special emphasis on the freedom
not to believe. The right to be secular runs like a thread through religious
regulations enacted this year in Xinjiang, the far-western region that is home
to 12m Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities. The revised rules impose new
controls on everything from religious teaching to mosque architecture, which
should reflect Chinese style. The regulations talk of extremists warping
minds and promoting terrorism. To prevent this, the rules state, no
organisations or individual shall induce or coerce locals to believe or not
believe in any religion.
This is in part a euphemism for enhanced controls on religion—in a region
that at the peak of a security campaign in 2018 and 2019 saw perhaps a
million of its Muslim residents locked in re-education camps. In part, an old
argument is being revived. The right to believe or not believe is in China’s
constitution. But a propaganda line is also taking shape: namely, that harsh
rule in Xinjiang protects its residents’ free will.
This article was downloaded by calibre from
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United States
Who are the swing voters in America?
The parent trap :: We interrogated a dataset of 49,000 people to find out

Mike Johnson may have to choose between Ukraine aid

and his job
Mud slinging :: The Republican House speaker is trapped by hardliners on his own side

How one California beach town became Gavin Newsom’s

nemesis
Surf City goes MAGA :: Huntington Beach’s hard-right turn is typical of modern California
Republicanism

New Jersey’s electoral process just got upended

Jersey unsure :: Andy Kim is fighting against some high-level political arcana

A challenge to leftist bias moves into America’s public

universities
Conservatives on campus :: Florida leads a push against prevailing progressivism

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The parent trap

Who are the swing voters in America?

We interrogated a dataset of 49,000 people to find out

Apr 10th 2024 |

DURING HIS two previous presidential campaigns, Donald Trump never

led general-election polling averages for a single day. In 2016 he pulled
within a percentage point of Hillary Clinton in July and September, but
trailed in the opinion polls by four on election day. Four years later Joe
Biden enjoyed a large, stable advantage over Mr Trump throughout the race,
and ended it with an eight-point edge, according to pollsters. In both contests
such surveys sharply underestimated the support Mr Trump received on
election day, particularly in swing states.

Today, the first former president seeking to return to office since 1912 is in
the strongest position in polls of his electoral career. Mr Trump first inched
ahead of Mr Biden, the incumbent, in national surveys last September, and
has held a narrow lead for most of 2024. Our national poll tracker has them
tied now, but state-level polls give Mr Trump clear leads in four of the six
states that could plausibly decide the election (Arizona, Georgia, Michigan,
Nevada, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin).

Even more surprising than the scale of Mr Trump’s apparent electoral

renaissance is its source. Delve inside these samples of voters and you will
see that white voters’ preferences have changed little since 2020, whereas
racial-minority groups—long the bedrock of Democratic support—have
lurched away from Mr Biden. Mr Trump has also cut into his successor’s
advantage among young voters, another core Democratic constituency, and
in some surveys actually leads among people aged 18-29.

However, standard surveys do not obtain enough data to drill down within
these groups and identify the exact types of voters who, on current trends,
are poised to return Mr Trump to office. At least one source of information,
thankfully, does not suffer from such limitations. Every week YouGov, an
online pollster, conducts a survey of 1,500 people for The Economist, asking
a wide range of questions about religion, race, voting intentions and political
views, among other things. Since last April the firm has obtained a total of
49,000 responses from registered voters to its question on general-election
voting intentions in 2024. Among them are 632 who say they backed Mr
Biden in 2020 and now support Mr Trump, more than the standard size of an
entire state-level poll.

Using this rich dataset, we have built a statistical model of voting intentions.
Based on the relationships between poll respondents’ stated candidate
preference and a wide range of demographic characteristics—ranging from
age and sex to specific states and religious affiliations—it estimates the
probability that an American with any particular combination of these
attributes plans to vote for Mr Trump or Mr Biden this year, as well as how
such a person recalls having voted in 2020. Some patterns are well known:
white evangelical Christians tend to back Republicans, whereas black voters
are still heavily Democratic overall. Others, however, are less familiar, and
many have changed since 2020. You can plug in any demographic profile
and explore the model’s findings at: economist.com/us-voter.
Most Americans are reliable partisans. They are far easier to identify with a
few pieces of information than swing voters are. Although race is often cited
as the central cleavage in America, the single best predictor of voting
intention is religion. A model that knows nothing save for respondents’
religious affiliations (including atheist, agnostic, “something else” and
“nothing in particular”) can correctly identify which of the two leading
candidates they prefer 62% of the time, compared with 59% for race. Of
Mormons and evangelical voters, 73% say they support Mr Trump. This
compares with 53% of Catholics, Orthodox Christians and non-evangelical
Protestants, 37% of Jews, 22% of agnostics and just 13% of avowed atheists
(see chart 1). Regardless of affiliation, the more importance someone places
on religion, the more likely they are to be a Trump voter.

Race does play a large role in shaping political choices as well, but its
impact varies by age and sex. According to YouGov’s data, among white
voters Mr Trump surprisingly attracts more support from women aged 18-24
(41%) than from the youngest men (35%). His vote shares rise with age, at a
faster rate for men than for women, up to people in their late 50s: he wins
59% of white women aged 55-59, and 70% of white men. Mr Trump
actually fares relatively poorly among the baby-boomers, who came of age
during the turbulent 1960s and 70s. He does best of all with the oldest white
voters, winning 66% of female octogenarians and 75% of male ones.

For black people, by contrast, the age-partisanship pattern is the opposite.

The youngest black voters are decidedly Trump-curious: 21% of such
women and a remarkable 33% of men aged 18-24 say they plan to support
him. But with each successive age cohort, backing for Mr Trump and the
size of the gender gap both shrink. Among black voters aged 70 or older,
who have personal memories of America before the Civil Rights Act, Mr
Trump wins just 10% of men and 6% of women.
Perhaps the most misleading variable is income. A simple plot of household
income against support for Mr Trump shows that the former president does
best among middle-class voters whose families earn around $50,000, and
worse among both poorer and richer ones. However, income is also closely
correlated with other demographic categories: poor voters are
disproportionately non-white, whereas rich ones tend to be white with
college degrees, and both of those groups lean Democratic.

Only when you look within race-education pairings—black people with

graduate degrees, or Hispanics who did not attend college—do the historical
affinities between Democrats and the working class, and between
Republicans and the wealthy, reveal themselves. In general, the richest
members of each of these groups are also the Trumpiest. In contrast, among
people of the same education level and race, those whose households include
a member of a labour union are around ten percentage points more likely to
back Mr Biden—a slightly larger impact than moving up one tier of
education (see chart 2).
Movers and flippers

Taken together, the demographic characteristics in YouGov’s surveys do a

good job of distinguishing Mr Biden’s voters from Mr Trump’s. Our full
model, which also includes variables like home ownership, marital status,
sexual orientation and residing in a city versus a rural area, can intuit the
voting intentions of three-quarters of respondents based on other data about
them. If you input your own profile, there is roughly a 75% chance that you
support the candidate whom the model deems the likelier choice. But
identifying the narrow sliver of voters who will account for changes from the
results of 2020—those who are either switching between voting and not
voting, or plan to flip from one candidate to the other—is far harder.
The two percentage points of vote share that Mr Trump has gained since
2020 come from three sources. The largest group is people who supported
Mr Biden last time, but are now undecided, backing minor candidates or not
planning to vote, who outnumber those making the same shift from Mr
Trump’s camp. These voters account for 0.9 points of Mr Trump’s two-point
improvement. Undecided former Biden voters are slightly younger, more
likely to be black or female and less likely to have attended college than
repeat Biden voters.

Mr Trump also enjoys an edge among people entering or returning to the

major-party electorate. The share who say they did not vote for either him or
Mr Biden in 2020 but have now settled on Mr Trump is 3.7%, slightly above
the 3.3% who are choosing Mr Biden. This group adds another 0.3 of a point
to Mr Trump’s tally.

The final group, swing voters, is the smallest but also the most impactful.
Because people who flip between the two major-party candidates both
subtract a vote from one side and add one to the other, they matter twice as
much as do those who switch between a candidate and not voting at all. Such
voters are rare—just 3% of respondents fall into this category—but Mr
Trump is winning two-thirds of them. With 2% of participants shifting from
Mr Biden to Mr Trump versus just 1% doing the opposite, swing voters
contribute a full percentage point to Mr Trump’s two-way vote share.

In today’s polarised political climate, with the same nominees running in

both 2020 and 2024, who could possibly change their mind? One political
cliché supported by YouGov’s data is that swing voters are far more focused
on “kitchen-table” issues than on the culture-war subjects that animate
reliable partisans. Among repeat Biden voters, the topics most often cited as
most important are climate and the environment; civil rights, abortion and
guns are also among the leaders. Democrats are placing a lot of hope on the
importance of abortion to raise turnout, particularly after Arizona’s supreme
court ruled that a ban on the practice for 1864 is enforceable, but our
numbers suggest it is not a priority for swing voters. On the Republican side,
immigration ranks second on the corresponding list for repeat Trump voters,
as well as conventional Republican topics like taxes and national security.
By contrast, Biden-Trump swing voters are most likely to list inflation as
their top issue, followed by “jobs and the economy”. Health care ranks third
for them and first for Trump-Biden voters, suggesting that Mr Biden might
be well-advised to make defending the health-care reform passed when he
was Barack Obama’s vice-president a core campaign issue.

Mr Biden has also lost ground among conservative-leaning African-

Americans. By 2020 Mr Trump had already alienated virtually the entire
left-of-centre electorate: among self-described liberals who recall supporting
a major-party candidate that year, Mr Biden won at least 90% within each
racial group. In contrast, although Mr Trump won 94% of the two-party vote
among white conservatives and 79% of Hispanic ones, he actually lost black
voters who identify as conservative, receiving just 35% of their support. This
year, Mr Trump is on the brink of winning this group outright, with a 46%
share among decided voters. A similar trend applies to the 23% of black
respondents registered to vote who say that they disapprove of Mr Biden’s
job performance. Of this group, 9% have already decided to flip to Mr
Trump after backing Mr Biden last time, and a further 27% say that they
voted for Mr Biden in 2020 but are now undecided, supporting a third-party
candidate or do not plan to vote.

The most intriguing pattern in YouGov’s data, however, is probably an

equally powerful factor that has nothing to do with ideology. Compared with
committed partisans, swing voters are vastly more likely to have children
aged under 18: 47% of those flipping from Mr Biden to Mr Trump and 40%
of those switching the other way are currently raising children, compared
with 22% of repeat Biden voters and 19% of consistent Trump ones. And
once the effects of race and parenthood are combined, the disparities are
striking.
Family matters

Among people who backed one of the two leading candidates in 2020 and
plan to do so this year, 10% of non-white respondents with school-age
children are flipping from Mr Biden to Mr Trump; another 3% are switching
from Mr Trump to Mr Biden. The corresponding figures for the rest of the
electorate are 2% and 1%. These switchers do not seem to have any
demographic factor in common besides their race and children. In a
statistical model accounting for 15 other variables—including sex,
education, income, religion and location—being a non-white parent is the
second-best predictor (after being young) of being a Biden 2020-Trump
2024 swing voter.

Of the 183 non-white parents in YouGov’s surveys who say they are
switching from Mr Biden to Mr Trump, just 3% list education as the
election’s most important issue, compared with 48% citing inflation or the
economy. This suggests that they are feeling squeezed more than voters who
do not have children. It may also suggest that there is something about
raising children.

There is no shortage of possible culprits, from concern about school

curriculums to a parental reaction against progressive ideas on gender. But
one thing that affected non-white parents of schoolchildren
disproportionately was public policy during the covid-19 pandemic.
Lockdowns were unusually difficult for parents raising children, who had to
watch their kids while schools were closed. And although lockdowns began
during Mr Trump’s presidency, they persisted well into Mr Biden’s term,
after the advent of covid vaccines made them harder to justify. Teachers’
unions, allied with the Democratic Party, embraced school closures despite
evidence from other countries or concerns about learning loss. Moreover, the
expansion of federal transfer payments during the pandemic, which were
particularly generous for parents, also began under Mr Trump and ended
under Mr Biden.

Non-white students were much likelier than white ones to have had fully
remote education during the pandemic. And non-white parents were
unusually prone to have jobs that required showing up in person. Most white
working-class parents who were upset about lockdowns were already solidly
Republican by 2020, limiting the number of voters from this group available
to defect from Mr Biden. In contrast, the president won large majorities of
non-white voters that year, so angering them was far more electorally costly.
Mr Biden faces a parent trap in November. ■

Stay on top of American politics with The US in brief, our daily newsletter
with fast analysis of the most important electoral stories, and Checks and
Balance, a weekly note from our Lexington columnist that examines the state
of American democracy and the issues that matter to voters.
This article was downloaded by calibre from https://www.economist.com/united-
states/2024/04/10/who-are-the-swing-voters-in-america

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Mud slinging

Mike Johnson may have to choose between

Ukraine aid and his job
The Republican House speaker is trapped by hardliners on his own side

Apr 11th 2024 | WASHINGTON, DC

SPARE SOME pity for Mike Johnson, the stuck speaker of the House of
Representatives. A relatively obscure congressman thrust into leadership six
months ago when the ungovernable Republican majority threw out the
former speaker, Kevin McCarthy, Mr Johnson may be defenestrated too if he
does something that he seems to think that he must: provide additional
military aid to Ukraine, over the objections of the isolationist wing of his
party.

While the European Union and its member countries have contributed
considerably to Ukraine’s budget and humanitarian needs, America has been
Ukraine’s largest provider of military aid, amounting to $44bn since Russia’s
invasion in February 2022. But further help has been stuck for months. In
October 2023 President Joe Biden proposed that Congress appropriate $60bn
for Ukraine as part of a security bill that would have spent a further $45bn
on securing America’s southern border and on arming allies like Israel and
Taiwan.

Six months of congressional Sturm und Drang ensued, but nothing has come
to the president’s desk. One Republican senator, James Lankford of
Oklahoma, spent months negotiating a harder-line compromise on the
southern border to accompany the aid package, only for his own party to
torpedo it in a matter of three days after its unveiling in February because
Donald Trump, the party’s presumptive presidential nominee, rejected it for
giving Mr Biden an election-year win. The Senate then passed a $95bn aid
bill without any border provisions, which Mr Johnson then rejected and
refused to bring up for a vote.

When foreign policy is subordinated to domestic politics, as has happened

with Ukraine and Israel, incoherence often follows. You can see this in the
short history of Mr Johnson’s own pronouncements. Before he was
appointed speaker, Mr Johnson was a Trump-following Ukraine-sceptic,
voting against a small $300m military-aid bill in September 2023. In
October, after getting the top job, he sounded more supportive, saying that
Vladimir Putin must not win. In December he said that this necessary aid
must be paired with sweeping reforms to Mr Biden’s border policy, which
would be his “hill to die on”. In February, when Mr Biden announced plans
to secure the border through executive action after the failure of the
bipartisan Senate deal, Mr Johnson denounced them as “election-year
gimmicks”—despite having previously called for him to do exactly that. In
March he said that he would unveil a new plan for Ukraine aid after Easter.

The eggs have stopped rolling, but Mr Johnson is yet to release his plan, the
details of which are not being shared widely. Many of the rumoured
components are designed to mollify the isolationists in his party: aid to
Ukraine would be labelled as a forgivable loan rather than direct aid
(following a suggestion of Mr Trump’s); some of the funding would be
recouped by seizing Russian assets that are currently frozen (though many
more of these are in the EU than the US); and Mr Biden would have to
endure a poke in the eye by overturning his recently announced moratorium
on new export projects for liquefied natural gas.

Democrats might grumpily accept even the environmental rollback; the real
hindrance to Mr Johnson will be his own party. Marjorie Taylor Greene, a
Republican congresswoman from Georgia, has filed a “motion to vacate” Mr
Johnson from his leadership, were he to secure Ukraine funding by relying
on Democratic support. Ms Greene is probably the most Putin-friendly
member of the party—bizarrely saying in a radio interview this week that
Ukraine was attacking Christianity while Russia was “protecting it”—but the
Republican majority is razor-thin, meaning that a few defectors could cast
off Mr Johnson.

Some think that Mr Johnson might simply have to accept that he cannot both
arm Ukraine and keep his job. “Then he’ll go down in history as being a
profile in courage who does the right thing. We need Winston Churchills
right now, not [Neville] Chamberlains,” says Don Bacon, a Republican
congressman representing Nebraska. Mr Bacon has been a staunch supporter
of Ukraine funding, crafting a so-called discharge petition which could
circumvent the speaker and bring a bill directly to the floor for a vote if a
majority of House members were to sign on. The discharge petition, which
has been closely watched by anxious European diplomats in Washington, is
an unconventional parliamentary tool. It is still a long shot, but its existence
gives Mr Johnson at least some leverage with his own hardliners.

Critics like Ms Greene are unlikely to be placated. But the cost of

congressional dithering is in this case quite real. Last week Sergei Shoigu,
Russia’s defence minister, announced that his army had captured 400 square
kilometres of territory from the Ukrainians, who have been forced to
conserve ammunition (Ukraine is over 600,000 square kilometeres, but the
trend is not good). Volodymyr Zelensky, Ukraine’s president, has said that
“if the Congress doesn’t help Ukraine, Ukraine will lose the war.” ■

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Surf City goes MAGA

How one California beach town became Gavin

Newsom’s nemesis
Huntington Beach’s hard-right turn is typical of modern California
Republicanism

Apr 9th 2024 | Huntington Beach

AN IDYLLIC CITY in swanky Orange County, California, is not where you

would expect to encounter a self-professed champion of the proletariat.
Huntington Beach was first known for oil (the high school’s mascot is still
the Oilers), then for surfing. Yet that is how Gracey Van Der Mark, its
Republican mayor, sees herself and her city. A framed copy of a recent Los
Angeles Times column suggesting (half facetiously) that Donald Trump
should pick her for his vice-president hangs on her office wall. She says
other cities are afraid of Gavin Newsom, the state’s Democratic governor,
“because he’s acting like a tyrant”.
Mr Newsom’s alleged tyranny stems from his administration’s insistence
that cities should build more housing, which the state badly needs and which
many cities with wealthy residents and scores of beach-front bungalows
resent. That is not his only crime, in the eyes of Ms Van Der Mark.
Huntington Beach is fighting the state on several fronts, from housing
regulations to voting rules to the flying of the gay-pride flag. The city’s ill-
advised battles against Mr Newsom are emblematic of the friction between
California’s many Republican pockets and the liberal state government; and
of the evolution of California’s Republican Party during the Trump era.

Some 41% of Huntington Beach residents are registered Republicans,

making them the city’s largest political tribe. But lately the city’s flavour of
Republicanism has changed. In 2022 Ms Van Der Mark and several MAGA
compatriots ran for the city council as a slate. All were elected, and now
serve alongside three Democrats—though local elections there are
technically non-partisan. Rhonda Bolton, a Democrat on the council, says
the body’s politics have become a poisonous sludge that bears a passing
resemblance to America’s House of Representatives.

This is not the first time Huntington Beach and the state, whose government
sits in Sacramento, have been at loggerheads over housing. In 2019 the state
sued the city for allegedly blocking new development. The trouble this time
stems from the city’s failure to approve plans to build housing to meet
projected demand, a process that every local government in the state must
complete. The state and city sued each other over the matter. The city’s case,
arguing that the state cannot force localities to build, was tossed out. The
state’s suit is still pending.

The city council put several contentious measures on the primary ballot in
March, including one that would introduce voter-ID rules. California’s
attorney-general and secretary of state, who is in charge of voting processes,
warned the city that such a measure contravenes state law. The measure
passed anyway. Another legal battle probably awaits.

Ms Van Der Mark argues that Huntington Beach can set its own housing and
voting rules because it is a charter city. A “home rule” provision in
California’s constitution holds that such cities, which have adopted a kind of
local constitution, can “make and enforce all ordinances and regulations in
respect to municipal affairs”. But the state’s constitution does not define
“municipal affairs”, leaving the courts to decide what is appropriate. More
than a fifth of all cities in California have a charter. But Huntington Beach
has become the biggest cheerleader for home rule. “Sacramento is using us
as an example for every other city,” says Ms Van Der Mark. On this, at least,
the city and state agree.

California Republicans were often more moderate than their eastern peers.
As governor, Ronald Reagan favoured some environmental protections.
Arnold Schwarzenegger travelled the globe warning about climate change.
Yet Mr Trump’s influence has proved too powerful for such moderation to
persist.

Ms Bolton says she believes most Huntington Beach residents are more
moderate than the council, and will not stand for such chicanery for long.
But the election cycle is against her. In November voters will get the chance
to oust her and the other Democrats. Ms Van Der Mark is not up for re-
election until 2026. She was tickled by the column suggesting that she is Mr
Trump’s loyal soldier in Orange County, but insists she will not run for
higher office unless she “is needed somewhere”.■
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states/2024/04/09/how-one-california-beach-town-became-gavin-newsoms-nemesis

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Jersey unsure

New Jersey’s electoral process just got upended

Andy Kim is fighting against some high-level political arcana

Apr 11th 2024 | PLAINSBORO, NEW JERSEY

THE DAY after Bob Menendez, New Jersey’s senior senator, was indicted
for corruption, Andy Kim, a congressman, announced he would take on his
powerful fellow Democrat in the upcoming Senate race. But the bigger
obstacle to his bid was not Mr Menendez, whose support among Democrats
quickly disappeared. It was an archaic primary process called the county
line. New Jersey is the only state in America which brackets endorsements
made by county party chairs and gives endorsees prime real estate on the
ballot.

Party leaders give preferential placement to their candidates. Those not on

the county line are tucked away in obscure rows and columns. Julia Sass
Rubin of Rutgers University looked at 20 years of New Jersey races and
found that the county line steered voters and helped preferred candidates by
an average difference of 38%. Another study found county-line benefits
ranged from four to 28 percentage points.

Mr Kim, who publicly opposed county lines before he got into the Senate
race, had not intended to take on the antiquated system. But then Tammy
Murphy, the wife of New Jersey’s governor, announced her candidacy. She
immediately won endorsements from party leaders. Her connections all but
guaranteed her county-line placement. Mr Kim filed a federal lawsuit
asserting the system was unconstitutional.

Mr Kim says a number of politicos told him that they couldn’t speak out
because they were worried their county chair would remove them from the
line. He also blames apathy. The “well, that’s just Jersey” sentiment was
entrenched. The same broken system protected Mr Menendez for years. “It
was nerve-racking,” says Mr Kim, “in the middle of a statewide US Senate
campaign to file a lawsuit that’s going to affect the party leaders of my own
party.”

But then Mr Kim won some county endorsements and edged ahead of Mrs
Murphy in polls. Last month she dropped out of the race. Mr Menendez said
he would not run in the Democratic primary. And a federal judge ruled in Mr
Kim’s favour. The demise of the county-lines system could affect the Senate
race and next year’s governor’s race. “I don’t think it can be understated how
big this is for New Jersey politics going forward,” says Ashley Koning of the
Eagleton Institute of Politics. ■

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with fast analysis of the most important electoral stories, and Checks and
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Conservatives on campus

A challenge to leftist bias moves into America’s

public universities
Florida leads a push against prevailing progressivism

Apr 11th 2024 | Gainesville

IN 1951 A 25-year-old Yale graduate published a 240-page polemic

inveighing against his alma mater’s left-leaning bias. The book launched the
career of William F. Buckley, the most influential conservative intellectual of
the post-war era. Although Buckley managed to reshape the Republican
Party, his war against academia proved less successful. Conservatives still
haven’t given up on changing the academy. The most robust reform
momentum now is building at public university systems. In Florida, in
particular, a trio of Yale alumni have ambitious plans to change the future of
higher education.
Ron DeSantis, the governor of Florida, who graduated from Yale in 2001,
likes to say that his state is “where woke goes to die”. In universities he put
in place a tenure-review process, which critics say weakened academic
freedom, and he has used his appointment powers to influence institutions.
At New College of Florida, a public liberal-arts college that had been a
bastion of progressivism, he appointed new trustees who fired the president
and replaced him with a former Republican lawmaker. Scores of faculty and
students left.

New College, which had fewer than 700 students in the autumn of 2022, has
drawn national attention. Yet much more consequential reforms are under
way at the University of Florida (UF), the state’s flagship university and
home to some 60,000 students. It ranks as one of the top public universities
in America. It also offers an increasingly attractive bargain: undergraduate
tuition and fees are only $6,380 this academic year for in-state students.

Ben Sasse, a former Republican senator who became UF’s president in

February 2023, says that producing graduates who can thrive in a disruptive
jobs market is at the heart of his mission. He still believes a fundamental part
of this ought to be learning about the liberal arts. But, says Mr Sasse, who
earned a doctorate in history at Yale, humanities faculties at most
universities are not “sure what their purpose is right now”. A core curriculum
is “incredibly important for an educated citizenry, but you have to be making
a case that you’re speaking to things that are big and broad and meaningful
and enduring.” He argues that this isn’t a right-wing project but a classically
liberal one. And at the heart of it is UF’s new Hamilton Centre.

Authorised by the Florida legislature in 2022, the centre is a $30m wager on

the appeal of Western civilisation. Mr Sasse has said that he intends
Hamilton to become UF’s 17th college (joining existing ones such as those
for business, engineering, law, medicine and pharmacy). Next year it will
begin offering two majors: philosophy, politics, economics and law; and
great books and ideas.

Will Inboden, Hamilton’s director, wants UF to have America’s top

programme in Western civilisation. The centre already employs a dozen
faculty members in a cramped space on UF’s sprawling campus, dominated
by the Florida Gators’ football stadium. It is hiring dozens more and
eventually will move to its own building. Mr Imboden says part of the
strategy is to seek out faculty in fields neglected by modern humanities
departments, such as military and diplomatic history. He also favours public-
facing academics.
Sunshine statement

Mr Inboden and Mr Sasse, who attended graduate school at Yale together,

both served in the administration of George W. Bush. But Mr Inboden argues
that the Hamilton Centre is a “pre-political” project. “Students are pretty
leery of being indoctrinated,” he says. “The answer to progressive
indoctrination on campuses is not conservative counter-indoctrination.”

Jill Ingram, Hamilton’s director of undergraduate students, echoes the desire

to avoid a reputation of being a politicised entity. “We’re interested in giving
students the tools and the practice to think for themselves, but also to bring
back an appreciation for the texts and the ideas that were involved in the
founding of America.”

The centre has received a mixed reception on campus. One student recalls
telling an adviser that she planned to apply for a fellowship through the
centre: “She was, like, ‘Don’t apply for that. It’s a bunch of right-wing storm
troopers.’” Yet many who take classes from Hamilton faculty aren’t even
aware the centre exists as its own entity. Students associated with it come
from a variety of political backgrounds.

Florida is not alone. Other states with new schools focusing on civic thought
include Arizona, North Carolina, Tennessee and Texas. A Republican state
legislature funded Arizona State University’s School of Civic and Economic
Thought and Leadership. When a Democrat, Katie Hobbs, became governor
in 2023, it seemed its days might be numbered: Ms Hobbs labelled the
school “libertarian” and proposed reallocating the funding. After some
debate, however, Democrats backed down.

Places like the Hamilton Centre will face two related challenges. Finding
faculty for a growing number of institutions could become harder in the
years ahead. Harder still will be to avoid becoming conservative ghettos
within their universities.
Ray Rodrigues, the chancellor of the State University System of Florida,
says the goal is to offer better general-education courses to all. He and his
colleagues also aspire to create scholars who will influence new generations:
“If, at the end of the day, what we’re doing is merely trading conservative
scholars from one institution to another, then we have failed.”■

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with fast analysis of the most important electoral stories, and Checks and
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Middle East & Africa

The IDF is accused of military and moral failures in Gaza
An assessment of the IDF in Gaza :: Its generals botched the strategy, and discipline among
troops has broken down

Israel’s use of AI in Gaza is coming under closer scrutiny

AI and Gaza :: Do the humans in Israel’s army have sufficient control over its technology?

America, Israel and Hamas are trapped in a dangerous

impasse
Israel v Hamas :: The fighting has ebbed. But ceasefire talks are going nowhere

Congo brings back the death penalty

Death threats :: And it is cracking down on government critics

China’s fishing fleet is causing havoc off Africa’s coasts

Slavery at sea :: The victims are non-Chinese crew members, local fishermen and marine life

Is South Africa ready for a change in government?

Opposition rising :: The ANC is unpopular, but the opposition is fractured

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An assessment of the IDF in Gaza

The IDF is accused of military and moral failures

in Gaza
Its generals botched the strategy, and discipline among troops has broken
down

Apr 11th 2024 | JERUSALEM

IN THE EARLY hours of April 7th the Israel Defence Forces’ (IDF) 98th
Division withdrew from Khan Younis, the second-largest city in Gaza,
exactly six months after Hamas’s attack of October 7th. Israel had the
sympathy and broad support of much of the West when it sent its army to
war with Hamas. Half a year later, much of Gaza lies in ruins. Over 33,000
Palestinians have been killed, according to the Gazan health ministry. The
uprooted civilian population faces famine. Israel has lost the battle for
global public opinion. Even its closest allies, including America, are
considering whether to limit arms shipments.

Much of the criticism centres on Israel’s armed forces. Even after its
devastating failure to prevent the massacres of October 7th, the IDF has
remained the most cherished institution in Israeli society. Holding fast to
the vision of the IDF as both effective and moral is essential to Israelis’
image of themselves. But it is now accused of two catastrophic failures.
First, that it has not achieved its military objectives in Gaza. Second, that it
has acted immorally and broken the laws of war. The implications for both
the IDF and Israel are profound.

Israel’s army is unusual. It is widely regarded as one of the world’s most

advanced in its use of technology. But the IDF is also a people’s army,
relying on both conscripts and reservists who represent a wide cross-section
of society. Many of the 300,000 reservists Israel called up live in
settlements in the occupied West Bank. Regular army units have spent
much of their time there policing the occupation. This has had an adverse
influence on their attitude to Palestinians, say many officers.

Any assessment of the IDF’s operational successes and failures in the war
in Gaza must consider the uniqueness of the war zone. Gaza is a densely
populated, largely urban enclave. Hamas has spent the past 17 years of its
rule embedding its military infrastructure into the civilian landscape and
building a vast network of tunnels.

But Israel’s army has, at best, only half-achieved the war objectives of its
politicians: destroying Hamas’s military capabilities; removing it from
power in Gaza; and rescuing the hostages. The IDF claims to have killed
about 12,000 militants. With the thousands it has wounded or captured, that
represents around half of the pre-war estimate of 40,000. Hamas’s military
capabilities have been dramatically curbed.

But the group is far from destroyed. Of the three men believed to have
planned the attacks of October 7th, just one, Marwan Issa, Hamas’s military
chief of staff, is thought to have been killed. Many other field commanders
have been killed, but Hamas’s fighters are still ambushing Israeli forces
throughout Gaza and the group is reasserting itself in areas the IDF has left.

Military pressure on Hamas helped yield a short truce in November in

which 105 hostages were released. That aside, Israel has rescued only three
live hostages.

The IDF’s first failure has been one of strategy. On that, blame lies
primarily with Israel’s politicians, and the prime minister, Binyamin
Netanyahu, in particular, who have refused to countenance any alternative
Palestinian force taking control of Gaza. But responsibility also rests with
the generals and their understanding of how success there should be
measured.
Hard and fast

Criticism of the decision to start the war with a massive assault on Gaza
City is growing. After October 7th, the IDF’s senior commanders were
“motivated by deep feelings of guilt and humiliation”, says Reuven Gal, a
fellow at the Samuel Neaman Institute, a policy research centre in Israel,
and retired colonel. He was a young infantry officer in the Six Day War and
went on to become the army’s chief psychologist. “Instead of stopping this
time to think and plan, [the army] went in fast and hard, to restore lost
pride.”
Major-General Noam Tibon is a retired corps commander who on October
7th rushed to his son’s kibbutz near Gaza, single-handedly extricating his
young family while Hamas was on the rampage. In hindsight, he says, the
IDF should have gone into Rafah first. He believes his former colleagues
were “under the illusion that going first into Gaza City would break Hamas
psychologically, by taking their symbols of government”. But, he argues,
“all the talk of dismantling their brigades and battalions is rubbish. They
remain a fundamentalist movement which doesn’t need commanders to
fight until death.”

Many serving officers decry the emphasis the IDF has placed both
internally and publicly on how many Hamas fighters have been killed,
instead of adopting a more strategic approach. “I don’t want to be
Westmoreland!” announced one senior general involved in directing
operations, early on in the war, referring to the commander of American
troops in Vietnam who boasted of his men’s body-counts.

The IDF’s second failure is the way in which the army has prosecuted this
war, specifically the high levels of destruction and civilian deaths. (The IDF
disputes the Hamas-run health ministry’s death toll, saying that many of the
dead are militants, but the number of civilians killed is undoubtedly
extremely high.) This is down to two main factors: first, operational
directives that allow strikes even when the likelihood of killing civilians is
significant; and second, a lack of discipline within the IDF in adhering even
to those rules.

Start with the laxer rules regarding targets. The IDF has a dedicated war-
room that tracks population levels in every area of Gaza and issues
warnings, via leaflet drops, social media, phone calls and text messages to
civilians, to move out of harm’s way. But no part of Gaza has ever been
totally cleared of civilians. An area on the population map constantly
updated by the operations room is considered “green” once less than 25%
of the original population remains. Even then, officers monitoring this
admit that ultimately their assessments are merely “recommendations” to
commanders in the field.

“The orders to carry out strikes were given in accordance to international

humanitarian law,” insists an officer in the IDF legal corps who helped
advise those commanders. “But the policy on the level of firepower has
changed. The strikes are more devastating in this war because the aim here
is to destroy Hamas. And there are many more strikes.”
The IDF has used drone strikes, or “targeted killings”, to assassinate
militants for two decades. But in the past these were authorised by senior
officers high up the command chain. By contrast, at some points during this
war there were over 20 different headquarters with officers of varying
experience calling in attacks. “We never had an opportunity to call in such a
range of air-power, anything from drones to F-35 fighters-jets,” said one
reserve officer in charge of a brigade-attack cell.

While there have been reports that many of the air strikes are determined by
artificial intelligence, the IDF insists the decisions to attack are taken by
humans. But there is ample evidence this is where the problems happen.

The lack of enforcement of even these looser rules of engagement has been
such that accusations that Israel has broken the laws of war are plausible.
“The standing orders don’t matter in the field,” says one veteran reserve
officer who has mostly been in Gaza since October. “Just about any
battalion commander can decide that whoever moves in his sector is a
terrorist or that buildings should be destroyed because they could have been
used by Hamas.” “The only limit to the number of buildings we blew up
was the time we had inside Gaza,” says one sapper in a combat-engineering
battalion. “If you find a Kalashnikov or even Hamas literature in an
apartment, it’s enough to incriminate the building.”

Other officers reported a breakdown of discipline in their units, with

multiple cases of looting. “I think everyone in our platoon took a coffee
set,” said one sergeant. Soldiers have filmed themselves vandalising
Palestinian property and, in some cases, put those videos online. On
February 20th the IDF’s chief of staff published a public letter to all soldiers
warning them to use force only where necessary, “to distinguish between a
terrorist and who is not, not to take anything which isn’t ours—a souvenir
or weaponry—and not to film vengeance videos.” Four months into the
war, this was too little, too late. “He should have acted much sooner to root
this out,” says one battalion commander.
Political failures

The IDF’s third failure is its role in Israel’s obstruction—until an angry

phone call between President Joe Biden and Mr Netanyahu on April 4th—
of aid efforts to Gazans. Officers have mainly blamed the politicians for
this. But some acknowledge that even without a political directive, the
army, which is arguably an occupying force in Gaza now, should have
assumed this responsibility from the planning stage. Instead it acted only
when the humanitarian situation became critical.

Major-General Tibon’s fiercest criticism is reserved for Mr Netanyahu:

“[He] has been running this war to serve his political interests—keeping his
nationalist base happy and preventing his far-right extremist parties from
leaving his government.” Serving generals share this view.

That does not bode well for the future. The war in Gaza is not over. Israel’s
next step is unclear. Mr Netanyahu says that a date has been set for an
incursion into Rafah, Hamas’s last major stronghold (in private, Israeli
generals deny this).

Another scenario is that Israel and Hamas agree to a temporary truce or a

more lasting ceasefire. That would allow the IDF to prepare for future
conflicts, perhaps including with Iran, which is threatening to retaliate for
an Israeli air strike in Syria that killed several high-ranking Iranian officers.
The IDF plans to form new armoured divisions—at great cost to the
country’s finances and to the soldiers who will have to serve for longer. Yet
more troops and tanks will not prevent the IDF from repeating the mistakes
it has made in Gaza. With the war at a hiatus, now is a moment for Israel
and its allies to ask hard questions about how it has been conducted. ■

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AI and Gaza

Israel’s use of AI in Gaza is coming under closer

scrutiny
Do the humans in Israel’s army have sufficient control over its technology?

Apr 11th 2024 | JERUSALEM

FOR OVER a decade military experts, lawyers and ethicists have grappled
with the question of how to control lethal autonomous weapon systems,
sometimes pejoratively called killer robots. One answer was to keep a “man
in the loop”—to ensure that a human always approved each decision to use
lethal force. But in 2016 Heather Roff and Richard Moyes, then writing for
Article 36, a non-profit focused on the issue, cautioned that a person
“simply pressing a ‘fire’ button in response to indications from a computer,
without cognitive clarity or awareness”, does not meaningfully qualify as
“human control”.

That nightmarish vision of war with humans ostensibly in control but shorn
of real understanding of their actions, killing in rote fashion, seems to have
come to pass in Gaza. This is the message of two reports published by +972
Magazine, a left-wing Israeli news outlet, the most recent one on April 3rd.
The Israel Defence Forces (IDF) have reportedly developed artificial-
intelligence (AI) tools known as “The Gospel” and “Lavender” to “mark”
suspected operatives of Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad, two militant
groups, as targets for bombing, according to Israeli officers familiar with
the systems.

The sources claim that the algorithms have been used to create
“assassination factories” in which the homes of thousands of Hamas
members, including junior ones, are marked down for air strikes, with
human officers providing merely cursory oversight. It is also claimed that
the IDF would be willing to risk killing 15-20 civilians in order to strike a
Hamas fighter. For Hamas battalion or brigade commanders, that number
rose to more than 100 civilians. By contrast, in 2003 America’s comparable
figure for Saddam Hussein, a head of state, was 30 civilians.

Israel denies these allegations. IDF officials say that AI tools like “The
Gospel” and “Lavender” are not used to automatically generate targets.
Instead, they were developed for the “target directorate”, a unit of the
military intelligence branch tasked with locating and confirming potential
targets, to manage huge quantities of data in various formats, collected by
different intelligence-gathering agencies. The systems are supposed to fuse
this data into a manageable format and present the relevant details to the
intelligence analysts whose job it is to “incriminate” targets (or
“recriminate” existing ones) for air strikes.

In their telling, the AI tools are “neutral”, used only for solving problems in
managing big data, and do not replace intelligence officers, who view the
relevant material and reach a decision. This would leave human beings in
charge of both the analysis and the decision-making leading up to a strike.

All this has raised questions about how precisely AI is used in warfare. In
recent years the public debate has focused on weapons that can choose their
own targets in some fashion, such as the cheap drones used by Russia and
Ukraine which can, in a growing number of cases, identify and strike targets
without human approval. The IDF’s use of AI suggests that its larger role is
more mundane, though it may include identifying potential targets.

Even before the war in Gaza, experts reckoned that military commanders—
who bear ultimate legal responsibility for strikes—have a poor grasp of the
intelligence processes that produce their target lists. AI would blur that
further. “What AI changes is the speed with which targets can be identified
and attacked,” says Kenneth Payne of King’s College London. “That means
more targets hit, and all else being equal, more risk to civilians.”

The IDF claims that AI tools not only make target identification quicker,
but also make it more accurate. Some Israeli intelligence officials
acknowledge this is true only if they are used correctly. “An alert and
conscientious officer will use these tools to ensure that the targets being hit
are valid,” says an intelligence analyst. “But in war...tired and apathetic
officers can too easily just rubber-stamp the targets suggested by the
algorithms.”

The biggest problem remains a stark gap between high-level policy and its
implementation on the ground, whether by the analysts marking down the
targets or the officers in operational headquarters deciding on the actual
strikes. “Nothing I have seen of them, up close and personal, leads me to
believe that, at the high command level, they are anything other than
professional,” says one Western official familiar with Israeli military
operations. However Israeli soldiers have said that in many cases
commanders in different sectors in Gaza have exercised policies of their
own, such as designating any adult men remaining in their sector as
terrorists and giving orders for them to be fired on (clearly illegal under the
laws of war).

Gaza would not be the first war where computers and code have been used
to generate targets to kill. In Afghanistan and Iraq, American intelligence
officers built highly complex “network diagrams” showing real or
purported connections between people and places, with the aim of
identifying insurgents. The process was often primitive, notes Jon Lindsay,
an academic. “Reliance on telephone communication patterns alone without
reference to other social context”, he writes, “might turn mere delivery boys
into nefarious suspects.”

Most controversial of all was America’s drone assassination programme in

Afghanistan, Pakistan and other countries. Documents leaked in 2015 and
published by the Intercept, a news website, suggested that America had
collected vast amounts of data on Pakistan’s mobile-phone network to
perform what they called “automated bulk cloud analytics”. The leaked
slides referred to “courier machine learning models”, suggesting that it was
using what would today be called AI to find patterns in this data. Yet the
analogy with Lavender is imperfect: drone strikes, though controversial,
and shaped by AI-derived intelligence, were far rarer than Israeli strikes in
Gaza and involved a slower and more careful targeting process than those
reportedly being used by Israel.

During the Vietnam war, American forces built a sophisticated network of

sensors along the Ho Chi Minh Trail. They used computers in Thailand to
process the information, allowing their planes to drop bombs within
minutes of suspected insurgents being detected. The system killed huge
numbers of enemy soldiers, encouraging a focus on body counts that
doomed the war. Israeli generals might take note. ■
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Israel v Hamas

America, Israel and Hamas are trapped in a

dangerous impasse
The fighting has ebbed. But ceasefire talks are going nowhere

Apr 10th 2024 | DUBAI

EID AL-FITR, which marks the end of Ramadan, is normally a joyous time
in Gaza, as families exchange gifts and buy new clothes for children. But the
holiday, which began on April 9th, is no cause for celebration this year.
Fighting has ebbed enough for a few thousand Palestinians to return to Khan
Younis, the southern city that has been the focal point of combat since
January, and scavenge through the remains of their ruined homes. The war is
not over, though, and efforts to negotiate a temporary ceasefire are still at an
impasse.

On April 7th Israel withdrew its ground troops from Khan Younis, leaving
just one brigade deployed in Gaza. Those who remain are stationed along a
corridor that cuts across the middle of the 41km (25-mile) enclave. They are
meant to prevent Palestinians from leaving the south, now home to almost
90% of Gaza’s 2.2m people, and returning to the north, which was
depopulated in the early weeks of the war.

With such a sparse ground presence, the army can do little to advance the
war’s twin goals: the defeat of Hamas and the return of 129 hostages still
held in Gaza (dozens of whom are thought to be dead). To do the former,
Israel would have to press into Rafah, the last remaining city it has yet to
assault; the latter would require a deal with Hamas. Neither seems likely.

Western and Arab negotiators had hoped to broker a ceasefire before the start
of Ramadan, and then before Eid al-Fitr. Those deadlines came and went.
Talks are still slogging along in Egypt and Qatar. Earlier this month Bill
Burns, the CIA director, flew to Cairo to present America’s latest proposal. It
called for Hamas to release 40 Israeli hostages—mostly women, the sick and
the old—in exchange for 900 Palestinians held in Israeli jails.

Negotiators put an optimistic spin on the effort. Majed al-Ansari, a

spokesman for Qatar’s foreign ministry, said he was “more optimistic”. A
few diplomats suggested the withdrawal from Khan Younis could serve as a
confidence-building measure to nudge Hamas into lowering its demands.
Others call this wishful thinking.

There are still big gaps between what Israel and Hamas are willing to accept
—the same ones that have bedevilled negotiations for months. Yahya
Sinwar, the leader of Hamas in Gaza, still wants a permanent ceasefire;
Israel will only agree to a temporary lull. Envoys from Hamas have also
claimed they cannot find 40 living hostages from the groups set to be
released. That would require them to release soldiers or young men, whom it
had hoped to hold as leverage, and for whom it wants a higher number of
freed prisoners.

Mr Sinwar also wants Israel to dismantle the checkpoints along its military
corridor and allow displaced Gazans to travel north during a truce. That
could allow Hamas to redeploy its own forces, and reassert some control
over the north. Israel, unsurprisingly, insists the checkpoints will stay. It
would allow women and children to cross, but men would face strict limits.
And far from serving as an inducement, the pullout from Khan Younis could
have the opposite effect: with little fighting, Mr Sinwar may feel little
pressure to deal.

Binyamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, also seems content to let the
talks meander: a ceasefire, even a temporary one, would be unpopular with
his far-right allies. In a statement on April 8th he warned that the Rafah
offensive was imminent. “This will happen; there is a date,” he said (while
declining to provide said date).

Mr Netanyahu has been promising to conquer Rafah for months. On

February 8th he said that Israeli troops would “soon go into Rafah”. On
March 17th he told the cabinet he had approved “operational plans” for the
offensive. After months of threats, it is doubtful that either Israelis or Hamas
leaders believe him. In reality, the offensive remains far off. A move on
Rafah requires calling up more reservists and preparing a plan to evacuate
1.5m Palestinian civilians living in the city. Israel has done neither. Yoav
Gallant, the defence minister, is said to have contradicted Mr Netanyahu and
told American officials that there is no scheduled date for the offensive.

That leaves the war effort deadlocked. Some Israeli officials argue that this
was the plan all along. In October, before the ground offensive began,
generals predicted it would take place in phases. There would be a stage of
heavy fighting, with a large Israeli presence inside the strip, and then a
longer period of targeted raids carried out by troops on Gaza’s periphery.
After four months of fighting in Khan Younis, they now say, their troops no
longer have big objectives left to pursue; it is sensible to let them rest, and to
focus on defending against other threats from Iran-backed militias across the
region.

Mr Netanyahu does not mind the stalemate either: the longer the war drags
on, the longer he thinks he can avoid early elections. But a quagmire means
that more hostages will probably die in captivity and gives Hamas more time
to regroup.

The withdrawal coincided with a big increase in deliveries of humanitarian

aid to Gaza. The Israeli army said that 322 lorries entered the territory on
April 7th, then a record high during this war; even more came through in the
following days. A group of nine countries took part in a joint air-drop of
food, clothing and toys ahead of Eid al-Fitr, the largest such operation to
date. Many Gazans say they have not seen much difference in the
availability of food, though. That is partly because the UN and other aid
agencies have been unable to unload and distribute all the goods that crossed
the border.

The influx of aid has less to do with the Israeli pullout than with American
anger over an Israeli drone strike on April 1st that killed seven aid workers.
On April 9th Univision, a Spanish news giant in America, broadcast an
interview with Joe Biden in which he called Mr Netanyahu’s approach to
Gaza “a mistake”. Yet while the most intense phase of fighting appears to be
over, and aid is picking up, America, Israel and Hamas remain trapped in an
impasse—with none willing to change course. ■
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Death threats

Congo brings back the death penalty

And it is cracking down on government critics

Apr 11th 2024 | KINSHASA

CRITICS OF CONGO’S government are on edge—and for good reason.

Last month the justice ministry said it was bringing back the death penalty,
ending a moratorium that had been in place since 2003, in order to “rid our
country’s army of traitors” and to “stem the resurgence of acts of terrorism
and urban banditry”.

Restoring capital punishment is, in part, a reaction to the desperate situation

in eastern Congo, where the M23 rebel group has surrounded the city of
Goma. The conflict with M23, which is backed by Rwanda, has forced more
than a million people from their homes, most of whom now live in squalid
conditions crammed around Goma. Congo’s army is on the back foot. “We
don’t have a choice,” says Patrick Muyaya, a government spokesman,
referring to the death penalty.

Human-rights activists and the Catholic church have protested, pointing out
that the justice system is dysfunctional. Even Congo’s president, Félix
Tshisekedi, describes the court system as “ill”. Moreover, the government
seems to use a rather expansive definition of treason and has recently been
arresting critics of even the mildest sort. “The immediate effect [of the death
penalty] is fear,” says Fred Bauma, the director of Ebuteli, a Congolese
think-tank. In February, secret-service agents arrested Mr Bauma and, he
says, assaulted him in detention.

Other incidents have also had a chilling effect. Last year the bloodied body
of Chérubin Okende, a politician who was close to the opposition leader
Moïse Katumbi, was found in his car in Kinshasa. Opposition parties said he
had last been seen alive outside the Constitutional Court, when he had sent
in his bodyguard to drop off some papers. When the guard returned both
Okende and his car were gone. After a lengthy investigation, officials
provoked derision by ruling that the death was a suicide. “Chérubin didn’t
get justice because the justice system is rotten,” said Georges Oyema, a
relative.

But Congo’s judiciary does not take criticism well and it is willing to pursue
those who question the official ruling. One of Congo’s best-known
journalists, Stanis Bujakera, was sentenced to six months in prison on
charges of spreading fake news about Okende’s death. His employer, Jeune
Afrique, had published an article without a byline that suggested that
Congolese military-intelligence agents had killed Okende, based on a leaked
intelligence memo. The government denied the memo’s authenticity, saying
it had been forged by Mr Bujakera.

Pressure on government opponents had been on the rise before the general
and presidential elections in December. But it has intensified since Mr
Tshisekedi was proclaimed the winner. According to Mr Bauma, the think-
tank director, the president is getting jittery about a loss of public support.
The military successes in the east that he promised in his campaign have not
materialised. A diplomatic solution to the conflict seems far off. “There’s a
desire to silence critics,” says Mr Bauma. ■
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and-africa/2024/04/11/congo-brings-back-the-death-penalty

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Slavery at sea

China’s fishing fleet is causing havoc off Africa’s

coasts
The victims are non-Chinese crew members, local fishermen and marine life

Apr 11th 2024 |

“THE FOREMAN woke us up by hitting us,” said the sailor. For the next 20
hours, on a typical day, the bleary-eyed crew would be hauling up fishing
nets. If sharks got entangled they would hack off their fins, tossing the
mutilated creatures back into the water to die. When dolphins were ensnared,
the captain shot them, cut out their teeth and bartered them with passing
ships in return for whisky.

These incidents all took place between 2017 and 2023 on Chinese fishing
boats in the south-west Indian ocean, according to the Environmental Justice
Foundation (EJF), a London-based NGO. China’s distant-water fishing fleet
is the world’s largest and most controversial. It has long been accused of
environmental and human-rights abuses in Latin America and west Africa.
An investigation by the EJF suggests it is terrorising fishermen and
plundering the seas off east Africa, too.

The EJF has identified some 138 Chinese vessels fishing in waters off
Mozambique, Tanzania, Kenya and Madagascar. Interviews with crew
members suggest that illegal fishing is rampant. Most of the interviewees
said they regularly and deliberately killed protected species, such as turtles,
dolphins and false killer whales. Fully 80% said they systematically engaged
in shark finning, an illegal practice, targeting several endangered or critically
endangered species.

Illegal fishing is also harming local fishermen. Chinese vessels routinely fish
in waters close to the shoreline reserved by law for small-scale local fishers.
According to the EJF, Chinese trawlers in Mozambique often line their nets
with a fine mesh, allowing them to catch smaller fish usually targeted only
by locals. They have also been known to intimidate the local fishermen,
ripping their nets and hounding them out of their usual fishing grounds. The
volume of fish caught by small-scale fishers in Mozambique has slumped by
30% over the past 25 years.

Things are even bleaker for the non-Chinese crew members who staff
China’s distant-water fleet. On one vessel eight Mozambican workers had to
sleep in just two beds. On another there was no working toilet for the
Filipino and Indonesian crew, who had to defecate off the side of the boat for
an entire months-long voyage. Anyone who complained would be kicked,
beaten or threatened with salary deductions. Crew members interviewed by
the EJF said four of their comrades had died at sea, one of them by suicide.

Three-quarters of those interviewed said Chinese captains or recruitment

agencies had confiscated their passports or birth certificates to prevent them
from leaving the ship. Some were trapped at sea for months or even years.
The EJF says such treatment amounts to “conditions of modern slavery”.

The Chinese government insists it has a “zero tolerance attitude” towards

illegal fishing. Yet it appears to be using its geopolitical heft to facilitate the
depredations of its fleet. Chinese vessels reportedly receive some $7bn a
year in government subsidies. According to the EJF, in the south-west Indian
ocean they sometimes travel under escort from the Chinese navy.

With more than 90% of the world’s fish stocks either fully fished or
overfished, Chinese boats must sail ever further to fill their nets. They are
racing each other, literally and morally, to the bottom of the global fish
barrel. ■
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and-africa/2024/04/11/chinas-fishing-fleet-is-causing-havoc-off-africas-coasts

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Opposition rising

Is South Africa ready for a change in government?

The ANC is unpopular, but the opposition is fractured

Apr 11th 2024 | JOHANNESBURG

SONGEZO ZIBI, the leader of a new political party in South Africa, thinks
the country is ripe for an Emmanuel Macron moment in the national election
on May 29th—one in which a political insurgent can disrupt the 30-year-
long reign of the African National Congress (ANC). The former newspaper
editor has a slick campaign that emphasises competence over hollow
campaign promises. Yet he lacks Mr Macron’s sweeping ambition. Instead of
aiming for the presidency, Mr Zibi simply hopes that Rise Mzansi, his party,
will win perhaps 5% of the national vote. (Polls currently have it at only
about 0.5%.)

These modest goals are not a deterrent to donors. Rise Mzansi (named after
the Xhosa word for “south”, a colloquial term for South Africa), raised
16.7m rand ($900,000) in the fourth quarter of 2023, which was more than
any other party, including the official opposition, the Democratic Alliance
(DA). This makes it one of the leading examples of how politics is
fragmenting in South Africa as the country prepares for the first election
since the end of apartheid in which the ANC is expected to lose its
parliamentary majority.

Of the five parties that raised the most money in the last quarter of 2023, the
most recent period for disclosures, four are polling at less than 2% each of
the national vote. In all, more than 115 parties will compete in the national
election.

Most will sink without a trace, but some are upending the country’s electoral
calculus. uMkhonto we Sizwe, a new party backed by Jacob Zuma, a
disgraced former president, has come out of nowhere to take more than 13%
of the national vote, according to a recent poll. As a result, the ANC’s share
of the vote may fall to around 40%.

That would be new and unpredictable territory. The ANC has never
previously fallen below 57% of the national vote and it will have to seek
coalition partners if it hopes to keep ruling. That could allow small parties to
wield an outsize influence on the shape of the next government. Which
parties the ANC chooses to form a government with, and how those parties
use their influence, may determine whether South Africa is able to find
political renewal or sinks deeper into economic stagnation and corruption.

In this regard, Mr Zibi’s party is also instructive. Rise Mzansi’s manifesto

does not contain any groundbreaking policy proposals. It wants to slim down
the cabinet, fix public procurement and ban “blue light brigades”, the
intimidating police convoys that escort senior government officials at speed.
The party’s big focus is instead on professionalising the government by
ensuring that people are appointed on merit rather than “deployed” by
political parties, as is currently the case. It also wants to reform how the
government awards contracts to reduce corruption. “We want to be the
grown-ups in the room,” says Mr Zibi.

The 48-year-old comes from a political family: two uncles fought in the
armed struggle against the apartheid government, and his mother helped
look after political prisoners. Initially, he took a different route. He made his
name first as the editor of Business Day, a respected newspaper, and then as
the spokesman for Absa, a major bank. But politics was always in his soul.
“When I was at Business Day, it became clear that you couldn’t just write
about this stuff,” he says, referring to the many government corruption
scandals that the paper covered during his tenure.

Mr Zibi struggled to find a home in any of the large established parties,

which have veered from what he believes are the country’s core values of
social democracy. When meeting other politicians, he would give them
copies of “The Third Man”, a political memoir by Lord Peter Mandelson, a
close ally of Tony Blair. He hoped this would persuade them to follow in
New Labour’s footsteps and shift to a more centrist sort of politics. No one
read the book. Eventually, he and a few like-minded colleagues realised they
would have to do it themselves, and Rise Mzansi was born. Mr Zibi
describes it as “a typical centrist European party”; in American terms, “a
little to the right of Bernie Sanders”.

The key question facing South Africa is whether the ANC would choose to
form a coalition with more or less liberal parties such as Rise Mzansi and the
DA, which is polling at about 27%, or instead swing to the hard left. That
would mean teaming up with the Economic Freedom Fighters, a populist and
socialist party that is expected to win about 10% of the vote, or Mr Zuma’s
new outfit.
Man in the middle

One issue that may be a stumbling block for the ANC forming a coalition of
the sensible could be agreeing on fundamental economic policies and the
appointment of people to key positions. “We would need an agreement on
who the finance minister is going to be. And on the independence of the
Reserve Bank,” Mr Zibi says. These alone would be a big ask, but previous
coalition negotiations in South Africa have thrown up even stranger
outcomes. Take the current mayor of Johannesburg, Kabelo Gwamanda, who
belongs to a fringe religious party that holds just three of the city council’s
270 seats.
His example has emboldened parties like Rise Mzansi to believe that, in this
most unpredictable of elections, they too can punch well above their weight.
That said, South African politics is littered with the discarded election
posters of smaller parties that have tried, and failed, to disrupt the status quo.
Mr Zibi will be hoping that his face is not on one of those. ■
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The Americas
Chinese green technologies are pouring into Latin America
The great green rivalry :: That is prompting anxiety in the United States about security,
coercion and competition

Haiti’s transitional government must take office amid gang

warfare
The first small steps :: Only after it is installed can an international security force be deployed
to the country

Brazil and Colombia are curbing destruction of Amazon

rainforest
Falling felling :: Tree loss in South America fell by almost a quarter in 2023, compared with
the year before

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The great green rivalry

Chinese green technologies are pouring into Latin

America
That is prompting anxiety in the United States about security, coercion and
competition

Apr 10th 2024 | Montevideo

FROM THE snazzy seats of the E14 bus in Montevideo, Uruguay’s capital,
it is hard to tell that the smooth electric machine is Chinese. Only an eagle-
eyed commuter would spot the tiny window sticker bearing the name of
BYD, a Chinese manufacturer. Enquiries as to passengers’ concerns about
the bus’s Chinese origins elicit bafflement. They are a vast improvement on
the deafening gas-guzzlers they replaced. The operator has just ordered 200
more. Thousands of similar buses glide through other Latin cities. But
politicians in the United States fret that Latin America’s growing reliance on
Chinese green technology, from electric buses to solar panels, is a problem
and even a threat.
Tensions are rising because the stakes are high. The fast adoption of green
technologies such as electric vehicles (EVs), solar panels and batteries is a
vital pillar of efforts to halt climate change. These technologies are also an
economic smash hit. In 2022 announced foreign direct investment in
renewable energy globally totalled over $350bn, dramatically more than
annual investments in any other sector not only that year but in decades.
That has made green technology the latest front in the United States’ rivalry
with China.
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The first small steps

Haiti’s transitional government must take office

amid gang warfare
Only after it is installed can an international security force be deployed to
the country

Apr 11th 2024 | MEXICO CITY and PORT-AU-PRINCE

ONE MONTH ago Haiti’s prime minister, Ariel Henry, despised at home
and stranded abroad, agreed to hand over power to a “transitional
presidential council”. It was to be formed according to a plan drawn up by
CARICOM, the 15-member Caribbean community, and other powers
including the United States. On April 7th the nine-member council finally
submitted a political agreement to Mr Henry for approval. His vestigial
government’s assent will let the violence-racked country move forward. As
The Economist went to press, that had not yet happened. Only once it does,
and a decree is published in Haiti’s official gazette, Le Moniteur, can the
council finally start work.

Haiti desperately needs some form of authority beyond the anarchic rule of
the gangs. The country of 11.6m people has been chaotic since July 2021
when Jovenel Moïse, the then-president, was murdered in his residence.
The situation reached a new low in early March, when gangs went on the
rampage while Mr Henry was out of the country, blocking his return. The
airport in Port-au-Prince has been too dangerous to use since then. No cargo
moves through the main port, a terrible problem in a country which is a net
importer of food. More than 40% of Haitians do not have enough to eat.
Thousands are displaced. Getting in and out of Port-au-Prince, to Cap-
Haïtien in the north, where Haiti’s other international airport is still
operating, requires a helicopter.
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americas/2024/04/11/haitis-transitional-government-must-take-office-amid-gang-
warfare

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Falling felling

Brazil and Colombia are curbing destruction of

Amazon rainforest
Tree loss in South America fell by almost a quarter in 2023, compared with
the year before

Apr 7th 2024 | Saõ Paulo

LAST YEAR, South America lost around 2,000 square kilometres of mature
tropical forest—equivalent to an area roughly the size of Wales, or three
times the size of the state of Delaware. These swathes of forest host some of
the planet’s highest levels of biodiversity. They capture and store carbon
more efficiently than any other environment. In one sense, 2023 was merely
another step along a grim, familiar path—South America has lost 30% of its
primary forest cover since 2001.
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americas/2024/04/07/brazil-and-colombia-are-curbing-destruction-of-amazon-rainforest

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Europe
The Kremlin wants to make Ukraine’s second city
unliveable
20km from the enemy :: The race to save Kharkiv from Russian bombs

Russia is struggling to find its missing soldiers

Missing in Ukraine :: Vladimir Putin’s war has left thousands of searching families in limbo

Austria’s accidental hard-right leader

Herbert Kickl :: A new biography portrays the rise to the top of an obscure man

Criminal networks are well ahead in the fight over

Europe’s ports
The continent’s narco-ports :: Cocaine seizures are sharply up, but much more is getting
through

What happens if Ukraine loses?

Charlemagne :: Russian victory would be debilitating for the West, and especially for Europe

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20km from the enemy

The Kremlin wants to make Ukraine’s second city

unliveable
The race to save Kharkiv from Russian bombs

Apr 7th 2024 | Kharkiv

IT HAS BEEN a few days since a 250kg Russian glide bomb landed in Iryna
Tymokhyna’s courtyard on 23rd August Street, and it is fair to say she is not
happy. Sitting on the park bench that has since become her living room, the
60-year-old curses Vladimir Putin and the minority of Kharkiv residents she
believes are still helping him. Her apartment is covered in dust and broken
glass, she says; her neighbours were put in hospital, and a passing bicycle
courier was killed. “If it was up to me, I would shoot the bastards…and I’d
wipe Belgorod [the closest Russian city] off the face of the Earth while I was
at it.”
Ms Tymokhyna’s sharp language is striking for the fact she was born in
Russia, and most of her relatives still live there. But her outrage is far from
unique in a 1.3m-person city now living through an airborne terror mostly
originating from the region just across the border.
Russia stepped up its bombardment of Kharkiv in December. Since then, the
city has been on the receiving end of more ballistic missiles than at any time
since the start of the war. Drone assaults have become more frequent: they
fly faster and higher, and have a carbon wing-coating that makes shooting
them down harder. But the March 27th attack on 23rd August Street was a
pivotal moment, the first time a glide bomb, launched from a plane and
capable of travelling tens of kilometres to devastating effect, had been used
against Ukraine’s second city.

The attack came just five days after a missile barrage destroyed almost all of
Kharkiv’s power-generation capacity. It has been followed by more than a
week of operations using glide bombs, missiles and drones, killing at least
16 people and injuring another 50 or more. The escalation had military
sources in Kyiv suggesting that Russia has resolved to make the city a “grey
zone”, uninhabitable for civilians.

The man responsible for keeping Kharkiv running disagrees. Interviewed at

a secret location, the mayor, Ihor Terekhov, says his city has no intention of
giving up. Things were worse at the start of the war, he says, when all but
300,000 of the pre-war population of 2m fled. “How can you make a city
like this a grey zone? People won’t leave, because they have already left,
then returned.” Yes, powering up a city without power stations or working
transformers was difficult, but they managed it. “If I told you how we did it,
that too would be targeted.” But many of the city’s problems could be solved
if the West provided capable air-defence systems or F-16s that could push
back the fighter jets carrying the new bombs.

Russia’s exact intentions are not clear at this stage, though there are signs
that it is preparing for a major summer offensive. A Ukrainian source with
knowledge of the intelligence picture said Russia is training six divisions
(some 120,000 men) in eastern Siberia. On April 3rd President Volodymyr
Zelensky said Russia would mobilise a further 300,000 in June. Kharkiv is
one of several possible directions for a future assault. It is not the most
likely, but it has already been heavily trailed in Russian media. That might
indicate a Kremlin information campaign to frighten Kharkiv residents. Or it
could be a nod in the direction of a pro-war camp agitating for a fiercer
response to Ukraine’s frequent attacks on Belgorod, which are also causing
unease in Western circles. In March Mr Putin talked about the creation of a
“buffer zone” on Ukraine’s border.

A military operation to seize Kharkiv would be a tall order for Russia. The
last time it tried, in 2022 when the city was much more poorly defended, it
failed spectacularly. Taking the city would require breaking through
Ukrainian defences and encircling it, which Russia is nowhere near being
able to do; establishing air superiority, which is not a given; and winning a
bloody urban campaign. “There’s a strong chance they would not succeed
with any of that,” says Andriy Zagorodnyuk, a former defence minister. For
others, the fear remains that the Russians will turn nastier when they realise
they can’t get what they want. “They won’t be able to take Kharkiv, but
destroy it—perhaps,” says Denys Yaroslavsky, a local businessman turned
special-forces reconnaissance commander. “We’d be talking about
something of the order of Aleppo.”

Some have already taken the hint and packed their bags. Iryna Voichuk, a
journalist, left for Europe at the end of March, after the glide bombs began to
hit. It felt like leaving a friend, she says: “I was happy to live there despite
the dangers, but that changed when a missile landed 100 metres away from
my flat.” Much of Kharkiv’s commerce vanished in 2022 along with its
richest inhabitants. The energy shortage and military escalation are testing
the resolve of the enterprises that are left. Among them, there has so far been
no exodus or panic besides a few isolated cases, insists Yury Sapronov, one
of the few big businessmen left in the city. “I can’t say that Kharkiv is
suddenly going to benefit from a massive influx of investment, since we
can’t move the Russian border. But we will survive and small businesses can
even prosper from internal demand.”

If others have written Kharkiv off, those inside the city have yet to receive
the memo. Urban life continues in spite of the dozen daily air-raid warnings.
Families walk in the city’s central park despite the missiles that occasionally
land nearby. Children play football next to a military facility. The sense of
digging in is summed up by the city’s decision to start building its schools
underground. The first of these will open this month. It is entered via a
single blast hatch that sticks out incongruously from a sports field. Built with
reinforced concrete that goes several metres underground, it should survive
anything Russia throws at it. All 900 spots in the first intake have been
reserved.

Ms Tymokhyna, who offers The Economist tea in her park-bench living

room, says there is nothing she would not do to defend the country that for
43 years has been her home. “I’m 60 years old, but I’m ready with my spade
to go wherever I’m needed,” she says. “Make Molotov cocktails, acid,
whatever it takes. Ukraine is everything to me. If the Russians dare to come
here, I’ll find them. They won’t have a hope of staying in the realm of the
living.” ■

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Missing in Ukraine

Russia is struggling to find its missing soldiers

Vladimir Putin’s war has left thousands of searching families in limbo

Apr 11th 2024 |

KAMONIN ALEKSANDROVICH disappeared in the Donetsk region in

winter. On February 22nd last year, as Ukraine repelled Russian assaults
along the front line across eastern Ukraine, his unit was involved in fierce
fighting. According to his family, Kamonin was badly injured. “He went out
with his unit on the mission, he had no documents with him,” they wrote on
an online message board. Their son did not return from the battle; and like
dozens more he simply disappeared.

“He was wounded and left behind. His colleagues don’t want to say
anything, and command hides the truth,” his family say. Mr
Aleksandrovich’s case is the tip of an iceberg. On People Search, a group set
up on Vkontakte, a Russian social-media platform, new faces of the missing
appear daily with pleas for help.

Thousands of Russian combatants are missing in Ukraine. Suddenly thrust

into war by President Vladimir Putin, Russia’s commanders were ill-
prepared for the losses their forces would suffer. “No funeral teams were
created in advance to search for and evacuate the bodies of the dead,” said
Sergei Krivenko of Memorial, a now-banned Russian human-rights group.
As Russia’s campaign descended into fiasco, many soldiers were hastily
buried in unmarked graves or incinerated in grisly pits and mobile
crematoriums. Hundreds more bodies were simply abandoned.

The Russian defence ministry has not put out a number on its missing in
action (MIA), but some experts say it could be as high as 25,000. Under
Russian law, if the body of a missing soldier is not found, official
recognition of his death can only take place, in court, two years after the end
of hostilities; though, this period has recently been cut to six months. After
that, relatives will be entitled to 12.5m roubles ($134,000) as compensation.

Russia’s record of finding missing soldiers, alive or dead, is abysmal. During

its two wars in Chechnya, official indifference and systemic army failures
forced many families to find and identify their missing relatives themselves.
Over 200 Soviet soldiers who fought in the Soviet-Afghan war are still
missing, with veterans still trying to trace them. In Ukraine these chronic
deficiencies remain entrenched, with secrecy and staff shortages hampering
efforts to find soldiers through official channels.

“Relatives learn information about a serviceman through the commander of

a unit in which the soldier serves,” explains Mr Krivenko. “It works in
peacetime but in war conditions less so.” Russian units have struggled to
contact the families of those missing, and have failed to create channels to
report soldiers’ statuses accurately. As a result, many combatants who have
gone missing, whether presumed dead or alive, are not officially recognised
as MIAs and have not appeared on any of the lists of injured, killed and
missing. For Russia’s defence ministry they do not exist. In such cases,
relatives are not entitled to compensation, or the government’s help in
searching for them.
Secretive and abusive practices long ingrained in Russian military culture
feed the crisis. The army often treats its personnel poorly, dead or alive. For
some commanders, eager to conceal losses on the battlefield from superiors,
it is easier to claim a soldier has “disappeared” and to leave their status
unresolved. It also means that compensation can be delayed or avoided
entirely. “Families have a right to compensation but the defence ministry
might not be willing to pay out immediately. It comes down to a propaganda
war,” says Matthew Holliday of the International Commission on Missing
Persons. “Announcing large numbers of missing is not a positive message to
share when you’re trying to win a war.”

Abandoned by the authorities, families are turning elsewhere for help.

Several communities dedicated to finding Russia’s MIAs have sprung up
online, sharing photos, unit details and identifying features. Relatives are
even going to battlefields and morgues themselves in the hope of finding
their relatives, or turning directly to Ukrainian social media for help.

In the opening days of the war, Ukraine’s interior ministry set up a hotline
and a Telegram channel called Look for Yours, which allowed families to
find information about missing Russian soldiers. But as the war has
intensified, attitudes towards the invaders have hardened. Ukrainians are
also struggling to find and identify their own MIAs. “We have so many
unclaimed Russian bodies, but there aren’t enough fridges to store the
number of dead,” says Olha Reshetylova of Media Initiative for Human
Rights, a Ukrainian human-rights group. “They are not the priority. We have
our own dead to find.”

Most Russian families will discover the fate of their missing loved ones, at
best, only after the end of the war, and even then the process could drag on
for many years after a ceasefire, when and if one ever comes. For some,
thwarted by the army’s bureaucratic labyrinth and existing in a hellish
personal and legal limbo, the answer may never arrive. ■

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Herbert Kickl

Austria’s accidental hard-right leader

A new biography portrays the rise to the top of an obscure man

Apr 11th 2024 | BERLIN

“IF A PARTY is a boat then I prefer to be in the engine-room rather than at

the captain’s dinner.” Thus spoke Herbert Kickl when Heinz-Christian
Strache was still boss of Austria’s hard-right Freedom Party (FPÖ),
according to “Kickl and the Destruction of Europe”, a new biography that
will be published (in German) on April 15th. Lacking in charm, Mr Kickl
was always meant to be the machinist rather than the captain. “I think he is
still sometimes surprised to be the leader of the FPÖ,” says Robert Treichler,
one of the two authors (the other is Gernot Bauer, also a journalist at Profil,
an Austrian weekly).

Nothing in his early years and even in his first decades as an apparatchik in
the FPÖ seemed to indicate that Mr Kickl would become a serious contender
for Austria’s chancellorship at elections this autumn. Born in 1968, he grew
up in a working-class family in Carinthia. He was a good student. He liked
the Beatles and the cargo pants he bought at the American army shop in
Spittal. His grandfather Florian had been a Nazi, but that was the case for
many of his generation in Carinthia.

In spite of his academic abilities, Mr Kickl never finished his philosophy

degree at Vienna University, nor his military service. Instead he joined the
FPÖ and fell under the spell of Jörg Haider, the party’s charismatic leader
from 1986 to 2000. Mr Haider spotted Mr Kickl’s talent for marketing and
communications—and he was happy to let him do the dirty work of coining
some of the FPÖ’s nastiest yet unfortunately catchy phrases. Mr Kickl is
said to have come up with a notoriously unpleasant comment by Mr Haider
about Ariel Muzicant, then the head of the Jewish community in Vienna, for
which Mr Haider faced the threat of legal action and had to apologise.

When Mr Haider quit the FPÖ to set up a new party in 2005, everyone
expected Mr Kickl to follow him. Messrs Treichler and Brauer don’t provide
a satisfying explanation for why he did not, but Mr Kickl probably thought
he would do better by staying with the FPÖ, soon to be led by Mr Strache,
another gifted retail politician. But Mr Strache almost destroyed the FPÖ
with a scandal involving a video secretly filmed on the island of Ibiza in
which he appeared to promise government contracts in exchange for party
donations to a woman who claimed to be the niece of an oligarch close to
Vladimir Putin.

With the FPÖ’s most talented politicians out of the way, the introverted Mr
Kickl rose to the top. He moved the party further to the right during the
covid pandemic, which he used to whip up protest against governmental
restrictions. He praises the “identitarian” movement, Europe’s answer to
America’s alt-right; wants to stop immigration and even to deport foreigners.
His hero is Viktor Orban, Hungary’s autocratic leader.

According to the polls the FPÖ is currently Austria’s strongest party, with
around 29% of the votes. The leaders of the second- and third-strongest
parties, the centre-right ÖVP and the centre-left SPÖ, vow they would never
form a coalition government with the FPÖ, apparently scuppering Mr
Kickl’s hopes of becoming chancellor. But after what looks like a tough
election for them, they might lose their jobs and their say in what happens
next. ■

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The continent’s narco-ports

Criminal networks are well ahead in the fight over

Europe’s ports
Cocaine seizures are sharply up, but much more is getting through

Apr 8th 2024 |

EUROPE’S PORTS are drug hubs. On February 16th the Port of Cork seized
€32.8m ($35.6m) worth of crystal meth. Last year Antwerp, one of Europe’s
main drug gateways, confiscated record amounts of cocaine. Most drugs,
though, elude customs and end up on the streets. More than a quarter of
seizures of illegal firearms and half of all homicides in the EU are linked to
drug-trafficking. The bloc’s illegal-drug market is now reckoned to be worth
at least €31bn a year, according to the EU’s main drugs-monitoring agency.

Ports are relatively safe terrain for narcos. Vast container traffic helps dodgy
deliveries slide under the radar. Antwerp, Europe’s second biggest port, after
Rotterdam, handles around 290m tonnes of cargo every year. Drugs hidden
in crafty spots, like inside frozen tuna or in sea chests, are difficult to spot.
Refrigerated containers carrying fresh produce, which require faster
processing, are popular places to stash drugs. On February 8th the port
authorities in Southampton seized 5.7 tonnes of cocaine in a banana
shipment from South America. It was the biggest class-A drug seizure in
Britain’s history.
As cocaine production in South America rises, and street prices in Europe
stagnate, traffickers seem to be favouring bigger shipments. That may
explain why the amount of seized cocaine in Europe is increasing as the
number of individual seizures has declined since 2019, says Cathy Haenlein
from the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI), a think-tank in London.
Meanwhile, higher levels of automation and digitisation at big ports are,
paradoxically, facilitating new security breaches for gangs to exploit.
Increasingly, they steal container-reference codes to nab cargo with cocaine
smuggled into it. Corrupt workers can get as much as 15% of the drugs’
value, according to Europol. Others are blackmailed.

As the crooks get more creative, the authorities are trying to catch up. The
use of drones is becoming popular; they use thermal cameras to look out for
gang members picking up shipments, or to track suspicious movements of
consignments. Antwerp became the first major port to use autonomous
drones last May and has also vowed to have all high-risk containers scanned
by 2028. Shipping companies are scrambling to upgrade their fleets with
new tech, such as vapour-screening sensors, smart containers and electronic
seals. In January the EU launched a European Ports Alliance to boost co-
ordination between ports, governments and private companies. Some €200m
will be spent on new scanning equipment.

But Europe is fighting a losing battle. The sheer number of containers

passing through its ports makes scanning ineffective. Just 10% of containers
from South America and 1.5% of containers overall are checked in Europe;
any more would probably hold up trade. Besides, if you close one door,
another one tends to open. Medium-sized ports, such as Helsingborg in
Sweden and Málaga in Spain, are already experiencing more traffic in
narcotics, no doubt thanks to tighter security at Rotterdam and other
established drug hubs.

Corruption is difficult to stamp out. Vetting processes carry little weight

compared with threats of violence. Many international crime networks hire
locally embedded co-ordinators; the returns available make the investment
well worthwhile. “They know the area and they know the people,” says
Louis Borer from RiskIntelligence, a consultancy.
What to do? Better information-sharing across Europe will help. But gaps
remain. The port of Piraeus in Greece has already been barred from the new
port alliance due to suspicions over its Chinese owners. That bodes badly for
European ports where foreign firms own majority stakes.

European officials are, rightly, boosting their efforts further up the supply
chain. The EU set up a Global Illicit Flows Programme in 2019 and began a
new phase of SEACOP, its co-operation project, in January. International
efforts are already bearing fruit. Some €48m-worth of cocaine-linked
property in Spain and Ecuador was frozen in February following a joint
investigation with Europol. (Ecuador had agreed to share more data with
Europol in May last year.) But Ecuador remains riddled with drug gangs. So
long as demand in Europe soars, the flow won’t stop. The crooks are in for
another bumper year. ■

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Charlemagne

What happens if Ukraine loses?

Russian victory would be debilitating for the West, and especially for Europe

Apr 11th 2024 |

TO ASK “what if Ukraine loses?” was once a tactic favoured by those

looking to berate its Western allies into sending more money and weapons.
Increasingly the question feels less like a thought experiment and more like
the first stage of contingency planning. After a gruelling few months on the
battlefield, gone are last year’s hopes of a Ukrainian counter-offensive that
would push Russia back to its borders and humble Vladimir Putin. These
days it is fear that dominates: that an existing stalemate might crumble in
favour of the invader, or of Donald Trump coming back to power in America
and delivering victory to Russia on a silver platter. Although a vanquished
Ukraine has become a less far-fetched prospect, it is no less frightening.
Sobering as the return of war on the continent has been, a successful
invasion reaping geopolitical rewards for Mr Putin would be much worse.
A defeat of Ukraine would be a humbling episode for the West, a modern
Suez moment. Having provided moral, military and financial succour to its
ally for two years now, America and Europe have—perhaps inadvertently—
put their own credibility on the line. That they have sometimes dithered in
delivering this support would make things worse, not better: further
confirmation, among sceptics of liberal polities, that democracies lack what
it takes to stand up for their interests. In Russia but also China, India and
across the global south, Ukraine’s backers would be dismissed as good at
tabling UN resolutions and haggling over wording at EU and NATO
summits but not much else. The colouring by atlas-makers of Ukrainian land
into Russian territory would cement the idea that might makes right, to the
benefit of strongmen far and wide. George Robertson, a former boss of
NATO, has warned that “If Ukraine loses, our enemies will decide the world
order.” Unfortunately for the Taiwanese, among others, he is probably right.

Nowhere would feel the brunt of this humiliation more than the EU, the
pinnacle of liberal international norm-setting. Ukraine’s neighbours moved
less fast than America in providing support. But in the European slow-but-
steady way they feel they have done as much as could be asked of them. By
sending arms (including using EU money to pay for weapons, a first),
propping up Ukraine’s finances, taking in millions of refugees, applying a
dozen rounds of sanctions against Russia and weaning themselves off its
piped gas, the bloc’s politicians have pushed out the boundaries of what
initially seemed possible. If it proves not to have been enough, plenty will
ask whether the union at its core is fit for purpose. Populists—and Putin fans
—in the mould of Hungary’s Viktor Orban or Marine Le Pen in France will
crow that theirs is the best way. Currently there are divisions between the
hawkish eastern fringe and others in the bloc. If Ukraine loses, those will
metastasise into recriminations and bitterness. Emmanuel Macron in France,
a newly minted hawk, has set the tone by warning of “cowards” holding
Europe back.

The geopolitical fallout of a Ukrainian defeat would depend on the shape of

any peace settlement. This in turn would hinge on military dynamics or the
mindset of Mr Trump, should he be elected again. If Ukraine’s ammunition-
constrained army crumbles and somehow Russia controls not just its eastern
territories but the whole country, perhaps under a Belarus-style puppet
regime, its aggressor will in effect share over a thousand more kilometres of
borders with the EU. Should defeat be more limited—including annexation
of territory, but a still-functioning “rump” Ukraine—nerves would still be set
jangling. How long would it be before Mr Putin finished the job? Millions
more Ukrainians might seize the opportunity to leave. The future shape of
the EU would change: the promise of enlargement to Ukraine presupposed a
comprehensive victory. The western Balkans, whose own bid to join was
revived by the war, would surely be left in limbo too.

Beyond the feeling of culpability and shame, a sense of fear would pervade
Europe. Might there be a further attack? Would it be on a NATO country,
forcing allies into action? Further attempts at conquest would at least be a
possibility. Mr Putin has alluded to Nazism in the Baltics, echoing the
pretext he used to invade Ukraine; the trio also have a large Russian-
speaking population. A year ago the joke was that Russia’s claim of having
the best army in Europe was ludicrous: it didn’t even have the best army in
Ukraine. Fewer think that today, given Russia’s ability to keep supplying its
men—not to mention supplying more men—faster than its adversary. A
victorious Russian army would leave Mr Putin commanding the only
fighting force with the battle-hardening and 21st-century warfare skills to
take territory; if he controlled the Ukrainian state he would control two such
military machines. Against him stand war-shy Europeans, perhaps with flaky
American backing and depleted armouries. Might Poland or Germany find
they will need their own nuclear deterrent?
War hoarse

Even if Ukraine wins, Europe will have to change. The “peace project” at its
core will have to adjust to a world in which war is, if not likely, then at least
possible. NATO celebrates its 75th birthday this month, but its future as an
alliance that Europeans use to ensure that America guarantees their territorial
integrity is uncertain. Decades of reaping the post-cold-war peace dividend
will have to be followed by higher defence budgets, as has started
happening.

But if Russia emerges even semi-victorious, change will be imposed upon

Europe in far more unpleasant and unpredictable ways. Seeking an
arrangement with Mr Putin that would reward his belligerence with control
over bits of Ukraine if he promised not to wage more war will provide
illusory security, if that. Europe’s answer to the question “what if Ukraine
loses?” remains simple: “It must not.” ■

Read more from Charlemagne, our columnist on European politics:

Germany’s Free Democrats have become desperate spoilers (Apr 4th)
How Europe’s fear of migrants came to dominate its foreign policy (Mar
27th)
Ukraine’s European allies are either broke, small or irresolute (Mar 21st)

Also: How the Charlemagne column got its name

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Britain
Britain is moving towards assisted dying
All things must pass :: The public is already supportive. Now the politicians are catching up

The Cass Review damns England’s youth-gender services

A landmark judgment :: A new report urges big changes

Primary schools in Britain are beginning to close

Playtime’s over :: A baby bust is starting to work its way through the system

How not to run a water utility

Pipe dreams :: Let Thames Water go into administration. But after that, water bills need to rise

A story of Scottish wildcats

A Tale of Two Kitties :: For some cats this is the best of times. For others, arguably a bit less
good

Why most people regret Brexit

Je regrette quite a lot :: A majority of British voters now believe the split was a mistake

Bootlicking: a guide to pre-election British politics

Bagehot :: Labour is not yet in power. But the honeymoon has already begun

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All things must pass

Britain is moving towards assisted dying

The public is already supportive. Now the politicians are catching up

Apr 11th 2024 |

IN 2015 the Conservative party conference hosted a fringe meeting on

assisted dying. There were, recalls Kit Malthouse, a Tory MP, three people
in the audience—one of whom was his aide. Despondent, Mr Malthouse
turned to a colleague and told him their prospects looked dreadful. “No,”
the colleague replied, undaunted. “This is how gay marriage started.”

Assisted dying, though still controversial, is no longer a fringe issue in

Britain. Bills that would allow it are already moving forward in Jersey, the
Isle of Man and Scotland. The leader of the Labour Party, Sir Keir Starmer,
openly supports a change in the law. He has promised a free vote (in which
MPs are not pressed to follow a party line) on the issue in Parliament if, as
expected, his party wins the next election. Rishi Sunak, the prime minister,
is less effusive but has indicated he would allow time for a bill, too. Britain
may be on the verge of its next big social reform.
That is not because of any big recent shift in public opinion, which was
already supportive. According to YouGov, a pollster, over two-thirds of
Britons support changing the law to allow someone to assist in the suicide
of someone with a terminal illness (see chart).

But there is a growing body of international evidence to point to. In recent

years assisted-dying laws have been passed in countries such as Australia
and New Zealand; similar bills are set to be introduced in Ireland and
France. Medical opinion is shifting. Following a survey of its membership
in 2021 the British Medical Association, the largest doctors’ union, changed
its stance from opposition to neutrality.
Politicians have taken note. The last time assisted-dying bills were debated
in Westminster and in the Scottish Parliament at Holyrood, in 2015, both
were soundly defeated. But now “it does feel like more and more colleagues
are looking for reasons to support rather than excuses to oppose,” says Liam
McCarthur, who introduced the new Scottish bill in March. The bill could
become law there in 2025.

It is hard to predict the outcome of a vote in Westminster, not least because

the election will mean a big new intake of MPs. But the last time a vote was
held, a smaller number of Labour MPs than of Tory MPs opposed assisted
dying. In March Dignity in Dying, a campaign group, released polling
which suggested majority support for the issue in every constituency. MPs
may want to be on the “right side of history”, suggests Sarah Wootton, the
group’s boss.

That does not mean debate over the issue will be easy or comfortable. Many
oppose assisted dying on principle, because they consider life sacred. Plenty
more question how a law would ever be able to fully protect the most
vulnerable patients.

The Scottish bill, for example, proposes that an adult would need to be
terminally ill and of sound mind to be eligible for an assisted death.
Although in theory safeguards exist against the risk of coercion, there
would be little to stop a patient choosing death because they feel like a
burden, says Dr Matthew Doré of the Association of Palliative Medicine, a
body of doctors that opposes assisted dying. They would have to reflect on
their decision for 14 days before proceeding. “You get a longer warranty for
your fridge freezer.”

Proponents of assisted dying argue that such concerns remain hypothetical.

In Oregon, which legalised assisted dying in 1997, disability-rights groups
have never received any complaints about coercion. Only two-thirds of
those who receive medication there ever actually take it. Within the first
year of a law being introduced in California in 2016, a fifth of patients who
applied for assisted dying could not proceed because they became too ill or
died unassisted; a cooling-off period was later reduced from 15 days to two.
Opponents also worry that the risks of abuse are greater in Britain given the
strains afflicting the National Health Service. They point to the quality of
end-of-life care, which is often patchwork and underfunded, and to stories
of people in Canada given help to die because they are too poor or
otherwise unable to get proper support. “We should be fixing the system,
not introducing the idea that this is the way out,” argues Alistair Thompson
of Care Not Killing, a campaign group.

But again there are good counterarguments. In Australia assisted-dying laws

were passed on the understanding that funding would also be increased for
palliative care. Canadians who choose an assisted death are typically richer;
and more than three-quarters of them receive palliative care. And one of the
most compelling arguments for introducing assisted dying in Britain is that
it is currently an option only for those rich and mobile enough to pay
£15,000 ($19,000) for an assisted suicide in Switzerland.

Indeed, the worry for some proponents is that new laws will be drawn too
tightly, not too loosely. When he was director of public prosecutions, Sir
Keir was moved by the case of Daniel James, a young man who became
quadriplegic following a rugby accident and whose parents faced
prosecution for accompanying him to Switzerland. But under the proposed
Scottish law, James would not have been eligible for an assisted death since
his condition was not terminal. Owing to concerns about euthanasia, most
conservative laws require that medications are self-administered.

Jean Eveleigh suffers from Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, a degenerative

disease, for which she has to take a colossal number of painkillers. She
would support any bill to legalise assisted dying, but worries she would not
qualify should her suffering ever get too much. “There would be nothing I
could do: I can’t afford to go to Switzerland,” she says. The only
jurisdiction in Britain considering assisted death for people with unbearable
suffering is Jersey, after a citizen’s assembly there recommended in its
favour.

Legislators will also need to consider the likelihood that different parts of
the British Isles will end up with different laws. On the Isle of Man, for
example, a committee recently concluded that its residency requirement
should be increased from one year to five, to deter people from other
jurisdictions from flooding in.

For all these complexities, a proper debate about assisted dying is long
overdue. When assisted-dying laws are finally introduced “we will wonder
what took so long,” says Mr McArthur. On that day, some will be fearful.
Many others will be relieved. ■

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A landmark judgment

The Cass Review damns England’s youth-gender

services
A new report urges big changes

Apr 10th 2024 |

THE LARGEST review ever undertaken in the field of transgender health

care is out. It is damning of practices that were commonplace in England
until recently and remain widespread in other countries, notably America.

The review, which was published on April 9th, was led by Dr Hilary Cass, a
former president of the Royal College of Paediatrics. It recommends a shift
away from medical intervention for trans-identifying children, “an area of
remarkably weak evidence”, to a model that prioritises therapy and considers
the possibility that other mental-health issues are involved. Dr Cass
concludes that “for most young people, a medical pathway will not be the
best way to manage their gender-related distress.”
Her review was commissioned in 2020, amid growing concerns about the
“affirmation model” of treatment for trans-identifying children being
followed by England’s only youth-gender clinic, the Gender Identity
Development Service (GIDS) at the Tavistock hospital trust in London. On
the basis of a single Dutch study in 2011, which suggested that puberty
blockers may improve the psychological well-being of such children, GIDS
had begun to give these medicines to young people. Their long-term effects
are not well-understood; children using them often ended up taking cross-sex
hormones, too.

More than 9,000 young people came through the doors of GIDS but the
clinic did not keep follow-up data on any of them. It was finally closed down
on April 1st and will be replaced by at least two regional centres, which the
findings of the Cass Review will help shape.

Dr Cass’s report looks at the reasons for the rapid rise in the number of
trans-identifying children in Britain over the past five years. She concludes
that greater acceptance of trans identities “does not adequately explain” the
sharp increase (nor the switch from a preponderance of natal boys affected to
a majority of natal girls). She finds that, compared with the general
population, children referred to gender services had higher rates of parental
loss, trauma and neglect, and she recommends that gender services should
consider the high rates of concurrent mental-health problems, neurodiversity
and “adverse childhood experiences”.

Many clinicians see the Cass Review as validation of their worries. But
some have lingering concerns. Anna Hutchinson, a psychologist at GIDS
until she resigned in 2017, says that cross-sex hormones are still available
from adult gender services after as few as two appointments; vulnerable 17-
year-olds with mental-health issues are no less vulnerable when they turn 18,
she says. Dr Cass pointedly notes that England’s adult clinics refused to co-
operate with her review; NHS England said this week that it will conduct a
separate investigation into these services.

A second concern is that private clinics have sprung up to offer drugs to

children online. Some former GIDS clinicians now work for them. Dr Cass
warns that such clinics are not conducting proper assessments of children;
she also wants laws to control prescribing from abroad.
A third worry is well-meaning but flawed legislation to impose a ban on
“conversion therapy”. Such a ban is already law in Canada; Britain’s Labour
Party has said it will introduce one if it wins power at the next election. That
may risk criminalising any kind of exploratory therapy into why a child is
identifying as trans. “The conversion-therapy bill would ban the very
therapy that Cass is saying should be prioritised,” says Stella O’Malley of
Genspect, a group of clinicians concerned about gender issues.

The affirmation model of transgender care for children has been dealt a
severe blow by Dr Cass’s review. But the gender debate is not yet over. ■

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Playtime’s over

Primary schools in Britain are beginning to close

A baby bust is starting to work its way through the system

Apr 11th 2024 |

THE PLAYGROUND at Randal Cremer primary school in Hackney used to

be boisterous. Now it feels like a “ghost town”, according to Jo Riley, the
head teacher. Just 120 pupils play in an area made for three times that
number. The school will close its gates for good later this year because it
cannot attract enough children. Some parents have already moved their
nippers elsewhere in anticipation of that day.

Randal Cremer is one of four primary schools in Hackney that will shut or
be merged due to low demand. Councils in other inner London boroughs,
and a handful of other places, have announced similar plans. This is partly a
familiar story of young families being priced out of certain areas by
unaffordable housing. But shrinking school rolls are also an early symptom
of a much deeper demographic trend.

The birth rate in Britain has been in decline since 2010. It has fallen steeply
in the past six years. In 2018 each woman in England and Wales had, on
average, 1.65 children. By 2022 the figure was 1.49, the lowest on record.
There is some variation but the rate has fallen significantly almost
everywhere—from inner cities to suburbs, towns to villages—and seems to
stem from changing social attitudes as well as less certainty around housing
and employment. Demographers see little prospect of it bouncing back
quickly, says John Ermisch of Nuffield College, Oxford.
The baby bust is now starting to show up in schools. In the past five years
the primary-school population in England has shrunk modestly, by around
1.2%. In the next five it will sink by 7.3%, according to the Department for
Education (see chart). Like Randal Cremer, many schools will face questions
about their viability.

Schools receive nearly all of their funding on a per-pupil basis, but their
main costs are relatively fixed. Fewer children can lead to some efficiencies.
But the same room and teacher are needed whether there are 30 in a class or
25. Some local authorities will see their funding for primary education fall
by more than a fifth in the next six years, calculates Robbie Cruikshanks of
the Education Policy Institute (EPI), a think-tank. The risk is that smaller
schools with less money will struggle to maintain educational quality.

Some will not survive at all, a process that will be bumpy for a couple of
reasons. The first is that councils find it difficult to make plans. Two decades
of education reforms in England have notched up notable successes but also
left a muddled landscape: some schools are accountable to local councils but
newer academies and free schools are overseen by the education department.
In England this second group accounts for around 40% of primary schools
and 80% of secondary schools.

Councils are responsible for managing changes in pupil demand across

schools in their area. But academies and free schools do not have to co-
operate with them by, for instance, taking on more or fewer pupils. Ms Riley
points out that a new free school opened just half a mile away from her one
in 2015, despite falling demand and Randal Cremer being rated “good”. In
Islington, another borough in north London, the council has been forced to
consider closing a school rated “good” after a half-empty one rated
“inadequate” managed to turn itself into an academy.

The second issue is that closures are rarely popular. Parents are often
attached to the idea of a local school. They like the sound of smaller classes,
even though the evidence suggests that reducing class sizes a bit does not
make much difference to learning (cutting them down to around 15 pupils
does, but that tends to be unrealistic in the state sector). In both Hackney and
Islington, they have mounted campaigns to preserve undersubscribed
schools. The dispute in Islington went to court, a strain on threadbare council
finances.

The EPI argues that the education department must force different types of
schools to work together on strategies to manage falling demand. That may
include giving councils more powers over local planning. This will become
even more important as the baby bust reaches secondary schools. Politicians
in Westminster will also face hard choices about where to put scarce
resources: there are already calls to offset some of the reduction in school
budgets with higher per-pupil funding. The baby bust may be making
playgrounds quieter. But it will cause plenty of noise. ■

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Pipe dreams

How not to run a water utility

Let Thames Water go into administration. But after that, water bills need to
rise

Apr 9th 2024 |

CLASHES OVER the water supply turned deadly in “Chinatown”, a 1970s

film set in Depression-era Los Angeles. “Middle of a drought, and the water
commissioner drowns,” one character marvels. The casualties in Britain’s
latest water-based drama are corporate. On April 5th the parent company of
Thames Water, Britain’s largest water company, defaulted on £1.4bn
($1.7bn) of debt. An elaborate and protracted restructuring looms.

The list of culprits is long. One is the company’s heavily indebted financial
structure. Its debt-to-equity ratio is 78%; the industry average is 68% and
Ofwat, the regulator, suggests 55%. That debt is dispersed across a
Byzantine corporate structure. Significantly, much of it is inflation-linked. In
theory that shouldn’t be a problem; although inflation is up, water bills—the
firm’s main source of revenue—are also inflation-linked. The problem is that
debt payments are linked to the retail-prices index, which since 2020 has
risen by ten percentage points more than CPIH, the inflation measure to
which water bills are linked. Some of Thames Water’s bonds are pricing in a
near-wipeout.

Next, mismanagement. Thames Water languishes near the bottom of Ofwat’s

efficiency rankings. Sarah Bentley resigned as CEO in June, two years into
an eight-year turnaround plan. Environmental fines have worsened the
squeeze: the utility’s record on sewage overflows is pretty unsightly. Ofwat
shares the blame for this: through most of its three-decade existence, the
regulator has focused single-mindedly on keeping bills in check. That has
sometimes come at the expense of maintaining and improving water
infrastructure. A dysfunctional planning system hasn’t helped: the last major
water-supply reservoir in England was completed in 1991.

Thames Water has lobbied Ofwat for special treatment: to pare back its fines
and approve a large increase in bills. Letting shareholders off the hook in
this way would be a mistake. If they don’t stump up more money, Thames
Water should be put into special administration, a form of insolvency that
keeps the utility running until new owners are found. As in a corporate
bankruptcy, equity-holders would be wiped out and debt-holders would take
a hefty hit. New owners could then take over the underlying assets without
inheriting a crippling debt burden.

Going into special administration would be a chance to make bigger

changes, too. Sir Dieter Helm, a professor at the University of Oxford, has
argued that Thames Water is unmanageably large. He suggests splitting out
the jobs of water provision and sewage, as well as separating London from
the rest of the Thames Basin.

But if Thames Water is an outlier, other water utilities share many of its
problems. The crux of the issue is the industry’s peculiar structure. Water
provision is a quintessential natural monopoly. Since competition between
utilities is impossible, the government keeps privatised water companies on
a tight regulatory leash. Ofwat sets the bills that companies can charge,
determines what investments they can make and picks their rate of return.
These determinations are made every five years. The next review, covering
the period from 2025 to the end of 2029, is set to conclude in December.
Past iterations have been contentious. In 2019 Ofwat vetoed 30% of the
investment on asset improvements proposed by the industry, saying the plans
lacked a clear rationale and were not good value for money. Now Ofwat says
its thinking has shifted and that it wants a step-change in investment. That
means a commensurate step up in water bills to fund it, though by less than
the companies’ opening bid of 31% in real terms (see chart).
The change of tone is welcome. But whether Ofwat will shift by enough is
an open question. One bellwether will be the allowed rate of return, critical
for attracting much-needed foreign capital. Ofwat has pencilled in 3.29%
plus inflation (measured by CPIH). That is almost certainly too low given
the rising risks in the sector and higher risk-free interest rates across the
economy. After the difficulties of the past few years, investors will not be
lured into the water by middling returns.

“Chinatown” ends in an expansion of Los Angeles’s water supply (as well as

violence). Britain’s creaking water infrastructure needs an upgrade, too,
given the pressures of population growth and climate change. That entails a
lot more investment. The right ending to the Thames Water saga would
involve pain for current shareholders and for future bill payers. ■

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A Tale of Two Kitties

A story of Scottish wildcats

For some cats this is the best of times. For others, arguably a bit less good

Apr 11th 2024 |

FOR CATS in the Cairngorms there is some good news and some arguably
less good news. For Scottish wildcats, a species that has been on the brink of
extinction, these may turn out to be the best of times. A rising number of
them—19 last year, another 20 this year if all goes to plan—are being
released into the Cairngorms National Park, Britain’s largest. A number of
Scottish wildcats have since been caught on camera stalking, chasing and
generally looking cute and furry.

For other cats, there is less to celebrate. The greatest threat to Scottish
wildcats is not that they will be destroyed by violent altercations with wolves
or hunters. It is that they will be seduced by the amorous approaches of
other, less wild cats. “The biggest threat is… hybridisation,” says Dr Jo
Howard-McCombe, a researcher at the Royal Zoological Society of
Scotland. Wildcats and domestic cats are different species but they are
capable of interbreeding. Even those wildcats that have been released in the
Cairngorms are not wholly wild: their genomes show clear signs of mating
with domestic cats.

To prevent more of this kind of shenanigans, campaigners are encouraging

locals to neuter all other cats. Such action is, they say, necessary and urgent.
A concatenation of events, from habitat loss to hunting, has led to near-total
population collapse of Scottish wildcats. Estimates are hard to make but the
total population may be below 100. (Its very name indicates how rare it is
across Britain: the only reason the animal is known as the “Scottish” wildcat
is that it is extinct in England and Wales.)

Conservationists are turning to rewilding as a result. This practice has

recently been successfully used to restore populations of dormice, beavers
and red kites in Britain. It has also proved helpful to that other endangered
species, the English nobility: obsequious commoners now fork out hefty fees
to wander around the estates of aristocrats who don’t mow their lawns.

But rewilding can cause problems. Species can move unexpectedly (beavers
recently turned up in Helman Tor, in Cornwall) and reintroduced species can
cause stress to those that are already there. Such as, for example, by causing
them to be castrated. Conservationists are clear: humanely done, neutering is
not harmful to the cat and is essential to stopping interbreeding. What the
cats themselves think of this is less clear.

In 1974 the philosopher Thomas Nagel wrote an essay titled “What Is It Like
to Be a Bat?”. No one has yet written a paper called “What Is It Like to Be a
Castrated Cat?” but the question is an interesting one, says Peter Pongracz,
an expert in animal behaviour at Eotvos Lorand University in Hungary.
Though he adds that the answer would probably be “fine”. Cats, he says, do
not tend to suffer from existential angst over whether or not they will
reproduce. Scotland is not going to become “the land of a bunch of sad cats”.
Even if that were a risk, given the state of the wildcat population, neutering
remains a far, far better thing to do now. ■
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Je regrette quite a lot

Why most people regret Brexit

A majority of British voters now believe the split was a mistake

Apr 11th 2024 | RICHMOND AND RICHMOND

IT IS RARE for voters to change their minds soon after referendums.

Experience from Canada to Scotland, from Norway to Switzerland, suggests
rather that opinions tend to move in favour of a referendum result more than
they swing against it. But Brexit seems to be an exception. Since the 52-48%
vote in favour of leaving the European Union in June 2016, the majority
view among Britons has shifted, and especially so in the past two years,
towards the conclusion that the decision was wrong (see chart).
One way to take the temperature is to visit two English towns called
Richmond which voted in very different ways in 2016. In Richmond-upon-
Thames in London, which voted 69-31% to remain in the EU, opinion has
hardened. Gareth Roberts, the Liberal Democrat council leader, notes that
post-Brexit niggles such as longer border delays and more intrusive passport
controls have helped to solidify local opposition. A Leave voter sitting by the
river says he has not changed his mind, but that he is disappointed by the
Tories’ failure to strike big trade deals outside the EU.

The other Richmond, in north Yorkshire, voted 57-43% for Brexit. One
Leaver in the market square echoes his southern counterpart by insisting that
he still supports Brexit but he complains that it has not been properly done
and that immigration has surged despite repeated Tory promises to reduce it.
A local bartender says that she voted instinctively to leave but that, were the
referendum re-run, she would work harder to understand what it would
really mean. Stuart Parsons, a former mayor of Richmond, claims that
several friends have changed their minds, especially small farmers who feel
betrayed by the Conservatives and now fret about future lost public
subsidies.

Such anecdotes chime with polls across the country. Research by UK in a

Changing Europe (UKICE), a think-tank, finds that most voters have not in
fact changed their minds since 2016. But because as many as 16-20% of
those who voted to leave have switched sides, compared with only 6% of
those who voted to remain, the balance has swung against Brexit. The
passage of time is also having its inevitable effect: older voters were
overwhelmingly keen to leave the EU and younger ones were fiercely
opposed to the idea. Don’t-knows and those who did not vote in 2016 now
tend to break strongly against Brexit.

Explanations abound for the disillusionment. Sir John Curtice, a leading

pollster who works with UKICE, points especially to gloom about the
economy since 2016, which he says matters more than irritation over
immigration. Sarah Olney, the Liberal Democrat MP for Richmond Park,
reckons that outright dishonesty on the part of the Leave campaign is to
blame. Peter Kellner, a political pundit and former president of YouGov, a
polling group, suggests that many Brexit supporters had no idea what would
happen if they actually won. That differs sharply from the run-up to most
other constitutional referendums.
Changes in the political background matter as well. The Conservatives under
Rishi Sunak, who happens to be the MP for Richmond in Yorkshire and is a
keen supporter of Brexit, are associated in voters’ minds with the decision to
Leave. Party disunity and the chaos of four prime ministers in five years
have helped to discredit something with which the Tories are strongly
identified.

Just as the Tories have helped tarnish views of Brexit, so Brexit is likely to
hurt the Tories at the next election. A chunk of people who voted Leave in
2016 say there should still be long-term benefits from quitting the bloc but
argue that too little has been done to realise them. This group now leans
against the Tories and may even prefer the Reform Party, an insurgent right-
wing party. In contrast, those who were against Brexit in 2016 think they
were right to fear its economic impact; many who were Tory then now back
Labour.

The anti-Brexit mood of a majority of voters is clear but that does not
translate into a burning wish to refight old battles. Brexit may be unpopular
but its political salience has faded. Even keen Remainers have doubts about
the wisdom of starting a lengthy campaign to rejoin. The Labour Party’s
decision to talk as little as possible about Brexit is understandable: the party
hopes to regain “red-wall” seats in the north and the Midlands that backed
Brexit in 2016 and then voted Tory in the 2019 general election.

But if and when Labour does take office, there will be political wriggle-
room to improve relations with the EU. Some in the party talk not just of
expanding today’s thin trade deal but of broader alignment with European
rules. Tory attacks on such ideas as a betrayal of the 2016 vote are less likely
to resonate when Brexit itself has lost its appeal for many.■

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Bagehot

Bootlicking: a guide to pre-election British politics

Labour is not yet in power. But the honeymoon has already begun

Apr 10th 2024 |

DAYTIME TELEVISION is a surprisingly dangerous place for a politician.

During the 2019 general-election campaign, Boris Johnson was chased into
an industrial fridge by an intrepid reporter from “Good Morning Britain”, a
chatty breakfast show. In 2012, during a live interview on “This Morning”, a
usually lightweight late-morning show, a presenter handed David Cameron,
then the prime minister, a list of politicians suspected of paedophilia.

No wonder Sir Keir Starmer looked apprehensive before a recent grilling

from Lorraine Kelly, a daytime-TV host. He should not have been. Ms Kelly
gushed about the Labour leader’s working-class roots for ten minutes.
Rather than a list of predators, Ms Kelly produced only a mug with a young
Sir Keir’s face on it as a reminder that he was—according to internet lore, if
not to Helen Fielding, the actual author—the inspiration for Mark Darcy, the
awkward but handsome lawyer from “Bridget Jones’s Diary”.

Simpering television interviews with the man likely to be prime minister

within a few months are now commonplace. Coverage of the shadow cabinet
is similarly adulatory. Simply by mentioning the word “reform”, Wes
Streeting, the shadow health secretary, is guaranteed a glowing write-up and
a picture of him looking stern. Rachel Reeves, the shadow chancellor, gets
the same treatment by praising Margaret Thatcher’s means, if not her ends. It
does not stop there. One newspaper published a 2,000-word interview with
Sir Keir about the virtue of learning the flute. It can mean only one thing:
bootlicking season is upon us.

An assumption exists in Westminster that polls will narrow and scrutiny of

Labour will increase as the election nears. So far, the direct opposite has
happened. Labour’s polling lead remains a sturdy 20 percentage points,
according to our tracker. Sycophancy, not scrutiny, has been the order of the
day as journalists, wonks and lobbyists scramble to win favour with the
future government.

Glowing profiles of people who may prove useful sources at some point
—“beat-sweeteners”, in the trade—come thick and fast. Sue Gray, Sir Keir’s
chief of staff, has been lauded. Her flaws as a civil servant, such as a near-
sociopathic desire for secrecy, are brushed over, and minor talents are hailed.
“She’s pretty ruthless at timekeeping,” noted one portrait. Often the tone is
of a primary-school teacher sending a report to a parent: “One Labour figure
said Gray had been a good listener.”

Everything turns upside down in bootlicking season. Flaws become

strengths. Ms Reeves set out her view of the British economy in a lecture in
March. “Its very dullness is rather exciting,” suggested one commentator.
Others applauded the shadow chancellor for a “serious” intervention, as if
the former Bank of England economist did well to resist the urge to start
juggling. Vices become virtues. Sir Keir promising a bunch of left-wing
policies to Labour members and then ditching them is commended as a
leader of the opposition doing his “homework” rather than the usual term:
lying. Even suggesting that Labour’s lead is fragile is a subtle means of
sucking up—it is the message that Sir Keir’s advisers, who are paranoid
about blowing their advantage, want to spread.

The chin of the right-wing press is also smeared with boot polish. Almost
every Labour leader has endured a mauling from the Sun, which prides itself
on being Britain’s most pugnacious tabloid. Only Sir Tony Blair avoided
such attacks. And that took years of effort and a 22-hour flight to Australia to
win over Rupert Murdoch, the media mogul who owns it. By contrast Sir
Keir spent a significant amount of his time as director of public prosecutions
trying to jail Mr Murdoch’s journalists for phone-hacking.

If the Sun is still upset about that, it has a peculiar way of showing it. The
newspaper recently painted Ms Reeves as a Thatcher-aping “iron
chancellor”. When Sir Keir turned up for an interview on the Sun’s new
YouTube channel, he endured an entertainingly awkward few minutes being
asked whether he had taken drugs while he was a lawyer. But the Sun itself
splashed on Sir Keir’s tabloid-friendly argument that Nike has been wrong to
tamper with the flag on England’s new football kit. Perhaps bygones are
bygones in bootlicking season.

When it comes to business, the boot is supposedly on the other foot: it is

Labour that is trying to woo business via a “smoked salmon offensive” led
by Ms Reeves. This has it backwards. A government can tax, regulate and
fine, squishing fat margins with a few strokes of a minister’s pen. The best a
firm can manage is a threat to close a factory in a marginal seat and to sign a
letter to the Financial Times. So when Labour hosted a £1,000 ($1,270)-per-
person business event at the Oval cricket ground in February, the place was
full of public-affairs types with a taste for leather.
We’re gonna need a bigger boot

Bootlicking always comes to an end. People cheer politicians on the way up

and boo them on the way down. Mr Johnson was a unique asset before he
became a unique liability. Theresa May went from a Brexit Boudica to the
Maybot, a malfunctioning droid, in a few months. Rishi Sunak was once
“Dishy Rishi”, the most popular politician in Britain, dazzling journalists
with his ability to make a pivot table in Excel. The Excel skills remain
elevated; the personal ratings do not.
What is sometimes ascribed to a bias towards the Conservatives is often
simply a bias towards power. Britain is so centralised that a competent
government can bend political reality to its will, whether it be spending
plans (which are treated as reality, no matter how absurd) or the news agenda
(which is still driven by whatever announcements Downing Street makes).
The Conservative government is in such a dire spot, however, that this magic
has faded. Labour is not yet in power. But the honeymoon has already
started. Tongue will meet leather for some time yet. ■

Read more from Bagehot, our columnist on British politics:

Sadiq Khan’s London offers a taste of Starmer’s Britain (Apr 3rd)
British boomers are losing out for the first time (Mar 27th)
The Conservative Party’s Oppenheimer syndrome (Mar 20th)

Also: How the Bagehot column got its name

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british-politics

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1843 magazine
Robert F. Kennedy junior doesn’t care if he condemns
America to Trump
Election 2024 :: He’s a tree-hugging conspiracy theorist – and he’s running for president

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Election 2024

Robert F. Kennedy junior doesn’t care if he

condemns America to Trump
He’s a tree-hugging conspiracy theorist – and he’s running for president

Apr 10th 2024 |

The first thing you notice, on entering Robert F. Kennedy junior’s office at
his home in Los Angeles, is a stuffed tiger. It was shot by Sukarno, the first
president of Indonesia, whom the CIA reputedly tried to assassinate. As
Kennedy tells it, his uncle, President John F. Kennedy, on learning that
Sukarno was anti-American, said, “I’d be anti-American too, if the CIA tried
to kill me.” Hearing of this, Sukarno “fell in love” with JFK and invited him
to visit Indonesia. Kennedy’s father, Robert F. Kennedy senior, who in the
early 1960s was the attorney-general in his brother’s administration, went
instead and brought back the gift of the tiger. Soon afterwards Sukarno sent
two live Komodo dragons that Bobby junior had requested (they wound up
in a zoo).

Today Kennedy keeps the animal in his outside office because his wife,
Cheryl Hines, an actor best known for her turn in “Curb Your Enthusiasm”,
“won’t allow it in the house”. The trophy keeps company with a stuffed bat
given to Kennedy by Glenn Close, who is godmother to one of his two
daughters, and a red-tailed hawk which, as a novice falconer, he trapped in
Virginia when he was 15. He took up falconry after reading about its role in
King Arthur’s Camelot (which is also the nickname applied to JFK’s
glamorous, ostensibly idealistic court).

This menagerie says a lot about Kennedy’s life, with its mix of tragedy and
privilege, celebrity and eccentricity. There is the overlap of politics, showbiz
and money that has characterised the Kennedys for several generations.
There is a reverence, bordering on ancestor-worship, for Kennedy’s father
and uncle, whose assassinations traumatised both America and him. And
there is the environmentalism that dates to Kennedy’s troubled childhood,
becoming a lifeline in his even more troubled early adulthood. In time his
devotion to the natural world would reinforce the conspiracist outlook that
was part of his inheritance. Later that mindset re-emerged as scepticism
about vaccines – a cause that gained unprecedented salience during the
pandemic, boosting Kennedy’s profile and, it seems, finally kindling his
political ambitions.

For all his inherited privilege, Kennedy is championing the many

Americans who want to tear the system down

Now he is running for president, like JFK, RFK senior and another uncle,
Ted Kennedy, before him. Kennedy has a condition of the larynx that lends
his voice a kind of vatic frailty, making it seem, on the stump, that he is
articulating hard-earned truths. But, unlike his presidential rivals, he is
physically trim and buff, and looks younger than the 70-year-old he is.
Rather than having the sort of tan that is sprayed out of a bottle, his skin is
the deep bronze of someone who spends a lot of time outdoors. It contrasts
sharply with his aqueous blue eyes – distinctly the eyes of a Kennedy.
His campaign, however, is not like his predecessors’. After an abortive bid to
challenge Joe Biden for the Democratic nomination, he is standing as an
independent. For all his inherited privilege, he is championing the many
Americans who want to tear the system down. Nothing in his intermittently
scandalous life has suggested he is destined to end up in the White House.
Yet Kennedy still believes he might.

Kennedy was born in 1954, the third of 11 children that his mother, Ethel,
had with Bobby senior. He grew up in what was, in effect, America’s royal
family. “When I was a kid,” he says, there was “an absolute adulation” for
the Kennedys. He describes the expectations of this high-achieving milieu at
the start of “American Values”, a memoir published in 2018: “From my
youngest days I always had the feeling that we were all involved in some
great crusade, that the world was a battleground for good and evil, and that
our lives would be consumed in that conflict. It would be my good fortune if
I could play an important or heroic role.”
 America’s first family The Kennedy family in 1938 (top). John F. Kennedy listens to Bobby junior
explain how a plane flies (middle). JFK addresses the nation in 1962 about the Cuban missile crisis
(bottom)

The ideas and values of that era, Kennedy tells me, inform his platform
today. He remembers his father taking him to Harlem, Appalachia, the
Mississippi Delta and Native American reservations, and telling Bobby
junior, “These are Kennedy people.” You can draw a line between the
patrician concern for the poor that RFK senior developed and Kennedy’s
avowed aim to help hard-up Americans now.

His views on foreign policy, and specifically the war in Ukraine, have roots
in his childhood, too. The Cuban missile crisis of 1962, when he was eight,
is a “touchstone” for him. His father, Kennedy recalls, didn’t want the family
to go to the government shelter, lest that incited panic, and asked him to “be
a good soldier”. The lesson he draws from the crisis is that, “If you want
peace, you have to be able to put yourself in the other guy’s shoes,” as he
believes JFK did with the Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev. The modern
corollary is that the West should have been more sensitive to Vladimir
Putin’s security concerns: by expanding NATO eastwards and proposing to
take in Ukraine, Kennedy thinks America provoked Russia’s invasion in
2022. (The only moral war America has fought since 1865, Kennedy
reckons, was the second world war.)

This take on Ukraine, common to the “America First” right and anti-war left,
is jarring in Kennedy’s case because one of his four sons, Conor, fought on
the Ukrainian side in the summer of 2022. Despite his reservations about the
war Kennedy says “I’m proud of Conor,” adding, “I’m also very happy that
he’s home.” As it happens, Conor Kennedy – who in 2012, when he was 18,
briefly dated Taylor Swift – is in the house and drops in to say hello. We
have a short exchange about Ukraine, which I once covered as a foreign
correspondent. “Go easy on him,” Conor says as he leaves. I ask which of us
he is talking to. “Both of you,” he calls back.

Kennedy had always been a difficult child who did badly at school.
After his father’s death, he went off the rails

As you might expect, the aspect of his childhood that most shaped Kennedy
is the assassinations – JFK’s in Dallas in 1963, when Kennedy was nine; five
years later Bobby senior’s in Los Angeles on the night of his victory in the
California Democratic primary. He speaks frequently of the people he saw
lining the railway tracks when his father’s coffin was taken from New York
to Washington to be buried; a group of nuns, standing and waving from the
bed of a yellow pick-up truck, made a particular impression on his young
Catholic mind. He served as a pallbearer at the funeral. These were seismic
events in American history and hinges in Kennedy’s life. Through his
candidacy, they are reverberating again.

Kennedy believes the CIA was involved in his uncle’s assassination, “and
continues to be involved in the cover-up”. The evidence, in his view, “is
pretty definitive”. The agency, he thinks, was in cahoots with the mob. They
were united, in this interpretation, by anger with JFK over his failure to
overthrow Fidel Castro, the communist leader of Cuba, where the mobsters
had lost casinos after the revolution of 1959. Proof of a CIA hand in Bobby
senior’s death is “more circumstantial”, but Kennedy is convinced his father
was not slain by Sirhan Sirhan, the man imprisoned for the crime. The fatal
shots were instead fired by a security guard. (Kennedy thinks Sirhan should
be paroled; his mother Ethel Kennedy, now 95, disagrees.)

JFK’s killing is the font and wellspring of modern American conspiracism.

The “paranoid style in American politics”, as Richard Hofstadter termed it in
a famous essay of 1964, long predates the Kennedys, but the assassinations
revived it. Kennedy says the events naturally “left a mark on me”. You do
not need to be a psychoanalyst to connect them to the ultra-scepticism,
verging on paranoia, which colours Kennedy’s outlook on many issues
today. Alan Dershowitz, a prominent lawyer and long-term friend of the
Kennedys, describes his operating principle as, “Prove it to me. Show me.”
This sort of disputation with the facts may seem a familiar stage of grief,
albeit in sensationalised form – as if, were you to show where the doctors or
investigators went wrong, you could somehow beat death on a technicality
and turn back time. As conspiracists are wont to do, Kennedy bolsters his
view of the assassinations with a torrent of expertise, or what appears to be
expertise, about bullet trajectories, the “carbon tattoos” left on his father’s
body, the clip-on tie he is clutching in photos taken at the scene.

Kennedy had always been a difficult child who did badly at school. After his
father’s death, he went off the rails. Launching his presidential campaign in
April 2023, then as a Democrat, Kennedy joked that “I’ve got so many
skeletons in my closet that if they could vote, I could be king of the world.”
(His “rambunctious youth”, he added, “lasted until my early 60s.”) Kennedy
got into fist-fights and was expelled from several schools. “You dragged the
family name through mud,” he recalled his mother telling him when, in the
summer of 1970, he was arrested for possessing drugs for the first time but
not the last. (Notwithstanding his problems, he studied at Harvard, the
London School of Economics and the University of Virginia’s law school.)

His frenetic career, directorships, consultancies and paid speeches – the

sort of opportunities that come your way if your last name is Kennedy –
have buoyed his income

“The curse of the Kennedys” is a tabloid truism, a reference not only to the
assassinations but to the litany of overdoses, skiing and aviation accidents,
car crashes, sex scandals and criminal prosecutions that the clan has
endured, to say nothing of the virulent strain of adultery among its men.
Kennedy’s life has contributed to the dismal legend. His second wife, Mary
Richardson, from whom he was estranged, died by suicide in 2012. (He
married Hines in 2014.) And, in his teens and 20s, he was a drug addict for
14 years. He survived and recovered, he recounts, in part by rediscovering
the Catholic faith he had imbibed as a child.

Like the distracted schoolboy he once was, Kennedy fidgets or jiggles a leg
for stretches of our interview. Often his posture is defensive, arms crossed
over his chest, or hands clinging to his seat as if he were riding a
rollercoaster. When he senses a trap, he can be curt. But when he talks about
the natural world, or about religion – and how he climbed out of the pit of
addiction on a ladder of faith – his answers are elegant and expansive, and
his body relaxes.
“I didn’t want to be white-knuckling my drug addiction,” Kennedy
remembers; rather he craved a “fundamental spiritual alignment”, an
epiphany of the kind experienced by St Paul, St Augustine and St Francis.
The psychoanalyst Carl Jung, he read, thought religious belief aided his
patients’ recovery. So in his late 20s Kennedy decided to believe – a
therapeutic version of Pascal’s wager. If you choose to have faith in God,
and He exists, you win everything; and if He doesn’t, you lose nothing.
Kennedy resolved to “fake it til you make it”. Before long, “That pit of
anxiety that I was born with disappears from my gut.”

American political biographies often feature a redemption arc, whereby, in

owning and overcoming their failings, the politician becomes a hero not in
spite of past sins, but because of them. “Almost everybody has had a
journey. And Bobby Kennedy’s journey is a hero’s journey,” says Tony
Lyons, who is both the boss of Skyhorse Publishing, which puts out some of
Kennedy’s books, and co-founder of a super PAC supporting his candidacy
(called “American Values 2024”).
The fall of Camelot Robert F. Kennedy with some of his 11 children, including Bobby junior on the
far left (top). Bobby junior leads the pallbearers carrying his father’s coffin at Arlington National
Cemetery in 1968 (middle). RFK junior developed a passion for falconry as a child (bottom)

Environmentalism is another legacy of his upbringing that, like his faith, was
key to his recovery. In 1983 he was arrested for possessing heroin, and the
resulting community service brought him into contact with an environmental
watchdog in the Hudson Valley. He was hired as the lawyer for Riverkeeper,
as the outfit came to be known, and represented it in suits against polluters.

This was the start of a long career in environmental law, in the course of
which Kennedy helped win big settlements from chemical firms including
DuPont and Monsanto, and represented minority and indigenous groups in
America and elsewhere. Riverkeeper inspired an international coalition
called the Waterkeeper Alliance, and Kennedy served as its president for 20
years. In 2000 he set up a law firm with Kevin Madonna, another
environmental lawyer. In his frenetic career, directorships, consultancies and
paid speeches – the sort of opportunities that come your way if your last
name is Kennedy – have buoyed his income.

Perhaps because Kennedy is spiky and self-important as well as dogged and

intelligent, aspersions have been cast on his environmentalism and its
motives. There was a bizarre, divisive episode when Kennedy was
determined to hire a scientist for Riverkeeper who had served time in prison
for smuggling cockatoo eggs. It is not hard to find dissatisfied former clients.
Kennedy and Madonna represented the Ramapough people of New Jersey in
a long battle with Ford over the dumping of toxic waste on tribal land. They
helped win a payout, a renewed clean-up of the site and publicity for the
Ramapoughs’ plight. Yet “In the end, I just felt so let down,” laments Wayne
Mann, one of the plaintiffs. “The law firms did much better than the people
did.”

He is not alone among environmentalists in developing a wider

aversion to government. In Kennedy’s case, the next focus of his
scepticism was vaccines

People who worked with Kennedy in these years defend his record. “I never
got the impression he was in it for himself,” recalls John Humbach, formerly
associate dean at Pace University, where Kennedy taught environmental law.
Madonna, his law partner, describes Kennedy as a talented orator. He is
“able to take very complicated ideas and synthesise them down to explain to
a jury or the public.” Kennedy, adds Madonna, is “probably the most loyal
friend I’d ever had.”

“He redeemed himself,” says Dershowitz of Kennedy’s environmental work.

You can chart the turnaround in his life through the grounds for his arrests.
Instead of being pinched for drug offences, Kennedy was arrested several
times at environmental protests. In 2001 he spent a month in prison for civil
disobedience on Vieques, an island that is part of Puerto Rico, which the US
navy was using for artillery practice. His youngest son, Aidan, was born
while he was inside; Kennedy met him for the first time on visiting day.

If Kennedy had stuck to environmentalism, he might have achieved the

“heroic role” he craved as a child. His hard-wired scepticism had found a
benign outlet in taking on derelict firms and regulators. But the instinct had a
logic and momentum of its own. Suspicion of the CIA seems to have cross-
pollinated with a distrust of government agencies fostered by his fights over
pipelines, fracking, factory farms and nuclear-power stations. Kennedy, as
Dershowitz puts it, is “someone who sometimes takes good ideas to an
illogical conclusion”.

He is not alone among environmentalists in developing a wider aversion to

government. That tendency is one factor in the horseshoe phenomenon of
modern Western politics – in which people on the green-tinged left and
disgruntled right agree on the perfidy of the state. In Kennedy’s case, the
next focus of his scepticism was vaccines. The thread between the issues
was mercury: Kennedy was exercised by its presence in fish and was
troubled by the stories he heard from anguished mothers about its past use in
childhood vaccines. In 2005 he published an article in Rolling Stone and
Salon which alleged that its use in a preservative was linked to an “epidemic
of childhood neurological disorders”. The piece was denounced and
discredited by scientists and eventually withdrawn.

In 2015 Kennedy got involved with the World Mercury Project, which
subsequently became Children’s Health Defence (CHD), an organisation of
which he is still chairman. He and the group have peddled the discredited
myth that vaccines may cause autism. Among other theories, Kennedy has
suggested links between school shootings and the use of antidepressants;
between chemicals in drinking water and gender dysphoria; and between
“cell-phone radiation” and cancer. He is not convinced that HIV is the sole
cause of AIDS. The result has been disgrace for Kennedy among people who
had respected him – in 2019 several relatives denounced him for helping
“spread dangerous misinformation” – and, say his critics, his words have put
other people in peril.

“I look at evidence,” Kennedy insists. “I don’t speculate.” As for the charge

that he is a conspiracist: “I’m perfectly willing to question government
pronouncements. And that’s a threat to people, and the way that they deal
with that threat is they say that you’re a conspiracy theorist.” The
questioning, and the denunciations, peaked after covid-19 struck in 2020.
Amid unprecedented interest in vaccines, Kennedy’s social-media following
ballooned; at the same time, some of his posts, and the CHD’s, were
removed and his accounts were temporarily suspended. In March 2021, the
Centre for Countering Digital Hate, a watchdog, included Kennedy in its
“disinformation dozen” – 12 social-media posters who, it calculated, were
responsible for two-thirds of anti-vaccine content posted on Facebook and
Twitter.

Under Biden, Kennedy now says, the Democrats are a corrupt party of
war, corporate control and censorship

Some of his opinions on the pandemic are unremarkable. He is right that the
closure of schools was damaging, and that lockdowns disproportionately
hurt the poor. At the same time, he sees malevolent machinations and power
grabs where there was only confusion and human error. In “The Real
Anthony Fauci”, a book he published at the end of 2021, Kennedy alleges
that Fauci – the infectious-disease expert who shaped the White House’s
response to the coronavirus – was involved in a “historic coup d’état against
Western democracy”. The media, big tech, big pharma and others were in on
the heist. But it was Fauci, “the most powerful – and despotic – doctor in
human history”, who was the “ringmaster in the engineered demolition of
America’s economy”. In a book as much about AIDS as covid-19, the other
horseman of the apocalypse turns out to be Bill Gates. Over decades,
Kennedy writes, Gates, Fauci and their co-conspirators promoted
“weaponised pandemics and vaccines”, with “catastrophic consequences for
humanity and democracy”.

Elsewhere Kennedy has invoked Nazism and the Holocaust when talking
about vaccines and lockdowns. “Even in Hitler’s Germany, you could cross
the Alps to Switzerland,” he said at a rally in 2022. “You could hide in an
attic like Anne Frank did.” Once again he was criticised publicly by several
other Kennedys, and even by Hines, his wife. (Kennedy apologised.)
Charitably, you might see in his calumnies and distortions a quest for
adversaries grand enough to let him fulfil his heroic role. Making a splash on
social media – the invigorating feeling of having done something and won
something to acclaim – can validate this sense of mission.
A rebel finds his cause RFK junior with his mother during a tennis tournament in Forest Hills, New
York (top). RFK junior speaking at the Democratic National Convention in Los Angeles in 2000
(middle). RFK junior in Vieques, Puerto Rico, after his release from prison following an anti-navy
protest in 2001 (bottom)

With a hauteur that perhaps only a Kennedy could muster, he tells me that in
2009 he was offered and declined Hillary Clinton’s seat in the Senate. After
a certain age, he figures, becoming a senator is pointless because “You don’t
really do anything when you first get in there.” Now, at 70, he is chasing the
grandest prize of all.

Kennedy is drawn to the central story in the “Bhagavad Gita”, a Hindu

scripture, which tells of Arjuna, a young prince who finds himself in a civil
war. Seeing his family arrayed against him, he wavers. Krishna, his
charioteer and an avatar of the god Vishnu, spurs him on. “Your duty on this
Earth is to do one thing, and you do it well, which is to fight,” Kennedy
recounts Krishna saying.
Squint, and you can see a parable of Kennedy’s decision to run against the
Democrats, the party of his family going back to his great-grandfather. Duty
is his professed reason for challenging Biden for the Democratic nomination
and then launching his independent candidacy last October. (His path to the
ticket was unfairly blocked by the DNC, he alleges.) “I never intended to run
for president,” Kennedy avers. But he “saw things happening to my party
and my country that made me frightened about the world that my children
are going to grow up in”.

Under Biden, Kennedy now says, the Democrats are a corrupt party of war,
corporate control and censorship. The censorship he is talking about is partly
of him: he alleges that Biden was personally responsible for some of his
social-media suspensions. He claims that the prospect of four more years of
Biden, who keeps a bust of Kennedy’s father in the Oval Office, worries him
as much as a second term for Donald Trump. JFK and Bobby senior “would
have walked away” from today’s Democratic Party, he believes. In a public
statement last October, four of his siblings disagreed forcefully.

He has probably never had, and will almost certainly never get, a better
shot at that “heroic role”. And it is clear he thinks he can win

His country needed him, his conscience compelled him: in other words, the
usual. But his run can also be seen as simply the sort of thing the Kennedys
do. It is not a new form of dynastic decadence, or a betrayal of family
tradition; rather, it is a continuation of both.

The Kennedys have always been opportunists, says Thomas Whalen, a

historian at Boston University. It isn’t just that JFK became president at 43.
RFK senior challenged a Democratic incumbent, Lyndon Johnson, in 1968
(Johnson later withdrew). In 1980 Ted Kennedy challenged Jimmy Carter,
another sitting Democratic president. The Kennedys, Whalen says, “don’t
like to wait in line”.

In this spirit, you can see why Kennedy thinks 2024 is his moment. Both the
main candidates are unpopular. Both are associated with pandemic-era
measures that were widely disliked and are fresh in the memory, and which
he has a record of opposing. Both are old enough to make him look
relatively youthful and vigorous. The misbehaviour of his youth is now
decades in the past; his children are adults and his marriage to Hines is
stable. He has probably never had, and will almost certainly never get, a
better shot at that “heroic role”. And it is clear he thinks he can win. Not for
him the cabinet job in someone else’s administration, the gig on a cable-
news channel, or the other baubles that are the consolation prizes of most
longshot campaigns. He is, after all, a Kennedy.
This leap for the White House as an independent, in what he calls a “crusade
for unity”, involves some wobbly intellectual contortions. When we met
Kennedy had been flirting with the Libertarian Party, which will pick its
presidential candidate in May. Joining the Libertarian ticket would let him
swerve the onerous and expensive process in many states for getting on the
ballot as an independent. Yet his policies call for higher spending to help
struggling Americans, paid for by steeper corporate taxes. I put it to him that
he is not, in fact, a libertarian. “I do think that the government has a role in
taking care of the poor,” he concedes, “But, you know, on many other issues
I’m a libertarian.”

The most glaring tension in Kennedy’s platform is simpler: he is running as

both a dynast and an outsider. Kennedy’s name and background are not
incidental to his pitch: in large measure they are his pitch. Marketing
messages exhort supporters to “put a Kennedy back in the White House”. A
campaign advert that aired during the Super Bowl, paid for by the super
PAC, was a remake of an ad of JFK’s from 1960, this time using Bobby
junior’s image. (Once again, other Kennedys took umbrage; again Kennedy
apologised.) Yet this man who, even as a child, hobnobbed with world
leaders, poses as an avenging tribune of the people. “We’re all going to go
over the castle walls together,” he vowed when declaring his independent
candidacy, an improbable mission for someone who grew up in Camelot.

Kennedy’s name and background are not incidental to his pitch: in large
measure they are his pitch

Whalen, the historian, thinks the ancestor Kennedy most resembles is his
grandpa Joe, a financier, movie mogul, ambassador and isolationist. “There’s
an ugly, reactionary part of the whole Camelot story,” he says, and Kennedy
is “dredging that up”. But the loudest echo of his campaign is with Donald
Trump, another politician born to privilege, albeit in a less illustrious niche
in America’s upper classes. Like Kennedy, he is an insider-outsider and self-
styled martyr; Trump likewise rose to notoriety on a famous name and a
conspiracy theory, in his case birtherism. (This is the magic of conspiracy
theories – they can make an outsider of an insider, and, by inducting the
humble into secret knowledge, vice versa.) Both Trump and Kennedy make
inflammatory comments that they try to pass off as mere hypothesising; “I
don’t necessarily believe…” is Kennedy’s version of Trump’s “A lot of
people are saying…” Both invoke the principle of free speech in defence of
madcap views. Both prophesy dreadful upheavals should things not go their
way: Kennedy speculates about popular anger erupting in a “really dark
revolution”.

You can see how a guy like Kennedy might figure that, if a guy like Trump
can be president, he can too. Kennedy is far better informed than Trump and
a more coherent orator. He is capable of penetrating moral reflection,
including on his years as an addict, that seems beyond Trump. He is
bracingly frank about America’s slipping international status. “I don’t think
it is an exemplary nation any more,” he says baldly.

He has another asset that Trump does not enjoy: Trump is running against
Biden, but Kennedy is running against both of them. Large numbers of
Americans tell pollsters that they would rather not choose between the
previous president and the current one. Kennedy frequently scores in the low
teens in national polls, impressive for any third-party candidate. His platform
offers something to refugees from both big parties. His economic policies
are much more left-wing than Trump’s: his proposals include cheap
mortgages backed by government bonds, a higher minimum wage, free child
care for millions and zero-interest student loans. But alongside this leftish
version of populism are positions more likely to appeal to exasperated
Republicans. Like Trump, Kennedy pledges to fix the border and renegotiate
trade deals. Both support gun rights and denounce the mainstream media.
Both are foreign-policy isolationists.
 The outside lane RFK junior and his wife, Cheryl Hines, waving at supporters during the launch of
his bid for the Democratic nomination (top). A billboard erected by the Democratic National
Committee alleging RFK junior is a Trump stooge (middle). RFK junior declares himself as an
independent presidential candidate in October 2023 (bottom)

Kennedy’s emerging coalition also takes in opponents of lockdowns and

mask mandates and sceptics of big pharma. Maybe because he knows his
stance on vaccines could alienate some voters, it is not at the forefront of his
pitch – but anti-vaxxers know he is their man. Surprisingly, younger voters
are keener on him than older ones: Kennedy points to polls showing that, in
a three-way match-up, he is leading among Americans under 35, perhaps
because they are less resigned to the two-party duopoly.

Attendees at a recent rally in West Virginia praised him for “talking about
issues that the other candidates are ignoring” and for his physical condition,
an advantage in a gerontocratic field, and a draw for wellness devotees and
health faddists. (“He’s 70 and he’s like Schwarzenegger!”) “A lot of people
think he’s a kook,” conceded one enthusiast, but her own research suggested
otherwise. If, in 2016, Trump successfully channelled American rage with
conventional politics, Kennedy’s candidacy is a symptom of a grave
disenchantment, perhaps even despair.

Along with these rank-and-file supporters, he has a roster of contrarian

backers from tech and finance. On March 26th he announced, as his vice-
presidential pick, Nicole Shanahan, a deep-pocketed lawyer, entrepreneur
and philanthropist. Thirty-eight years old and a novice politician, Shanahan
is part of a peculiar Californian ecosystem that mixes tech, megabucks and
moonshot health research. Formerly married to Sergey Brin, co-founder of
Google, she may help Kennedy meet the costs of getting on the ballot.

“This is a three-man race,” he declares. He is almost certainly wrong.

Putting a Kennedy back in the White House is unlikely to have as
widespread an appeal as Bobby junior hopes. In any case, the barriers to
victory for a third-party candidate are probably insuperable. None has even
carried a state since George Wallace in 1968. And history suggests that
support for third-party wannabes declines as election day approaches and the
futility of voting for them sinks in.

If Trump successfully channelled American rage with conventional

politics, Kennedy’s candidacy is a symptom of a grave disenchantment

Still, his run is much more than an excuse for journalists to use the word
“scion”, and for opponents to reprise the bullseye line first used in a debate
in 1988: “You’re no Jack Kennedy.” He claims he is galvanising supporters
who would not otherwise vote, and perhaps he is. As for the rest of the
electorate, Kennedy says his own polling shows that he’s “drawing evenly…
from Trump and Biden”. Whichever of them he takes more votes from may
well lose.

For now, his candidacy is worrying Democrats more than it is troubling

Republicans. Some recent polls have Kennedy in double digits in the key
states of Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin
– with Trump winning all of them. If he does throw the vote to Trump, the
election of 2024 will form a surprise coda to the psycho-saga of the
Kennedys and American politics. You might trace the outcome to the night in
1968 when Bobby senior was shot, bequeathing to his son a gnawing
mistrust and grandiose expectations.

When our interview ends, a colleague who accompanied me says that

Kennedy reminded her of another resident of California with a persecution
complex: Prince Harry. I can see what she means: the combination of
authentic suffering and engrained privilege, albeit the sort of privilege which
you would not want to have, and the kind of suffering with which it is not
always easy to sympathise. As we leave, Kennedy retreats into his garden
and begins cawing at the ravens, apparently a habit of his. In that moment he
seems, once again, a wounded boy, turning back to nature for refuge from
the world. ■

Andrew Miller is special correspondent of The Economist and the author of

several books including “Snowdrops” and “Independence Square”

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Strategy and stockpiles

Who wields the power in the world’s supply

chains?
Inventories offer a clue

Apr 11th 2024 | Dubai

SUPPLY-CHAIN managers cannot seem to catch a break. Consider the past

month alone. A collapsed bridge has walled off the Port of Baltimore, one of
the biggest on America’s east coast, until at least late May. A big earthquake
in Taiwan, where a large share of microchips are made, has rattled an
industry that increasingly underpins a lot of the world’s manufacturing.
Houthi rebels in Yemen keep lobbing missiles at ships in the Red Sea, a
critical passage for seaborne trade. America and China are still at
loggerheads over their mutual economic entanglements. Wars still rack
Ukraine and Gaza.
These disruptions pale next to the snarl-ups of the covid-19 pandemic. But
each is a reminder of the business lesson of that period: it is better to be safe
than sorry. Politicians regularly hector companies to make their supply
chains less “just in time” and more “just in case”. Corporate bosses often
nod along, vowing to make their supplier networks shockproof.

The simplest way to do this is to build bigger buffers, both of raw materials
needed to produce whatever it is a company makes and of its finished
product. In practice, this simple solution comes at a big cost. And that cost is
rising. Higher interest rates make short-term loans used for day-to-day
operations, including holding inventory and paying suppliers, dearer. A
shortage of warehouse space means higher rents to stash the extra stocks.
JPMorgan Chase, a bank, calculates that by the end of 2022, companies that
make up the S&P 1500 index of America’s large firms had more than
$600bn trapped in working capital (the value of a business’s inventories plus
what it is owed by customers minus what it owes suppliers). That was two-
fifths higher than before the pandemic. The figure may have risen since.

Each dollar tied up this way is a dollar not invested in pursuit of future
profits. No wonder, then, that chief executives, for all their resilience-related
nodding, try to unshackle as many of those dollars as they can. Some are
having considerably more luck than others. This reflects longer-running
changes to the balance of power across the world’s supply chains.

For American business as a whole inventories look roughly as plump as they

did on the eve of the pandemic, relative to sales. For all the talk of the
supposed supremacy of “just in time”, such stockpiles had in fact been
getting plumper for a decade before covid-19. Yet that general trend conceals
a divergence. Retailers’ inventory-to-sales ratios have been coming down
since the early 1990s. For manufacturers, they are (bar a brief pandemic
spike) higher than at any time in the past 30 years (see chart). What is going
on?

As supply chains became more efficient in the 1990s thanks to globalisation,

retailers drove a harder bargain with suppliers. Being closer to the consumer,
they had a better idea of what shoppers wanted and when they wanted it. At
the same time, notes Niraj Dawar of Brand Strategy Group, a consultancy,
limited shelf space allowed shop owners to demand that producers hold
more inventory themselves in exchange for having their products displayed
on those scarce shelves. Manufacturers’ hopes that e-commerce would
strengthen their hand by giving them direct access to buyers were dashed;
shoppers chose the convenience of e-emporiums such as those of Amazon,
Target and Walmart. Retailers’ pandemic-era willingness to let suppliers
dictate prices and the timing of payments and deliveries, just to get goods on
shelves, proved to be a blip.

Technology has bolstered retail further. Consumer-goods firms used to know

more about shopping habits, recalls the chief executive of a giant one. Now
“retailers have the insights,” and these are based on real purchasing
behaviour, not market research. This, he says, is putting pressure on firms
like his to deliver “on time in full” (OTIF). If they cannot, that means lower
sales, adds the supply-chains chief at another big consumer-goods firm.
The OTIF motive

OTIF requires suppliers to do one of two things. They can use forecasts to
make products in advance, and keep their fingers crossed they made the right
amount. The alternative is to build spare production capacity, which allows
them to react to changes quickly without having to hold more inventory.
“Companies can’t afford to simply increase their inventories and not address
the bigger structural resiliency efforts,” says Mourad Tamoud, who oversees
the supply chain of Schneider Electric. The French maker of electrical
equipment has built an extra factory in two regions and plugged them into a
more local network of suppliers.

Those extra factories cost money to build and maintain, which can hurt
profitability if they run with plenty of idle capacity. And demand forecasts
can be wrong, especially at a time when supply chains are backed up with
goods which have left factories but have yet to be sold by distributors or
retailers. Nicole DeBlase of Deutsche Bank calculates that for many large
categories of products, including car parts, machinery, semiconductors and
consumer electronics, the value of such “channel inventory” is between 30%
and 110% higher than at the end of 2019. So long as all of it sits on resellers’
balance-sheets, they are unlikely to order more from manufacturers. This
causes finished goods to pile up at factories, which then prefer to hold off on
procuring their inputs—and so on down the value chain.

Whether by investing in spare capacity or betting on the size of spare stocks,

it is the manufacturers that pick up the tab. And this tab grows with distance
to the consumer. Makers of industrial goods are turning over their stocks
more slowly than sellers of consumer products. But whatever they make,
manufacturers are trying to ease the pain. A common tactic is to cut down
the variety of goods they produce. Hasbro, a toymaker, said in February that
it was refocusing on “fewer, bigger, better” brands. Coca-Cola has cut the
number of its brands in half over the past few years. Newell Brands, which
makes everything from Sharpies to strollers, has trimmed its range of
scented Yankee candles from 200 to 150. GE Vernova, which makes power-
generating equipment, used to sell nine types of nacelle, a wind-turbine’s
central hub. Now it makes three. “It’s easier to juggle three balls than nine—
always,” sums up GE Vernova’s chief executive, Scott Strazik.

Producers of hot products will always be able to dictate terms—and prices—

to buyers. But what counts as a hot product can itself change rapidly,
ultimately as a function of what consumers want. A shortage of
semiconductors between 2020 and 2022 strengthened chipmakers’ hand. A
subsequent glut in 2023, after everyone who wanted a new laptop,
smartphone or car had bought one, weakened it. For manufacturers—of
chips and everything else—inventory aches and pains are increasingly a
chronic condition. ■

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Bartleby

Productivity gurus through time: a match-up

James Clear v Arnold Bennett

Apr 11th 2024 |

THE MOST-READ non-fiction book in America, measured by views on

Kindle and listens on Audible, an audio-book service, is “Atomic Habits” by
James Clear. Published in 2018, it has now been on the bestseller list for 277
weeks. Mr Clear’s book, which pulls off the impressive trick of being both
ludicrous and helpful, argues that small changes of routine can compound
into big improvements, whether your goal is to be more productive at work,
to eat more healthily or to develop new skills.

A manual on time management and self-improvement might sound modern.

But these were also the themes of a bestseller from the early years of the
20th century. “How to Live on 24 Hours a Day”, first published in 1908, is a
short self-help book written by Arnold Bennett, a prolific English writer.
Bennett’s book was meant to salve the “feeling that you are every day
leaving undone something which you would like to do, and which, indeed,
you are always hoping to do when you have ‘more time’”. He wrote, in other
words, for the same aspirational market as Mr Clear does today. (Another of
today’s productivity Yodas, Cal Newport, cites Bennett in “Deep Work”, a
book on how to focus.)

Comparing Bennett’s book with Mr Clear’s yields instructive likenesses and

dissimilarities. One obvious difference is tone. Bennett is wry about human
foibles. If you think that “ingeniously planning out a timetable with a pen on
a piece of paper” will be enough to solve your problems, he writes, then “lie
down again and resume the uneasy doze which you call your existence.” He
warns against fetishising a programme of self-improvement, lest “one may
come to exist as in a prison and one’s life may cease to be one’s own.”

Mr Clear is more earnest. He clothes his advice in capital letters: the Plateau
of Latent Potential, the Four Laws of Behaviour Change. He thinks in terms
of winners and losers. He says truly bizarre things like: “If you can get 1%
better each day for one year you’ll end up 37 times better by the time you’re
done. Conversely, if you get 1% worse each day for one year you’ll decline
nearly down to zero.” This is known as the Misuse of Mathematics.

The two are separated by social and technological gulfs, too. Bennett’s world
is one in which women stay at home, tea is made by servants and people
entertain themselves by playing cards and “pottering”. He tells readers who
enjoy nature to go to the nearest gas lamp with a butterfly net. In Mr Clear’s
world, people spend hours working on their biceps at the gym, make time to
be grateful and stop themselves from watching too much TV by taking
batteries out of the remote.

Perhaps the biggest point of difference concerns work itself. Bennett’s

audience was the new army of white-collar types taking the train in and out
of work each day. He presupposed that the time they spent in the office was
unfulfilling. A majority puts “as little of themselves as they conscientiously
can into the earning of a livelihood”, he wrote. Work was an eight-hour
sentence bordered at each end by a commute. As a result, Bennett’s tips
focus exclusively on the other 16 hours of the day. These were the times
when people could carve out the space to develop an expertise in anything
from music to architecture.

Mr Clear makes the modern assumption that work is as likely to provide

purpose and identity as other parts of your life. And it leaves no obvious
ocean of time to fill—his tips are about optimising already-busy days by
weaving new routines into them. He is a proponent of “stacking habits” so
that one ritual follows another: after a morning cup of coffee, for example,
meditate for a minute. Bennett thinks in terms of hours, Mr Clear in terms of
seconds.

If the differences between the two mavens are great, the similarities are
striking. Both authors espouse the importance of discipline, ritual and habit
in managing time more productively. Both stress the need to start small
when developing new routines; Mr Clear gets out his capitals again and calls
this the
Two-Minute Rule.

Above all, it is plain that humans are largely and exasperatingly unchanged.
At one point Bennett writes about the difficulty of sustaining concentration
in a way that is shamefully recognisable to modern readers: “You will have
not gone ten yards before your mind has skipped away under your very eyes
and is larking around the corner with another subject.” Unless humanity
itself gets an upgrade, the market for a 22nd-century version of Bennett and
Mr Clear is assured. ■

Read more from Bartleby, our columnist on management and work:

The six rules of fire drills (Apr 4th)
The pros and cons of corporate uniforms (Mar 27th)
The secret to career success may well be off to the side (Mar 21st)

Also: How the Bartleby column got its name

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No-sun seekers

Airbnb bookings for the solar eclipse reach

astronomical levels
Limited inventory and opportunistic travellers have kept the windfall in
check

Apr 6th 2024 |

THE MOON would not start to move between Earth and the sun until the
morning of April 8th. But the business impact of this month’s total solar
eclipse, which started over the Pacific Ocean, cut a path across North
America and ended in the Atlantic, was already plain to see. According to
Jamie Lane of AirDNA, a travel-data firm, on a typical Sunday night in April
around 30% of homes listed for short-term rental on Airbnb or Vrbo in areas
in or around the eclipse’s path were occupied. A remarkable 92% of listings
within the zone of totality had been booked for April 7th. Demand for homes
just a few towns outside this roughly 180km-wide strip had barely changed.
The eclipse was visible from a handful of big or biggish cities, including
Dallas, Indianapolis, Cleveland, Buffalo and Montreal. CoStar, a hotel-data
provider, reckons that occupancy rates in those places were up anywhere
from 12 percentage points (in Montreal) to 67 (in Indianapolis). The
remaining rooms appeared to be available only at elevated prices. Ahead of
the eclipse the New York Times reported that nearly half of Super 8 motels in
its path with rooms still available were charging at least twice the standard
rate.

Yet this path mostly covered areas with relatively scant lodging inventory.
Of the 92,000 American short-term listings in this zone—just over 5% of the
1.6m in the United States as a whole—85,000 had been reserved for April
7th, compared with just 20,000 for the following Sunday. In theory, owners
of short-term rental homes should have been able to jack up prices just like
hoteliers, particularly in places with few hotel rooms.

However, few Airbnb hosts run their properties with a hotel manager’s
business acumen. AirDNA’s numbers show that in cities like Dallas and
Niagara Falls, the majority of reservations for April 6th, 7th and 8th were
made more than two months ago—far earlier than is typical. Savvy guests
pounced on the standard prices on offer before hosts realised that they could
raise them and still secure bookings. The average booking on April 7th went
for $269, only slightly above the $245 level for April 14th. Combining the
65,000 additional bookings with a 10% increase in the nightly rate suggests
that Airbnb and Vrbo hosts received a total revenue bump of merely $18m.
Even counting the days before and after the peak of demand, when
occupancy rates also exceeded 80%, only brings the cumulative additional
turnover to a total of $44m.

The American hosts—and the digital platforms that live off commissions on
such rentals—missed a trick, in other words. Unfortunately for both groups,
they will not have another chance to learn from their mistake for a while.
Alaskans have to wait until 2033 for the next total eclipse, North Dakotans
and Montanans until 2044, and Floridians, tourist-friendlier providers of
accommodation, until 2045. ■

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Raising Arizona

TSMC’s American chipmaking plans grow $25bn

more ambitious
They still pale next to its Taiwanese endeavours

Apr 11th 2024 |

TSMC MAKES about three-quarters of the world’s most cutting-edge

computer chips. But even as it builds new factories (or fabs) in America and
Japan, it has kept its most advanced production at home in Taiwan. Until
now. On April 8th TSMC said that it intended to make “2-nanometre” chips,
the current state of the art in chipmaking, at its planned fab in Arizona. It
will also build a third factory in the state by 2030, on top of two already in
the works. Its total American investments will rise from $40bn to $65bn.
Uncle Sam will chip in another $6.6bn in grants and up to $5bn in loans.

In the eyes of Gina Raimondo, America’s commerce secretary, this shows

the value of the CHIPS Act, a $50bn package of subsidies and tax credits
aiming to revive domestic chipmaking and reduce America’s reliance on an
island exposed to geopolitical and, as an earthquake this month in Taiwan
reminded policymakers, seismic instability. But look closer and TSMC’s
American ambitions may not be all that grand.

The CHIPS Act’s sweeteners notwithstanding, TSMC will continue to make

most of its high-end chips at home, not across the Pacific. Building fabs in
America takes longer and costs more than in Asia, though subsidies cover
some of that difference. Finding workers to operate them is harder. And the
factories will be smaller, which makes them more expensive to run. TSMC’s
four “gigafabs” in Taiwan can each churn out more than 100,000 wafers a
month, compared with 25,000 at its American “megafabs”.

The company has not disclosed the capacity of its third plant in Arizona. But
analysts expect that by 2030 it will produce around 80,000 wafers a month,
all told. Bloomberg, a data provider, forecasts that TSMC’s Taiwan operation
will make almost four times as many in 2024, much of it for American
customers such as Apple and Nvidia. The company also plans to build
“multiple fabs” in Taiwan. Morris Chang, TSMC’s retired founder, has
called America’s chipmaking ambitions a “very expensive exercise in
futility”. That is harsh—but probably true. ■

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Schumpeter

Generative AI has a clean-energy problem

What happens when the AI revolution meets the energy transition

Apr 11th 2024 |

WHEN A COLLEAGUE from this newspaper visited Sam Altman in 2022

at his home in San Francisco, he noticed two pairs of pink high-tops on a
bookshelf. One had the logo of Mr Altman’s machine-learning startup,
OpenAI. The other bore an emblem for Helion, a nuclear-fusion company
that Mr Altman also backs. The entrepreneur is obsessed with both
technologies—not just as foot fashion. He believes that the cost of
intelligence and the cost of energy will fall in a mutually sustainable way. He
calls it a “long and beautiful exponential curve”.

Nasty, brutish and short, more like. Talk to utilities and data-centre operators
and, though many share Mr Altman’s excitement about artificial intelligence
(AI), they are grappling with an energy conundrum on which the future of
three big economic shifts partly hinges: the AI revolution; the efforts to
electrify swathes of the economy; and the fight against climate change. In a
nutshell, “generative” AI, the sort behind OpenAI’s ChatGPT, has a
ravenous appetite for electricity. It has landed, virtually out of the blue, on a
global energy system that is already struggling to cope with alternative
sources of power demand. As yet it is not clear whether there will be enough
clean energy to meet everyone’s needs.

At first glance, the solution looks simple. Data centres, such as those that
companies like Alphabet, Amazon and Microsoft use to supply cloud-
computing services, have over the past decade or so accounted for only 1-
2% of global energy demand. For years the big-tech “hyperscalers” have
harvested ever greater energy efficiencies from their server farms, even as
the world’s computing workloads have soared. Moreover, they have invested
heavily in clean energy to offset their carbon footprints. In America,
electricity providers to the hyperscalers are only too keen to help. They have
endured two decades of anaemic electricity demand and are desperate for
new sources of growth. In recent earnings calls their bosses have promised
tens of billions of dollars in investment over the next five years to pump
more power to data centres. Last month one such firm, Talen Energy, sold
Amazon a nuclear-powered data centre for $650m. So far, so promising.

Generative AI changes the nature of the game, though. Since the days when
they were the workhorses of the cryptocurrency boom, graphics-processing
units (GPUs), the chips on which models like ChatGPT are trained and run,
have been energy addicts. According to Christopher Wellise of Equinix,
which rents out data centres, a pre-AI hyperscale server rack uses 10-15
kilowatts (KW) of power. An AI one uses 40-60KW. It is not just
computation that gobbles up electricity. Keeping the racks of GPUs cool
requires just as much oomph. Moreover, a lot of AI-related energy demand
in the past year or so has come from trainers of “foundation” models like
GPT-4, OpenAI’s latest offering. Widespread use of these as tools—for
research, to make videos, to dress the Pope in Balenciaga—could put more
strain on the grid. A search by ChatGPT may consume ten times the
electricity of googling.

It is early days in the generative-AI boom, so it is too soon to make hard and
fast predictions. But informed guesses about the related rise in energy
demand are striking. At the top of its range, the International Energy Agency,
a global forecaster, says that by 2026 data centres could use twice as much
energy as two years ago—and as much as Japan consumes today. It expects
data centres to account for a third of new electricity demand in America over
the next two years. Rene Haas, chief executive of Arm, a chip-design
company, told the Wall Street Journal this week that by the end of the decade
AI data centres could consume as much as a quarter of all American
electricity, up from 4% or less today.

In America, two things further compound the complexities. The first is

timing. The rise of generative AI coincides with a booming economy, with
power consumption to match. Many power consumers want their energy to
be zero-carbon, creating competition for a scarce resource. So do buyers of
electric vehicles (EVs), the rise of which may have slowed but has not
stopped. The second is the challenge of expanding the grid. Despite support
from the White House, it is not easy for utilities to build new renewable
capacity quickly. They suffer from supply-chain problems; by some accounts
it takes three years to deliver a transformer, up from less than a year
previously. Interest rates have pushed up the cost of wind and solar projects,
making them harder to fund. Building new transmission lines is fiendishly
tough.

No doubt there will be creative thinking. The obvious solution is to make

GPUs more energy-efficient. Nvidia, their biggest supplier, says it has
already achieved this with its latest generation of AI servers. More efficient
chips can, however, simply stimulate more usage. Another option, says
Aaron Denman of Bain, a consultancy, is for the hyperscalers to use their
deep pockets to help utilities overcome some of the grid constraints. He says
that the real crunch may occur during certain parts of the year, such as
unusually hot summer days when Americans switch on their air-
conditioners. That means having small power plants on standby. The
likelihood, though, is that these will be fuelled by natural gas, undermining
the cloud providers’ climate commitments.
The nuclear option

If shortages of renewable energy occur, it will come at a cost. No one knows

yet how generative AI will make money. What people do know is that the
cost of acquiring GPUs is rocketing. If the energy costs of running them
soar, too, it could put the brakes on expansion. In addition, the electrification
of the rest of the economy is highly cost-dependent; an AI v EV scramble for
clean power would push up prices and serve neither industry well. By all
means keep your fingers crossed for Mr Altman’s rose-tinted fusion dream to
become reality. But don’t count on it. ■

Read more from Schumpeter, our columnist on global business:

Why Japan Inc is no longer in thrall to America (Apr 2nd)
Meet the digital David taking on the Google Goliath (Mar 27th)
Can anything stop Nvidia’s Jensen Huang? (Mar 20th)

Also: If you want to write directly to Schumpeter, email him at

schumpeter@economist.com. And here is an explanation of how the
Schumpeter column got its name.
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Finance & economics

The rich world faces a brutal spending crunch
Fantasy economics :: Countries including America, Britain and France are up against
remorseless fiscal logic

Ukrainian drone strikes are hurting Russia’s oil industry

Behind enemy lines :: The world’s third-largest producer is now an importer of petrol

When will Americans see those interest-rate cuts?

Put the axe away :: Following a nasty surprise, some now think they may come only after the
presidential election

China’s state is eating the private property market

Xi’s healthy appetite :: Pity those soon to buy a home

How fast is India’s economy really growing?

Beyond GDP :: Statisticians take the country’s figures with a pinch of salt

What China’s central bank and Costco shoppers have in

common
Buttonwood :: Hint: it is not a fondness for cryptocurrencies

What will humans do if technology solves everything?

Free exchange :: Welcome to a high-tech utopia

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Fantasy economics

The rich world faces a brutal spending crunch

Countries including America, Britain and France are up against remorseless
fiscal logic

Apr 9th 2024 | New York

A DECADE AGO finance ministries were gripped by austerity fever.

Governments were doing all they could to cut budget deficits, even with
unemployment high and economic growth weak. Today things are very
different. Across the West, most economies are in better shape. People have
jobs. Corporate-profit growth is strong. And yet governments are spending a
lot more than they are taking in.

No government is more profligate than America’s. This year the world’s

largest economy is projected to run a budget deficit (where spending exceeds
taxation) of more than 7% of GDP—a level unheard of outside recession and
wartime. But it is not the only spendthrift country. Estonia and Finland, two
normally parsimonious northern European countries, are running large
budget deficits. Last year Italy’s deficit was as wide as in 2010-11, following
the global financial crisis of 2007-09, and France’s grew to 5.5% of GDP,
well above forecasts. “I am calling for a collective wake-up call to make
choices in all of our public spending,” announced Bruno Le Maire, its
finance minister, last month.
Some countries have been more reserved. Last year Cyprus ran a surplus.
Greece and Portugal—close to balancing their budgets—look like the model
of fiscal rectitude even if they still have colossal debts. Still, the general
direction is clear. The Economist has analysed data from 35 rich countries.
Whereas in 2017-19 the median country in our sample ran a budget surplus,
last year it ran a budget deficit of close to 2.5% of GDP (see chart 1).
Measures of “primary” deficits (excluding interest payments) and
“structural” deficits (abstracting from the economic cycle) have also
widened.

Two factors explain the splurge. The first relates to taxes. Across the rich
world, receipts are surprisingly weak. In America, revenue from income
taxes deducted from pay fell slightly last year. Meanwhile, “non-withheld
income taxes”, including on capital gains, tumbled by a quarter. Britain’s
capital-gains-tax take is running 11% below its recent high. And Japan’s
self-assessment tax take for this fiscal year, which includes some levies on
capital gains, is on track to come in 4% below last year’s.

Taxmen are suffering because of market ructions in late 2022 and early
2023. Tech firms, which pay big salaries, let staff go, trimming income-tax
hauls. As stock prices fell, it became more difficult for households and
investors to sell shares for a profit, reducing the pool of capital gains. Last
year few people made profits from flipping houses as property prices
dropped. Senior staff at private-equity firms, who often receive income in
the form of investment returns rather than a conventional salary, had a bad
year.

The second factor is state spending. Following the whatever-it-takes fiscal

policy of the covid-19 pandemic governments have retrenched, but not fully.
In Australia elderly people in care homes may still receive financial
assistance during a covid outbreak. Only in mid-2023 did Germany
completely wind down the job-protection schemes implemented during the
pandemic. America is still paying out hefty tax refunds to small businesses
that kept people on during lockdowns. In Italy a project concocted in 2020,
designed to encourage homeowners to green their homes, has spiralled out of
control, with the government so far disbursing support worth more than
€200bn (or 10% of GDP). The name of one of the schemes, “Superbonus”,
would be amusing were it not so profligate.
Politicians have also become more prepared to intervene—and spend money
—in order to right perceived wrongs. After Russia invaded Ukraine and
energy prices soared, governments in Europe allocated about 4% of GDP to
protect households and companies from the effects. A few, including Poland
and the Baltics, are now spending big on guns and soldiers. President Joe
Biden wants to forgive as much student debt as he can before America’s
presidential election in November.

How long can the firehose keep blasting? At first glance, it looks like it
could keep going for a while. Markets are on a tear, which will boost tax
receipts. And a government’s debt sustainability does not change solely
owing to what happens to the budget deficit. It is also a product of overall
public debt, economic growth, inflation and interest rates. Since the end of
the pandemic, inflation has been high and growth has been solid. Although
interest rates have risen, they remain fairly low by historical standards.
These conditions put politicians in a fiscal sweet spot (see chart 2). We
calculate that in 2022-23 the median rich country was able to run a primary
deficit of about 2% of GDP and still cut its public-debt-to-GDP ratio. The
nominal value of debt would have risen, but, helped by inflation, the size of
the economy would have risen by even more. A few countries faced an even
more favourable environment. Italy’s debt ratio has fallen by about ten
percentage points of GDP since 2021, despite its loose fiscal policy. France’s
ratio has edged down, too. Greece—combining favourable economic
conditions with tight fiscal policy—has seen its debt-to-GDP ratio fall by a
stunning 50 percentage points.

Now conditions are changing, however. Interest rates facing governments

are not yet falling, even as economic growth and inflation have come down.
In America investors are trimming their bets on rate cuts by the Federal
Reserve. All told, the fiscal arithmetic is becoming more daunting. For
instance, whereas last year the Italian government could have run a primary
deficit of up to 2% of GDP and still cut its debt ratio, now it needs to run a
surplus of 1% of GDP. America is in a similar position. Further falls in
inflation, a slowdown in growth or higher rates would make it more difficult
still for governments to stabilise their debt.

Small wonder that talk of fiscal consolidation has become louder. The Italian
government believes it will soon be reprimanded by the EU for its stance. In
Britain the Labour Party, which hopes to take power before long, promises
fiscal rectitude. The French government has discussed cuts to health
spending and unemployment benefits. America is the outlier. In the world’s
leading economy, the conversation still has not turned. Ahead of the election,
Donald Trump and Mr Biden promise tax cuts for millions of voters. But
fiscal logic is remorseless. Whether politicians like it or not, the era of free-
spending governments will have to come to an end. ■

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Behind enemy lines

Ukrainian drone strikes are hurting Russia’s oil

industry
The world’s third-largest producer is now an importer of petrol

Apr 11th 2024 |

SELLING MORE oil at higher prices ought to be the stuff of dreams for a
petrostate. But for Russia it is a sign of a new, punishing phase in its war
with Ukraine. Months of Ukrainian drone strikes on refineries have crimped
Russia’s ability to produce refined fuels, such as diesel and petrol, and
turned the world’s third-largest oil producer into an importer of petrol.
Energy firms have tried to pare their losses by selling unrefined oil overseas,
pushing exports to a ten-month high in March.

In Ukraine’s most recent attack on April 2nd, its planners extended their
reach. They managed to land explosives on a refinery 1,115km from the
border. Their attack set fire to a unit responsible for 3% of Russia’s refining
capacity. Although it left no lasting damage, others have been more
successful. All told, Ukraine’s barrage has knocked out a seventh of Russian
refining capacity, according to S&P Global, a data firm. Maintenance work
and flooding in the city of Orsk on April 8th has taken more capacity offline.
Wholesale prices on the St Petersburg International Mercantile Exchange
have spiked. Ukraine, which has itself been the target of strikes on energy
infrastructure, hopes the assaults will slow the flow of dollars into its
enemy’s war machine and dent support for the war.

Russia’s oil giants are suffering the most. Refineries that normally produce
petrol and diesel for overseas clients at a premium have been diverted to
domestic production. The volume of diesel due to pass out of Russian ports
has hit a five-month low. At the same time, oil barons are seeking new
customers for their excess crude, on which they will stomach losses of $15
or so for every barrel that could have been exported as a refined product,
says Sergey Vakulenko, a former oil executive.

Although Ukraine’s attacks have slowed since Vladimir Putin’s re-election

in March, Ukraine has given no indication that they will stop. It can lob
drones faster and more cheaply than Russia can repair its refineries. Some
facilities, like the NORSI refinery in the city of Nizhny Novgorod, have
been particularly slow and expensive to fix, in part because access to
equipment is stymied by Western sanctions. As of this month, Russian oil
producers must also reduce the amount they pump from the ground by about
5% as part of a production cap agreed with OPEC+, an oil cartel.

Motorists have so far been shielded from Ukraine-inflicted “unplanned

maintenance” (as Russia’s energy ministry puts it). The government has kept
a lid on prices by banning petrol exports for six months from March 1st, and
striking a deal with Belarus, its client state. Russia imported 3,000 tonnes of
fuel from Belarus in the first half of March, up from zero in January. Fearing
that may not be enough, officials have also asked neighbouring Kazakhstan
to set aside a third of its reserves, equivalent to 100,000 tonnes, should
Russia need them, according to Reuters. If attacks continue, they could start
to push up prices.

The consequences for Russia’s public finances should be limited, even

though oil revenues represent 34% of its budget. Rosneft, the state oil
company, will dispense a smaller dividend if it cannot make up its lost
revenues, but many doubt these dividends make it to state coffers at all. The
government will even save some cash by paying out fewer per-barrel
subsidies to refineries. Russia’s biggest money-earners are resource taxes.
And because these are levied as royalties at the well-head, the government is
indifferent between oil exported as crude or as refined fuel, says Mr
Vakulenko. As long as Russia is able to export crude, it can collect royalties.

Observers outside Russia are watching to see if Ukraine’s attacks will affect
the global oil market. They have yet to have much impact, but the price of
Brent crude has risen by 19% this year to just under $90 a barrel, owing to
OPEC+ supply curbs, better-than-expected global economic conditions and
disruptions in the Red Sea. Few observers have more at stake than Joe
Biden, who faces an election in November. His administration has urged
Ukraine to halt its attacks, fearing they will provoke tough retaliation from
Russia and drive petrol prices higher. Ukraine’s leaders are willing to take
the risk. ■

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Put the axe away

When will Americans see those interest-rate cuts?

Following a nasty surprise, some now think they may come only after the
presidential election

Apr 10th 2024 | Washington, DC

PERHAPS IT WAS always too good to be true. The big economic story of
2023 was the seemingly painless disinflation in America, with consumer-
price pressures receding even as growth remained resilient, which
underpinned surging stock prices. Alas, the story thus far in 2024 is not quite
so cheerful. Growth has remained robust but, partly as a result, inflation is
looking stickier. The Federal Reserve faces a dilemma about whether to start
cutting interest rates; investors must grapple with the reality that monetary
policy will almost certainly remain tighter for longer than they had
anticipated a few months ago.
The latest troublesome data came from higher-than-expected inflation for
March, which was released on April 10th. Analysts had thought that the core
consumer-price index (CPI), which strips out food and energy costs, would
rise by 0.3% month on month. Instead, it rose by 0.4%. Although that may
not sound like much of an overshoot, it was the third straight month of CPI
readings exceeding forecasts. If continued, the current pace would entrench
inflation at over 4% year on year, double the Fed’s target—based on a
slightly different inflation gauge—of 2% (see chart 1).

Back in December, at the peak of optimism, most investors had priced in six
or seven rate cuts this year. They have since dialled back those expectations.
Within minutes of the latest inflation figures, market pricing shifted to
implying just one or two cuts this year—a dramatic change (see chart 2). It is
now possible that the Fed will not cut rates before the presidential election in
November, which would be a blow to the incumbent, Joe Biden.

Jerome Powell, the Fed’s chairman, has remained consistent. He has always
insisted that the central bank will take a data-dependent approach to setting
monetary policy. But rather than bouncing up and down in reaction to fresh
figures, he has also counselled patience. At the start of this year, even after
six straight months of largely benign price movements, he said the Fed
wanted more confidence that inflation was going lower before starting to cut
rates. Such caution risked seeming excessive. Today it looks appropriate.

The volatility of market pricing has also changed the Fed’s positioning
relative to the market. At the end of last year, when investors foresaw as
many as seven rate cuts this year, officials had pencilled in just three,
appearing hawkish. In their more recent projections, published less than a
month ago, officials still pencilled in three cuts, which now appears doveish.
The Fed will next update its projections in June.

In the meantime the Fed will be watching more than the CPI. Its preferred
measure for inflation, the core personal consumption expenditures price
index (PCE), will be released in a few weeks, and is expected to come closer
to 0.3% month on month in March. Several of the items that drove up CPI,
particularly motor-vehicle insurance and medical services, are defined
differently in PCE calculations. The Fed may also be comforted by data
showing wage growth has continued to moderate.
Nevertheless, trying to explain away uncomfortable numbers by pointing to
this or that data quirk is redolent of 2021, when inflation denialists thought
that fast-rising prices were merely a transitory phenomenon. The general
conclusion today is that although growth has remained impressively strong,
it now appears to be bumping up against the economy’s supply limits, and is
therefore translating into persistent inflationary pressure. That calls for tight,
not loose, monetary policy. The Fed, already cautious about cutting rates
when inflation figures were more co-operative, is likely to be even more
wary now. ■

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Xi’s healthy appetite

China’s state is eating the private property market

Pity those soon to buy a home

Apr 11th 2024 | Wuhan

AT AN UPMARKET housing development in Wuhan, sales agents want to

make clear that their state-owned firm has severed all its ties to the private
sector. The firm had at first partnered with Sunac, a private developer, until it
defaulted in 2022. A saleswoman explains that the firm’s owner also controls
the city’s waterworks and electricity provider. If this type of firm collapses,
she says with a grin, “then the whole country has no hope”.

More than three years into China’s property crisis, the biggest private
builders are folding under the strain of enormous debts. New-home sales in
30 large cities fell by 47% in March, year on year. Revenues for the 100
biggest developers were down 46% in the same month. Housing investment
dropped to 8.4trn yuan ($1.2trn), a quarter below its peak in 2021. Although
millions of families are waiting for developers to finish building their flats, it
would take 3.6 years to sell China’s glut of inventory, including homes still
under construction, reckon analysts at ANZ, a bank.

All this presents an opportunity for state-owned firms. Only by securing

access to funding can developers survive. Some private companies have
found help via a government programme that approves housing projects for
state funding, but it has been slow to deploy capital. State firms, on the other
hand, have long enjoyed tight links with banks. This means they are buying
more land, building more homes and selling more of them than their private
counterparts. At a time when most private companies face some form of
restructuring, a few state-owned firms are miraculously eking out profits.
Moreover, their actions provide hints as to the plans of Xi Jinping, China’s
leader, for the next decade of the country’s property industry.
As part of those plans, the state is set to become China’s biggest home-
builder. The country’s leaders want to construct millions of “social housing”
units for low-income households, which cannot be resold like normal
commercial units. Such is the scale of the planned construction, social
homes will come to dominate overall housing supply by 2030. As much as
4trn yuan will be spent on social housing and other state building this year
and next, estimates S&P Global, a credit-rating agency. According to Capital
Economics, a research firm, just as construction by developers began to
plummet year on year in late 2021, building by other types of companies,
mainly local-government firms, soared (see chart). As a result, 30-40% of
new housing supply will be social homes by next year, up from just 10%
currently.

Local governments may also become the largest buyers of the country’s
housing stock. The city of Zhengzhou recently announced that it would
purchase 10,000 homes to make them social units. Many will be rented out.
Although there is no estimate of how big a landlord local governments will
become, several other cities have announced similar plans.

A few powerful state-owned firms are on the rise. CR Land, owned by the
central government, notched a 3% year-on-year increase in its core profits—
an astonishing accomplishment when most of its peers have lost money or
collapsed. COLI, another centrally controlled giant, saw profits fall by a very
respectable 3%. As the crisis has played out, home sales by the largest state
firms fell by only 25% between mid-2021 and mid-2023, while those at the
largest private ones tumbled 90%.

This reflects official preferences. On April 8th a state bank called for the
liquidation of Shimao, a private developer that defaulted in 2022, over a
$200m unpaid loan. Needless to say, this would hinder Shimao’s attempts to
restructure its debts and continue building unfinished homes. By contrast, in
March regulators asked banks and bondholders to help save Vanke, a
developer with a powerful state-backed shareholder. Chinese policymakers
are much happier to offer bail-outs to institutions over which they have
influence.

With the state set to consume China’s property industry, what could go
wrong? For a start, state firms face dangerous debts. Local-government firms
sit on estimated collective debt of 75trn yuan, or about 60% of GDP. When
such firms buy land from local governments they merely shift money from
one pocket to another. These transactions have kept money flowing into
local coffers, but are building up unsustainable burdens. Some local-
government firms have started to issue bonds for the sole purpose of paying
off other companies’ debts. Analysts fear that this level of spending cannot
continue much longer, especially in poorer provinces.
Additional debts might appear to policymakers to be a price worth paying
for control over China’s most important asset. The future of the housing
market, the thinking goes, would include fewer boom-and-bust cycles if
sober state firms were in charge. Cheaper accommodation should also help
Mr Xi fight China’s widening wealth gap. Yet state dominance will also
mean a less efficient market. China’s private homebuilders are masters of
supply chains. Their ability to organise labour for construction is
unparalleled. The state, in contrast, is a lousy builder. As state firms take on
a bigger and bigger role, the quality of new homes is likely to fall.

The intervention will also shake the foundations of the market. Homebuyers
will probably become reluctant to buy a home at commercial rates when the
same unit may later be available at subsidised ones. Market-watchers suspect
officials want to conserve funds to buy up homes on the cheap, taking
advantage of the struggles of private firms. As a consequence, the rapid
growth of social housing will probably cause an even deeper crisis among
private companies. That may not be quite what Mr Xi has in mind. ■

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Beyond GDP

How fast is India’s economy really growing?

Statisticians take the country’s figures with a pinch of salt

Apr 11th 2024 | Mumbai

OPTIMISM ABOUT India tends to spike now and again. In 1996, a few
years after the country opened to foreign capital, the price of property in
Mumbai, India’s financial hub, soared to the highest of any global city,
according to one account. In 2007 the country’s economy grew at an annual
rate of 9%, leading many to speculate that it might hit double digits. Yet after
each of these booms, hopes were dashed. The late-2000s surge made way for
financial turbulence in the 2010s.

Today India again appears to be at the start of an upswing. In the year to the
fourth quarter of 2023, GDP growth roared at 8.4%. But such figures tend to
be treated with a pinch of salt. Economists inside and outside the
government are debating just how fast the economy is growing—a question
that has particular piquancy ahead of a general election that begins on April
19th. So what is India’s actual growth rate? And is the economy
accelerating?

To answer these questions, start with the 8.4% figure. Nominal GDP growth
in the same period was 10.1%, implying that inflation was only 1.7%.
Although that may seem suspect, given that India’s consumer prices rose by
5.4% over the year, it can be explained. Like many other countries, India’s
GDP deflator puts a lot of weight on wholesale producer prices. These are
volatile and grew by only 0.3% over the year.

India’s approach does have oddities, however. In 2015 the country changed
its GDP calculation, starting with figures from 2011, from one that measured
real GDP directly by observing changes in production quantities to one that
measured nominal GDP through surveys and financial reports, before then
deflating them to obtain real GDP. It is a complex process: some sectors,
such as manufacturing and mining, are deflated using a wholesale price
index (WPI); services use a mix of the WPI and consumer prices; other
sectors, including construction, use a quantity-based method.

In 2017 Arvind Subramanian, then India’s chief economic adviser, observed

that the country’s GDP figures were falling out of line with indicators such
as credit, electricity use and freight traffic. In 2019 he published a paper
suggesting India’s GDP growth in 2011-16 had been overestimated by a few
percentage points a year. The numbers have since been mired in controversy,
not least because the methodological change came with a revision to
historical data that reduced the growth rates achieved by the previous
government.

Few people suspect foul play in India’s GDP calculations. The old approach
struggled to capture changes in the quality of goods, rather than quantities,
says Pronab Sen, India’s first chief statistician. But the new method has
disadvantages of its own. “Earlier, the chances were we were measuring real
GDP growth more accurately, and today we are measuring nominal GDP
more accurately,” says Mr Sen.

The disadvantages reflect two issues: the choice of deflator, and how the
deflation is carried out. More sectors use WPI as their deflator than
consumer prices. Indeed, even though WPI does not contain service prices, it
is still used for a number of industries, such as hotels, that ought to
incorporate them. This is a growing problem. Service sectors already make
up more than half India’s GDP and are expanding faster than the rest of the
economy. By our calculations, India’s consumer price index, which puts
greater weight on services, grew by 20 percentage points more than its GDP
deflator from 2011 to 2019—the largest gap in any big economy. From 2003
to 2011, by contrast, it grew by three percentage points less.
Then there is how deflation is done. Most countries use a method called
“double deflation”, where input and output prices are deflated separately.
Consider a manufacturer importing oil for use in production. If oil prices
fall, output prices do not and quantities stay the same, real value added
should not change. But if the same deflator is used for inputs and outputs, as
in India, it would look as if the manufacturer had become more productive.

This is what seems to have happened during the 2010s. Oil prices were
steady at $90-100 a barrel from 2011 to 2014, before crashing to below $50
over the next two years. India is reliant on oil imports, as the world’s third-
biggest consumer of oil, 85% of which is brought in. Although India’s
manufacturing sector struggled in this period, GDP data concealed its
difficulties.

The good news is that since the covid-19 pandemic, the divergence between
WPI and consumer prices no longer appears as significant. From December
2011 to 2019, consumer prices grew at a 5.8% annual rate and WPI grew at a
2.6% annual rate. Yet in the four years to December 2023, both measures
have grown at around 5.7%. WPI remains volatile, which is why quarterly
GDP figures, such as the recent 8.4% growth rate, should be treated with a
degree of caution. The number was also boosted by a one-time reduction in
subsidy payments and an increase in indirect tax collections, which is why
the trend is more likely to be closer to 6.5%—the growth rate of gross value
added.

India’s government is working towards incorporating services into its price

indices. The road to a fully fledged producer-price index and double-
deflation will be a long one, however. Mr Sen says many Indian companies
would rather not share data on their costs with the government. Statisticians
are often reluctant to force the private sector to comply. Meanwhile,
collecting wholesale prices is much easier because traders are happy to
report them.

Do existing data suggest a boom? Since December 2019, real GDP has
grown by 4.2% at an average annual rate, meaning that India, like many
other countries, has not recovered to its pre-pandemic trend. Corporate and
foreign investment remain weak. But looked at since December 2021,
India’s overall economy seems robust, having grown at 7.1% annually.
Alternative indicators, from electricity use to freight traffic, are strong;
surveys of purchasing managers for both manufacturing and services have
hit their highest levels in over a decade. Forecasters expect 6.5% annual
growth over the next five years. Although real GDP growth from 2011 to
2019 was also officially 6.5% a year, the underlying rate was probably
lower, implying genuine acceleration may be under way. The data is noisy,
the picture is mixed and yet most government economists would be satisfied
with that outcome. ■

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Buttonwood

What China’s central bank and Costco shoppers

have in common
Hint: it is not a fondness for cryptocurrencies

Apr 11th 2024 |

GOLD HAS always held an allure. The earliest civilisations used it for
jewellery; the first forms of money were forged from it. For centuries kings
clamoured to get their hands on the stuff. Charlemagne conquered much of
Europe after plundering vast amounts of gold from the Avars. When King
Ferdinand of Spain sent explorers to the new world in 1511, he told them to
“get gold, humanely if you can, but all hazards, get gold.” Ordinary men also
clamoured for it after James Marshall, a labourer, found a flake of gold while
constructing a saw mill in Sacramento, California, in 1848.

People are once again spending big on the precious metal. On April 9th its
spot price hit a record of $2,364 an ounce, having risen by 15% since the
start of March. That gold is surging makes a certain degree of sense: the
metal is seen to be a hedge against calamity and economic hardship. It tends
to rally when countries are at war, economies are uncertain and inflation is
rampant.

But only a certain degree. After all, why is it surging precisely now?
Inflation was worse a year ago. The Ukraine war has arrived at something of
a stalemate. In the month after Hamas’s attack on Israel on October 7th, the
price of gold rose by just 7%—half the size of its more recent rally.
Moreover, investors had only recently appeared to have gone off the stuff.
Those who thought gold would act as a hedge against inflation were proven
sorely wrong in 2022 when prices slipped even as inflation spiralled out of
control. Cryptocurrencies like bitcoin—often viewed as a substitute for gold
—have gained popularity. Longtime gold analysts are puzzled by its ascent.

An investor who cannot understand a rally on the basis of fundamentals must

often consider a simpler rationale: there have been more eager buyers than
sellers. So, who is buying gold in bulk?

Whoever it is, they are not using exchange-traded funds, or ETFs, the tool
most often used by regular folk through their brokerage accounts, as well as
by some institutional investors. There have, in fact, been net outflows from
gold ETFs for more than a year. After tracking each other closely throughout
2020 and 2021, gold prices and ETF inflows decoupled at the end of 2022.
Although prices are up by around 50% since late 2022, gold held by ETFs
has dropped by a fifth.

That leaves three buyers. The first, and biggest, are central banks. In general,
central bankers have been increasing the share of reserves that are stored in
gold—part of an effort to diversify away from dollars, a move that gathered
pace after America froze Russia’s foreign-exchange reserves in response to
its invasion of Ukraine. Nowhere is this shift clearer than in China, which
has raised the share of its reserves held in gold from 3.3% at the end of 2021
to 4.3%. Trading has picked up in the so-called over-the-counter market, in
which central banks buy much of their gold. China’s central bank added
160,000 ounces of gold, worth $384m, in March.
The second is big institutions, such as pension or mutual funds, which may
have been making speculative bets or hedges on gold—in case inflation does
come back or as protection against future calamities. Activity in options and
futures markets, where they tend to do most of their trading, is elevated.

The third potential buyer is the most intriguing: perhaps private individuals
or companies are buying physical gold. In August it became possible to buy
hunks of the metal at Costco, an American superstore beloved by the cost-
conscious middle classes for selling jumbo-size packs of toilet paper, fluffy
athletic socks and rotisserie chickens, all at super-low prices. The retailer
started selling single-ounce bars of gold, mostly online, for around $2,000—
just a hair higher than the spot value of bullion at the time. It sold out almost
immediately, and continues to do so whenever it restocks. Analysts at Wells
Fargo, a bank, estimate that shoppers are buying $100m-200m worth of gold
each month from the superstore, alongside their sheet cakes and detergent.

That would be 40,000 to 80,000 ounces of gold each month; or, in other
words, up to half as much as the Chinese central bank. Such behaviour is
perhaps a harbinger of a trend. Inflation in America is creeping up again. It
has overshot expectations for three consecutive months, and would reach 4%
in 2024 if current trends were to continue. Medium-term expectations, which
had dropped, have begun climbing. As shoppers peruse Costco’s wares,
worrying about the cost of living, it is it any wonder they are tempted by a
bit of bullion?■

Read more from Buttonwood, our columnist on financial markets:

How to build a global currency (Apr 4th)
How the “Magnificent Seven” misleads (Mar 27th)
How to trade an election (Mar 21st)

Also: How the Buttonwood column got its name

This article was downloaded by calibre from https://www.economist.com/finance-and-
economics/2024/04/11/what-chinas-central-bank-and-costco-shoppers-have-in-common

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Free exchange

What will humans do if technology solves

everything?
Welcome to a high-tech utopia

Apr 9th 2024 |

IN “PERMUTATION CITY”, a novel by Greg Egan, the character Peer,

having achieved immortality within a virtual reality over which he has total
control, finds himself terribly bored. So he engineers himself to have new
passions. One moment he is pushing the boundaries of higher mathematics;
the next he is writing operas. “He’d even been interested in the Elysians [the
afterlife], once. No longer. He preferred to think about table legs.” Peer’s
fickleness relates to a deeper point. When technology has solved humanity’s
deepest problems, what is left to do?

That is one question considered in a new publication by Nick Bostrom, a

philosopher at the University of Oxford, whose last book argued that
humanity faced a one-in-six chance of being wiped out in the next 100 years,
perhaps owing to the development of dangerous forms of artificial
intelligence (AI). In Mr Bostrom’s latest book, “Deep Utopia”, he considers
a rather different outcome. What happens if AI goes extraordinarily well?
Under one scenario Mr Bostrom contemplates, the technology progresses to
the point at which it can do all economically valuable work at near-zero cost.
Under a yet more radical scenario, even tasks that you might think would be
reserved for humans, such as parenting, can be done better by AI. This may
sound more dystopian than utopian, but Mr Bostrom argues otherwise.

Start with the first scenario, which Mr Bostrom labels a “post-scarcity”

utopia. In such a world, the need for work would be reduced. Almost a
century ago John Maynard Keynes wrote an essay entitled “Economic
Possibilities for Our Grandchildren”, which predicted that 100 years into the
future his wealthy descendants would need to work for only 15 hours a
week. This has not quite come to pass, but working time has fallen greatly.
In the rich world average weekly working hours have dropped from more
than 60 in the late 19th century to fewer than 40 today. The typical American
spends a third of their waking hours on leisure activities and sports. In the
future, they may wish to spend their time on things beyond humanity’s
current conception. As Mr Bostrom writes, when aided by powerful tech,
“the space of possible-for-us experiences extends far beyond those that are
accessible to us with our present unoptimised brains.”

Yet Mr Bostrom’s label of a “post-scarcity” utopia might be slightly

misleading: the economic explosion caused by superintelligence would still
be limited by physical resources, most notably land. Although space
exploration may hugely increase the building space available, it will not
make it infinite. There are also intermediate worlds where humans develop
powerful new forms of intelligence, but do not become space-faring. In such
worlds, wealth may be fantastic, but lots of it could be absorbed by housing
—much as is the case in rich countries today.

“Positional goods”, which boost the status of their owners, are also still
likely to exist and are, by their nature, scarce. Even if AIs surpass humans in
art, intellect, music and sport, humans will probably continue to derive value
from surpassing their fellow humans, for example by having tickets to the
hottest events. In 1977 Fred Hirsch, an economist, argued in “The Social
Limits to Growth” that, as wealth increases, a greater fraction of human
desire consists of positional goods. Time spent competing goes up, the price
of such goods increases and so their share of GDP rises. This pattern may
continue in an AI utopia.

Mr Bostrom notes some types of competition are a failure of co-ordination:

if everyone agrees to stop competing, they would have time for other, better
things, which could further boost growth. Yet some types of competition,
such as sport, have intrinsic value, and are worth preserving. (Humans may
also have nothing better to do.) Interest in chess has grown since IBM’s
Deep Blue first defeated Garry Kasparov, then world champion, in 1997. An
entire industry has emerged around e-sports, where computers can
comfortably defeat humans. Their revenues are expected to grow at a 20%
annual rate over the next decade, reaching nearly $11bn by 2032. Several
groups in society today give us a sense of how future humans might spend
their time. Aristocrats and bohemians enjoy the arts. Monastics live within
themselves. Athletes spend their lives on sport. The retired dabble in all
these pursuits.
Everyone’s early retirement

Won’t tasks such as parenting remain the refuge of humans? Mr Bostrom is

not so sure. He argues that beyond the post-scarcity world lies a “post-
instrumental” one, in which AIs would become superhuman at child care,
too. Keynes himself wrote that “there is no country and no people, I think,
who can look forward to the age of leisure and of abundance without a
dread. For we have been trained too long to strive and not to enjoy…To
judge from the behaviour and the achievements of the wealthy classes today
in any quarter of the world, the outlook is very depressing!” The Bible puts
it more succinctly: “idle hands are the devil’s workshop.”

These dynamics suggest a “paradox of progress”. Although most humans

want a better world, if tech becomes too advanced, they may lose purpose.
Mr Bostrom argues that most people would still enjoy activities that have
intrinsic value, such as eating tasty food. Utopians, believing life had
become too easy, might decide to challenge themselves, perhaps by
colonising a new planet to try to re-engineer civilisation from scratch. At
some point, however, even such adventures might cease to feel worthwhile.
It is an open question how long humans would be happy hopping between
passions, as Peer does in “Permutation City”. Economists have long believed
that humans have “unlimited wants and desires”, suggesting there are
endless variations on things people would like to consume. With the arrival
of an AI utopia, this would be put to the test. Quite a lot would ride on the
result. ■

Read more from Free exchange, our column on economics:

Daniel Kahneman was a master of teasing questions (Apr 4th)
How India could become an Asian tiger (Mar 27th)
Why “Freakonomics” failed to transform economics (Mar 21st)

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Science & technology

How Ukraine is using AI to fight Russia
AI at war :: From target hunting to catching sanctions-busters, its war is increasingly high-tech

The first week after prison is the deadliest for ex-inmates

Prisoners’ health :: Alcohol and drugs kill many in the early days of freedom

New technology can keep whales safe from speeding ships

Conservation :: Collisions kill 20,000 every year

Bees, like humans, can preserve cultural traditions

Hive minds :: Different colonies build in competing architectural styles

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AI at war

How Ukraine is using AI to fight Russia

From target hunting to catching sanctions-busters, its war is increasingly
high-tech

Apr 8th 2024 |

IN THE RUN-UP to Ukraine’s rocket attacks on the Antonovsky Bridge, a

vital road crossing from the occupied city of Kherson to the eastern bank of
the Dnipro river, security officials carefully studied a series of special
reports. It was the summer of 2022 and Russia needed the bridge to
resupply its troops west of the Dnipro. The reports contained research into
two things: would destroying the bridge lead the Russian soldiers, or their
families back home, to panic? And, more important, how could Ukraine’s
government maximise the blow to morale by creating “a particular
information environment”?

This is how Sviatoslav Hnizdovsky, the founder of the Open Minds Institute
(OMI) in Kyiv, describes the work his research outfit did by generating
these assessments with artificial intelligence (AI). Algorithms sifted through
oceans of Russian social-media content and socioeconomic data on things
ranging from alcohol consumption and population movements to online
searches and consumer behaviour. The AI correlated any changes with the
evolving sentiments of Russian “loyalists” and liberals over the potential
plight of their country’s soldiers.

The highly sensitive work is still shaping important Ukrainian decisions

about the course of the war, says Mr Hnizdovsky. This includes potential
future strikes on Russia’s Kerch Bridge, the only direct land link between
Russia and Crimea.

Ukraine, outgunned by Russia, is increasingly seeking an edge through the

use of AI. A Ukrainian colonel involved in arms development says drone
designers commonly query ChatGPT as a “start point” for engineering
ideas, like novel techniques for reducing vulnerability to Russian jamming.
Another military use for AI, says the colonel, who requested anonymity, is
to identify targets.

As soldiers and military bloggers have wisely become more careful with
their posts, simple searches for any clues about the location of forces have
become less fruitful. By ingesting reams of images and text, however, AI
models can find potential clues, stitch them together and then surmise the
likely location of a weapons system or a troop formation. Using this
“puzzle-pieces” approach with AI allows Molfar, an intelligence firm with
offices in Dnipro and Kyiv, to typically find two to five valuable targets
every day, says Maksym Zrazhevsky, an analyst with the firm. Once
discovered, this intelligence is quickly passed along to Ukraine’s army,
resulting in some of the targets being destroyed.

Targeting is being assisted by AI in other ways. SemanticForce, a firm with

offices in Kyiv and Ternopil, a city in the west of Ukraine, develops models
that scrutinise online or uploaded text and images in response to prompts.
Many of SemanticForce’s clients use the system commercially to monitor
public sentiments about their brands. Molfar, however, uses the model to
map areas where Russian forces are likely to be low on morale and
supplies, which could make them a softer target. The AI finds clues in
pictures, including those from drone footage, and from soldiers bellyaching
on social media.

It also cobbles together clues about Russian military weaknesses using a

sneaky proxy. For this, Molfar employs SemanticForce’s AI to generate
reports on the activities of Russian volunteer groups that fundraise and
prepare care packages for the sections of the front most in need. The
algorithms, Molfar says, do a good job of discarding potentially misleading
bot posts. (Accounts with jarring political flip-flops are one tip-off.) The
firm’s analysts sometimes augment this intelligence by using software that
disguises the origin of a phone call, so that Russian volunteer groups can be
rung by staff pretending to be a Russian eager to contribute. Ten of the
company’s 45-odd analysts work on targeting, and do so free of charge for
Ukrainian forces.
Spy versus AI

Then there is counter-intelligence. The use of AI helps Ukraine’s

spycatchers identify people whom Oleksiy Danilov, until recently secretary
of the National Security and Defence Council (NSDC), describes as “prone
to betrayal”. Offers to earn money by taking geolocated pictures of
infrastructure and military assets are often sent to Ukrainian phones, says
Dmytro Zolotukhin, a former Ukrainian deputy minister for information
policy. He recently received one such text himself. People who give this
“market for intelligence services” a shot, he adds, are regularly nabbed by
Ukraine’s SBU intelligence agency.

Using AI from Palantir, an American firm, Ukrainian counter-intelligence

fishes for illuminating linkages in disparate pools of data. Imagine, for
instance, an indebted divorcee at risk of losing custody of his children
whose phone has been detected near a site later struck by missiles. If, say,
the hypothetical divorcee has strong personal ties to Russia and has begun
to take calls from someone whose phone use suggests a higher social status,
then AI may use such “social-network analysis” to increase his risk score.

Such AI assessments of interactions among a network’s nodes have

impressed experts for over a decade. Kristian Gustafson, a former British
intelligence officer who advised Afghanistan’s interior ministry in 2013,
recounts the capture of a courier transporting wads of cash for Taliban
bigwigs. Their ensuing phone calls, he says, “lit up the whole diagram”.
Subsequent algorithmic advances for calculating things like “betweenness
centrality”, a measure of influence, make those days look, as another former
intelligence officer puts it, “pretty primitive”.

In addition, network analysis helps Ukrainian investigators identify

violators of sanctions on Russia. By connecting data in ship registries with
financial records held elsewhere, the software can “pierce the corporate
veil”, a source says. Mr Zolotukhin says hackers are providing “absolutely
enormous” caches of stolen business data to Ukrainian agencies. This is a
boon for combating sanctions-busting.

The use of AI has been developing for some time. Volodymyr Zelensky,
Ukraine’s president, called for a massive boost in the use of the technology
for national security in November 2019. The result is a strategically minded
model built and run by the NSDC that ingests text, statistics, photos and
video. Called the Centre of Operations for Threats Assessment (COTA), it is
fed a wide range of information, some obtained by hackers, says Andriy
Ziuz, NSDC’s head of staff. The model tracks prices, phone usage,
migration, trade, energy, politics, diplomacy and military developments
down to the number of weapons in repair shops.

Operators at COTA call this model a “constructor”. This is because it also

ingests output from smaller models such as Palantir’s software and Delta,
battlefield software that supports the Ukrainian army’s manoeuvre
decisions. COTA’s “bigger picture” output provides senior officials with
guidance on sensitive matters, including mobilisation policy, says Mykola
Dobysh, NSDC’s chief technologist. Mr Danilov notes that Mr Zelensky
has been briefed on COTA’s assessments more than 130 times, once at
10am on the day of Russia’s full invasion. Access to portions (or “circuits”)
of COTA is provided to some others, including insurers, foreign ministries
and America’s Department of Energy.

Ukraine’s AI effort benefits from its society’s broad willingness to

contribute data for the war effort. Citizens upload geotagged photos
potentially relevant for the country’s defence into a government app called
Diia (Ukrainian for “action”). Many businesses supply Mantis Analytics, a
firm in Lviv, with data on everything from late deliveries to call-centre
activity and the setting off of burglar alarms. Recipients of the platform’s
assessments of societal functioning include the defence ministry and
companies seeking to deploy their own security resources in better ways.

How much difference all this will ultimately make is still unclear. Evan
Platt of Zero Line, an NGO in Kyiv that provides kit to troops and who
spends time at the front studying fighting effectiveness, describes Ukraine’s
use of AI as a “bright spot”. But there are concerns. One is that enthusiasm
for certain AI security applications may divert resources that would provide
more bang for the buck elsewhere. Excessive faith in hyped models is
another risk.

More dramatically, might AI prove to be a net negative for Ukraine’s

battlefield performance? A few think so. One is John Arquilla, a professor
emeritus at the Naval Postgraduate School in California who has written
influential books on warfare and advised Pentagon leaders. Ukraine’s
biggest successes came early in the war when decentralised networks of
small units were encouraged to improvise. Today, Ukraine’s AI “constructor
process”, he argues, is centralising decision-making, snuffing out creative
sparks “at the edges”. His assessment is open to debate. But it underscores
the importance of human judgment in how any technology is used. ■

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Prisoners’ health

The first week after prison is the deadliest for ex-

inmates
Alcohol and drugs kill many in the early days of freedom

Apr 11th 2024 |

EVERY YEAR more than 30m people are released from behind bars. Many
leave much as they enter—in very poor health. People who end up in prison
have higher rates of infections such as HIV and hepatitis; cognitive
disabilities; mental illness and addictions. Prisoners tend to have several of
these problems, often rooted in abuse or other trauma. Unsurprisingly, ex-
prisoners die earlier than those who have never been incarcerated. What is
striking is how many deaths occur within days of release.
A paper in the Lancet on April 10th by an international research consortium
led by Rohan Borschmann from the University of Melbourne and Stuart
Kinner from Curtin University, in Perth, sums up an analysis of the records
of nearly 1.5m prisoners released between 1980 and 2018 in America,
Australia, Brazil, Canada, New Zealand, Norway, Scotland and Sweden.
These ex-prisoners were followed up by consortium members for an average
of seven years. The researchers found that mortality was highest in the first
week following release and fell dramatically after that (see chart). In the first
week it was more than twice as high as it was a month later. (The researchers
excluded the spike in deaths on day one, which they discovered was partly
due to recording errors for inmates who had died in custody.)

In the first few weeks on the outside alcohol and drug poisoning represented
the leading cause of death in every country except for Brazil (where deaths
from violence predominated). One possible explanation is that enforced
abstinence when in prison makes an addict’s body less able to handle their
usual dose, increasing the risk of fatal intoxication thereafter. Deaths from
alcohol and drugs remained high beyond the first week of freedom but were
eventually overtaken by the combined deaths from suicides, accidents and
disease.

These results, if put to use, could save lives. Upon their release, prisoners
with opioid addiction could be provided with naloxone, a drug that treats
opioid overdose. This has been tried in parts of Canada since 2016, with
naloxone kits given to prisoners upon release, on the assumption that either
they or a close contact would be likely to need it. (The consequences of this
intervention were outside the scope of this week’s paper.) Ensuring better
access to mental-health services in the first weeks after release could also be
beneficial.

A study from the Netherlands published in 2021 found that prison has no net
effect on inmates’ pre-existing health. Someone who goes in unwell, in other
words, comes out unwell. Appropriate care behind bars could change that,
helping prisoners better face what awaits them outside. ■

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Conservation

New technology can keep whales safe from

speeding ships
Collisions kill 20,000 every year

Apr 11th 2024 |

ON MARCH 3RD a whale calf washed ashore in Georgia, on America’s east

coast, bearing slash marks characteristic of a ship’s propeller. Less than a
month later another whale, a recent mother, was found floating off the coast
of Virginia. Her back was broken from the blunt-force trauma of a ship
collision; her calf, missing and still meant to be nursing, is not expected to
live. Three deaths within weeks is not good news for the North Atlantic right
whales, of which only about 360 remain.

They are dying mainly because of human activity, and they are not alone.
Ship collisions threaten whale populations worldwide, killing up to 20,000
individuals annually. With global ocean traffic forecast to rise by at least
240% by 2050, the problem will balloon. But a new movement is using
technology to fight back. On April 11th a Californian strike-prevention
programme expanded operations across North American waters. Other
countries are following suit.

Whale Safe launched in 2020, two years after the number of whales killed by
collisions in California reached a record high of 14. Callie Leiphardt, the
scientist leading the project at the Benioff Ocean Science Laboratory, says
that for every killed whale found, ten more are thought to die unrecorded.
That so many were dying despite voluntary speed limits suggested more
robust interventions were needed. The team reasoned that by alerting ships
to whales, and publicising which shipping companies ignored the speed
limit, they might increase compliance and bring down deaths.

Their approach rests on listening for whales underwater using microphone-

equipped buoys capable of separating low-frequency whale calls from the
ocean’s background noise. Vetted detections are then fed into Whale Safe’s
alert tool, alongside sightings and model-based predictions, to tell nearby
skippers to slow down. The team then monitors ships’ speeds within
established slow zones via a widespread GPS-tracking system and awards
parent companies marks from A to F, visible online. With this week’s
expansion to the east coast, Whale Safe will now assess companies across all
slow-speed zones in North America.

How many whales have been saved is hard to say. But since Whale Safe first
launched, Californian collisions seem to be decreasing: only four were
reported in 2022, compared with 11 the year before. In the Santa Barbara
channel, a collision hotspot, the proportion of ships that slow down has also
been rising—from 46% in 2019 to 63.5% in 2023.

The idea is also catching on elsewhere. In 2022 Chile moored its first
acoustic buoy to alert ships to blue, sei, humpback and southern-right
whales. That same year Greek researchers published the results of a trial
using buoys to detect sperm whales in the Mediterranean and to pinpoint
their location in three dimensions, informed by work on the black boxes of
lost planes. Another European project, led by a consortium of NGOs and
naval companies, is developing detection boxes that use thermal and infrared
cameras, alongside other sensors, to help ships spot whales early.
For Mark Baumgartner at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in
Massachusetts, who pioneered the use of acoustic buoys, the real solution
lies in changing ships’ behaviour. After all, spotting a whale is useful only if
the ship is moving slowly enough to react. This is why Canada has expanded
mandatory speed restrictions to ever more areas where right whales live;
America is considering doing the same. The International Maritime
Organisation, a UN agency, created a “Particularly Sensitive Sea Area” in
the north-western Mediterranean last summer, the first such area explicitly
created to mitigate ship strikes. Several companies are now rerouting ships
away from sperm-whale habitats there. Similar efforts are under way in Sri
Lanka and New Zealand.

It will not all be plain sailing. Some overlap between ships and whales is
inevitable in busy ports. What’s more, slow container ships can still kill
whales, as can smaller boats. Many coastal communities, whose economies
rely on their ports and harbours, often resist stricter measures, such as
mandatory speed limits or no-go areas. With all that in mind, it is easy to feel
pessimistic on behalf of a species like the North Atlantic right whale. But
like all whales that used to be hunted for meat and blubber, it has bounced
back from the brink of extinction before. According to Dr Baumgartner,
“Everyone that works on right whales has hope.” ■

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Hive minds

Bees, like humans, can preserve cultural traditions

Different colonies build in competing architectural styles

Apr 10th 2024 |

WHEN IT COMES to architectural accomplishments, humans like to think

they stand at the top of the pyramid. That is to underestimate the astonishing
achievements of social insects: termites raise skyscraping nests and
honeybees fashion mesmerisingly geometric combs. The true master
builders of the insect world, however, are the hundreds of species of
stingless bee, native to the tropics and subtropics, which weave combs of
unparalleled variety and intricacy inside hollow tree trunks or other cavities.

Now a group of evolutionary biologists led by Viviana Di Pietro at KU

Leuven, in Belgium, reports that, like humans, these tiny-brained creatures
are capable of building according to different architectural traditions which
are then handed down over generations.
The finding, published in Current Biology, is the clearest demonstration yet
of cultural differences spontaneously appearing in insects. Insect culture
would once have been thought impossible, says behavioural biologist
Andrew Whiten of the University of St Andrews, who was not involved in
the research. “Less than a century ago, culture was thought to be uniquely
human.”

To collect their data, Ms Di Pietro and her colleagues observed more than
400 colonies of the stingless bee species Scaptotrigona depilis in a large
apiary in Brazil over two extended periods in 2022 and 2023. Around 95%
of the colonies exhibited combs built up in horizontal layers, like tiered
wedding cakes, while the remainder adopted a spiral structure. In each case
the tradition was maintained over many generations of worker bees.

Since S. depilis shows a strong preference for a horizontal-layer comb

structure, it is surprising that spiral combs occur at all. Capturing the insects’
behaviour on video, the team established that there was no difference in
average cell-building rate between the two styles, and hence no efficiency
advantage to either.

In order to rule out a genetic explanation for the different styles, the
researchers transplanted workers from colonies that built in one tradition to
colonies that built in the other, having first emptied the host structures of
their indigenous adults. The imported workers soon switched to the local
style, which was then perpetuated by the colony’s own larvae as they
eventually matured into workers.

Tom Wenseleers, who runs the lab in which Ms Di Pietro is a doctoral

student, hypothesised that the bees may switch styles as a way of coping
with the build-up of minuscule construction errors made by their
predecessors. Such a process, in which multiple organisms indirectly affect
each other’s behaviour through the traces they leave on their environment, is
known as stigmergy. To test whether stigmergy was in fact responsible for
the stylistic schism between bee colonies, the researchers introduced a hint
of helicity to otherwise perfect horizontal-layer combs, and found that it did
indeed prompt the bees to switch to building spirals. That is strong evidence
in favour of Dr Wenseleers’s hypothesis.
These results have left observers of animal culture abuzz, as they suggest
that stingless bees can transmit different building traditions across
generations without individuals needing to be instructed by their peers. This
is a more expansive way of thinking about culture, which is often rigidly
defined as behaviour directly transmitted from individual to individual until
it becomes characteristic of a group.

For Dr Whiten, the new finding indicates that more complex animal
behaviours—the building of dams by beavers or nests by chimpanzees, for
instance—may also have arisen through such indirect transmission. Though
it is too early to know for certain, say scientists, it is possible that some
human traditions could have stigmergic roots too.

Bees may not be done confounding expectations. In recent laboratory

experiments with bumblebees, Lars Chittka, a behavioural ecologist at
Queen Mary University of London, found that they were capable of learning
cumulatively—that is, adopting and expanding upon the innovations of
previous generations. The team trained “demonstrator bees” to open a
complicated two-step puzzle box (in which blue and red tabs had to be
pushed out of the way to reveal a solution of sucrose), and then observed
other insects learning the right technique from the demonstrators. Such
cumulative culture, which does require social learning, was previously
thought to be unique to humans. It may be long past time to make room at
the top of that pyramid. ■

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Culture
Americans are turning to stories of civil war, real and
imagined
Return to Gettysburg :: The real risks America faces are more insidious

How to protect an endangered language

Johnson :: A new book looks at the threats facing six small languages and the efforts to save
them

An enthralling account of Captain Cook’s final, fatal

voyage
Sailing close to the wind :: Hampton Sides also takes on the complex legacy of the British
explorer

Adelle Waldman’s new novel follows workers in a big-box

store
Barely gettin’ by :: “Help Wanted” is based on the author’s own stint employed by one

Flat whites are Australia’s greatest culinary export

World in a dish :: They are even better than Vegemite

The drawbacks—and benefits—of solitude

All by myself :: Three books examine the perils and pleasures of being alone

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Return to Gettysburg

Americans are turning to stories of civil war, real

and imagined
The real risks America faces are more insidious

Apr 11th 2024 |

CALIFORNIA AND Texas, calling themselves the Western Forces, have

seceded from the Union. Other states are following suit. The president,
installed for an unconstitutional third term, vows that the uprising will be
quashed quickly. He harnesses the full strength of America’s army and
authorises the use of drone strikes on civilians. The Western Forces march
on, determined to take the White House.

“Civil War” arrives in cinemas on April 12th. The film does not offer an
explanation of how this fictional version of America descended into chaos;
instead, it follows a group of journalists and immerses the viewer in the fog
of war. According to Alex Garland, the writer-director, anyone who has
followed American politics in recent years will “know exactly what the fault
lines and pressures are”. Perhaps he sees no need to point out the country’s
bitter polarisation, the loss of faith in the organs of government or the threat
posed by a former president who thinks democratic norms are for other
people.

In the wake of the attacks of January 6th 2021—when a mob of Donald

Trump’s supporters stormed the Capitol in an attempt to block the transfer of
power—the threat of insurrection has felt uncomfortably real. A full-scale
civil war remains wildly improbable, given the strength of America’s
institutions and the professionalism of its armed forces. Yet according to a
poll conducted by YouGov in 2022, 43% of Americans think such a war is
“at least somewhat likely” to break out in the coming decade. Nearly 25%
want their home state to secede from the Union. Marjorie Taylor Greene, a
Trumpier-than-Trump congresswoman from Georgia, has said that: “We
need to separate by red states and blue states.” In 2021 the Nation, a left-
wing magazine, ran an essay titled “The case for blue-state secession”.

For some Americans, then, “Civil War” offers a horrifying vision of the
future. “This isn’t just a film. It’s a premonition,” one person wrote
underneath the trailer on YouTube. Trump fans have declared that the movie
is “predictive programming” as “there will be a civil war after they use
illegals to steal the 2024 election.”

The film joins a burgeoning genre: writers are gripped by the idea of a
second American civil war. In a novel from 2017 by Omar El Akkad, some
southern states secede after the federal government bans fossil fuels. In
“DMZ” (2022), a miniseries, America is divided between the United States
and the secessionist Free States.

In “Flyover”, an absorbing novel by Douglas Kennedy which came out last

year in France (it is awaiting publication in English), the United States has
been succeeded by the United Republic and the United Confederacy. The
United Republic is an offshoot of the Democratic Party and a purported
bastion of progressivism on the coasts; the United Confederacy, its
Republican counterpart, is a Christian theocracy spanning the Midwest and
the South. “What I am trying to do is just say, ‘Pay attention here,’” Mr
Kennedy reflects.
It is not just storytellers, either. Academics have also been ringing alarm
bells in books such as “How Civil Wars Start” (2022) by Barbara Walter, a
political scientist, and “The Next Civil War” (2022) by Stephen Marche, an
essayist. Both assert that the Union is in a fragile, rancorous state. “The
United States is a textbook example of a country headed towards civil war,”
Mr Marche has claimed, pointing to, among other things, Americans’ lack of
faith in the merits of democracy. (According to the Pew Research Centre, a
pollster, last year public trust in the federal government reached a near-
record low.)

Many Americans prefer accounts of their country’s actual civil war to

speculation about a future one. Some 60,000 books have been published on
that conflict—more than the number of soldiers who died at Gettysburg, the
war’s bloodiest battle. The fighting in 1861-65 “holds a central place in the
American imagination”, says Fredrik Logevall, a professor of history at
Harvard University. “Each generation since 1865 has assessed and then
reassessed the meaning of the civil war.”

Andrew Preston, a historian at Cambridge University, says the war “is a

touchstone whenever Americans are in a crisis”. In the 1930s, amid the Great
Depression, Franklin Roosevelt repeatedly invoked the conflict to underline
the seriousness of the economic situation. He also intended to provide some
comfort to the American people, for if their ancestors could go through hell
and survive, they could too.

During the civil-rights movement of the 1960s American politicians looked

to Abraham Lincoln as someone who abolished slavery and acted “with
malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right”. In 1963
Martin Luther King chose to deliver his “I Have a Dream” speech on the
steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, to invoke the legacy of the
president and to show that the fight for racial equality that Lincoln had
championed was not yet finished. Yet, as divided as America looked in the
1930s and 1960s, Professors Logevall and Preston insist there was never any
serious talk that a second civil war would erupt.

Today, breathless histories of the civil war advertise their lessons for the
present day. In “The Demon of Unrest”, published later this month, Erik
Larson adroitly chronicles the events in the lead-up to the South’s secession
in 1861. He follows a cast of characters and uses diaries and letters to trace
their thinking. “What I was trying to chronicle, really, is the forces that
caused Americans to actually begin to imagine the wholesale killing of one
another, and how that came to pass.”

During the research, Mr Larson says he was struck by the similarities in

political discourse between the mid-19th century and today. Several
novelists envisioned that a civil war would break out between northern and
southern states. Much as Mr Trump’s followers are convinced that the
election of 2020 was stolen from him, southern states did not recognise
Lincoln as the legitimate president, even though he had been democratically
elected. This era of history is not “some dusty old thing from the past. This is
the story for now,” says Mr Larson.

In looking to that past, many today yearn for a political leader like Lincoln.
In 2022 Jon Meacham released “And There Was Light”, a paean; last
October “Differ We Must”, an admiring biography by Steve Inskeep, became
a bestseller shortly after publication. Both books emphasise that lawmakers
have much to learn from Lincoln’s ability to reach across divides.

A prudent assessment of the risks facing modern America would focus on

less dramatic ones, such as Mr Trump’s probable undermining of democratic
institutions during a second presidency, or the spread of hate-fanning
falsehoods. But civil war makes for more exciting movies. In Mr Garland’s
film, the Western Forces eventually reach Washington, DC, and a bomb goes
off at the Lincoln Memorial, ripping out the neoclassical columns. ■

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Johnson

How to protect an endangered language

A new book looks at the threats facing six small languages and the efforts to
save them

Apr 11th 2024 |

Language City. By Ross Perlin. Atlantic Monthly Press; 432 pages; $28.
Grove Press; £19.99

OF THE WORLD’S 7,000-odd languages, almost half are expected to

disappear by the end of the 21st century. Two culprits are usually
considered responsible for this decline. The first is colonialism: when great
powers conquered countries, they imposed their language in government
and schools and relegated local ones (or banned them outright). The second
is capitalism. As countries grow and industrialise, people move to cities for
work. They increasingly find themselves speaking the bigger language used
in the workplace rather than the smaller one used at home.

English, as the most dominant language in the history of the world, often
stands as a symbol of homogenisation and the steamrolling of smaller
cultures. So it may come as a surprise that the most linguistically diverse
spot on Earth spans a few square miles in New York. Ross Perlin’s new
book, “Language City”, is the story of what he has learned as the co-
founder of the Endangered Language Alliance, a non-profit organisation
that has managed to identify some 700 languages spoken in New York, a
number vastly greater than the 100 or so listed in America’s official census.

Mr Perlin profiles speakers of six languages. Each tongue is threatened by

different, larger neighbours. (English is by no means the only linguistic
juggernaut.) Seke, from Nepal, is squeezed by Nepali and Tibetan. Wakhi,
from Central Asia, sits between Chinese, Persian and Russian; its speakers
also usually speak Tajik with others from their home country.
Nahuatl—though not a tiny language, as it is spoken by more than 1.6m
indigenous Mexicans—is giving way to Spanish. N’Ko, a sort of alphabet-
cum-written-standard meant to serve several closely related Manding
languages of west Africa, must compete with French, the language of
prestige in the region. Yiddish is losing out to English in New York and to
Hebrew in Israel. As the language of secular Ashkenazi Jews it is nearing
extinction (though it is flourishing among the ultra-Orthodox).

The people Mr Perlin meets are multilingual by necessity. Together they

speak more than 30 languages; each person has “to move nimbly from one
linguistic ecology to another”, he writes. They refuse to stop using their
cherished language—despite incentives to do so—in order to preserve
something of the associated culture.

The death of languages often follows the same pattern. Conquest and
colonisation lead to poverty, and sometimes an internalised shame. As a
result, parents often choose to raise their children in a bigger language for
their own economic benefit. Whether a language disappears altogether is
determined by the next generation: many assimilate and their language is
lost for good. But sometimes they may try to reverse the decline.

Can outsiders aid preservation? Many speakers of small languages treat

them as a kind of sacred or scarce good that outsiders do harm to by
learning and documenting; they do not think of their languages as objects of
scientific curiosity. So those trying to help, including Mr Perlin, are
learning to tread carefully. (In the book he describes an initially wary
encounter with the last known native speaker of Lenape, New York’s own
indigenous language.)

Tim Brookes, a British writer and the executive director of the Endangered
Alphabets Project, another non-profit group, describes his own approach in
his recent book, “Writing Beyond Writing”. He makes a persuasive case
that linguists have long neglected writing systems in their well-intentioned
push to give dignity to spoken as well as written languages. Linguists have
tended to ignore the wonderful and hugely varied scripts that are threatened
by behemoths including the Latin, Arabic, Devanagari and Chinese
systems. As well as research and advocacy, Mr Brookes makes beautiful
wood carvings in the scripts he describes. Like Mr Perlin, he is careful
always to put the native users of a language at the heart of the story. The
field has no time for white-saviour narratives anymore.

Julia Sallabank, a linguist at the School of Oriental and African Studies at

the University of London, has described how experts have historically
approached languages in danger of extinction. In decades past a Western
linguist would show up, learn as much as possible, then publish the results
back home. In time, academics came to assist the language community by
producing grammar books, dictionaries and recordings for speakers to use
and pass down. Next came collaboration. Scholars and activists would sit
down together to work out exactly what the group needed for the language
to thrive.

The final step has proved to be the hardest: work by the language
community, with leaders taking charge of the process and outsiders
providing funding and advice. It is the platonic ideal of language
revitalisation but is far from the universal one. It is possible in places like
America and Australia, rich countries starting to recognise the wrongs done
to their indigenous peoples. But much language loss is going on, often in
undemocratic countries with little time for troublesome minorities. What
Western experts certainly can do is raise the alarm—and show what they
have learned from their own past. ■

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Sailing close to the wind

An enthralling account of Captain Cook’s final,

fatal voyage
Hampton Sides also takes on the complex legacy of the British explorer

Apr 8th 2024 |

The Wide Wide Sea. By Hampton Sides. Doubleday; 432 pages; $35.
Michael Joseph; £25

UNTIL RECENTLY Captain James Cook was not a particularly

controversial figure. But in January a statue of the 18th-century British
explorer was toppled in Melbourne and the words “The colony will fall”
spray-painted on the plinth. In Hawaii an obelisk in Cook’s memory has
been splattered with red paint and the message “You are on native land.”
Cook has joined Edward Colston and Cecil Rhodes as a focal point for anti-
colonialist ire.
Yet Cook was neither a slave trader nor much of an imperialist. He was, first
and foremost, a brilliant navigator and cartographer. Acting under Admiralty
orders, he undertook three pioneering voyages in the Pacific between 1768
and 1779. His mapmaking transformed Europeans’ knowledge of the world’s
largest ocean.

An excellent new book draws on Cook’s letters and notebooks to tell the
story of his third and final trip. Cook was almost 50 when he set off on HMS
Resolution in July 1776. Among the crew he took were William Bligh (later
captain of the Bounty before the mutiny in 1789) and Mai, a Tahitian prince
noted for being painted by Sir Joshua Reynolds. Cook had secret instructions
from the Admiralty not only to claim new territory for Britain, but to search
for a north-west passage via the Bering Strait (a task even someone with his
navigational experience found impossible).

The author, Hampton Sides, focuses on Cook’s return to Australia and New
Zealand—countries the explorer had first encountered almost a decade
earlier—his discovery of the Society Islands (today part of French
Polynesia) and his time in Hawaii. It was there, in February 1779, that he
was killed after a botched attempt to kidnap a local chief in response to the
theft of a longboat.

Cook was a man of his era. He believed Europe would have a civilising
influence on many benighted folk in the Pacific. He was cruel when meting
out punishments, to his own crew as well as to any indigenous people who
opposed him.

At the same time, Cook admired many of the people and places he
encountered in the South Pacific. Unlike the Spanish, he had no interest in
religious conversion. He tried hard to stop his men from spreading venereal
disease. For the most part, his land claims were aimed not at promoting a
British empire but forestalling grabs by its rivals, France and Spain.

As the author makes clear, there is a balance to be struck between justified

admiration for Cook’s seamanship and a legitimate resentment of the
colonialism that followed indigenous peoples’ first contact with Europeans.
Today many Western countries are divided over how to think about such
vexed legacies. In 2020 half of Britons thought it was right that Colston’s
statue was removed (though many disapproved of it being dumped in Bristol
harbour). Cook’s statue still stands in London, as does Rhodes’s in Oxford.
The question is whether they will enjoy their perches much longer. ■

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Barely gettin’ by

Adelle Waldman’s new novel follows workers in a

big-box store
“Help Wanted” is based on the author’s own stint employed by one

Apr 11th 2024 |

Help Wanted. By Adelle Waldman. W.W. Norton; 288 pages; $28.99.

Serpent’s Tail; £16.99

ADELLE WALDMAN’S sharp-eyed observations of intellectuals in

Brooklyn chasing book deals and bedmates made her first novel, “The Love
Affairs of Nathanial P.” (2013), a hit. For her follow-up, she has traded the
excesses of the urban elite for the struggles of unskilled workers farther
afield. This may sound dreary, but “Help Wanted” is a lively, humane book.

To write about the employees of a big-box store in upstate New York, Ms

Waldman spent months working at one herself, earning $12.25 an hour
unloading trucks of merchandise at 4am. Many of her colleagues had been
working at the shop for years, but their hours were limited and
unpredictable, which made it hard for them to make plans, get a second job
or reliably cover their bills.

Town Square, the shop in “Help Wanted”, is a rare source of jobs in a town
that has seen better days. The fictional Potterstown still hasn’t recovered
from losing an office of IBM, a computer firm, to Mexico decades ago. The
employees who show up to the “dungeon-like” warehouse in the small hours
are not thrilled by their lives, but they are grateful to be there.

Ms Waldman probes the needs of this motley morning team, such as Nicole,
a young mother with an unemployed fiancé, who hides her anxiety about
how she will feed her daughter beneath “an air of boredom and free-floating
hostility”. These affectionate portraits chronicle the rough luck of people
who cannot afford university and who struggle to make ends meet or, in
some cases, to stay out of prison.

Yet the book’s light tone and brisk pace keep it from getting bogged down.
The novel’s drama comes from a scheme the workers concoct to get rid of
their cartoonishly terrible manager by getting her promoted, which would
also open up a rare managerial job at the store. Each character dreams of the
life they might lead if only they had a salary and benefits.

The employees of Town Square enjoy their shared rituals and take pleasure
in their “sense of mastery” as they expertly stack boxes and arrange displays.
Their pride is real but fragile, threatened by greedy employers, monopolistic
e-tailers and the prospect of automation, which looms ominously near the
end of the book. ■

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World in a dish

Flat whites are Australia’s greatest culinary export

They are even better than Vegemite

Apr 11th 2024 |

ON ANY GIVEN day Shoreditch, a trendy part of London’s East End, is a

flurry of hipsters clutching artfully designed takeaway cups. Between April
11th and 14th some 30,000 caffeine-keen people will descend on the area for
the London Coffee Festival. Many visitors will be ordering flat whites. The
drink has rapidly gained popularity among those who want to taste their
beans rather than temper them.

Flat whites, which originated in Australia and New Zealand in the 1980s, are
powerful yet smooth. Two shots of espresso are combined with between 140
and 180 millilitres of gently steamed milk and crowned with a sliver of
“microfoam”. The result is punchy and, if done well, a little sweet: less
milky than a latte and not as frothy as a cappuccino.
Australia’s coffee-making prowess is fairly recent. Tea was the preferred
beverage for British settlers in the 18th century; as a result, no one seemed to
know how to make a decent cup of joe. Beans were not roasted, but boiled.
To improve the taste, people added chicory, a bitter endive, egg shells or
mustard. In a letter to a newspaper in 1939, one man complained that
Australia’s coffee “punishes the drinker”.

During the second world war, American servicemen stationed in the Pacific
refused to drink such concoctions and demanded that the Antipodeans up
their game. The Greek and Italian immigrants who arrived after the war
brought expertise. Commercial espresso-makers reached the country in the
1950s. Peter Bancroft had tasted proper coffee on holiday in London and,
with the help of his father, began importing Italian machines.

Australia’s cafés take in A$10bn ($6.6bn) a year, the most per person of any
country outside Europe. Some 95% of the country’s 14,000 cafés are
independently owned. It is a market in which Starbucks has struggled. The
firm opened 84 shops in 2000, but has closed many; it posted a profit in
Australia for the first time last year.

Much of the country has an unfavourable climate for coffee plants, so it

imports far more beans than it sells. However, along with avocado toast and
Vegemite, flat whites are one of Australia’s great culinary exports. In the past
year one in three British consumers ordered the beverage; Pret A Manger
alone sold 8m to thirsty Brits. (The company sold 9m cappuccinos, but says
the gap between the pick-me-ups is shrinking.) Americans are increasingly
sipping flat whites, too.

At COP, the UN’s annual climate summit, the Australian pavilion has
become a social hub. Not because of the country’s green credentials—it is
one of the world’s top exporters of coal and natural gas. Instead, what makes
Australia so popular is the barista the delegation brings along. Call it flat-
white diplomacy. ■

Read more from The World in a Dish, our column on food:

“Perpetual stew”, an ancient way of cooking, has won Gen Z fans (Apr 4th)
How moussaka made it into the pantheon of Greek gastronomy (Mar 25th)
For a Christmas drink, eggnog does not have a heartwarming history (Dec
15th)

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All by myself

The drawbacks—and benefits—of solitude

Three books examine the perils and pleasures of being alone

Apr 5th 2024 |

All the Lonely People. By Sam Carr. Picador; 256 pages; £11.99. To be
published in America in December; $28.99

Solitude. By Netta Weinstein, Heather Hansen and Thuy-vy Nguyen.

Cambridge University Press; 300 pages; $25.95 and £20

The Triumph of the Slippers. By Pascal Bruckner. Translated by Cory

Stockwell. Wiley; 118 pages; $19.95. Polity; £16.99

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE, that great coiner, is given credit for the word
“lonely”. Coriolanus, one of his heroes, compares going into exile to a
“lonely dragon” retreating to his lair. The Roman general was talking about a
physical state: someone who was lonely was simply alone.
Then, thanks to the Romantic poets, the word took on emotional overtones.
Loneliness became a condition of the soul. For William Wordsworth, who
famously “wandered lonely as a cloud”, the natural world offered a reprieve
from negative feelings of isolation—a host of daffodils could provide
“jocund company”.

By the early 20th century loneliness was considered one of the defining
afflictions of urban life. Hannah Arendt, a political theorist, lamented that a
feeling that was “once a borderline experience usually suffered in certain
marginal social conditions like old age, has become an everyday experience
of the ever-growing masses”.

Her concerns resonate today, as loneliness is frequently identified as a

serious public-health problem, an epidemic even, that besets the elderly and
young alike. During the covid-19 pandemic half of Britons reported often
feeling lonely; those aged between 16 and 24 struggled the most.
Smartphones, social media, online dating and working from home are all
blamed for feelings of alienation. Three recent books have taken on the
subject.

In “All the Lonely People” Sam Carr, a psychologist, collects stories of

individuals who feel cut off or forsaken. A teenage Afghan refugee struggles
to blend in at school in Somerset. An octogenarian languishes in a retirement
home. Mr Carr handles this material sensitively, weaving their experiences
together with his own, in particular his role as a single parent.

The author evokes the pain of bereavement, heartbreak and childhood

trauma and underlines the stigma attached to being withdrawn and
friendless. Somehow, the book is not an unbearably bleak read, but you do
wonder whether loneliness is just an unavoidable part of the human
condition. The range of testimonies also suggests that loneliness is not a
single feeling so much as a name for a medley of emotions and unsatisfied
appetites.

For “Solitude” Netta Weinstein and Thuy-vy Nguyen, two psychology

professors, have teamed up with Heather Hansen, a science journalist, to
ponder the rewards of time spent alone. They begin with an account of the
mythology of solitude created by figures such as Michel de Montaigne, an
essayist, and Edward Hopper, a painter. They then draw on laboratory work,
interviews and surveys to illuminate how being alone really affects the
human psyche.

It is common to treat loneliness and solitude as synonyms, but they are not.
The authors suggest that what is negatively portrayed as one state can be
positively reframed as the other. To this end they emphasise the restorative
possibilities of being alone and include practical guidance. In a noisy and
crowded world, they argue, people should make time to be by oneself, away
from attention-grabbing stimuli.

The book’s interviewees mostly regard a lack of company as conducive to

autonomy. But this depends on whether solitude is elective or enforced. If it
is enforced, as it is for social outcasts and some prisoners, for instance, it is
often wretched. Elective solitude, by contrast, above all in natural settings,
affords space for reflection. It can open the door to “peak experiences” such
as wonder, awe, harmony, even ecstasy. (In a hyper-connected digital age,
many readers may not fancy their chances of ever being unplugged long
enough to have such experiences.)

Pascal Bruckner sees a world shrinking from sociability in favour of snug

seclusion. “The Triumph of the Slippers” is grounded not in research but in
the French tradition of witty social criticism. Mr Bruckner, a philosopher and
polemicist, dubs the present period “a Great Withdrawal”. As he sees it, the
openness of the late 20th century is over, and “the closing of minds and
spaces is well under way.” People may like living in “authorised sloppiness”,
yet it is hard to imagine heroes and trailblazers wearing dressing gowns:
“While it’s nice to be comfortable, you can’t build a civilisation on
softness.”

With a mixture of playfulness and grandiosity, he describes a society where

most tasks can be completed without leaving the house. His book overflows
with soundbites—the public sphere, for example, is dominated by “orgies of
pettiness”—and he peppers his short chapters with references to Nietzsche,
Plato and Rousseau.

Though his argument spins off in many directions, Mr Bruckner’s main

theme is the need for people to relearn the art of intimacy. “Interactive
solitude”, enabled by technology, is no substitute for “the great theatre of the
world”. Mr Bruckner supplies a checklist for warding off enduring, corrosive
feelings of loneliness: “Have we loved enough, given enough, lavished
enough, embraced enough?” If these books are right, many readers will find
themselves answering “No.” ■

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The Economist reads

What to read about golf
Five books on a sport that inspires enthusiasm—and provokes frustration

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The Economist reads

What to read about golf

Five books on a sport that inspires enthusiasm—and provokes frustration

Apr 11th 2024 |

THE PINK and purple azaleas are in majestic bloom. Augusta National golf
course is immaculate, thanks to a small army of groundsmen, gardeners and
volunteers, for the start of the Masters on April 11th. It is the eagerly awaited
first of the four “major” men’s golf tournaments of the season.

Like baseball and cricket, golf has inspired writing of the highest quality.
P.G. Wodehouse wrote whimsically about his favourite game. John
Betjeman, who was buried near the tenth green of a rugged Cornish golf
course, wrote a delightful poem, “Seaside Golf”, about scoring a birdie on
one of its toughest par fours. Perhaps John Updike best described the
novelist’s attraction to this most frustrating of sports. “It is of all games the
most mysterious, the least earthbound, the one wherein the wall between us
and the supernatural is rubbed thinnest.” Its detractors may say that a round
of golf is a “good walk spoiled” (the title of a fine book by John Feinstein).
But they are wrong. Here are five of the best golf books, chosen from a long
and worthy list, that demonstrate why.

GOLF IS MY GAME. By Bobby Jones. Doubleday; 255 pages; $28.79.

Classics of Golf; £59

No one has played the game with more grace than Robert Tyre (“Bobby”)
Jones junior. In 1930 he won the British and American Opens and the British
and American amateur titles, an achievement that has never been repeated.
The basis of Jones’s brilliance was his “picture swing”, which no one had
taught him. His putting, with a rusty, goosenecked club he called Calamity
Jane, was fearless.

Jones retired in 1931, aged just 28, and went on to co-design and co-found
the Masters at Augusta. He published this autobiography three decades later.
It is part instruction manual, part analysis of famous golf courses and part
memories of his greatest rounds. He practised infrequently because, as he
writes, “You learn very soon, in tournament golf, that your most formidable
adversary is yourself. You win or lose according to your own ability to
withstand pressure.” Jones soaked up that pressure better than any other
golfer in history.

The Golf Courses of the British Isles. By Bernard Darwin. Create Space
Publishing; 122 pages; $13.24. Konecky & Konecky; £9.99

If Bobby Jones was the most stylish golfer, the grandson of evolution’s
greatest theorist was its most elegant chronicler. Bernard Darwin’s foreword
to Jones’s book is one of countless pieces that he wrote about golf (he
covered the sport for the Times from 1907 to 1953). As with many of the
finest sportswriters, Darwin had expertise that extended beyond the game; he
was an authority on Charles Dickens. Darwin was no mean golfer himself.
He was a Cambridge Blue and played in the Walker Cup, a tournament that
pits amateur golfers from the British Isles against Americans. It all helped to
inform his erudite writing on the game. This book is imbued with Darwin’s
charm and humour. It has vivid descriptions of courses like St Andrews (“the
home of golf”), Sunningdale, Rye and Hoylake, accompanied by excellent
illustrations of famous holes.

Tiger Woods. By Jeff Benedict and Armen Keteyian. Simon & Schuster;
512 pages; $18.98. £10.99 (hardback £20)

Tiger Woods has been the subject of umpteen volumes, some of them self-
serving autobiographies or hagiographies. None has probed as deeply as this
one. There is something almost Shakespearean about the rise and fall of Mr
Woods, perhaps the most famous athlete on the planet for two decades,
whose psychological flaws ultimately brought him crashing down. Driven by
ambitious parents, Tiger was hitting golf balls on national television with a
perfect swing at the age of two. Jeff Benedict and Armen Keteyian recount
in gripping fashion Mr Woods’s increasingly reckless behaviour off the
course—the philandering and car crashes—at the height of his fame. Yet the
most thrilling passages are those that transport readers to the scene of Mr
Woods’s many triumphs on the course, describing his supreme mental
toughness and his technical brilliance.

GOLF DREAMS. By John Updike. Random House; 208 pages; $16.

Penguin; £15.99

The master novelist was a golf addict, “curiously, disproportionately,

undeservedly happy on the course”. Updike was a reasonable golfer
(handicap 18). In 30 lyrical and often humorous essays he portrays the highs
and lows associated with this standard of play. The duck hook, the banana
slice, the topped dribble, the ricochet off the tree, the fat hit, the stubbed putt
—never have the failings of the average golfer been so vividly described.
But the moments of utter satisfaction, when result matches intention, are
vividly recorded, too. Who but Updike would weave Herodotus, Artemis,
Florence Nightingale, George Eliot, Dante and his own fictional creation
Rabbit Angstrom into a book about golf? Battles with his swing, tussles with
his instructor, musings about the etiquette of the game and his pleasure in the
camaraderie of a fourball are interspersed with fictional excerpts and
philosophical ramblings.

The Greatest Game Ever Played: Vardon, Ouimet and the Birth of
Modern Golf. By Mark Frost. Disney Publishing Group; 496 pages;
$13.99. Little, Brown; £12.99

New York-born Mark Frost is a man with many strings to his bow: novelist,
screenwriter, film and television producer and director. He was the co-
creator of the quirky television series “Twin Peaks”. But he is also a fine
golf writer. All three of his non-fiction golf books are outstanding. “The
Match” is an enthralling story about a bet by two American millionaires in
1956, which led to a match that pitted two young amateur stars, Harvie Ward
and Ken Venturi, against the greatest pros of the time, Ben Hogan and Bryon
Nelson. “The Grand Slam” recounts Bobby Jones’s capture of the
“impregnable quadrilateral”. But “The Greatest Game” edges out those two.
It tells the story of the US Open at Brookline Country Club in 1913, an epic
battle between Harry Vardon, a 43-year-old Briton who by then had won six
majors, and 20-year-old Bostonian Francis Ouimet, an amateur who lived
across the street from the course. Both men had dragged themselves out of
poverty and broken social barriers to play the game. Mr Frost employs the
techniques of a novelist to build tension as Vardon and Ouimet, along with
Briton Ted Ray, are forced into a playoff to decide the title. Their battle is
one of the most rousing sports events in history, and Mr Frost narrates it
magnificently.
Also try

Read about Saudi Arabia’s splurge on golf and other sports. A couple of
scholars made the surprising discovery that reducing par on a hole improves
golfers’ performance on that hole. Our sports column explained why the best
golfers don’t have winning streaks as long as those of the best tennis players.
Here we discuss how new ways of swinging a club are revolutionising golf.
This Christmas special from 2014 reports on golf’s ebbing popularity in
America and Europe and how the sport is trying to reinvent itself.■
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Economic & financial indicators

Economic data, commodities and markets
Indicators ::

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Indicators

Economic data, commodities and markets

Apr 11th 2024 |
This article was downloaded by calibre from https://www.economist.com/economic-and-
financial-indicators/2024/04/11/economic-data-commodities-and-markets

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Obituary
Rose Dugdale went from debutante to IRA bombmaker
The militant debutante :: The heiress and IRA militant died on March 18th, aged 82

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The militant debutante

Rose Dugdale went from debutante to IRA

bombmaker
The heiress and IRA militant died on March 18th, aged 82

Apr 10th 2024 |

HER HAIR was curled. Her skin was powdered. Her white organdie gown
had been tailor-made by the House of Worth. Her gloves, as all debutantes’
must, reached to the elbow. Her posture was from Miss Ironside’s School
for Girls in Kensington (“Shoulders back! Stand up straight! Speak
clearly!”). Rose Dugdale—heiress, debutante, beauty—was very well put
together.

Her bombs would be well put together too. Take the ones she dropped from
the helicopter she helped hijack in Northern Ireland. They had a milk churn
for the main casing. A core of gelignite. Fertiliser around that. Wire round
the top to keep it all in. She worked with ingenuity and care—and food
would be a feature of her DIY destruction: she would later use packets of
digestive biscuits to dampen the recoil on grenade launchers. That, the
police thought, was clever. You had to understand physics to do that.

But then Rose was clever. And for a time—after the ball gowns but before
the bombs—she had excelled. She’d only agreed to that gown so that her
parents would let her apply to Oxford. Soon, she was studying philosophy,
politics and economics there. Later, she would specialise in philosophy and
in Wittgensteinian “simples”: categories of objects that were one single,
simple thing. Though little was simple about Rose: debutante-terrorist;
heiress-thief; oxymoron incarnate. Her father would blame that education.
“Never”, he warned, “send your daughter to Oxford.”
He certainly had not meant to. Rose had been born into that English class
for whom ignorance was less an accidental state than an ideal. At Miss
Ironside’s School for Girls, mistresses instructed the girls less in science
than in sitting up straight: getting the right answer mattered far less than
getting “Mr Right”. At home, Rose was expected to dress for dinner, curtsy
to guests and hunt both deer and a husband. And above all she had to do
“the season”, that “upper-class version of a puberty rite” as the writer
Jessica Mitford called it, when four hundred girls in pearls curtsied before
the queen. Or, as Princess Margaret put it, when “every tart in London” did.
Rose was repelled: it was no more than a pornographic marriage market.

Oxford, by contrast, had felt so modern. Her female tutor, Peter Ady,
particularly so. Peter had breeches, Burmese ancestry, dark eyes, a boy’s
name (her mother had hoped for a son) and a habit of passionately kissing
other women on the mouth. Students had watched, fascinated, as Peter
stalked up to the philosopher Iris Murdoch and kissed her on the lips. A
little later, as Sean O’Driscoll records in his biography, Rose had kissed
Peter too. Peter had responded and soon they were in bed. After, Rose lay
on Peter and Peter stroked her hair. They weren’t lesbians, Rose thought, or
trying to be feminist fundamentalists or anything. They were just trying to
be in love.

And for a time she was. With Peter, and with social change. Later, after
Rose had been arrested—first for burgling her father’s house, then for
stealing art from another one, and for that hijacking—people would wonder
why an Oxford-educated deb had turned to terrorism. It was the wrong
question: she was not a rebel despite her advantages but because of them.
Oxford had liberated her from her sex and class. There, she had stopped
curtsying and started to wear men’s shirts. She and a friend had even
disguised themselves as men (wigs, glasses, grunting) to crash the all-male
Oxford Union. Though her liberation was not total: when the BBC came to
interview her about it, Rose meekly made them tea.

Still, the revolution was coming. And when Bloody Sunday happened in
1972, and 13 civilians were killed by British soldiers, Rose decided to
hasten it along. She turned against Britain—the “filthy enemy”—and
became a militant. Whereupon her upper-class education suddenly came
into its own. All that hunting and shooting was ideal rifle practice for a
terrorist. Years of crawling on her belly stalking deer made her the perfect
guerrilla fighter. Hadn’t Mao said that political power grew from the barrel
of a gun? Well, Rose knew how to wield one. And a stint in a French
finishing school turned out to be splendidly handy for an art heist.

On April 26th, 1974, a little after 9.15pm, a car drove up to Russborough

House in Ireland. Inside the house were Sir Alfred and Lady Beit and an
expensive art collection. Inside the car were three masked men, two AK-47
rifles and Rose, pretending to be a French tourist whose “voiture” had
broken down. Within minutes Sir Alfred and Lady Beit had been tied up at
gunpoint. Rose walked round the house, telling her men which paintings to
steal (still speaking, as Mr O’Driscoll’s book notes, in that accent).

She wanted “Zis one” (a Goya) “and zis one” (a Velázquez) and definitely
“zis one” (a Vermeer). The spell at finishing school and youthful trips to the
Louvre had given her a discerning eye: “Non! Not zat one!” She didn’t
regret the heist: the pictures could be used to ransom IRA prisoners and the
Beits were capitalist pigs; they deserved it. Besides, the Vermeer was just
beautiful. History, she knew, would absolve her.

The legal system was less lenient: after she was caught, she was sentenced
to nine years in prison. History would be less forgiving than expected too:
Rose would be remembered largely for violence and for failure. That heist
merely ended in arrest, while those carefully made milk-churn bombs failed
to detonate properly: one bounced off a roof; another splashed harmlessly
into a river. A British major said the army had begun assessing an
interesting new weapon, the AGMIC: the “Air-to-Ground Milk-Churn”.

The AGMIC didn’t catch on. The IRA eventually handed over its weapons.
But Rose, who was let out of prison in 1980, was unrepentant. Towards the
end of her long life she was asked what its best day had been. She thought
for a moment and then answered: the day when she had dropped those
bombs. That had been the happiest day of her life. ■
This article was downloaded by calibre from
https://www.economist.com/obituary/2024/04/10/rose-dugdale-went-from-debutante-to-
ira-bombmaker
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