Alternatives International

Whistleblowers: Heroes or Heretics?

Suzanna Khoshabi — 2013-07-03T03:50:37Z

One year ago this June, Julian Assange was granted political asylum at the Ecuadorian Embassy in London. However, the anniversary of his stay at the embassy had to share headline space with Edward Snowden's scandalous leaks about the US government's NSA program, and also with the anticipation of Bradley Manning's trial.

At a glance, the United States appears to be a country that is historically sympathetic to whistleblowers. The False Claims Act of 1863 encouraged and rewarded individuals who spoke out against corporations supplying dishonest information to the government. In 1989, the US passed the Whistleblower Protection Act, which claims that whistleblowers ‘serve the public interest by assisting in the elimination of fraud, waste, abuse and unnecessary Government expenditures'. This bill was, however, put on hold as of December 2011.

It is also impossible to forget the famous right of Free Speech, which all American citizens are entitled to.

The cases of Edward Snowden and Bradley Manning, however, make it clear that there is a line – which they have both crossed – between what the US government considers to be a democratic right to freedom of speech and divulging dangerous information to the public.

Manning is responsible for leaking the largest collection of classified information in history to Wikileaks, with most of it focusing on the Iraq war. Many have ascribed the Arab Spring to the information that he made public about US involvement in the Middle East.

His trial began on June 3 and he has pleaded guilty to 10 of the 22 charges made against him. Espionage and ‘aiding the enemy' are charges that Manning is currently fighting to prove his innocence against. The prosecution argues that when leaking classified information to the public, this public includes Al Qaeda. Even if Manning did not intentionally share top-secret US information with Al Qaeda, the prosecution argue that it is still a crime, and that Bin Laden had Wikileaks documents in his possession when he was killed that came from Manning.

However, it has been pointed out that aiding the enemy is a controversial charge that could be used to criminalize journalists' sources, and many are skeptical that Col. Denise Lind, who is judging the case, will find him guilty of it.

Alongside waiting for the verdict of Manning's trial, the whole world appears to be waiting to hear about where Edward Snowden will appear next, and which country (if any) is going to grant him political asylum.

Snowden is currently on the run from the Obama administration's wrath, trying to escape potential charges of violating the Espionage Act by leaking confidential documents revealing the NSA's controversial surveillance programs.

While the US was quick to clarify that it is not spying on - or recording phone conversations of - innocent American citizens, Snowden claims that the NSA surveillance programs could enable him to gather highly private and personal information of virtually anybody he wishes to from his former position as an NSA contractor.

The BBC published a guide in response, detailing to readers exactly what ‘spooks' can find out about them as innocent individuals.

While there was an initial uproar about the possibility of US citizens being spied on, the fact that people in other countries may fall under the NSA's radar seemed to be left out of the debate. This was up until Snowden leaked information on the US bugging European agencies and offices. Obama is now busy with rapid damage control to avoid souring relations with the EU.

Europe, however, appears to be short tempered, demanding an immediate end to any alleged spying. ‘We are no longer in the Cold War', said Angela Merkel's spokesperson Steffen Siebert.

Snowden has also been disappointed with the media response to his leaks. “Unfortunately, the mainstream media now seems far more interested in what I said when I was 17 or what my girlfriend looks like rather than, say, the largest program of suspicionless surveillance in human history,” he told The Guardian.

The public's perception of whistleblowers ranges from seeing them as heroes to heretic. Whistleblowers' fates, however, all seem to be similar: heavy prison sentences.

It is fair to believe that the government must keep certain information hidden from the public for their own good, and this is the view typically held by those who see Snowden, Manning and Assange as troublemakers and egomaniacs. However, when Manning is being nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize, there appear to be too many contradictions to make sense of.

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro touts Snowden as a deliverer of much needed truth: "We think this young person has done something very important for humanity, has done a favour to humanity, has spoken great truths to deconstruct a world … that is controlled by an imperialist American elite."

Neo-Fascism: The Beginning of a New Chapter in Europe's History?

Suzanna Khoshabi — 2013-06-02T22:43:41Z

Scattered across seven years, seven cities, and seven professions, nine of the victims of the ‘Doener murders' had one thing in common: a shared status as immigrants in Germany.

It took the German authorities what many consider to be a surprisingly long time to connect these politically motivated murders. The press, on the otherhand, were quick to connect the Turkish ethnicity of 8 of the victims as they named the murders after the popular Turkish Doener dish served at snack stands around Germany. The reasons for the tenth and final murder of a German policewoman are still under investigation.

Beate Zschaepe went on trial this month as the last living member of the neo-Nazi cell known as the National Socialist Underground, allegedly responsible for the murders. The case is bringing up recurrent issues in Germany that have been especially delicate and difficult to confront.

However, these issues of neo-Nazis and xenophobia are not unique to Germany.

Political scientist Francis Fukuyama considered Europe to be the continent closest to crossing the ‘End of History' finish line: liberal democracy, he argued, was the conclusion of man's political evolution. Fascism, then, could have been explained away as a small stumble on the path to utopia—except that extreme right-wing parties are currently seeing a revival again in many European countries.

Focusing primarily on issues of immigration, national identity, Euroscepticism and economic policy, these nationalist parties have recently gained an increase` in voters and support. Although in some cases, parties on the far right still remain on the peripherals, in others they represent a significant fraction of the electorate.

In Hungary, for example, 16.71 percent of the vote went to the far-right Jobbik Party in the April 2010 general elections, making it the third biggest party in the country. While party leader Gabor Vona's ‘Hungarian Guard' paramilitary fringe group was officially banned, it still works in practice as a voluntary civil service whose duties include patrolling against crime in Romani neighbourhoods and villages. Along with a firm antagonism towards Hungary's Roma population, anti-Semitism is also one of the party's defining factors. They have also said that if they held power, banning dual Israeli-Hungarian citizenship is something they would consider. Resisting global domination by Zionists is an openly acknowledged part of the party's agenda.

Greece's neo-Fascist Golden Dawn Party won just under 7 percent of the vote in May 2012. Despite its newcomer status to parliament, its associations with racism, Nazism and violence have created a media stir. The party banner is suspiciously reminiscent of the banner of the Nazi Party, though Golden Dawn claims it is an ancient Greek symbol. The Party denies allegations of violence, yet as the Greek economy continues to flounder, the party's nationalist rhetoric and populist policies are winning it more support. Hearkening back to the glory days of Ancient Greece and linking National Socialism to Ancient Greek values, these strategies are having a soothing effect on voters who feel that Greece has fallen victim to unfair immigration and economic policies.

France is another example of a country having a far-right party gaining significant popularity. The Front National is now the third largest party in the country, and won 11 percent of the vote in the March 2011 local elections. Unsurprisingly, it also opposes immigration—particularly from Muslim countries that the party claims threaten French secular values. The Party's leader, Marie Le Pen, is also opposed to dual citizenship. As for economic policy, the Front National calls for Protectionism and for France to leave the euro.

In Austria, the Freedom Party of Austria wants an end to immigration. With 25.8 percent of the vote in the 2010 Vienna elections and popularity that has only increased since then, this may be something they could one day achieve. The party is notorious for its low tolerance of Muslims: party leader Heinz-Christian Strache advocates a ban on building mosques in the country, and he sees the ethnically Austrian population as victims of ‘inverse racism' from its immigrant Muslim communities. Like many of his fellow far-right counterparts, he also must constantly deny allegations that he is racist or a Nazi supporter.

The Italian Lega Nord Party accepts immigration, though only from Christian countries, so that the socially conservative values it supports can be upheld. The UK was already dealing with the British National Party—which up until recently required its members to be ethnically British—and the English Defence League's anti-Islam demonstrations, when the UK Independence Party joined the far-right ranks with sudden electoral success in 2012 and 2013. The Sweden Democrats party won parliamentary representation in Sweden for the first time in 2010. It can now push to strip the country's indigenous Sami population of their indigenous special rights status.

The list goes on, and the policies are similar. Not all the parties are associated with violence, and in cases such as Beate Zschape and the NSU, the violence came from what many consider to be a terrorist cell rather than a political group.

The EU is undeniably enduring difficult times, and many of these parties have seized their opportunity to gain power and popularity. The Golden Dawn tries to persuade people that the Greek financial crisis will be resolved once the immigrants are gone. In Hungary, the Jobbik party are seen by some as simply a fresh face in politics, who weren't afraid to break taboos speaking out against the Roma and other delicate issues. But although it may be refreshing for disillusioned voters, bold rhetoric can quickly become dangerous.

According to these parties, they aren't racist. They are Nationalist. They aren't white supremacists, they are just want to preserve the traditional white ethnicity of their country. And their racist and often offensive comments are, according to them, taken out of context by the international media.

This week, the EU Commissioner of Home Affairs Cecilia Malmström gave a speech at the ‘We are the Others Conference' in Berlin. “[Migrants] enrich our societies, and always have done. If we forget that, if we appeal to populism rather than engaging with the real issues when we discuss migration and integration, we risk fading into a very dangerous rhetoric,” she said.

The reality of Europe today is a multicultural society, unfortunately one that is economically struggling. But xenophobia and violence are unacceptable reactions to this reality, and they fail to address the real nature of Europe's problems. The European Union is supposed to support human rights, respect and equality for those that live within it. Hopefully, these values of liberal democracy will continue to be upheld.

Thatcher and Femenism

Suzanna Khoshabi — 2013-05-01T22:18:31Z

Earlier this month the United Kingdom laid its longest-serving Prime Minister of the 20th century to R.I.P. However, the nation is divided over whether this stands for Rest In Peace, or Rest In Pieces.

Rejected from a job (long before her premiership) for being ‘dangerously self-opinionated', it isn't surprising that the severe policies Margaret Thatcher implemented during her reign as Prime Minister are as fiercely divisive now as they were twenty years ago.

What is surprising, however, is that the first – and only – female Prime Minister of a country can be such a controversial feminist role model. Whether it's because she was not womanly enough, or unsympathetic to women's rights, many are unhappy with the inclusion of Thatcher in any sort of feminist agenda. On some level, this feminist backlash is understandable – the woman being remembered as the first female Prime Minister of the United Kingdom is also the same woman who will be remembered for saying “The feminists hate me, don't they? And I don't blame them. For I hate feminism.”

Upon hearing the news of her death, more than a few U.K. cities held parties in celebration. To many, Thatcher's policies are a bitter memory that people would rather forget than commemorate. Trade unions were crippled during her time in power, costing entire communities tens of thousands of jobs, and her opposition to sanctions on South Africa and refusal to recognize the African National Congress as anything other than a terrorist organization are just a few reasons to regard her political legacy negatively.

Even David Cameron's attempt at a parliamentary debate on Thatcher's legacy did not turn out to be quite the tribute he had in mind, with many left-wing MPs criticizing her policies more vehemently than he expected. As Labour MP David Winnick said, her policies “caused immense pain and suffering to ordinary people.”

During the debate, Labour MP Glenda Jackson's 7-minute speech began with a tirade against the late Prime Minister's policies. Given Jackson's position on the left of the U.K. political spectrum, the reasons for her condemnation of ‘Thatcherism' were clear. However, her speech ended with the conclusion: “The first Prime Minister of female gender, OK. But a woman? Not on my terms.” The relevance of Thatcher's ‘womanliness' to the debate was less easy to understand.

If a woman does a bad job as Prime Minister, does she simply not count as a legitimate woman or politician? If she doesn't live up to society's expectations, should society wait and hope that, next time, the woman elected to govern the nation is a better embodiment of what we expect from a pioneering political female – a more likeable, strident supporter of the feminist cause?

If so, Thatcher can be consigned to history as a disappointing first draft of what a female Prime Minister is expected to be.

However, the fact that poor policy decisions are still being equated with the gender of the person deciding them shows that the feminist movement still has a lot left to fight for. In Thatcher's early years, women fighting for gender equality were quick to condemn the misogynistic ‘Ditch the Bitch' anti-Thatcher campaign, despite a firm hatred for her policies. Yet in the week following her death, the song ‘Ding Dong! The Witch is Dead' claimed a top five position in the UK music charts, without strong objection to its misogynistic undertones.

The attacks on Thatcher's gender are coming from both sides. Feminists have written about her legacy as one that was disappointing and contributed little to the struggle for gender equality, when it had the potential to contribute so much. The metaphor of ‘smashing the glass ceiling' has been modified to suit Thatcher specifically: she climbed through it and pulled the ladder up with her. To many, her gender and achievements matter less than her attitude and beliefs. They would contend that a woman who described feminism as ‘poison' simply can't be counted as a feminist role model – not even an unwitting one.

A final tension arises between Thatcher's position as head of the Tory Conservative party and feminism. From a theoretical perspective, it is hard to reconcile feminism with conservative political values and policies. A classic example of this tension is that Thatcher herself was unsupportive of ‘workplace crèches' – day-care facilities in the office – that would help women work and raise children at the same time.

When she was 26 years old, Thatcher published an article entitled Wake Up, Women. It expressed her optimism that Queen Elizabeth II's reign could ‘remove the last shreds of prejudice against women aspiring to the highest places'. She went on to say that she hoped women could start to combine careers and marriages – it just wasn't the state's responsibility to help them with it.

Margaret Thatcher was an ambitious and powerful woman, a self-professed hater of feminism, a Prime Minister, and a Conservative. The United Kingdom chose, albeit with some protests, to commemorate her with a full military honors funeral. Her case forces feminists to ask themselves: does feminism support the achievements of all women, or only fellow feminists?

In either case, Margaret Thatcher is still the only female Prime Minister of the UK to date. Hopefully, this fact will change in the near future.