Globalaffairs

Issue 12/December-January 2009
By Sushil Srivastava

The two words art and investment taken together create an intellectual contradiction and force us to think as to how an art object is termed as an investment.

An art object is a soulful expression of the artistic sensibilities that has an intrinsic value. Which is not just because of the interlaced creative and aesthetic juices but also because of it’s relevance in the time frame of an era. And it is due to these attributes that an art object acquires a financial value.

And since art is very subjective it needs deeper understanding with regard to its financial aspect.

The Indian art is today being recognized on the global platform and at home the Indian art market is annually growing at 30-35%. It is being predicted that this trend would continue. It is not just because of the surge in Indian economy that has had a trickle effect and triggered the boom in Indian art market but also because Indian art has a long way to go. It is far behind if one was to draw a comparison with others in Asian art market itself. Thus with a potent economy to support, international exposure, the ever growing awareness and the knowledge of art just a click away, it all mounts to the long awaited big bang in Indian art industry. And since our art industry is still in an emerging state those who understand this transition will benefit the most.

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Issue 12/December-January 2009
By Juan Luis Dorado

In the last few months, people have been talking a lot about the change. The President-Elect of the United States has arrived at the White House with a message of change. They are also trying to change the international financial system, to avoid a new difficult situation for the markets. But, when will the situation change in Latin America?

During the last years, several Latin-American countries have reemerged and they have acquired an important role in the international system of the 21st century (above all in the economy).

Brazil has turned into a world economic power. This country is one of the strong ones of the Group of Emerging Market Countries. Moreover, Brazilian President Lula da Silva had an important role at the meeting for the financial reform, which took place in Washington.

Argentina also recovered stillness after the stormy times of the “corralito” and it is also becoming important in the International Community. An example of this was Cristina Fernández, being at the meeting of the G-20.

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Issue 12/December-January 2009
By Glen Ruffle

Given the hysterics in the media, one could easily conclude that we are heading towards a new ‘great depression’ and massive global unemployment. Everyone is placing the blame on someone else: the politicians blame the regulators: the regulators blame the bankers: the bankers blame the borrowers: the borrowers blame the politicians: and everyone blames the Bush Presidency. But despite all of this, the US is not technically even in recession yet. So what’s going on?

A new crisis?

To start it is worth asking if this is a new crisis. While it is new for America, Western Europe and Anglo-sphere Pacific-rim states, it’s just another crisis for the rest of the world. Russians simply shrug their shoulders – after all, they’ve had their life savings wiped out twice already in the 1990s, so why should they not expect it again? And what about Latin America, where most of the continent usually has some form of financial problem and where large in-flows and out-flows of investment have helped to destabilize governments? Then in the late 1990s there was the Asian financial crisis. And of course there are still the 30,000 people who die each day because they cannot feed themselves, whilst the EU and the US wonder how to reduce obesity. For the historian Eric Hobsbawm, all of these things are signs that the rest of the world has constantly been in capitalist crisis, and only the structuring of the world economy to serve the interests of Western governments and consumers has protected us in the West from these ‘normal’ events.

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Issue 12/December-January 2009
By Kim Young

After twenty-two months of grueling campaigning, America chose African-American Barack Obama to be the 44th President of the United States of America. With celebrations erupting in Grant Park, Chicago in Obama’s home state of Illinois to celebrations in Kenya, London, Japan, Europe and Sydney, to name a few, a new era was ushered in under the mantle of “Change We Can Believe In”, while at the same moment, exactly 44 years later, an African American affirmed the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

Obama was born in Hawaii to a white mother from Kansas and a father from Kenya and largely raised by his white grandparents. He lived in Indonesia and was raised in Hawaii until his college years at Harvard where he became the President of the illustrious Harvard Law Review and went on to teach Constitutional Law. Married to a Harvard educated lawyer, Michelle Obama, Obama gave up the prospect of a six figure income to work in community organizing on the South side of Chicago when unemployment was high and homelessness stole hope from its citizens. He wrote two memoirs, “The Audacity of Hope” and “Dreams from my Father” both immediate bestsellers.

In a hard fought battle, Obama emerged victorious around midnight. Over at the luxurious Belmont Hotel, a sorely disappointed John McCain, a US war veteran and former P.O.W. who already attempted to run for President, addressed die-hard Republicans and graciously accepted the will of the people. However, graciousness was not the hallmark of the battle for the White House.

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Issue 12/December-January 2009
By Aurora Moreno Alcojor

Once again, the Democratic Republic of Congo is threatened by war, after years of confrontations against rebellious forces, foreign troops and governmental charges. When it seemed that they have attained a peace attempt definitely, after the first free and democratic elections celebrated in the country in 2006, the refugees horror, destroyed villages and a bloody fight in each millimetre of earth has come back to disturb the limited peace which the Congolese inhabitants were enjoying.

The history keeps repeating over and over again in Congo, a country which drags a truculent past full of violence since the Belgian brutal colonization in 1912, under the yoke of Mobutu Sese Seko, one of the most violent and oldest dictators of Africa. The geographical situation of Congo, together with his widely and covetously natural resources and a succession of corrupt dictators, has never helped to improve the situation.

Congo borders nine unstable countries: Sudan, Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi, Tanzania, Zambia, Angola, Congo-Brazzaville and the Centre African Republic. One more time, Congo is first page of newspapers and magazines after the armed revolt led by the General Laurent Nkunda. The movement, which was planned for several years, is sinking his roots in the events of the neighbouring Rwanda, in 1994. Between May and June 2004 the main attacks took place in the province of North Kivu. Extremists Hutus put an end to lives of approximately 80.000 Tutsis and Hutus who were stroked with knifes several weeks after. This event became the biggest genocide of recent history. When peace was settled in Rwanda and the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) (movement formed by Tutsis) of Paul Kagame came to power, problems moved to Congo.

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Issue 12/December-January 2009
By Glen Ruffle

The EU and Russia have both taken steps that will undermine the long term future of NATO. As the need for NATO decreases, so the presence of the United States in Europe will be undermined and the multipolar world will arrive quicker.

It all began in April 2008, when NATO ministers met and agreed that eventually, Georgia and the Ukraine would join the alliance. The much sought after MAP (Membership Action Plan), the actual timetable for membership, was not granted to these states, but they at least had firm plans in place to work with NATO and receive aid.

The next major development was in August. From what it is possible to gather from the OSCE, the Georgian President, Mikhail Saakashvili, pulled the trigger first in a tense situation that had built up in South Ossetia. Separatist forces had for a long time been receiving aid and help from Russia, and when Saakashvili decided to try and crush them by force, he bit off much more than he could chew. Presumably he thought the West would help and be able to stop Russia, but geography worked against him. The West was helpless and Georgia was, and still is, at the mercy of Russia.

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Issue 12/December-January 2009
By Enrico Labriola

The surest thing about the 15th October election was, not as usual, the outcome. All political analysts observed that the confirmation for the incumbent Ilham Aliyev, was out of doubt. The result, with the 88,73% of the votes casted for Aliyev (1), confirmed what the pundits said months ago. No one of the other 6 candidates passed the 3%, showing that the popularity of the current president is very high. Around 75,6 % of voters, according to the official turnout figures, entered the polling stations in the sunny day of 15th October. Some bloggers defined the elections a mere formality for the head of New Azerbaijan Party (2). When he was elected for the first time, in 2003, the vote was regarded by international observers as not meeting the international standards, putting a shadow on the 77% the Central Electoral Commission assigned to him(3). Son of the ‘national hero’ Heydar Aliyev –whose potraits are everywhere in the streets of the country-, Ilham has now another plebiscite in his favour, even bigger than before.

Veteran opposition leaders and their respective parties—the Musavat Party’s Isa Gambar, the Popular Front of Azerbaijan Party’s (PFAP) Ali Kerimli, and the Democratic Party’s Sardar Jalaloglu—stayed out of this presidential election, after grouping in a “Joint front of democratic forces” on 5 september(4). Some negotiations were held to find a common candidate and a platform and participate in the elections, but were unsuccessfull (5). The boycott could be seen as a move to avoid a count of their vote share and claim all the people that will stay at home as their supporter. This move was pointed out as non-sense by Embassador Boris Frlec, the head of OSCE/ODIHR mission, because staying out of the race meant for them not benefiting of the legal protection guaranteed by rules, and not showing in the electoral campaign that they are present and active. Moreover, if they feared violations of their rights, they could denounce them to the observation missions present.

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Issue 12/December-January 2009
By Pablo A. Gambandé

“Facebook…a social utility to connect people around you”

Facebook awakens love and hate, because it is a computer application that can be a way of connecting friends and acquaintances for some people. However, for other people it is a tool used by liberal capitalism, which is also considered part of the American Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).

Beyond the truth, the question we should ask ourselves is the following one: Are we facing a capitalist and imperialist conspiracy or, without wanting it, a new process of change in the world order?

As with all the social facts, probably the subjectivity level and cohesion level towards a stand or another will form the future social fact. I believe it will mainly be defined by a generational and passage of time matter. Concerning the Facebook phenomenon, we should consider that most of people who were born in the 70s and the 80s have seen more than one social communication tool. We use e-mail tools, or instant Messenger tools, such as MIRC and ICQ, and others, such as BBS and FTP to share information.

We can or cannot understand these abbreviations or we can consider them obsoletes, but many of them still work. They are tools that we have used in the past, spending at least more than two hours of our time.

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Issue 12/December-January 2009
By Paul Pryce

Following reports that Kim Jong Il, Dear Leader of the Hermit Kingdom, had suffered a stroke in September, speculation has abound as to the health of the reclusive dictator. The gossip over the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea’s (DPRK) dictator reached a near crescendo after Kim failed to appear at a parade marking the anniversary of North Korea’s founding on September 9th. (1)

Due to the reclusiveness of Kim Jong Il and the general guardedness of that regime, it is still difficult to tell how extreme Kim’s stroke was and whether the man is close to his demise or still has many years left ahead of him. To discuss his health further at this point, without any proper evidence as to Kim Jong Il’s physical condition from his country, would be to simply add further speculation where the potential for gossip has nigh been exhausted.

However, the secrecy surrounding Kim Jong Il’s stroke brings up an interesting notion which deserves to be explored. That is to say, what if Kim Jong Il will suffer another stroke in a short few years? If the Dear Leader is going to die in the very near future, would the DPRK die with him or would someone step forth from the shadows to assume the mantle of dictator?

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Issue 12/December-January 2009
By Andrea Bonzanni

The whole world is cheering President Obama these days. The 44th president of the United States of America represents a turning point in the history of the country and optimism seems to reign, even though the issues he has to confront with are numerous and complicated, especially in the international arena. From Iran and its nuclear plans, to the awakening of Russia and the anti-American axis in Latin America, the presidential agenda already seems quite busy. And again there is Pakistan, Israel, North Korea, Sudan…

However, it is not too ingenuous to think that a President like Barack Obama can reorient American foreign policy simply thanks to what he is, even before finding out what he does. Perceptions matter in international relations. The people from every continent who fled in the street waving stars and stripes to celebrate his election on 4th November will have little or no impact on foreign policy making, but even their leaders are not immune to such infatuation.

A geographical area where this paradigm applies really well is obviously the Middle East. Resentment and anti-Americanism have played a significant role in the politics of the region, especially over the last decade or so. Blaming the unique superpower has been a useful tool for discharging responsibility and gain consensus. Few governments and ruling elites in the Middle East have not taken advantage of it and the Bush administration has not done anything to reverse the state of things. Its unilateral, sometimes arrogant, stance and its misconceived ‘long war on terror’ has instead worsened the situation fuelling and oiling the machine of Islamic politics, further destabilising the region.

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