Totalitarianism Today

TOTALITARIANISM TODAY

Monday, February 17, 2003

ENTRY #21
Pakistani soldiers praying at top of Karakoram mountains in Kashmir.

Monday, February 17, 2003

ENTRY #20
No Marshall Plan for you.

Sandra Mackey reports that US officials aren't planning to put many financial resources into rebuilding post-war Iraq. Investors, take note.

Meanwhile, the Kurds look to their south at the prize of Kirkuk. Ah, the days of plundering and pillaging are back on the horizon. Gentlemen, prepare to get your war booty.

Monday, February 17, 2003

ENTRY #19
The role of melancholy in the "artistic temperament".

Catey O'Sullivan writes:

According to the Scientific American Book of The Brain, (1999) "Increased rates of suicide, depression and manic-depression among artists have been established by many separate studies. Artists experience up to eighteen times the rate of suicide seen in the general population, eight to ten times the rate of depression and ten to twenty times the rate of manic-depression in it's milder form."

O'Sullivan takes issue with the view of the so-called experts that depression, or what the French used to refer to as la melancholie, must be excised or exorcised. Indeed, in our high-speed, high-stress, consumer-obsessed world, there is no time for melancholy, moodiness, or other such "clinical disorders". The focus is on functioning as a member of the status quo-- not discovering and attenuating yourself as an individual.

The medical community does not know that low Seratonin and/or norepinephrine levels cause depression, not in the sense of a falling brick causing broken toes, or any other strong causal sense. A doctor does not take a blood sample and analyze it to determine whether or not you're depressed. What the doctor does know is that often, if you raise Seratonin and/or norepinephrine levels, clinical depression lifts. There is probably a biological mechanism at work here, something more provable than evil spirits, the bad karma from stealing your neighbor's husband, or the fact that you neglected to sacrifice a goat at the last full moon, but the medical community does not know what it is.

The problem with scientific, biochemical explanations for depression is that they're almost entirely mechanistic. Psychiatrists commonly confuse proximate cause with true cause (aka, the contractor's congenital idiot son stacked the bricks wrong.) I can't tell you the number of these guys who've looked at me like I myself am a congenital idiot when I asked, "yeah, but what causes depression?" Particularly when they've already given me the Seratonin, norepinephrine rap. Sometimes, they'll get really desperate and throw in the word "dopamine," which is another neurotransmitter to which the connection to clinical depression has not been established. Usually, they just write me a prescription and chase me out of their offices.

Psychologists, on the other hand, will often tell you depression is caused by psychological traumas that happened when you were small, which will require several years of expensive therapy. If you ask them whether you'll be cured after that, they'll say things like, "that depends on the work you're willing to do," or worse, "that's not up to me." If you're really depressed, this is the point when you leave her office to go find a hosepipe to funnel car exhaust into the front seat of your Toyota. Not only does this person fail to realize that just getting out of bed in the morning is all the work you can manage, but she clearly has no idea as to what depression really is. In other words, she is an insensitive knucklehead.

Which some people are. It doesn't matter how many letters they have after their names. Some of them are born this way-- they just don't have a lot of awareness about what's really going on around them, some make themselves this way. Artists are, for the most part, very sensitive individuals. This is a good thing in love, art, poetry and music, but a bad thing in almost any other field. The world is a cold, hard place which would be much colder and harder if everybody was wired like Vincent Van Gogh, Sylvia Plath, or Kurt Cobain. Any one of them would make lousy engineers, cops, or paramedics for example. I hate to be badly injured, look up, and see Sylvia Plath looking back at me. She'd be too busy feeling my pain to put the splints on! Either that or she wouldn't have come to work in the first place because she was either stupefied with a hangover or busy cooking her head in the oven. But the fact is, we live in a tough world and it is painful. Some people simply feel things harder than others. I can sit next to a total stranger in an airport and if he or she is sad, depressed, blue, or simply upset, feel it. I've found this doesn't happen as long as I don't exchange words or make eye contact, but it's a fact about myself I have come to live with. Worse yet, it's not a quality I want to exterminate because it's the very quality that renders me sensitive to the nuances of human attitude and behavior. In other words, it's one of the qualities that makes me an artist.

Some of the most talented musicians I have known are considered clinically depressed. And medications tend to sour their creativity. O'Sullivan is right to urge artists (and others) not to fear their momentary lapses of reason. Perhaps melancholy brings us closer the the Muses.

Monday, February 17, 2003

ENTRY #18
Ending the winter of our discontent.

At the Birmingham demonstration this weekend, I was comforted and energized by the diverse crowds who showed up to protest the war-- the perfect photo of America's variety and pluralism. Among the most amusing characters, I should mention the good old boys who showed up decked out in their camouflage, sporting a large poster reading-- I'D RATHER SHOOT DEER. They charmed a smile out of me.

Meanwhile, my smiles border on the 24-hour, nonstop variety, thanks to some of the amazing material in the blogosphere.

1.Dack's thorough and selective war coverage commands my attention, as does his delicious Perpetual War Portfolio-- an excellent resource for those watching defense contracts and war spending.

2. Robert Jensen's critique of media attention to anti-war protests is right on target. It is a pity that the American media gets away with a complete lack of accountability for the information it provides. Granted, the media has never been the paragon of intellectual integrity, but how the hell did Geraldo move from mediating disputes between hookers to posing as an expert on the Middle East? Disgusting.

3. Charles Johnson, whom I had the pleasure of re-meeting this past weekend, dints the picture of liberated Afghani women with this witty little expose of the true state of Afghani women. Auburn University remains the home of truly radical free spirits-- I still can't thank the AU Philosophy Dept., the Mises Institute, and the libertarians of the area like Scott Kjar or Dan Bowden enough.

4. Exile's War Nerd, Gary Brecher gives an amusing account of the North Korea scenario. God bless the chauvinists at Exile for managing to keep it crude, rude, and completely unacceptable in these reform-zealot times.

These are just a few of my daily opiates. More to come later.

Monday, February 17, 2003

ENTRY #17
Concerns about the economy will affect the outcome of the war on Iraq.

According to a CBS news poll, only 38% of Americans polled approve of the way George W. Bush is handling the economy--– the lowest percentage since he has been in office. Perceptions of the economy continue to decline, as they have since the start of the Bush Administration. The poll reveals that 60% believe the economy is in bad shape, while 39% believe it is in good shape -- the worst evaluation of the state of the economy since September, 1993. Call me presumptuous, but I might hedge a bet on that 39% having ties to government or the defense sector-- an increasingly large component of the economy.

The poll also shows that Americans are presently more concerned with the economy than with Iraq. When asked which is the most important for Congress to address -- the economy, Iraq, or the war on terror, 41% say the economy should be the primary focus of government. 30% think Iraq is the priority, followed by 23% who name the war on terror. According to CBS, "there is evidence that the situation in Iraq is becoming more urgent, reflected in the greater number of Americans who now think Iraq should be the priority, compared to last month."

I must hand it to the Bush propaganda machine that they have managed to replace Osama with Saddam as enemy of the state numero uno. Let me also remind you that the situation in Iraq is only "becoming more urgent" because the US government is stacking its troops for war-- not because Saddam's behavior has undergone any radical changes. Good old Saddam is still the same nasty dictator-- horrible, selfish, but containable.

Asked whether they believed Iraq was hiding weapons of mass destruction, an overwhelming 85% of Americans said it was. Nearly half are pessimistic that the U.N. weapons inspectors can root those weapons out. But asked to assess the threat to the U.S. from Iraq’s weapons, and what action that requires now, Americans were split: just under half said Iraqi weapons present a threat that necessitates military action right now, and about the same number said the weapons, while a threat, can be contained for now.

Let's hope the common-sense approach demonstrated by half wins out over the war-hungry other half.

Monday, February 17, 2003

ENTRY #16
Watching the markets during war-time.

Adam Lashinsky gives us his take on how war might influence the already-finicky markets.

The war puts everything on hold. On days when its imminence seem greater than others stocks go down, no matter the quality of the financial news to hit the tape. Other days they drift up, as investors supposedly "forget" we're about to go to war.

Now, it may seem old hat to suggest that the market is in a holding pattern for a while. But it's not a trivial point for individual investors. There are two topics the talking heads think they have an answer to but don't. One is whether stocks will begin to rally after the fighting starts, as they did in 1990. The other is whether this war will be a quick one.

As far as the first topic is concerned, it is possible that stocks will rally once the war officially begins but ONLY IF investors feel that this war is a uniting force rather than a dividing one. What does this means? Remember that the first Gulf War benefitted from international support and legitimacy; the PR campaign with the yellow ribbons worked wonders. Unless NATO allies and public favor turns a bright eye on Bush's war in Iraq, it is highly unlikely that any market rally will last long enough to do more than further distort price signals and investor confidence. I am quite happy to announce that the worldwide anti-war protests this past weekend don't look too hot for Bush and Comp.

As for whether this war will be quick enough-- whether the end is in sight and a quagmire can be averted-- most signs are troublesome. Sure, Iraq can be bombed into submission, but the real test will come with the "regime-change" exercise that follows. Ted Galen Carpenter has made consistent, insightful arguments throughout his career as to why nation-building exercises don't seem to work. I am fortunate to have learned this from him directly. My advice for investors? Take your money to Russia.

Monday, February 17, 2003

ENTRY #15
A note on Bruno Bettelheim.

Robert Gottlieb's review of three books about Bruno Bettelheim, the doctor who posited that autism stemmed from the cold behavior of parents, makes somewhat-sense of this disturbed and very charismatic man.

Monday, February 17, 2003

ENTRY #14
To understand autism.

Autism remains one of the most mysterious and misunderstood neurological diseases-- this, despite much research and scholarship to the contrary. Some scientists even went so far as to blame autism on parental coldness-- a suggestion almost as horrifying as the idea that circumcising men will civilize them. In an essay for the Boston Sunday Globe, Harvey Blume relates the mental functioning of autistic people to visual skills. Blume explains one of the newer approaches to understanding autism:

One of the more promising approaches to the syndrome attributes it to a deficit in neural processing speed. In this view, the autistic infant's brain isn't quick enough to put a parent's mobile mouth, shifting eyes, wrinkling forehead and flaring nostrils together into anything as reassuring as a smile. If even a parent's face is fragmented and disconcerting, social life will offer nothing secure to build upon.

To flesh out the theory with a few examples, Blume introduces several autistic artists, and notes that one thing these artists share is a reluctance to draw or portray human beings.

Verbal backwardness and a remarkable facility with images often occur together in people with autism. Is there a reason for this? According to the neurologist Oliver Sacks, who has written widely on the topic, autistics typically suffer impairments in their ability to interact with others, communicate, and use their imaginations. For many autistics, the impairment of the imagination takes the form of an extreme literalness, a difficulty grouping particular objects together by means of concepts.

For Temple Grandin-a high-functioning autistic writer and animal scientist who is discussed in Sacks's 1995 book An Anthropologist on Mars-this literalness is not so much an impairment as another form of mental processing altogether, one she characterizes as "visual thinking." As Grandin describes it, visual thinkers process images rather than ideas. "If you say the word, `boat,' to me," she has explained, "I see pictures of specific boats; I don't have a boat concept." Nadia, clearly, was a visual thinker par excellence, stunted with regard to ideas and their verbal expressions but overflowing with distinct, highly individualized images.

If Nadia is an artistic rain man, so, too, is Stephen Wiltshire, the subject of another chapter in Sacks's book. Wiltshire, who began exhibiting precocious talent at age seven, specializes in graceful, exquisitely detailed renderings of bridges, palaces, and cathedrals. Jessy Park, who lives in Williamstown, Mass., is another autistic artist attracted to architectural structure, but also to "radio dials, speedometers and mileage gauges, clocks, heaters, and electric blanket controls," as her mother, Clara Claiborne Park, attests in her 2001 memoir Exiting Nirvana: A Daughter's Life with Autism.

One thing that Nadia, Stephen Wiltshire, and Jessy Park have in common, however, besides impressive skill, is a strong disinclination to draw human beings, and a seemingly absolute lack of interest the human face. This isn't surprising: Faces, typically, are terra incognita to autistics. You might sum up their difficulties with socializing by saying that for them, faces just don't add up. (When Nadia, in her teens, was urged by her caretakers to draw people in the hope that doing so would help socialize her, she did so only reluctantly and without her usual aplomb. The pressure to draw people, in fact, may have contributed to her giving up on drawing altogether.)

According to the theory of slow neural processing, testimony from many autistics who report that their perceptions get stuck in "freeze frames" explains why depicting something as complicated and variegated as a human being might be more difficult for autistic artists. Yet, this explanation does not hold steady for all autistic artists.

One exceptional autistic child by the name of Johnathan Lerman defies such expectations in his art by depicting human faces and people in general. In Lerman's situation, the theory of slow neural processing doesn't stick-- why would he be able to rapidly assemble face parts into coherent and significant wholes?

Monday, February 17, 2003

ENTRY #13
Learning how to be "camp" from the master.

A tawdry little interview with Quentin Crisp, who explains how to make proper use of leisure, pretense, and salacious events.

Sunday, February 16, 2003

ENTRY #12
The war in Iraq as predicted by Sid Meier's "Civilization".

Don't miss this.

Sunday, February 16, 2003

ENTRY #11
"Those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it." George Santayana

Sunday, February 16, 2003

ENTRY #10
An excerpt from Rainer Maria Rilke's Letters to a Young Poet

"I would like to beg you...to have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language. Don't search for the answers, which could not be given to you now, because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradaully, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer."

Sunday, February 16, 2003

ENTRY #9
A cyber-conference worth attending.

The UMass Center for Information Technology and Dispute Resolution, in collaboration with the Online Dispute Resolution Section of the Association for Conflict Resolution, is pleased to be holding Cyberweek 2003 this year from February 24-28th. This is the fifth Cyberweek, a free all-online conference focused on the use of technology in dispute resolution. You can participate in this conference from anywhere. Register and you will recieve additional information prior to the start of Cyberweek. Cyberweek consists of online discussions, simulations and other activities that we hope will illustrate the opportunities and challenges provided by our new technologies. This year's most ambitious activity is ICODR 2003 , the International Competition for Dispute Resolution. ICODR 2002, held in conjunction with Cyberweek 2002, involved eleven schools in a negotiating competition. ICODR 2003 involves over thirty five schools from five continents in negotiation, mediation and arbitration competitions. Please feel free to circulate this announcement to colleagues and students. Participation in Cyberweek is free.

Sunday, February 16, 2003

ENTRY #8
A new kind of state.

Neue Slowensiche Kunst advertises itself as a virtual state, as the "world's first universal state".In PM's interview with NSK official, Peter Mlakar, Mlakar talks about how NSK is focused upon absolute loyalty and discipline towards its own artistic vision and aesthetic. Just as soldiers swear their loyalty to their country, the members of NSK do so to each other and their vision.

If we focus on a soldier's determination to be absolutely loyal, to obey the orders unmercifully, to submit to the will of his commander to protect his country, no matter what happens to him, and when death is very possible, this leads us to the analysis of the soldier's soul, to the essence of his own being, not to the importance of his country. In his determination, the soldier sees that something very strong is at work. Something which transcends his own particular, concrete life, but in which his life has its meaning, namely something which manifests itself as some kind of necessity, in which he finds satisfaction, a final fulfilment of his life.

If we try to describe what this necessity is, this Law, which we must obey, we find that it is Nothingness itself, the very last station of every Sense, pure enjoyment in its very essence. It is nothing, which is connected with life and world, but this is what to life and world gives Sense. . . . So this in its description proves that last Station, last enjoyment, is absolutely transcendent. Therefore is so empty, without a cause. Only when this Principle is at work, the obedience for country is meaningful and has its power.

Our discipline as NSK members is based on this Principle. To be submitted to something, which does not exist, as does not exist the Principle, of which I am talking now, and which does not have anything in common with this world. Our obedience to NSK discipline has no cause, perhaps 'in the sense of earthly pleasures' because of fame, women and money.

When asked how the NSK might effect political change in the world of highly competitive nation-states, Mkalar replies:

There are thoughts that NSK predicted the Balkan bloodbath, which left us in the position where we are now. Speaking of Slovenia, at the gates of EU and NATO. There are thoughts that we have contributed something to the consciousness of the totalitarity, which is eternal, which is a virus, a hidden totalitarity of totalitarian praxis. We have also constructed the virtual state of NSK, which has more citizens than the Vatican, and which brings to light a new paradigm: the state without territory but in time, the global state that proves there is no ordinary state anymore, the state that gives sub-physical foundations of state, and which with its aesthetic views and ethical extremity establish joyful perception of a cataclysmic model.......

NSK is mostly a spiritual state. The state which changes and fixes things in heads. Maps and borders are primary concepts, which are a material force that moves borders, produces maps. One may say that this attitude has nothing in common with concrete life, with real geography. What a naïve position. We are the cause, the consequences come. When we say that politics is the highest form of art, this politics, which is the most encompassing, comprehensive force in the whole social world, this politics is art that triggers senses by mental power, which changes images in our heads, gives meaning to life. If we paint images of lost paradise to entertain, what soul could be more secure? Therefore we see ourselves as politicians, and in terms of its global character, the NSK state is the Internet of political subjects.

Saturday, February 15, 2003

ENTRY #7
Daniel Dennett's latest contribution in the badly organized free will v. determinism debate.

Matt Ridley reviews the latest book, Freedom Evolves by one of the most fascinating materialists of our time, Daniel Dennett. I quote generously:

"Either our actions are determined, in which case there is nothing we can do about them, or our actions are random, in which case there is nothing we can do about them."

The source of this pithy summary of the conundrum of free will has proved appropriately hard to trace. Simon Blackburn quoted it as the definition of "Hume's Fork" in his Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy, but he has recently admitted that Hume's Fork generally refers to a different, and much less pithy conundrum. Somebody said it, though, and of his own free will.

For all the efforts of philosophers, free will remains a problem for the man in the street. To the extent that he (or she) understands the causes of his behaviour, he seems to lose his own freedom to have chosen to behave differently. To the extent that his behaviour had no cause, he simply becomes the victim of chance.

Little wonder that many people accuse science of taking away their free will, by discovering the causes of their behaviour. Some fall back on the idea of an immaterial soul beyond the reach of science. Others flirt with the notion that free will is merely an illusion. Spinoza once said that the only difference between a person and a stone rolling down a hill is that the person thinks he is in charge of his own destiny.

Daniel Dennett to the rescue. The ebullient, pugnacious and ever pithy sage of Boston has written books on free will, consciousness and Darwinism. He now returns to free will with a remarkably persuasive new idea derived from Darwinism: that freedom of the will is something that grows, that evolves. The greater the sophistication of an organism, the greater its knowledge of the world and of itself, so the greater its ability to take charge of its own destiny. A rock has no freedom to choose; a bacterium has very little; a bird has some; a conscious primate has much more; a conscious primate inheriting a rich lode of cultural knowledge has the most of all.

Determinism - the idea that a cause automatically produces an effect - is not, says Dennett, the same as inevitability. This is a surprising assertion which he spends several chapters justifying, and I think he succeeds. Take short sight, an affliction for which we know the causes: too much reading in people with certain genes. Illiterate hunter-gatherers are very rarely myopic, whatever their genes, and some people do not become short-sighted however much they read as children.

The causes of short sight are deterministic, but they are (in one of Dennett's characteristic coinages) very much "evitable". What makes them evitable is knowledge, which could lead to spectacles, to laser treatment, perhaps one day to gene therapy, conceivably even to (a little drastic, this) a deliberately illiterate upbringing for people with certain genes. The more we know, the more degrees of freedom we have.

Far from closing down our freedoms, scientific knowledge opens them up. "Scientific knowledge is the royal road - the only road - to evitability", says Dennett, lambasting Tom Wolfe for deploring the use of Ritalin for hyperactive children and preaching old-fashioned true grit in its place. "I wonder if Wolfe would commend a bracing regimen of eye exercise and courses in Learning to Live with Short-Sightedness in lieu of eyeglasses for the myopic. Why should it be important that you do all your self-improvement the old-fashioned way?"

Along the way to this arresting conclusion, Dennett, the thorough-going materialist, demolishes many myths, not least the notion that we are progressively exculpating more and more offences on the grounds of understanding the causes. People may duck some kinds of responsibility, but they welcome other kinds: somebody caught speeding is unlikely ever to plead in court that he could not help following the dictates of his genes: if he convinced the judge, he would never get his licence back.

On the other hand, should paedophiles, some of whom really cannot help themselves from reoffending, be allowed to volunteer for castration? Dennett is not sure.

Having argued that natural science is the ally, not the enemy, of freedom, Dennett then notes how few of his fellow human beings currently share this view - and he becomes uncharacteris tically gloomy. "Our capacity to tolerate the toxic excesses of freedom cannot be assumed in others, or simply exported as one more commodity." Perhaps militant Islam was in his thoughts.

Saturday, February 15, 2003

ENTRY #6
Can't get enough...

Of Jimmy Fallon. Maybe it's the grin. Or the guitar. All I know is I would love to get involved in his mischief.

Saturday, February 15, 2003

ENTRY #5
Roundup.

Thousands of South Africans march against the war with Iraq.

"We are united in our conviction that war against Iraq is wrong. It is wrong because it is the poor who will be its main victims. It is wrong because it will inflame, rather than resolve global conflicts, particularly those in the Middle East.

The demonstrations came on a day of anti-war protests around the world - and a day after the United States and Britain failed to persuade their allies on the UN Security Council to support their threatened war against Iraq. "The voice of peace is louder than the threats of war," said al-Nijma. "But if they want war, we are ready for it." UN weapons inspectors indicated Friday that Saddam has shown increasing cooperation with their mission to make sure Iraq has eliminated its weapons of mass destruction. Iraqis have also taken to the streets in defiance of US threats. The demonstrations came on a day of anti-war protests around the world - and a day after the United States and Britain failed to persuade their allies on the UN Security Council to support their threatened war against Iraq.

"The voice of peace is louder than the threats of war," said al-Nijma. "But if they want war, we are ready for it." UN weapons inspectors indicated Friday that Saddam has shown increasing cooperation with their mission to make sure Iraq has eliminated its weapons of mass destruction.

As the Pentagon tells us that US troops in the Iraqi region number over 150,000, Chinese scientists express heightened concerns over the war.

Bianca Jagger, speaking in one of the biggest antiwar demonstrations in the world, told the crowds, "It is NOT in our names that this war is being fought."

An Iranian cleric declares the "death of the UN and humanity" if the US attacks Iraq.

Friday, February 14, 2003

ENTRY #4
Woman Defending Herself Against Love by William Bouguereau

Friday, February 14, 2003

ENTRY #3
As Once The Winged Energy of Delight by Rainer Maria Rilke

As once the winged energy of delight
carried you over childhood's dark abysses,
now beyond your own life build the great
arch of unimagined bridges.

Wonders happen if we can succeed
in passing through the harshest danger;
but only in a bright and purely granted
achievement can we realize the wonder.

To work with Things in the indescribable
relationship is not too hard for us;
the pattern grows more intricate and subtle,
and being swept along is not enough.

Take your practiced powers and stretch them out
until they span the chasm between two
contradictions...For the god
wants to know himself in you.

Friday, February 14, 2003

ENTRY #2
The role of conscience in politics.

In a speech given in 1999, Vaclav Havel commented on the role of conscience in political dissent:

"It has been our absolutely basic historical experience that, in the long run, the only thing that can be truly successful and meaningful politically must first and foremost—that is, before it has taken any political form at all—be a proper and adequate response to the fundamental moral dilemmas of the time, or an expression of respect for the imperatives of the moral order bequeathed to us by our culture. It is a very clear understanding that the only kind of politics that truly makes sense is one that is guided by conscience."

Indeed, it is important to remember that basing political decisions on your conscience prepares you to live a solitary life. You will not be popular; in fact, you might even be deemed insane by your opponents. Worse, you will have to watch your opponents win public favor as you struggle for tenure. Your family might take your conscientious politics as a strike against their role in your life. Your children may beg you to stop saying things that arouse laughter in the school halls. You may lead a perfectly uneventful life. This is the price. When you make the choice, be sure to acknowledge the full extent of committment that such a choice requires.

Friday, February 14, 2003

ENTRY #1
Nationalism, the "nation", and a little forecasting from yours truly.

Since the events of the Sept. 11th, the press has devoted much less attention to all but the economic problems in Europe. Does this mean the book on nationalism can be safely shut for now? Absolutely not-- the mere fact that nationalism does not recieve the media coverage it deserves says nothing about its influence on political science, economics, and the study of postcommunist countries. In today's Times UK, Richard Ford writes about the rise of ethnic minorities in British demographic statistics.

In England ethnic minorities comprise 9 per cent of the population, an increase of 3percentage points on the 1991 figure. Census officials said that part of the reason for the rise was that a new category of “mixed race” was included in the census form.

In two areas of London, Asians and blacks outnumber whites for the first time. Non-whites made up almost 60 per cent in the London borough of Newham and 55 per cent of the population of the London borough of Brent.

The problems associated with the nation-state and citizenship in a globalized, interdependent environment continue to plague the postcommunist states. According to today's RFE/RL Newsline: Polish President Aleksander Kwasniewski on 13 February offered Ukrainians visas at no fee under a new border regime that will be introduced on 1 July, in line with EU demands, Ukrainian and Polish media reported. "The Polish side announces that it will introduce the most liberal visa regime for Ukrainian citizens while meeting the demands of the European Union and the Schengen agreement. It will include free visas for Ukrainians," said a joint statement issued after Kwasniewski's talks with his Ukrainian counterpart Leonid Kuchma in Ivano-Frankivsk, western Ukraine, earlier the same day. Speaking to journalists after the talks, Kuchma said Polish citizens will not need visas to visit Ukraine after 1 July. "A joint decision on the visa regime between our countries -- free Polish visas for Ukrainian citizens and a visa-free regime for Polish citizens -- is the Polish president's personal achievement, I want to emphasize this," Kuchma noted. However, public opinion polls in Poland show public support for this visa regime lagging behind. It certainly won't help that Polish farmers, a tremendous constituency, have taken to throwing eggs at Polish leaders to express their disapproval of the current government's strategy.

In the same Newsline, US Ambassador to the Czech Republic Stapleton also said the visa requirement for Czechs visiting the United States is unlikely to be lifted in the near future, and "in fact [the U.S. visa regime] is going to be tightened,"..... He cited terrorism and the current international situation as justifying the new tack. "The United States is one of the most porous countries in the world, and that's going to change," he warned. He told the audience that Czechs can expect longer delays, interview processes, and other administrative precautions in the future as a result of the more comprehensive security. It will be interesting to see if the US government continues to urge non-restrictive, non-nationalistic immigration policies for Europe as it tightens immigration restrictions at home.

Meanwhile, the rights of the Romany people continue to be disputed-- an interesting case of how citizenship in a nation-state confers a guarantee of rights. (Another good illustration is the problem of the Palestinians.) In this particular case, it is the voting rights of Hungarian Roma that are being contested. Yesterday, Hungarian Prime Minister Peter Medgyessy stated in a letter to Florian Farkas, president of the Romany Lungo Drom organization, that the government cannot fulfill his request to appoint a government commissioner to supervise repeat Romany-authority elections scheduled for 1 March. Last month, the Supreme Court established that the 12 January Romany assembly had no quorum, after Lungo Drom representatives walked out of the election hall in protest over voting procedures. Medgyessy said the government must not influence the voting, either by appointing a commissioner or by instituting technical rules pertaining to the elections.

The legal questions here are fascinating. For example, is citizenship a prerequisite for the assertion of rights? Supporters of the ICC would argue that only a world court can deal with this question. If libertarians believe that rights precede government, then why are so many horrified by a court which might guarantee one's rights against a government? Given that governments violate human rights en masse, and that "national security" is the prime justification for governmental aggression, why not take issue with the term "national"? If the US government had to say "We are going to war to protect our government interests" instead of "We are going to war to protect the nation" (which, sorry to say, does not exist anymore), then the burden of justification might prevent frivolous wars. We will see more of these questions in the future, especially as the war in Iraq begins to unravel any assumptions about the Iraqi "nation". Keep your eyes on the Kurds, the Shiias, and the Sunnis.

"GIVE BACK MY BOOK AND TAKE MY KISS INSTEAD.
WAS IT MY ENEMY OR MY FRIEND I HEARD,
"WHAT A BIG BOOK FOR SUCH A LITTLE HEAD!"
-Edna Saint Vincent Millay