Power Play: Instrumentalising Georgia; Constructing Russia

The latest outbreak of violence in the Caucasus has left thousands dead, thousands more displaced and plunged the people of the region into terrifying uncertainty amidst talk of a ‘new cold war’. Deconstructing the trite simplifications and ideological rhetoric in order to understand the conflict and its fall out requires us to examine the geopolitical and historical hinterlands of the conflict, as well as the Western construction of Russia and Russians. By Benjamin Tallis

Long before its forces crossed the nominal border of South Ossetia, Russia’s response to the Georgian attack on Tskhinvali was condemned in the West as the action of an aggressive bully, violating international law and the etiquette of the world’s elite clubs. In light of the Iraq debacle, the American and British appeal to principle in their condemnation of Russia’s military action in Georgia is a little like a pair of wolves, their wool-tangled teeth still dripping with blood, telling the fox to stay out of the henhouse.

New World Disorder or New World’s Order?
The collapse of the Soviet Union sparked a scramble for territory, influence and resources, with independence and collective identity claims coming thick and fast. Nasty, brutal, although mercifully short conflicts erupted along ethnic and political dividing lines that had been kept in the deep freeze of history by the overriding imperatives of Soviet unity. Breakaway republics in Moldova (Transnistria) and Georgia (Abkhazia and South Ossetia) retained defacto independence and the soviet successor states found themselves not only dealing with ‘Frozen Conflicts’, but also caught in the international crossfire over energy resources, strategic influence and security provision in the post-cold war world.

At the time, the West was focused on the bloody conflicts Europe’s Balkan backyard which provided a mawkish re-living of Europe’s holocaust nightmares as the post-modern security architecture collapsed under the weight of its own ineffectiveness. The belated, US-led military action allowed Europeans and Americans to exorcise these demons and believe that they had ‘done the right thing’ and learn particular lessons about power and intervention. As Canadian academic and politician Michael Ignatieff put it,

“We intervened not only to save others, but to save ourselves, or rather an image of ourselves as defenders of universal decencies. We wanted to show that the West ‘meant’ something.” (Ignatieff quoted by David Chandler)

The unmandated intervention in Kosovo and the push for its independence by America and its allies violated international law (The NATO war against Yugoslavia only received retrospective endorsement and independence violated Security Council Resolution 1244 which guaranteed the territorial integrity of Yugoslavia with regard to Kosovo and later applied to Serbia & Montenegro and finally to Serbia), which all too often remains little more than a convenient and disposable, mask for power. Crucially, the West also effectively told Russia that it did not belong at the top table of international decision making. Despite the talk of human rights and self-determination, all sides learned that power remains the deciding factor in international relations.

Guns and Roses
Georgia followed an unexceptional post-soviet path under former Soviet foreign minister Edvard Shevernadze. A collapse in living standards was followed by economic recovery marked by massive inequality, grinding poverty, cronyism, corruption and the prevalence of organised crime. The independence claims of its separatist regions took a back seat to the division of the spoils of transition, while allowing for patriotic posturing, with the presence of Russian ‘peacekeeping’ forces acting as a deterrent to Georgian irredentism.

The situation changed dramatically following Shevardnardze’s attempt to rig an election in late 2003. With Western support, the protestors showed that they had learned the lessons from the Serbian overthrow of Milosevic and developed the demonstrations into the Rose Revolution , with the young, English speaking, Harvard-trained lawyer Mikheil Saakashvilli at its head. With the situation in Iraq worsening, this provided a much needed showcase for the US project to spread democracy-lite throughout the world. The US also irresponsibly encouraged Georgia to push for early NATO membership, which only fuelled Saakashvilli’s hubristic antagonism of Russia.

The optimism of the Rose Revolution soon gave way to allegations of improper conduct, authoritarianism and corruption, which came against a backdrop of rapidly deteriorating relations with Russia and continued economic hardship. Having imposed martial law in response to anti-government demonstrations, Saakashvilli won a snap election in January 2008, although with a massively reduced majority, leaving him in need of a unifying second term project. This need led him to massively miscalculate both the Russian response to an incursion into Ossetia and his support in the West.


Friends, Foes & Faux Friends
It should now be clear to Georgians that despite the lofty rhetoric that met their Rose Revolution, for the West they are little more than a pawn in the greater game, a well positioned fly in Russia’s ointment. Tragically for the Georgians’, their misadventure has only furthered Russia’s drive to force its way back onto the top table of international affairs, putting them in the position of being instrumentalised by both sides.

EU accession is a distant prospect and the idea of NATO membership (and protection under the article 5 mutual defence clause), now seems vaguely ridiculous. Can we really imagine the combined forces of Europe and North America riding to the rescue of the Georgians, with the potential to provoke a full-scale conflict with Russia in its own back yard. The irony of Bernard Kouchner, the high priest of interventionism calling on Russia to halt their military action exposes the West’s rules – legitimate interventions are only those that the US, NATO or the EU can put a stop to.

How to lose friends and alienate peoples
It would seem that America is determined to go back-to-the-future and recreate Russia as nemesis, playing on long-learned fears and nostalgia for old certainties, in the vein of the Straussian political philosophy (particularly its need for enemies) that has underpinned so much of the neo-con project. The diffuse, lurking threat of Al Qaeda may no longer be seen as sufficient for these ends and recasting Russia in the role of ‘Evil Empire’ provides an easily identifiable potential menace. This project has been made easier by the Russians’ clumsy attempts to re-assert themselves on the world stage as they stumbled out of the chaos of the Yeltsin years. Intimidation of former Soviet Republics, politically motivated murders, aggressive energy policy and the imposition of a new Russian corporatism in place of Western style turbo-capitalism have all served to fan the flames of Russophobia.

While these concerns are legitimate, the Western media’s coverage of these issues, and the current conflict, has been notable for its anti-Russian bias. Typically, on the first night of the conflict the BBC showed speeches from Russian President Dmitriy Medvedev and Georgian leader Saakashvilli. Medvedev’s appearance was restricted to a translated one-liner boiling down to “we will find those responsible and they will be punished”, while Saakashvilli, speaking in English, was given much lengthier airtime as he pleaded his case in front of a carefully positioned EU flag. Writing in The Guardian, David Clarke described Russia as a bully wreaking havoc, while in Canada’s Globe & Mail, John O’Sullivan asked us to consider whether Russia is morphing into another USSR.

This long-standing media positioning had the effect of casting Russia in the role of a calculating bully, smarting over its lost empire, while the West’s ally du jour is seen as a noble, plucky and innocent victim appealing to the right of self determination. Consequently the image of Russia as a wild, unknowable and ungovernable place, populated by gangsters and unstable, hard-drinking serfs crying out to be ruled by a strong leader is a common one in much of the Western public perception. Our leaders have done little to dispel this image as it allows their conduct in relation to Russia to come under far less intense scrutiny.

Constructing Russia as an enemy makes it much harder to engage in a mutually beneficial way, with Western policy makers vacillating between aggression and fear. If we are to really make the world safer and avoid the kind of tragedy that has befallen the peoples of Georgia, Russia and South Ossetia, then we need a genuinely collective approach to security, which seeks to include rather than demonise. Only in this way can legal norms and values be prioritised over the exercise of power, with genuine human security taking precedence over the power games of elites and vested interests. The first step towards this is to hold our own leaders to account for the crashing hypocrisy they have displayed in dealing with this conflict. A reasonable second step would be to demand a more balanced view from our media.

Originally published on e-politik.de on 18/09/2008

Black Arts

The sculpture "Entropa" by the Czech artist David Cerny – and the furore it has caused – remind us of the power of good political art.



David Cerny is no stranger to controversy, although previously this has remained relatively local. Whether painting a Russian memorial tank pink as a send off to departing soviet soldiers or decorating the futuristic Prague TV Tower with faceless, climbing babies, Cerny has been one of Czech art’s most prominent provocateurs. Now, having duped the Czech government that has recently taken over the presidency of the EU, he has generated a trans-European controversy which has enraged officials and energised the often soporific corridors of the EU.

Playing on the Czech word for Europe (Evropa) and the concept of Entropy, David Cernywas supposed to be co-ordinating a government funded project bringing together artists from each of the 27 EU member states to mark the Czech presidency. Playing on the EU slogan of ‘United in Diversity’, each country is presented as a snap-out piece from a self-assembly Europe kit, with the artists riffing on national stereotypes and prejudices. This elicited mixed reactions, with some praising the candour of the piece, while others objected that it merely reinforced prejudices and played up to cheap notions of each member state. However, when it became apparent that, despite the carefully composed biographies, websites and other props, the artists were actually fictional creations and the whole process had been engineered by Cerny and his team, the sparks really started to fly.

Discussing identities
Prague TV tower with Cerny's babiesThe Czech deputy PM for European affairs, Alexandr Vondra, was ‘unpleasantly surprised’, while the Bulgarians summoned the Czech ambassador to explain why an officially sanctioned art piece had chosen a Turkish toilet to symbolise their country.

Entropa brilliantly raises many issues which urgently need discussing in the European context, ranging from identity to image management and the simulative façade of politics as well as foregrounding the role of art itself in an age of commodification and official patronage. Why was it risqué but ultimately acceptable for artists to poke fun at their own country, but not for a foreigner to do it? What happens when the yawning gap between the European dream and the reality of the Euro-everyday is exposed? Where is the space for artistic creativity and independence, when contemporary art is so often valued only in monetary terms and revolutionary artists have all too often morphed into decorators for the rich?

Like much good contemporary art, Cerny asks us to question ascribed identities, from the national stereotypes so playfully presented, to the carefully honed harmony of the EU, which rings hollow when compared to its helplessness on the international stage.
That Cerny had to lie to the Czech government to bring this project to fruition exposes a disturbing trend – art and artists are all too often instrumentalised to the purposes of others, becoming as AnArchitektur put it (when describing architects) monkeys dancing while those with the money call the tune.

Czechs as balances: a history of satire
Given the overly marketised state of the art world, it is no wonder that much of the more interesting work being done at the moment comes from ‘subsidy artists’ who survive on grants from governments and foundations. However, while each of the donating institutions has its own goals and ambitions, it is clear that for really good art to be created, it cannot be subjugated to serving as legitimation for others. The Czech government clearly wanted to have something tangible to mark the clearest possible indication of their reintegration into the European mainstream. They got it, but not in the way they expected.

Far from being embarrassed, the Czechs can point to this as the latest episode in a subversive tradition that takes in the Good Soldier Svejk, the (imaginary) national hero Jara Cimrman, the protagonists of the novels of Kundera and Hrabal and in recent times, many of the younger artists working in Prague. Mocking Prague’s pretensions to be an Olympic city, while social issues go unaddressed, the Guma Guar collective produced posters of notorious criminals declaring ‘We are all on the national team’, hijacking the official slogan to great effect. Guma Guar also courted controversy by making work masquerading as that of the much loathed national gallery director Milan Knizak, foreshadowing Cerny’s deception. The Stohoven group inserted footage of a nuclear explosion into a weather forecast and Katerina Seda has produced wonderfully warm antidotes to contempory alienation and atomisation.

Artistic independence and free speech

Metalmorphosis by David CernyThe work of Cerny and these young artists stands for artistic independence, free thinking and free speech, as well as thumbing its nose at the EU’s carefully constructed version of Europe and Europeanness. One might therefore imagine that, although he and Cerny have history, the notoriously eurosceptic Czech President Vaclav Klaus would approve of this piece. However, Cerny doesn’t let his compatriot off the hook, making Klaus and some of his more notorious pronouncements the focus of the Czech puzzle piece. “Let the head of state have his say! He’s not just a skier but a great guy!”

Klaus’s opposition to all things EU has meant that the government has worked hard to keep him out of the limelight, while Prime Minister Topolanek and Deputy PM Vondra present the ‘acceptable’ face of Czech Euro-subservience. Cerny has therefore managed to strike another blow against the careful presentation and image management which is so often one of the biggest obstacles to understanding and engaging with contemporary politics. The gap between the EU’s image and reality needs to be addressed if the Union is to properly represent its peoples and act on the world stage as a legitimate and effective force for good.

The Czechs are enduring a baptism of fire in their first stab at the EU presidency, with Gaza and Gazprom plaguing their carefully prepared plans. They should look to their slogan – “Europe without barriers” – for inspiration and thank David Cerny for investing this with real meaning.

A copy of the full version of the Entropa project, complete with images of each country and false artists' biogs is available on request. Leave a comment or email me

Originally published on www.e-politik.de on 29/01/2009

Security Theatre

Police ballet in Vinohrady calls bigger questions to mind



There is a nightly ballet in Prague 2, but it doesn’t take place at Divadlo Na Vinohradech (Vinohrady Theatre).

Instead, the stars are police, tow-truck drivers and city officials, and the setting is the not-so-mean streets of Mánesova, Polská, Blanická and Anny Letenské.
Hunting in packs, police seek out cars that violate Prague 2 parking restrictions. The orange, flashing lights of the trucks and the attending police and city officials would need only to be accompanied by music to create a performance worthy of homage to Karlheinz Stockhausen, the avant-garde German composer.

At first glance, the Prague 2 authorities’ efforts to address the parking situation seem laudable. However, their efforts form part of a wider security trend, which is altogether more worrying.The tow trucks are often augmented by state police who stop drivers and dish out on-the-spot fines for minor violations. Walking through this melee, a visitor would likely draw conflicting conclusions about the state of security in Vinohrady.

On one hand, actions are being taken in the name of safety, order and the rule of the law, so it would be hard not to feel like this is not a terribly safe place. But, since Vinohrady seems like such a peaceful and affluent neighborhood, why do police devote so many resources to this job, particularly when there are so many news reports about serious and organized crime?
What if the very presence of large numbers of police uniforms on the streets actually perpetuates the problem rather than helping with the solution?

You have probably heard of the popular “broken windows” police policy, which calls for police and residents to deal with small problems like graffiti and broken windows right away to reduce the likelihood that more serious crimes will be committed. It’s used in much of the United States these days as one of the basic tenets of community policing.

But the broken windows policy is also controversial and highly disputed. The jury is still out on whether this kind of policing works, despite well-publicized claims that it does from former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani and his law enforcement chief, Ray Bratton.

It may be that the criminality in the United States is decreasing for other reasons, as argued in Freakonomics, a book by renowned economist Steven Levitt, who argues that the social demographics of the United States in the post Roe v. Wade era are a more significant determinant of crime than any method of policing. Levitt illustrates the correlation between those sectors of society that are most likely to exhibit criminal behavior and those seeking abortions. Controversially, yet compellingly, Levitt argues that those who were committing the crimes are simply no longer being born.

Whatever your opinion on the merits of this particular argument, it demonstrates that “law and order” politicians such as Giuliani are willing to claim credit for their methods without considering the wider factors at work or the potential ramifications of their policies.
If, in British parlance, getting more “bobbies on the beat” may not be effective in actually reducing crimes, what would justify this massive investment of resources in Prague?

Perceptions of crime and perceptions of safety are often quoted as indicators of the success or failure of policing strategies and as providing guidance for future action. The British Government Crime Survey is just one example of perception based research that is used to support the demand for more street-level policing.
If we go back to our example of the Vinohrady visitor, what is the actual effect of the orange and blue lights, two sets of police uniforms and the massed vehicular presence?

First, the visitor may think something serious has happened, which is unsettling in any neighborhood, let alone in the relative peace and affluence of Vinohrady. Although the visitor would soon realize there’s nothing wrong, a second impression may then take hold — the possibility of being in the wrong, of being caught and being punished by the temporary removal of property or the issuing of monetary penalties.

This would likely be disturbing, since money and property are everyone’s ultimate goals in the currently dominant value system. If you increase the threat of removing my car, especially through the application of opaque or complex rules, it makes me feel uneasy. It also gives me the feeling that it could well be me next who is “in the wrong” and has to deal with police.
So this is the heart of the point:

“In the absence of existential comfort, people settle for the pretense of safety,” notes sociologist Zygmunt Bauman, in his book Liquid Times.
Bauman goes on to show how the globalized consumer capitalist system causes a general existential insecurity. The expendable nature of labor, the constant shifts in trends and the apparent disconnect between the real economy and global financial markets give an impression of unknowable and uncontrollable forces at work on our lives.

People attempt to mitigate this by grasping for personal safety in their surroundings and by demanding that politicians recognize their position as potential victims. From the top, this is manifested in public displays of strength, from parking armored vehicles outside of airports to the previously mentioned street-level policing, even if parking and traffic violations are not a major threat to the well-being of most consumers.

From the bottom up, the growth in the number of closed-circuit TV cameras, people adding fortifications to their homes and businesses, and more people participating in self-defense and martial arts classes are all examples of what people do to try to increase their personal safety. They also withdraw from public transport in favor of isolating themselves in their own cars, the better to avoid interacting with any dangerous outside elements.

There are certainly clear dangers in contemporary society — from large-scale terrorism and fights between mafia gangs to the elusive yet pervasive presence of pickpockets invading our personal space.

But are street-level policing measures actually providing us with greater security? Or are they just providing us with the pretense of safety?
It is the contention of Bauman, and many others, that these safety measures — while justifying law and order politics — can actually have detrimental effects to our collective well-being. They create an existential insecurity, even if nominal (and often short-lived) safety gains are made.
This happens for two reasons.

First, the perception created by these visible safety actions may give you the idea that there are myriad potential dangers to you, your family and your property. Those dangers are lying in wait for the moment you drop your guard.

If these dangers really exist, we must strengthen our own safety measures and keep our guard up at all times. This fuels the inherently competitive nature of the prevailing system, with a race to safety and the perceived need to do your protective duty — to yourself, your family and your property. This only accelerates the perceptions of fear themselves, which are compounded by the governmental security theater described above. It creates a vicious cycle.
Fundamentally, these measures make us all less safe, as they encourage the disparity of wealth and power that we currently see.

The Czech Republic has not gone as far down this road as many American and West European societies, but once the journey starts, it develops momentum and accelerates in a way that becomes difficult to stop, let alone reverse.
Czech society’s innate civility can be a powerful bulwark against this declining solidarity, which actually leaves us more vulnerable to the real dangers that do threaten our security and our safety.

But these qualities will only be useful if harnessed by people, communities, institutions and the government. This requires leadership.
In the current vacuum of vision that characterizes not only the Czech Republic but also large political swaths worldwide, the security agenda is a powerful and expedient, legitimate tool for power.

With that last thought — let me illustrate how this affects us all on a large scale.
The plan for the United States to build a radar system on Czech soil to monitor potential missile threats from “enemy” countries is a discussion about security. While the radar system seems to offer the promise of safety, the plans have already succeeded in antagonizing Russia and putting Czechs in the firing line.
Keep that in mind the next time you see the tow trucks in Vinohrady.
From the smallest example of parking violations, to the geopolitics of missile defense, such “safety agendas” must be resisted.

This article originally appeared in The Prague Post on 02/04/2008

The Blame Game

To see the real source of corruption, look in the mirror


A specter is haunting Central Europe — the specter of corruption. Graft, bribery, patronage and cronyism remain among the most significant challenges facing the Czech Republic.

We are widely considered one of the success stories of the transition from communism to capitalism, with consistent GDP growth and generally rising standards of living. But we continue to lag behind in dealing with corruption, which has the potential to undermine the good work that has been done and limit future economic growth and societal progress.

Corruption distorts all sectors of life. In this country, money that could be spent productively is instead used to grease the wheels, to buy access to doctors, to secure places at universities or win public contracts.

As the anti-corruption nonprofit group Transparency International has explained so well, corruption is disproportionate in its effects: It hits the poorest the hardest. So, anyone concerned with social justice should also be concerned about tackling corruption.Successive governments, including the current one, give solemn promises to deal with corruption. Yet the problem persists.

The European Union and the World Bank, among other international institutions, continue to zero in on the Czechs’ apparent inability to deal with this issue. Transparency International, as reported recently in The Prague Post, places the Czech Republic among the European Union’s most corrupt nations, closer in standards to Bosnia than to Denmark.

What is to be done?
Common wisdom is that the best strategy hinges on reducing the role and influence of government.Czech officials have certainly passed laudable initiatives to reduce bureaucratic red tape and simplify legislation, while simultaneously increasing oversight on public officials and bringing in tougher penalties for those caught in the act. And the pending privatization of Czech Airlines (ČSA) and Prague’s Ruzyně Airport, along with massive reforms of the healthcare and pension systems, seem to hold the promise of reducing opportunities for corruption.

This logic underpins anti-corruption efforts around the world. Professor Steve Hanke of Johns Hopkins University and an adviser to the Bosnian government puts it this way: “Shrinking the size of the government down to almost zero … is the only way to get rid of corruption. Have no government officials, and a minimum state.”
It sounds extreme. Yet, particularly in former communist countries, corruption seems endemic to the political process.

Author and activist Naomi Klein talks about this in her meticulously researched book The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism. Klein notes that wherever the transition from communism to capitalism encounters problems, those problems are based on corruption. While countries move toward privatization, deregulation and a free market, economic shock therapists always blame a “culture of corruption” for derailing their reform programs.

It may well be true that there is a historical hangover from the communist period, when the only way to get what you needed was to subvert and bypass the system, effectively creating parallel mechanisms reliant on corruption and favoritism.
But while this may have established a baseline of corruption, transitions in post-communist countries have set new benchmarks.

President Václav Klaus’ “Turnpike,” the much heralded straight road from Husák to Thatcher, was the transition route chosen by Czech elites. They headed directly down this road, ignoring speed limits and exhortations to drive carefully.

This period of “nomenklatura capitalism” and the emergence of a new gilded class of oligarchs gave rise to a series of scandals, with Harvard Capital Consulting and IPB Bank being only the most well-known examples. This way of doing business was actively encouraged at the time, with transition economies attempting to harness what economist Anders Aslund memorably called “the temptations of capitalism.” Klein and others contend that corruption is not an obstacle to this style of capitalism, but has been an inherent part of it, from Russia to Chile, Indonesia to Poland.

But it is not enough to raise our hands, shrug our shoulders and lay the all-encompassing, obfuscatory blanket of corruption over everything that goes wrong. There are other forces at work, unleashed deliberately to pursue particular agendas.
For example, given the private sector’s previous history, we should think twice in the future about transferring assets there. The high frequency of large-scale scandals in the business world in recent years offers ample demonstration that companies will often push as far into grey areas as possible to secure an advantage in the increasingly competitive global market. This means stretching regulatory provisions and disclosure requirements to the limit and, on occasion, flat-out deception and lying.

We have already seen what happened in companies from Enron and Worldcom to Ahold and Deutsche Post. After a scapegoat was identified, a feeding frenzy for the assets of the disgraced company ensued and executives and spokespeople appeared on the nightly news, wringing their hands and promising to do better next time. Backward-looking legislation addressed the scams that were uncovered. But those measures never look ahead, anticipating the ruses that profitability and accelerating growth will require.

Does it have to be like this? Consider the examples of the Nordic countries, which despite having relatively large state sectors and no shortage of money to tempt officials (especially when we consider Norwegian oil wealth), rank among the best performers in Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions Index.
The difference in the Nordic situation is that the governments responsible for large state sectors are accountable to more engaged populations, and by a media not content to feast on a diet of continual scandal and soap-opera politics. By contrast, in this country it seems that the government is never held to account and forced to deliver on its promises. The public apparently doesn’t want to get involved in politics, and the media drags everything down to a level that can be easily understood on the surface but draws a veil over the real arenas of power.

Ultimately, apathy is the real specter haunting Central Europe, not corruption.
Only by overcoming this ennui can we reverse the corruption that has beset our politics and engineer a return to accountable government. Only by reconstituting our public and political lives can we expect to be able to regain control over the decisions that affect us.

This article was originally published in The Prague Post on 16/07/2008

Kings for a Day

The EU presidency is seen as a crowning achievement for Czech democracy, but the tectonic plates of geopolitics are shifting


The Czech Republic is poised to crown its European re-integration by taking on the presidency of the European Union. However, even as the Czechs take this symbolically momentous step, it seems the game has changed, and the Czech Republic may again find itself outflanked by the resurgent forces of history.

The presidency of the EU entails setting agendas for EU meetings and chairing discussions and negotiations. In practice, this allows the holder of the presidency to emphasize its particular concerns and to try pushing the union in a new direction. A positive example is the exposure given to the plight of East Timor during the 2000 Portuguese presidency, which highlighted the intolerable occupation of its former colony. This resulted in greater EU pressure on Indonesia and eventual independence for the Timorese people.

The depth and breadth of each of the themes of the Czech presidency — especially in the midst of the present economic and security uncertainties — would test the bureaucracy of any state. So, how will a midsize European country with a relatively young democracy cope with the internal machination of the EU and the external challenges during its time in the hot seat?

Although the EU prides itself on being a postmodern, post-power organization — with Luxembourg having the same voting power as Germany on many issues — there is still a tendency for the big boys to get their own way. The newer members of the exclusive club have also, on occasion, found themselves marginalized by the coherent (and somewhat inflexible) shared vision of more established states. The Czech government and civil service will work in close cooperation with the European Commission but must be careful not to let their own priorities be obscured by the onward march of unilinear Euro-visionary history.

The stated priorities for the Czech presidency come under the general slogan of “Europe without barriers” and include working toward a competitive and open Europe, sustainable and secure energy, a budget for Europe’s future, Europe as a global partner and a secure and free Europe.

A competitive and open Europe
This priority is intended to reinvigorate the movement toward the single market. This means removing remaining barriers to the free movement of capital, goods, services and labor, as well as eliminating the barriers retained toward new member states, plus making progress on the Lisbon agenda — which aimed to make the EU the world’s most competitive, knowledge-based economy. The Czech government has also explicitly stated that it intends to push for enhanced trade liberalization with external trading partners. However, with the liberal free trade model increasingly under attack — because of the world economic crisis and by resurgent worker and people’s rights movements — this may not only be easier said than done, but may not have the support of much of the European populace.

Sustainable and secure energy
The European Security Strategy identifies critical resources — such as oil and gas — as potential flash points for future conflicts. The Czechs, along with other Central Europeans, are all too aware of this, reliant as they are on Russian hydrocarbons. Having previously seen the taps turned off, the Czechs and the EU are keen to avoid a situation where Russian power makes others powerless through through their monopoly supplier position.

This seemingly laudable quest for “energy security” raises many important issues for the EU and the way that it conducts business. As was clear during the recent Georgia crisis, the EU’s relationship with Russia is characterized as much by impotence as by antagonism and internal division. The reflexive Russo-phobia on the part of many of the newer member states certainly does not help this trend, although the unilateral deal making of Germany and others is equally damaging in the EU’s quest to maximize leverage with the biggest fixer of its fossil fetish. However, as much as this reflects the EU’s inability to get its act together, it also illustrates the crass way in which the collective West disdainfully treats Russia’s assertions that it has a place at the top table of international politics. In these regards, the Czech presidency will need to be as mindful of the ambitions of certain EU states to reassert themselves as deal makers and power brokers on the world stage.

A budget for Europe’s future
The EU’s current budgetary fudge runs until 2013, and the Czech presidency wants to begin work on reaching a better settlement for the next budgetary period. This is a noble endeavor when one considers the Gordian knot of budgetary strands, including agricultural, regional and structural funding, not to mention the ideas for enhanced cooperation in justice and home affairs and the stated preference of the presidency preparation team for an intensified European Neighborhood Policy. Further perpetuating Czech difficulties is the current economic environment. The politics of economic choice have not been so prominent in a generation, and questions of state redistribution and subsidy, as well as the efficacy of free markets, are genuinely back on the table. This budget is likely to descend into trench warfare pitting commission ideologues against populist nationalists.

Europe as a global partner
EU foreign policy has been a traditional focus of presidential tenures, with most policy elites seeing it as key to expanding the EU’s global clout. The Czech Republic has identified three areas of focus: trans-Atlantic relations, the Western Balkans and Eastern Europe. As good Euro-Atlantic citizens, it is not surprising that the Czechs have chosen to focus on cooperation between the EU and NATO. Despite overlapping membership between the two organizations and the many practical agreements in place, significant differences remain. The issue of NATO expansion illustrates rifts between politicians in Washington and Brussels. In terms of practical issues, there is still much to be done with regard to interoperability within NATO itself, let alone between it and the EU. However, the real challenges remain political and strategic rather than military and tactical. Czech collaboration with the missile-defense shadow in Central Europe only heightens the complexity of their task in this field.

The Czechs will push for further integration and accession for countries of the Western Balkans. With the prospective drawdown of peacekeeping forces in Bosnia, against a backdrop of political fear and loathing there and in Kosovo, to say nothing of infighting among the international community, this region may unfortunately again become a focal point for Europe. Enlargement has been the most successful foreign policy in the EU’s history, the carrot of membership being sufficient for it to get its way abroad. This has taken a few hits of late, with doubts about process and methods compounded by a decreasing appetite for further enlargement. Hence, we see that in certain countries commitments have already been made for fast-tracking (Croatia), while others are farmed off into the European Neighborhood Policy. The Czechs cannot feasibly solve this on their watch, but initiating a more open and realistic dialogue, which recognizes the more pertinent critiques of the enlargement and neighborhood policies, would be welcome.

A secure and free Europe
The Czechs have identified the build-up in freedom, security and justice as one of the most dynamic areas of cooperation within the EU. They are keen to push this — to get further support for their own modernization of law enforcement and participation in the Schengen system and to be seen as full partners, not unreliable Eastern neighbors. However, this approach inevitably prioritizes security over freedom. It is worth remembering here that the taking down of formal borders has been accompanied by the increase of checks carried out by random patrols. The idea that borders have become filtration systems for sorting the useful wheat from the “unproductive chaff” is unacceptable in the context of the global income and opportunity disparities that drive much migration. The Czech presidency should strive to ensure that Schengen and increased law-enforcement cooperation are not allowed to become disguised mechanisms for detecting, detaining and deporting “surplus humanity.” Proposed measures — such as immigration policies targeting skilled labor and the creation of an electronic network of national judicial records — should be supplemented by public information campaigns to ensure that increased powers are accompanied by enhanced accountability from citizens, civil society and the media.

Royal ascent or democratic dialogue?
The Czech Republic’s priorities for the presidency run the gamut of difficult issues that the EU and its member states currently face. This is to be saluted, as Czechs have not ducked the big questions, although in a challenging environment they may have bitten off more than they can chew. It is imperative that, as well as delivering an administratively efficient presidency, the Czechs make their voices heard, while recognizing the inadequacies of current EU thinking and policy in each of these areas. Six months is too short a time to address the issues outlined above, but it is sufficient to build a platform for further and better debate, both behind closed doors and in the public arena. In this way, the Czech Republic could be remembered for a presidency that supports further democratization of the EU, rather than the reinforcement of a top-down elitist project.

Originally Published in The Prague Post on 17/12/2008

Uncommon Ground

Prioritizing profit undermines civic interaction


Change is afoot in Prague. Following the heady exuberance of the early 1990s, the sobering reassessments at the turn of the millennium and the consolidations of the first Václav Klaus presidency, the city is thrusting itself into a new transitional phase. Keen to position itself as a thriving metropolis, alert to contemporary challenges and opportunities, Prague can point to growing prosperity, a flirtation with hosting the Olympics, a proliferation of new shopping centers, major real estate development, a proactive approach to issues such as homelessness and “anti-social behavior,” and plans for more pedestrian zones in the center.
While these seemingly disparate signifiers of success appear to reflect well on the approach of city government in providing a framework for business-led development, backed by urban planning and socially aware law enforcement, closer inspection reveals more. Common to all these trends is the destruction of “common space” — the zones of interaction and social potential where access is not restricted to certain groups and outcomes are not predetermined. New “public-private” hybrid spaces are replacing the commons, our behavior is ever more closely regulated and we run the risk of being infantilized into consumerist conformity.
The benefits of pedestrianization are clear — particularly in the case of Wenceslas Square — but the downsides are less discernible as they often reside in the motivations accompanying such schemes
The pro-business governing elite would not support plans such as the creation of pedestrian zones unless the benefits for their constituents outweighed the inconvenience to car owners and businesses. In 2005, The Prague Post noted that: “Casinos, kitschy tourist shops and tacky clubs now line the boulevard, along with fast-food stands.”
It seems this is no longer the image that Prague wishes to project and that an opportunity has been seen to extend the row of gilded boutiques from Pařížská to Opletalova. The relatively low margin businesses listed above — many of which are run by immigrants — cannot compete with the Guccis, Diors and Vuittons neither in margin nor rent, nor in image to a city keen to embrace the extremes of Western consumer culture, under the impression that it exudes class.
This move toward higher margins is consistent with a drive to take Prague “upmarket” and attract a better (read “wealthier”) class of tourist, while simultaneously “cleaning house.” Pedestrianization is partnered with a sweep to rid the square of pickpockets, prostitutes, pimps and junkies who might scare off the wealthy consumers. While pickpocketing is not to be condoned, there is obvious hypocrisy in morally justifying such “cleanups” while just around the corner, brothels masquerading as strip clubs operate with impunity.
The desire to sweep away “problems” is also evident in the much lauded new scheme to tackle homelessness in Prague, announced this summer by Councilor Jiří Janeček. Though cloaked in the “progressive” language of outreach and opportunity, the plan appears to be aimed at cleansing the city of any unpleasant reminders of the precariousness of our own positions and prevent the abject or unproductive from appearing unannounced in the middle of shopping spree or business liaison. As was noted on these pages in June: “Tourists … [and] locals would feel annoyed or even threatened by people begging for money.” Police forcibly transported the “unpleasant characters” with their “unpleasant odors” (as was referenced in the same story) away from the city center. The plan portends to compensate for this violation of rights by providing access to healthcare and employment opportunities. All those hoping to benefit from these provisions are registered in a new, comprehensive database. Should someone fail to engage with what is on offer, they are blacklisted or placed, as Janeček says, “out of the game.”
As this newspaper reported at the time, the plan seems to ignore the reality of the people who “live in a different, internal world that doesn’t mesh with the strictures of society” and who the Salvation Army say often require multiple attempts to get back on their feet. Is this really a progressive scheme or one designed to permanently exclude more of those that this newspaper likened to weeds? According to Janáček: “The goal is to protect regular citizens from the negative phenomenon of homelessness.”
The development of city-center shopping complexes — like Palladium on náměstí Republiky — only reinforces exclusionary practices. Not only do these cathedrals of consumerism provide spectacular reminders of who is in and who is out, they also come replete with surveillance technology and guards, which not only protect the property but also create what architecture critic Steven Flusty calls “interdictory spaces” to intercept, repel or filter would-be users. Similar phenomena can be found in new residential developments, especially luxury ghettoes or gated communities. We can expect watered-down versions in the myriad midmarket and nový panelák schemes planned or under construction.
These examples highlight the restrictions on access to common space for those deemed to be undesirable, but what about those who are still considered includable — readers of this article, for example? Recent legislative and policing innovations help to shed light on this. This summer saw the drinking of alcohol banned in a large number of public spaces in Prague, accompanied by the introduction of stiff penalties for those who litter or drop cigarette butts. As Prague city police spokeswoman Radka Bredlerová put it: “It aims to solve problems connected with drinking in certain public spaces, especially those places where a number of not socially integrated citizens hang out and who, after they drink, tend to bother other citizens, litter or use the street as a bathroom.”
Supposedly targeted measures dealing with problems from “socially unintegrated” citizens result in limitations on everybody’s freedoms. This is the key to understanding the destruction of common space — access to and presence in the space is dependent on staying within increasingly narrowly prescribed limits. Step outside the strict boundaries of what has been deemed acceptable and you become “anti-social,” no longer “socially integrated” and will be punished or excluded.
In a report on “The Hyper-regulation of Public Space,” London-based group the Manifesto Club described “booze bans” as infantilizing, with our ability to mutually mediate interaction being damaged by this over-regulated approach. We need to be aware of the identity and motivations of those deciding which groups and activities are undesirable. Many would say that public spaces still exist — just look at all the squares and parks, even the streets — and, even if we can’t drink there, what is to say that a café or a pub is not a public space? This again goes back to the issue of exclusion, with those who are not model consumers, conformists or “socially integrated” all too easily kept out. Those cafés, bars and other businesses that occupy the fringes of common space encroach and transform this into public-private hybrid space. Along with this comes the “shoo away” of the “undesirable,” so as not to be bothered, and we actually become creators and guarantors of interdictory space.
Our spaces should not be put at the service of the economy, cranking out pseudo-common experiences for the lucky insiders within the tight constraints and pre-determined outcomes of the profit motive. Rather, they should serve as platforms for human interaction, where no one is illegal and all are invited to engage and interact in order to mutually explore our potential in the spirit of solidarity. This means (re)creating genuine common spaces, which, as architect Wim Cuyvers notes, are spaces of needing, understanding, creating and doing that put people first, not profit.
Common spaces are currently characterized by waste, transgression and powerlessness. We must have the courage to make them into spaces of “unfear” where we embrace uncertainty and the possibility of failure that is inherent to genuine human interaction — especially with those who don’t look the same, act the same or follow the same life paths as we do. Genuine tolerance involves recognizing that others have a right to do things that we may not like and that they can do this in spaces that we may share.
In this spirit, we need to look critically at what is happening in our common spaces on a daily basis. We must challenge senseless restrictions on our freedom that only serve the interests of particular groups. We need to stand in solidarity with excluded groups and fight for our right to access and use common space.
Practically, this is as simple as a group of friends going for a beer in the park.

Politics Reborn?

With the tumult of 2008 drawing to an explosive close in Gaza, my first hope for 2009 is that the international community, and particularly the newly elected Obama administration, will put sufficient pressure on Israel to meaningfully reinvigorate the Middle East peace process and end the persecution of the Palestinians. This requires courage, and also cooperation with the other powers of the quartet that hold at least some of the cards and a lot of the cash that can prise apart this particularly Gordian knot.

Significantly, the Russians are involved in this process, and it is another of my hopes for 2009 that this practice be extended to include many more spheres, with Russian difference of opinion or worldview welcomed and engaged with rather than ostracised and humiliated. This is essential if we are to resist the construction of a new Cold War-type conflict that leaves Europe caught in the crossfire of others' causes. There will still be plenty to fight about in the coming year, but, thankfully, for the first time in a generation, one of these things will be the politics of real social democracy, which have been rediscovered amid the ruins of turbo-capitalism. We need to seize this opportunity to make our case, and remake our world.

Lastly, I would like to see the England cricket team reclaim the ashes from Australia in this summer's edition of one of sport's most enduring contests!

This was originally published in The Prague Post on 31/12/2008

This Ruckus is Sponsored by Political impotence

Whether smashing up banks, burning effigies of bankers or urging people to harm Bono, there was a lot of anger on the streets of London last week. The G20 summit attracted large-scale protests from diverse groups eager to vent their frustration on topics ranging from climate change to the credit crunch.

However, many commentators have argued that venting was about all that was going on. Even at the heart of the protest outside the Bank of England, there was a bizarre mix of spectacle and stagnation, with the sporadic excitement of dodging the battalions of baton-wielding robocops interspersed with the long periods of standing around in the sun. Protester doubled as photographer, demonstrator as dancer and provocateur as voyeur. Professor Frank Furedi described it as a "caricature of a riot," dismissing the demo as "a half-hearted ritual of pretend-rage and pseudo-concern."

This is unfair. Although the content of the protest was hardly cohesive or consistent, its form reflected a lack of other options in the current climate. The diverse groups involved are actually objecting to facets of the same thing: the current political arrangements that put profits before people, imperil the planet and, crucially, exclude the people from politics and power.

The G20 and Obama's attempt to disguise more of the same as a new world order won't address this. Neither will a middle-class day out with concessions to angry anarchists around the edges. What we need is real democracy, and for that we need to get engaged in politics by creating new political parties or reforming existing ones. We need to hold our governments to account, and although protesting alone won't achieve this, it isn't a bad start.

We need to build on this platform and get meaningfully political. Isolated meetings of touring world leaders only put us further away from power.

Originally Published in The Prague Post on 09/04/2009

Don’t Jump on the Ban-Wagon

Recent attempts to outlaw the DS (Workers Party) raise questions about our current conceptions of democracy, freedom and tolerance



The Czech Supreme Court’s rejection of the government-requested ban on the anti-Roma, far right Workers Party (DS) will doubtless have many ‘liberal’ folk cursing or crying over their fair-trade coffee. However, on closer inspection, supporters of true democracy and freedom may well have reason to cheer what ostensibly seems to be a victory for a fairly reprehensible bunch.

Acting on the advice of the Interior Ministry, headed by well known friend-of-freedom Ivan Langer, the Czech government recently sought to ban the Workers’ Party for violating the constitution in at least four major ways. In the run up to the verdict, The Post reported that Klara Kalibova of Czech NGO ‘Tolerance’ supported a ban despite admitting that the Government presented no serious legal argument. Thankfully, presiding Judge Šimíček didn’t agree, stating that
“The government produced no evidence of the radicalization of the party’s activities with the ultimate goal of seizing power through non-democratic means, or of its violation of the Right to Assembly Act. The proceedings before this court did not show that the Workers’ Party’s activities, as documented by the government, provide reasons to dissolve it.”

Even if Šimíček had upheld the ban, DS Chairman Tomas Vandas had insisted that they would simply form a new party with the same agenda, although under a different name, highlighting the practical difficulties of this approach to dealing with difference in a democracy. Kalibova was undeterred by this and, presumably speaking in the spirit of Tolerance, declared that the fight to ban any such organization would continue, as this is “a battle between right and wrong.”

The ODS Government’s latest attempt to demarcate the acceptable bounds of democratic society and limit the public sphere come against a backdrop that includes the successful banning of the Young Communists (KSM: Komunisticky Svaz Mladeze) in 2008 and talk of trying to ban the main Communist Party of Bohemia and Moravia (KSCM).

Many people, looking back in history, and to its supposed end - when Western liberal market democracy claimed victory over collapsed communism - would cheer these moves. However, it is worth considering what implications banning political parties has for our vision and practice of democracy as well as for our conceptions of politics and freedom in the Czech Republic and beyond.


Widen the lens, narrow the view
Czech Republic is far from being the only country to ban or consider banning political parties, with numerous examples around Europe fuelling the fire of debate on the ethics and efficacy of such moves.

In Germany, there have been repeated attempts by successive governments to ban the NPD (Nationaldemokratische Partei Deutschlands) which is held to represent resurgent neo-nazism and as such violate clause 2 of Article 21 of Germany’s constitution (written by UK and US lawyers and imposed by the allies) which states that

“Parties that, by reason of their aims or the behaviour of their adherents, seek to undermine or abolish the free democratic basic order or to endanger the existence of the Federal Republic of Germany shall be unconstitutional.”

However, no ban has been enforced and in 2003 the Schroeder government suffered a significant humiliation when the constitutional court threw out the case against the NPD because their inner circle had been so comprehensively penetrated by government agents and informants. These agents had also authored several of the key pieces of evidence against the NPD including anti-Semitic texts and the party had, in several instances, been effectively responding to state diktat.

In Belgium, the right-wing, nationalist party the Vlaams Blok was formed in the late seventies, appealing to Flemish concerns about unfair representation and resource distribution and calling for Flemish independence. The Blok grew in popularity, polling progressively higher totals in national and European elections, reaching 11% and 14% respectively, until in 2004 it was banned for “permanently inciting discrimination and racial segregation”. Despite this, a new and similar party, the Vlaams Belang (Flemish Interest) was quickly formed and is, by some measures, the largest in Belgium gaining up to 25% of the vote. The party is kept out of government by a Cordon Sanitaire imposed by mainstream parties, raising the questions of democratic representation. These questions are also reflected in the contradiction between the aforementioned second clause of Article 21 of the German constitution and the first, which reads

“Political parties shall participate in the formation of the political will of the people. They may be freely established.”

In Spain, the banning of pro-independence, left-wing Basque parties drew “concern” from UN special rapporteur on human rights, Martin Scheinin, and followed the 2002 ban on Herri Batasuna, the political wing of ETA. In the UK, while no parties have been banned recently, just last month controversial Dutch parliamentarian Geert Wilders was prevented from even entering the country and there have been many calls to ostracize Avigdor Lieberman, the right winger who is likely to be Israel’s next foreign minister.


Banning demeans us all
The argument for banning largely follows the line taken by the German constitution, that ‘extremist’ parties threaten the state itself or the nature of democracy within it. In the Czech case, this has been the line taken over the KSM and that has been proposed in the past in relation to the KSCM, largely for their commitment to returning the means of production to public ownership. With regard to the DS, the situation was less clear as, despite their ties to the NPD and other foreign right-wing groups, they were largely brought to court over their anti-Roma stance and overtly xenophobic views. While reprehensible, it is interesting to note that the Czech state felt itself incapable of defending Roma rights and freedoms through normal judicial mechanisms.

When a party is banned for the reasons given above, the government is in effect saying that these views are not admissible to the public sphere: that they are dangerous to the very practice of democracy itself and threaten both the state and the people in it. As Klara Kalibova put it, the DS was dangerous because it was “getting [to] some of the so-called real Czech people”.

Disregarding Kalibova’s de-Czechification or de-personification of those who hold different views to herself, this is reminiscent of the shutting down of the public sphere under Husak’s project of ‘Normalisation’, as is the unwillingness to seriously consider why the KSCM still gets 20% of the vote or why only 25% of young Czechs think life is better now than under Communism.

This reasoning supposes that we, the people, are easily led sheep, incapable of acting as democratic citizens and differentiating between a political plurality and the vicious views of xenophobes and wannabe dictators. It assumes that enough of us actually hold extreme opinions or are all too easily swayed by the weasel words of those who do. Therefore, for our own individual and collective good, we must be protected from these opinions and those who hold them, lest they activate our latent greed, stupidity and prejudice.

This view only gains traction if the demos has become so disenfranchised, disengaged and de-politicised as to see these extreme views as offering a better representation of themselves and their view of people and society than any of the other options on the political table. This is in fact where the true danger lies, as this depoliticisation is exactly one of the unfinished projects of ‘end of history’ neoliberal, post-political governance. Such governance disguises large political decisions behind facades of naturalized economics portrayed as science, managerial - technocratic decision making or otherwise takes decisions out of the contestable realm of politics on the grounds of security. This, combined with the convergence of political parties in many parts of the world around a ‘centre’ that has shifted quite dramatically to the right in the last 30 years, leaves people feeling disconnected and with the feeling that politics is a game played elsewhere, by other people.

Win the argument, don’t ignore it
However, this project is indeed incomplete and by getting engaged, holding our politicians to account for what they promise and demanding that politics should not be reduced to tactical voting for ‘the least bad option’, we can defeat both patronizing control and dangerous extremism.

On practical grounds, we should also oppose the banning of political parties or of the airing of apparently abhorrent views. The philosopher Judith Butler has argued that banning or censoring often has the effect of actually propagating the views that the banning authority was trying to restrict and that the attempt to censor endows them with a power and a platform that they otherwise lacked. The example of Geert Wilders, who until recently was a largely unknown figure in the UK, is a case in point with Wilders becoming a martyr for free speech and his xenophobic opinions being aired on national television.

This is not to deny the potentially destructive and exclusionary power of language, or of particular discourses, which can make people feel like outsiders and make it more likely that they will live in fear or identify themselves as an under-class, with fewer freedoms and opportunities than others. These are the real dangers that are posed by the views of the DS. The question of who has the authority to outlaw certain views and why they do so also becomes pertinent here. It is chillingly ironic to imagine a new control society in which first they came for the communists and we did not stand up, then they came for the fascists and we did not stand up and when they came for us, there was no one or no grounds to stand up for us.

However, rather than banning views or parties, we need to engage ourselves in continually thinking about what our views actually are and asking ourselves why we think what we think and believe what we believe. We need to then take these views into the public, political sphere to discuss them with others who may share some or none of opinions. This is the beginning of reclaiming politics for the people and demanding real representation instead of merely complying with the current consensus of corporate interests that has filled the post-89 political vacuum. This public, political engagement based on private, personal reflection will allow us to win the arguments against proponents of xenophobia, exclusion and anti-democracy, rather than perpetrating these intolerant attitudes in the name of defeating them.

Originally Published in The Prague Post on 16/04/2009