Debating Myself

My second senior thesis is finished. This paper, written in German, was much more of a challenge in some ways than the Politics and Government thesis. Having chosen specifically to write two senior theses instead of simply writing one larger thesis on a topic that overlaps both subjects, I had a hard time finding my way to a topic of interest to me involving Germany.

My main problem was finding available resources in German to conduct strong academic research from. In the end I chose as similar road as my POLS thesis–namely reanalyzing an existing case-study.

I am interested in theories of federalism, generally, and the European Union as a sort of interesting new experiment in multi-level governance. However, looking specifically at environmental policy within Germany and the EU is ironic, because it is perhaps the type of politics that interests me the least. Luckily I was able to focus my paper on the theoretical implications of the division of power between Germany, the EU and the German Länder in the realm of environmental policy, and avoid tedious discussions of allowable levels of pollutants in rivers and streams.

Mainly, it is just really hard to write a substantial research paper in a foreign language you have studied for only four years–and I am probably most proud of my thesis not for its clear and original analysis (of which it has much less than my POLS thesis) but for my use of the German language. Since coming back to Germany I think my mastery of written German has probably increased significantly due to the outstanding support of my German professor (Professor Lorely French) and the insane amount of papers I had to write in German this year.

Oddly, I wrote more pages/papers in German this academic year than in English. Crazy.

For comparison’s sake, here are the vital stats on my German thesis:

• Pages: 43
• Words: 10,773
• Footnotes: 30
• Words (with footnotes): 11, 476
• Sources Cited: ??
• Sources Consulted: 83
• Appendixes: 0

And, I’m done. If anyone out there is fluent in German and interested, please feel free to read the attached PDF below. For those of you not fluent in German here is an English description of the theme of the paper:

The Federal Republic of Germany is a founding member of the European integration project and a strong supporter of the European Union. Yet the rapidly increasing centralization of European policy in the form of mandates from the EU is particularly complicated for Germany due to its federal structure. The sixteen German states, or Länder, have become increasingly active in the politics of integration in the last twenty years in an attempt to protect their traditional constitutional sovereignty. The Länder have been particularly active, sometimes against the wishes of the federal German government. The struggle against European environmental standards exemplifies how integration can be burdensome and costly for the Länder to implement. This study analyzes the different strategies employed by the Länder in defending their sovereignty.

“Purely Administrative Entities”? The Role of the German Länder in the European Union (PDF)

Champions of the new left in South America (of the Chavez kind) are about to be faced with what seems to be a stark rebuke of leftist policies and Chavez-esque populism. Evo Morales, the populist President of Bolivia and self-appointed champion of indigenous people and the poor, is facing the apparent disintegration of Bolivia.

Residents of Santa Cruz are expected to have approved a state-wide referendum declaring autonomy from the Bolivian central government last Sunday. According to the Washington Post:

Five more of the country’s nine states — including all of those in the eastern lowlands that produce most of the country’s income — are considering similar referendums in coming months.

For those keeping count it could add up to 6 of the country’s 9 states declaring autonomy from the Morales-dominated central government.

Notably, the autonomy referendum does not declare independence. Leaders of the autonomy movement:

simply want more local control over taxes, the courts, property titles and police forces. An autonomous Santa Cruz would remain a part of Bolivia, and its institutions would still be connected to those of the national government.

This will certainly hinder Morales’ plans for a constitutional revision, but they were already in dire shape having been rather undemocratic (this is a favorite move of South American leaders, and even the distinctly un-Chavez leader, Colombia’s Alvaro Uribe, is rumored to be mulling a constitutional revision).

What is interesting to note here is that the issue of devolving power to regional autonomies appears to be an acultural and practically universal phenomenon. From the disintegration of Yugoslavia, to pressures for regional autonomy in Spain, to the long-standing Quebec separatist movement—the nation-state is under significant pressure around the globe.

In this case Bolivia is fitting into a seemingly normal pattern, as the pressure for devolution has divided up along ethnic/culture lines. States with lower populations of indigenous people are feeling threatened by the pro-indigenous policies of Morales, which some have even viewed as racist, and are attempting to separate and avoid conflict. The indigenous people, for their part, feel that Morales is finally representing their interests after a long period of repression and see the autonomy movement as a direct threat.

As one indigenous supporter of Morales put it to the Washington Post:

“They will be killing us — the indigenous — with this statute,” said Alejandro Antezana, who opposes autonomy. “We are going to fight to the death if we have to. We are not going to let them set up their ballot boxes this Sunday, even if that will lead us to confrontation and bloodshed. We have too much to lose.”

In general, if nation-states can’t learn to strike a balance between assimilating and integrating their diverse populations while allowing them to retain their cultural identity, they will always trend toward instability and devolution. The United States has been remarkable in this regard, absorbing millions upon millions of immigrants from diverse places around the globe. Of course, for the United States the assimilation process is lightened because by and large most immigrants choose to immigrate to the United States.

The indigenous population of Bolivia did not choose to immigrate there, or choose to let the Spanish conquistadors in. In that regard perhaps it is more fair to compare the US indigenous populations with those in Bolivia–and of course the US went the route of devolution there by granting Native American tribes significant autonomy (in exchange, of course, for taking all of their land and decimating their population…)

Mixing cultures and ethnic groups under one national government will always prove to be problematic. Bolivia, where the oppressed indigenous peoples finally have power at the national level, is proving that simply giving indigenous peoples power for awhile to run the government also can’t be seen as a solution. Some kind of power sharing, coalition forming, and compromise is needed to ensure stability and a sense of unity.

Unfortunately those words are a lot easier to write than to turn into practical politics.

UPDATE 1: The referendum passed by a margin of 85% in Santa Cruz. This blog post details a lot about the referendum and the electoral process throughout the day.

For those of you wondering about what has happened in the Zimbabwe election since I last posted on the topic about a month ago, here is the answer:

Not much

The results of the presidential election have yet to be announced, though it seems the government is making a gesture toward releasing them by the end of the week.

International pressure is mounting, but it seems like Mugabe has some big time countries protecting his regime. Of course China has massive investment interests in Zimbabwe and would probably like the regime to stay stable, while South Africa is fighting a proxy political battle over Zimbabwe pitting President Thabo Mbeki against his political rival Jacob Zuma, who is a staunch supporter of the Zimbabwe opposition (and recently elected head of the African National Congress). The fear here is a win for the opposition in Zimbabwe could lead to a larger win for the opposition in South Africa.

All of this is occurring amidst election violence that some have said is like “a war zone”. In all twenty people are verified to have died from election-related violence, and the Economist ran a story this week saying that the toll may be much higher according some doctors in the country.

It certainly seems like Mugabe lost the election and is trying desperately to hold on to power. Honestly, I’m not sure they’ll be able to force him out–the UN is virtually powerless due to China’s position, and Africa remains largely divided on the issue, so the African Union can be of little help as well.

Mugabe may be able to draw on all of this external support to make up for the lack of internal support he enjoys. We’ll see how it plays out.

Zimbabwe’s 84 year old dictator Robert Mugabe will someday no doubt be the subject of a book titled “How Not to Run A Country” or alternatively “How to Squander, Exploit, and Destroy a Nation”.

In his tenure as Zimbabwe’s “President” Mugabe has seen inflation skyrocket to an unimaginable and unbelievable 100,000%. The US dollar, even in its current feeble state, is worth around 30,000 Zimbabwe dollars–but you won’t be able to trade it for that price because the rate gets worse every single day.

Even if you forget that Mugabe also destroyed 400,000 homes in a crackdown on black market trading and zoning violations, the opposition should be able to phone this election in and still win by a landslide. Right? Right?!?

Wrong. In the Parliament the ruling party, Mugabe’s Zanu PF, is still managing a slim lead as election results are released. Although the opposition has declared itself the winner in the presidential vote, the results are not being released. For up to the minute results check out this blog set up by the Zimbabwe Guardian based in London.

Obviously this isn’t a fair election. Some curious factors that only add to that suspicion:

(more…)

Microsoft was recently slapped with a record fine for failing to comply with a 2004 ruling in an anti-trust case. PaidContent.org has a good summary of the European Commission’s decision, which found that Microsoft still was charging too much for licensing of its server data to enable competitors’ products to be compatible. (Another sticking point was the bundling of the IE with the Windows OS.)

The Economist’s Free Exchange blog gives a good description of the rocky history between Microsoft and the EU:

In 2004, the European Commission used its awesome trade regulation powers to fine the software firm €497m, followed by a further €280m in 2006. Now, the commission has fined Microsoft €899m ($1.4b, £681m) for failure to comply with an earlier 2004 ruling, centred on its bundling of Explorer internet software with its Windows operating system.

Clearly Microsoft is a successful and financially stable company (stable enough to attempt to acquire Yahoo for $44.6 billion) but as the Economist points out, this fine is larger than Sweden’s net contribution to the EU budget in 2006. Microsoft has continually faced much stiffer resistance to its business practices in Europe than in the United States—and certainly this latest setback does not bode well for Microsoft’s acquisition of Yahoo! either.

Certainly bloggers over at the Guardian feel that Microsoft got what was coming to it—there is a great discussion in the comments section of this blog debating the evils of Microsoft. I’m not sure I agree. Microsoft’s market dominance perhaps stifles the development of operating systems, but no one seems to complain that if I were to purchase a MacBook (until recently) I only had one choice of operating system on that platform as well. Microsoft has, in fact, been facing stiff competition from cost-free open-source competitors in the form of various incarnations of Linux. It seems to me that the punishment does not fit the crime—and certainly bundling XP with IE seems a rather minor affair in an era when browsers are obtainable in a matter of seconds.

After puzzling this for some time, I began to think, what if Microsoft struck back at the EU? A blogger at 22Hundred.net had this to say:

To Microsoft I say this…..pull out of Europe! Not completely obviously but give the EU exactly what they want. Remove IE, Windows Media and all other additional software from XP now, after all it’s only going to be supported for a few more months anyway. Then let the people who have just bought their shiny new OS try to use the damn thing without the bundled applications and ensure that the OEM’s do not bundle software to make up for it. It’s time to make the EU suffer.

My girlfriend and I were having a similar discussion, but she wasn’t as concessionary. Imagine if Microsoft pulled out completely. European consumers would be furious at the European Commission, because love it or hate it the Microsoft monopoly means that all of their computers can talk to each other. Most consumers are familiar with Windows and switching to Linux or Mac would be difficult, costly, and inefficient. Server farms running on Windows Exchange and other software would not be able to upgrade to Vista. Even the lack of Office support and service alone could bring the massive bureaucracies of the EU and its member-states to a halt.

Of course public opinion would prevent Microsoft from doing anything like that. But, if any corporation is tough enough to take on an overzealous regulatory regime like that of the EU, Microsoft is. I’m not saying it would (or should)… but it is an interesting thought experiment.

Perhaps a safer solution comes from the Economist:

Perhaps Bill Gates should cut his losses and buy a small EU nation state (Malta is nice at this time of year), keep paying the same money, but this time ask for voting rights at EU summits.

He could rename it something catchy too—like Zune Island.