Law – Page 27 – a sibilant intake of breath

The Warrior’s Honour

It is strange to read Michael Ignatieff’s The Warrior’s Honour now, when he is leader of the official opposition rather than a journalist. Back in 1998, Ignatieff described the purpose of the book:

I wanted to find out what mixture of moral solidarity and hubris led Western nations to embark on this brief adventure in putting the world right.

Ignatieff is making reference to the whole notion of ‘humanitarian intervention’ and the ‘responsibility to protect’ which emerged strongly after the scale of both killing and western inaction in the 1994 Rwandan genocide became apparent. The book is certainly dated in some ways, which can be a liability. At the same time, it has value insofar as it does express one perspective of that time, and facilitates consideration of what has changed since.

The central concept of Ignatieff’s book is the ethics of warriors themselves – the internal moral forces that sometimes help to constrain behaviour within the most limited bounds of ethics, even in wartime. He explores the role of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) as special representatives (‘enforcers’ is too strong a word) of the Geneva Conventions. He explains how Henry Dunant – founder of the organization – established a continuing tradition in which delegates of the ICRC have “made their pact with the devil of war” and “accept[ed] the inevitability, sometimes even the desirability of war” while “trying, if it is possible, to conduct it according to certain rules of honour.” Ignatieff also describes the consequences when warriors abandon honour, as he alleges took place during and after the breakup of Yugoslavia, when former neighbours destroyed their collective homeland driven by “the narcissism of minor difference.”

The Warrior’s Honour is not an especially practical book. The tone is more mournful and ambiguous than certain or persuasive. It doesn’t offer much guidance to those trying to decide how to respond to the humanitarian emergencies of today. Ignatieff’s book does more to describe the predicament than to suggest paths out of it, though that is a valuable undertaking in itself. In the conclusion, he explains:

The chief moral obstacle in the path of reconciliation is the desire for revenge. Now, revenge is commonly regarded as a low and unworthy emotion, and because it is regarded as such, its deep moral hold on people is rarely understood. But revenge – morally considered – is the desire to keep faith with the dead, to honour their memory by taking up their cause where they left of. Revenge keeps faith between generations; the violence it engenders is a ritual form of respect for the community’s dead – therein lies its legitimacy. Reconciliation is difficult precisely because it must compete with the powerful alternative morality of violence. Political terror is tenacious because it is an ethical practice. It is a cult of the dead, a dire and absolute expression of respect.

One has to wonder whether it wouldn’t be better for humanity to simply forget the outrages of the past, given the tragic way in which they perpetuate conflict into the present and future. Like feuding gangs, human beings feel this constant compulsion to respond to every slight with a larger slight, and pay back every rape and murder with two more.

Given the course of Michael Ignatieff’s life, the book also highlights the tragic theatrical character of government and opposition. As a journalist, Ignatieff could grapple with major political and ethical questions with a kind of integrity and with acceptance that the answers derived from history are usually imperfect and uncertain. As a politician, he must engage in a much less sophisticated slinging back-and-forth of accusations. One of many unfortunate facts about political life is that proximity to power tends to be accompanied by a cheapening of discourse.

Midterm day

Despite all the complaints from both left and right, I think Barack Obama is a promising president, whose tenure has largely been wasted on the financial crisis so far. Nonetheless, he does have some decent achievements to point to, most notably on health care, and there is a lot more he could accomplish with adequate Congressional support.

Hopefully, today’s elections will be less dire for the Democrats than many have been expecting.

While some of the complaints about Obama from the right have been non-sensical (all that secret Muslim / socialist stuff), what really seems to endanger him is a loss of enthusiam from his core supporters. Certainly, he could have done more on issues like gay rights and climate change. Nonetheless, it doesn’t make sense to punish him for inadequate action by rewarding those who will do even less on those issues, or even try to roll back the modest progress that has been made.

The Republicans seem to understand the value of unity and pulling together far better than Democrats do. That may be a big part of why they seem to be so much more effective at driving their agenda, despite how it tends to serve the needs of a powerful minority more than those of the population at large.

California’s Proposition 19

Tomorrow, the people of California will vote on Proposition 19: a measure that would make marijuana legal to grow, own, sell, and use in small quantities. The two major arguments being used are economic – since the measure would let counties and municipal governments levy taxes on the stuff – and security-focused – since marijuana is currently one of the sources of financial support for Mexico’s brutal drug gangs.

I have argued before that the best approach to drugs is to legalize, regulate, and provide treatment for addicts. Hopefully, California can set a progressive precedent for the rest of the United States (unlike other examples).

Spying between friends

Richard Alrich’s GCHQ: The Uncensored Story of Britain’s Most Secret Intelligence Agency describes a number of instances of longstanding allies conducting espionage against one another, including signals intelligence (SIGINT). Aldrich describes how the ‘Echelon’ system run by British and U.S. intelligence was used to “read the traffic of their minor allies, including France and West Germany”. This system is now estimated to process five billion intercepts per day, probably filtering them for suspicious words and phrases. Aldrich talks about how, after the second world war, Britain’s codebreakers were “doing extensive work on Britain’s European allies, regarding them as either insecure or untrustworthy, or both”.

Of course, more awkward allies have been a higher priority for codebreaking and other forms of covert activity. During the interwar period, Russian ciphers were the the “core business” of Britain’s codebreakers, and apparently work on them didn’t stop despite their subsequent alliance. The Soviets were also spying on the allies, though with more of an emphasis on human intelligence (HUMINT). For example, John Cairncross worked at GCHQ’s predecessor – Bletchley Park – and warned the KGB of the impending German armoured offensive at Kursk, one of the decisive battles of the war. He also saw some of Britain’s early thinking on atomic weapons while working at the Cabinet Office, while his fellow Russian spy Klaus Fuchs was virtually able to provide the blueprints of the devices built at Los Alamos. The Soviet Union achieved other notable HUMINT successes throughout the Cold War, such as the John Walker espionage within the navy. Surely, there are other examples that are still secret.

Allied SIGINT against Soviet targets continued after 1945, as GCHQ and others started to intercept messages between Moscow and the capitals of new client states.

The most subtle reference to inter-allied spying comes from a passage on the Diplomatic Wireless Service, developed in 1944 and 1945. Aldrich describes how the DWS was primarily a system of military SIGINT collection stations, but that it also “doubled as a secret monitoring service working from within British Embassies and High Commissions”. High Commissions are only located in Commonwealth countries, on whom Britain is presumably still spying. They seem to be returning the favour, as demonstrated by another anecdote from the book, in which Prime Minister Tony Blair discovered his hotel room in India to be laced with listening devices that would have had to be drilled out of the walls to disable.

Federal responsibility in Canada’s oil sands

The Pembina Institute – in cooperation with Environmental Defence and Equiterre – has released a new report on Canada’s oilsands. It concludes that even with optimistic assumptions about carbon capture and storage, greenhouse gas emissions from the oil sands are set to be unacceptably large by 2050, making Canada’s climate change mitigation targets infeasible:

A key finding of the report is that the math on carbon emissions doesn’t add up. If expansion of the oil sands proceeds as planned, the oil sands industry will outspend its proportional share of Canada’s carbon budget under the government’s current target by a factor of 3.5 times by 2020 and by nearly 40 times by 2050, even assuming very optimistic application of carbon capture and storage technologies. The oil sands sector must do its fair share to reach the federal government’s commitments to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, or other sectors of the economy will be asked to shoulder the extra burden.

The report calls for oil sands operations to be subject to a carbon price, which would be applied equally across the economy.

The report stresses how, if the government gives the oil sands soft treatment, everybody else will need to work harder to achieve Canada’s climate targets.

The report does not particularly stress the sheer size of the fossil fuel reserve embedded in the oil sands, which may actually be the biggest problem from a climate change perspective.

Science and politics in Canada

I think it’s fair to say that political conservatives have long had a rocky relationship with science. While they approve of the chain from basic science to technology to economic growth, science has also repeatedly brought to light facts that undermine conservative ideologies and religious perspectives. With that in mind, this is an interesting development:

Today, the union that represents federal government scientists launches a campaign to put the spotlight on science for the public good.

“Federal government scientists work hard to protect Canadians, preserve their environment and ensure our country’s prosperity but they face dwindling resources and confusing policy decisions,” says Gary Corbett, president of the Institute.

The Professional Institute of the Public Service of Canada is a national union. Among its 59,000 federal and provincial members are 23,000 professionals who deliver, among other knowledge products, scientific research, testing and advice for sound policy-making.

The recent decision to end the mandatory long form census is the latest step in a worrying trend away from evidence-based policy making. Restrictive rules are curtailing media and public access to scientists, while cutbacks to research and monitoring limit Canada’s ability to deal with serious threats and potential opportunities.

This follows an editorial in Nature criticizing the Canadian government:

Concerns can only be enhanced by the government’s manifest disregard for science. Since prime minister Stephen Harper came to power, his government has been sceptical of the science on climate change and has backed away from Canada’s Kyoto commitment. In January, it muzzled Environment Canada’s scientists, ordering them to route all media enquires through Ottawa to control the agency’s media message. Last week, the prime minister and members of the cabinet failed to attend a ceremony to honour the Canadian scientists who contributed to the international climate-change report that won a share of the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize.

While factual claims about the nature of the universe do have political ramifications – think of the reality of climate change, or evolution – that doesn’t mean that the expression of factual information is a political act. Further, society has an enormous interest in the dissemination of accurate information, and the formulation of policy on the basis of such information. As such, it is encouraging to see scientists asserting their right to express their expert opinions, even when doing so is politically challenging for the government.

Soda and food stamps

William Saletan has written a very odd article for Slate, responding to New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s plan to make soda ineligable for purchase with food stamps. I think he intends to argue against the plan, but all his piece does is list the arguments in favour of it.

He points out the severity of America’s problem with obesity, as well as the argument that it is more justifiable to restrict how consumers can use food stamps than it is to restrict what they can do with their own money. He cites Robert Doar’s argument that “[g]overnment should not be in the business of subsidizing poor health habits that end up costing taxpayers through higher Medicaid and Medicare costs” and makes reference to how soda is “nutritionally empty.”

Saletan seems to be personally offended by these arguments – especially the notion that soda is a ‘product’ rather than a ‘food’ and that it is in any way like alcohol or tobacco – but he never really articulates why, beyond vague suggestions of libertarian displeasure. He argues that excluding soda from the set of foods that can be purchased with food stamps would “help… to push soda out of the food category and into a category with alcohol and tobacco, where it can be taxed and restricted more easily.”

What’s the problem with that?

This is your adjustment time

Virtually all moral systems incorporate some notion similar to John Stuart Mill’s Harm Principle – the idea that a person’s freedom to act can be legitimately restricted, when the actions of that person cause harm to others.

It is now beyond question that burning fossil fuels causes climate change, and that climate change is harmful to people all over the world. Also, there is a strong case that subjecting future generations to the risk of catastrophic or runaway climate change is morally unacceptable. Moral philosopher Henry Shue equates doing so to forcing someone to play Russian Roulette; even if they don’t end up getting shot, you have still imposed a risk on them in an immoral manner.

As a consequence of what we know about climate change, and what ethical theories tell us about freedom and harm, it seems safe to say that people no longer have an unlimited right to burn fossil fuels. As I mention in a comment on BuryCoal, however, there is a further wrinkle that deserves consideration:

One moral case that does have a bit of traction is based on ignorance and historical trends. Places with abundant coal – for instance – invested heavily in coal-based infrastructure before they were aware of the existence and threatening character of climate change. A strong case can be made for them to be given time to adjust, now that everybody knows that burning those fuels is deeply harmful. That being said, the world’s current legal regimes strongly defend the rights of resource owners to dig up and sell these fuels as they wish. There is little danger of them being immediately ordered to stop. As such, adjustment time is being provided based on the sheer length of time it is taking for the legal and political systems to take climate change into account.

To me, it now seems fair to tell the world’s fossil fuel users and extractors that their adjustment time has started. They should consider themselves on notice, when it comes to future restrictions on their right to extract and use fossil fuels.

If they are smart, they will be using this time to develop alternatives. That way, investments in appropriate infrastructure can be done efficiently and gradually, rather than in a time of crisis. When our legal and political systems finally catch up to the reality of climate change, they will no longer have much of a legitimate claim for transition time. That is especially true when it comes to some of the grossly inappropriate infrastructure that is being built now, such as coal-fired power plants and unconventional oil and gas projects.

Marriage for citizenship

The ongoing struggle for equal rights for gay couples has kept the issue of how states should legislate marriage at the political forefront in recent years. To me, the question of whether two consenting adults – regardless of sex – want to wed is entirely settled, as far as ethics are concerned. Places that restrict that right for same-sex couples are simply bigoted and operating under antiquated laws.

A broader question is the legitimate purposes for which people can get married. Clearly, we don’t believe child-rearing to be an essential component of marriage, or we wouldn’t allow the aged and infertile to do it. What then of those who want to get married because of economic benefits (health care, tax breaks, etc) or in order to acquire citizenship. Does it devalue marriage when people use it for such purposes? Should states try to prevent people from using marriage in that way, by trying to separate those who want to wed for ‘approved’ reasons from those who want to wed for ‘inappropriate’ ones?

I have argued before that states should treat marriage as just another contract. That being said, I do think there could be some validity to the argument that using marriage as a mechanism for achieving legal benefits is something of an affront to its importance as an institution. After all, it is the social importance of marriage that explains why homosexuals want to gain access to it. That being said, it seems like an awkward role for the state to try to determine the reasons why a couple want to wed. Also, a case can be made that immigration law and regulations on healthcare are overly restrictive, as of now, and that any mechanism that opens them up a bit has value.

What do readers think?

Canada doesn’t deserve a UN Security Council seat

At the moment, Canada is competing for one of the ten non-permanent seats in the United Nations Security Council – the principal international body charged with the maintenance of international peace and security. Canada thinks of itself as an internationalist country that has committed itself to peacekeeping and other forms of international assistance. Unfortunately, Canada is also doing virtually everything in its power to worsen the most pressing medium-term threat to international security, namely climate change.

At the moment, the United Nations process designed to find a successor to the Kyoto Protocol is going nowhere. While that situation has many causes, one of the most important has been the unwillingness of developed states to make real commitments and take meaningful domestic action. For its part, Canada has adopted targets that would be better than nothing, but which are neither fair now adequate. In order for the world to avoid dangerous climate change, other countries would need to pick up the slack created by Canada’s lack of ambition. Even worse, Canada has no credible plan to meet those targets, and has taken no serious domestic action on climate change.

Right now, Canada is flirting with some of the most dangerous energy options out there. These include unconventional oil and gas, including the oil sands and shale gas, as well as fossil fuel reserves in formerly inaccessible places like the Arctic. Chasing those fossil fuels is foolishness. It commits us to perpetuating an energy system that profoundly threatens future generations, and redirects resources from the task of building a sustainable basis for our society.

As long as Canada continues to behave with such reckless disregard for those outside its borders, including those who are not yet born, it doesn’t deserve the prestige associated with a Security Council seat. To be sure, some of Canada’s international actions have been and are praiseworthy, but that doesn’t counterbalance the way in which Canada is helping to commit the world to a colossal blunder. Ultimately, it may require Canada becoming an international pariah before our government will stand up to the oil and gas sector. Hopefully, it won’t come to that. If Canada loses its bid for this seat on the basis of domestic and international disapproval of our environmental record, perhaps it will be a much-needed signal that our recent conduct has been unacceptable.

[Update: 12 October 2010] Canada’s bid was unsuccessful. Hopefully, the embarassment will encourage Canada to play a more constructive role in future climate change negotiations.