Pieces of the Puzzle: A Current Affairs Blog

So, why run a blog? The simple reason is to force myself to ask the harder questions like 'What’s wrong with our world and what can we do to fix it?' I will be sharing here content in the form of original work as well as other published material worthy of discussion. Several themes will be present throughout the work shared, including responses to contemporary events and trends.

• The World According to Podcasts

• The WTO Covid-19 TRIPS Waiver Proposal: Are the Rules Subject to Change?

• Can digital identity become a passport for the world’s poor?

• 2020 was a reckoning. What if nothing changes in 2021?

• What does a temple tell us about Pakistan’s vision of nationhood?

• Coronavirus and the return of history

• SITUATING THE STORY: TO THE TWENTIES AND BEYOND

• INUIT YOUTH ASK TRUDEAU FOR HELP

• SITUATING THE STORY: A REVIEW OF 2016

• GREENLAND: THE CASE FOR ENGAGING THE GIANT NEXT DOOR

• NEPAL: MERITORIOUS, NOT INCLUSIVE

• A SHORT THOUGHT: GO FEVER AND CHOICE

• CANADA: SITUATING TRUDEAU'S ELECTION VICTORY

The World According to Podcasts

(Last updated August 1, 2023)

On-demand radio would seem like a curious medium to attract the kind of attention it does. But in their simplicity, podcasts have enabled the creation of a world of content that can inform, educate and occupy the mind in a form perfectly suited to our limited attention spans and need to fill every conscious moment with engagement. 

Maybe the ubiquitous sight of commuters wearing headphones will be seen as a symptom of an isolating era in technological development or maybe students decades from now will be assigned old classics to indulge their minds with a human touch as other machines train their bodies. 

Either way, I wanted to take a moment to consider the last decade, which I have spent heavily immersed in a wide range of podcasts; from deep history to current affairs. If cumulatively available, the statistics on listening time would be quite staggering (approaching 150 full calendar days) so I will try to structure the list below assuming you aren’t looking to fill every unstructured minute for the next few years with a quick listen. 

I fully acknowledge my interests, time restrictions and usage of Stitcher, limits what I’ve been exposed to. A preference for scripted versus conversational content should be quickly visible for instance. That, however, is the beauty of the medium - unexpected gems just sit there waiting to be discovered on some idle meander or overlong flight to expose us to something wholly different.

Below, I’ve broken down my recommendations across several categories. I’ve tried to provide a brief note or link where appropriate to guide the curious listener and will endeavour to keep this list updated as new finds arise. To a starter, I’d recommend starting slow, finding a narrator or subject that keeps your attention and then in a decade list them out for the world to see!

Top Tier: Worth finding the time to listen to regardless!

• Anthropocene Reviewed: John Green reviews facets of the human-centered planet on a five-star scale.

• Talking Politics: History of Ideas

• Dan Carlin’s Hardcore History

• Fall of Civilizations: A podcast that explores the collapse of different societies through history.

• Museum of Lost Objects (BBC): Tracing the histories of antiquities and landmarks that have been destroyed or looted in Iraq and Syria, India and Pakistan.

Current affairs content you shouldn’t miss

• Explainers from The Foreign Desk (Monocle)

• The BBC’s Podcast Network:

• The Inquiry

• Analysis

• A Point of View

• The Compass

• Common Sense with Dan Carlin

• Past Present Future

• Ones and Tooze

Contemporary thought and analysis

• The Prof G Pod with Scott Galloway

• Tech Won’t Save Us

• GZERO World with Ian Bremmer

• RANE Podcast

• FiveThirtyEight Politics

• Why It Matters (CFR)

• The Bugle [Classic comedy podcast with Andy Zaltman]

• WSJ’s The Future of Everything

• Mark Leonard’s World in 30 Minutes

• Tech Tonic (FT)

• Crash Course (Bloomberg)

• Nothing is Foreign (CBC)

• What Could Go Right?

• The Realignment

• Ways to Change the World with Krishnan Guru-Murthy

• Odd Lots (Bloomberg)

• Democracy Paradox

Ongoing work that has a strong back catalog

• Dan Carlin’s Hardcore History: Addendum 

• The History of Byzantium

• The Gray Area with Sean Iling

• Tides of History

• Lex Friedman Podcast

• Hardcore History Addendum

• Human Circus - Journeys in the Medieval World

• Throughline

• Kerning Cultures

• Cautionary Tales with Tim Harford

• Intelligence Squared

• Trailblazers with Walter Isaacson

• The Audio Long Read (Guardian)

• Ideas (CBC)

• Long Now: Seminars about Long-term Thinking

• Book Club with Jeffrey Sachs

• Unexplainable (Vox)

• Time to Eat the Dogs

• History Unplugged

• Bridges to the Future (RSA)

• Hidden Brain

• If Books Could Kill

• Countries That Don’t Exist Anymore

The Archives: Feeds that aren’t putting out new content but still worth a listen

• Deep Background with Noah Feldman

• The Hellenistic Age Podcast

• Talking Politics

• Context with Brad Harris

• Head on History

• From the Washington Post’s Lillian Cunningham:

• Constitutional

• Presidential

• Moonrise

• Revolutions (from Mike Duncan)

• History of the World in a 100 Objects

• History of Exploration

• 50 Things That Made the Modern Economy (BBC)

• Malcolm Gladwell's Revisionist History

If I could only make time to listen to it

• The History of Rome (from Mike Duncan)

• Through Persian Eyes (BBC)

• Living with the Gods (BBC)

• The French History Podcast

• The Ancient World

• The Conquerors Podcast

• Empire Podcast

• The Rest is History

• These Times (UnHerd)

The WTO Covid-19 TRIPS Waiver Proposal: Are the Rules Subject to Change?

This article was published on March 1, 2021 on the opinion page of TRT World and is available at the following link: https://www.trtworld.com/opinion/will-intellectual-property-take-precedence-over-vaccine-distribution-44630

Can digital identity become a passport for the world’s poor?

This article was published on February 12, 2021 on the opinion page of TRT World and is available at the following link: https://www.trtworld.com/opinion/can-digital-identity-become-a-passport-for-the-world-s-poor-44120.

2020 was a reckoning. What if nothing changes in 2021?

This article was published on December 29 2020 on the opinion page of TRT World and is available at the following link: https://www.trtworld.com/opinion/2020-was-a-reckoning-what-if-nothing-changes-in-2021-42759.

What does a temple tell us about Pakistan’s vision of nationhood?

This article was published on August 13, 2020 on the opinion page of TRT World and is available at the following link: https://www.trtworld.com/opinion/what-does-a-temple-tell-us-about-pakistan-s-vision-of-nationhood-38880.

CORONAVIRUS AND THE RETURN OF HISTORY

(July 27, 2020)

When one considers the past few months, it is difficult to avoid the conclusion that we are living through a momentous shift of whose character and breadth we are only beginning to understand. It is simplistic to pin the palpable sense of collective anxiety to the Coronavirus alone. It is merely a catalyst that has highlighted the dysfunction of global governance, the fallibility of economic dogma and the vapidity of our individualistic postmodern world. In doing so, it has upended the theoretical constructs that have dominated our discourse since the end of the Cold War and propelled us forward at an uncomfortable pace into an unpredictable future. Only if we reimagine our understanding of our present predicament and refocus our efforts at building resilient systems, can we emerge stronger and more capable of meeting the uncertainty ahead.

The Arsonists

The march of progress that we ascribe to our broader civilization has been viewed through a misguided prism of optimism for the lifetimes of almost everyone alive today. Ignoring the vast structural inequalities and horrendous acts of barbarism still with us, it is easy to think geopolitics has been relatively stable since the P5 took their seats at the Security Council. This structure was seemingly solidified by the collapse of the Soviet bloc and the victory of neoliberalism over all competing ideologies. Traditional risks were abated and, aside from 19 hijackers in 2001 and subprime borrowers a few years later, few events threatened to metastasis uncontrollably. We now, however, sit at the cusp of something different, albeit familiar. Ahead of us is an era defined by a more conventional understanding of risk and instability - in that they are constant.

For the vast majority of human history a sense of foreboding and fear was completely justified. Across any hill and wall could emerge the barbarians or worse. The cycle of regimes was characterized by the near inevitable replacement of a ruling class by a stronger rural force hardened on the periphery, which too would eventually become mollified by urban comforts and replaced by a subsequent wave. This was an expected and manageable part of organized society, one that did not stall the vehicle of progress. A systemic risk posed a danger to the entire system. That it would be able to leverage its host to break it, say a pathogen travelling business class from Shanghai to London or an upstart Macedonian using the Royal Road to march to the Persian capital, in retrospect is always a surprise.

How then to characterize this moment in the wider sweep of history? As of this writing, it is too soon to place Covid and it’s resulting economic deep-freeze alongside other historical arsonists. The list of forces that can be described as such is mercifully short. A Mongolian who, alongside his immediate successors, killed enough of humanity to literally change the climate as wildlife reclaimed fields left fallow. Our previously mentioned Macedonian, who razed through the known world not to take joy in its wonders, but to feed his own insatiable thirst for glory. Or the bacterium, Yersinia pestis, that created such a labour shortage that it arguably forced European minds to build the machinery that enabled them to shape the world we live in today. I don’t think we live amongst an arsonist today, but climate scientists of the future may argue that point. Corona may not give us a clean slate to rebuild. It certainly, however, has renewed conviction in a simpler understanding of history that has been dormant for the last thirty years - progress is not the norm.

The last serious threat to our current unimaginative framework of global understanding was September 11, 2001. (The fact that wars in Africa since the Cold War had claimed tens of millions of lives could be ignored as affairs of the barbaricum - beyond the frontier of Pax Americana.) The shock of those events reawakened a sense of political realism. The core could be challenged by the periphery with their own tools, albeit only in symbolic gestures. Failed wars to quell these foes will be remembered in posterity as imperial overreach. All the while, the Washington Consensus’ sway over the world’s policymakers was being dramatically challenged by a competing node of authority and unsurprisingly it didn’t reside in Afghan caves. The Chinese thoughtfully characterized their rise as a revival of balance, keen to avoid a Thucydidian clash. The barbarians on the periphery had weakened the preeminent power, distracting them from more pressing internal and external issues, but they remained dominant. That is until games of power and brinkmanship gave way to a storm.

There are no Macedonians on the move just yet. The Doomsday Clock needn’t be adjusted. A virus with a low mortality rate shouldn't shake the foundations of a meticulously constructed and seemingly immovable international institutional order. But a concert of forces has exposed the weakness of a system worn away by decades of neglect and, at times, outright obstruction. The list of strongmen made vulnerable by a microbe - Xi, Trump, Putin and Bolsanaro - is likely incomplete. As nations and households turn inward, the light of public scrutiny misses strife from Libya to Hong Kong. All through this the UN sits silent and it’s 75th anniversary only a reminder of the fire burning atop dreams of a post-nationalist world. The end of wanton consumerism and the convenience of automation also spell serious trouble for both capital and labour. If shoppers do not buy and workers do not work, what is the basis for our rigid market system? Further, the stigma of social contact has ended an optimistic era of connectivity. We may not miss the flash mobs, but issues of loneliness and despondency are dramatic problems quietly festering in the background.

Inflexibility in response to novel crises has traditionally limited the ability of incumbent superstructures to withstand the effects of so-called historical arsonists, whether they were a flea carried on the back of a rat or a Mongol upon his sturdy steed. The bubonic plague of the Late Middle Ages had horrific mortality rates and subsequently redefined the existing class relations amongst those that remained - arguably ending feudalism. Genghis Khan’s descendants ended the myth of Arab military dominance, reduced Islamic centralized governance to ashes at the height of their power and delivered to one of the world’s major religions an originalist posture that still besets its progress nearly 800 years later. Arsonists needn’t only fundamentally reshape the systems that order our lives, they can also restrict their ability to ever recover from the blow.

The Present Disorder

We spent seventy years building the most interconnected global system that has ever been seen. Roads cross like arteries across deserts and through mountains. One could conceivably drive from Spain to Singapore. Diaspora’s connect across oceans as quickly as Amazon packages. We created the transmission pathways for a pathogen and neglected to design the means to respond once it arose.

The palpable anxiety and fear that afflicts every corner of the world today is not due to Covid alone, but considered altogether the reaction is certainly justified. It has even convinced the most traditional investors to indulge in techno-utopian fantasies of financial collapse and social disorder. The fears of March, however, seem to have quickly given way to complacency and bravado in certain corners. The masters of the universe are back on the trading floor in New York, but their Southern counterparts seem to only just be learning the basics of public health management in a pandemic. European cosmopolitans are considering their staycations and beach holidays as a warm summer beckons. The Brits have kept a stiff upper lip and reverted to business as usual disregarding the galling incompetence of their leadership. The Muslim world restrained itself over Ramadan, but has also allowed Eid to mark the begining of a new phase. (Strangely, the police states of the Arab Gulf have displayed remarkable prudence and creativity in their policy-making, with the UAE barring those over 60 years old from restaurants and malls for an extended period.) The Asian Tigers, barring isolated clusters, are cautiously returning to business as usual. The isolated corners of Australia and New Zealand seem to be relishing in the gifts of geography. The Chinese, where it all started either by the cruelty of animal husbandry or inconceivable gastronomic creativity, have the systems of control ideally suited to manage the storm surges of infection. The New Cold War shaping ahead of them, however, seems far more challenging.

There are few dramatic images or singular events that will haunt our memory from this time. The effects of the emergency were more insidious then could be captured on a screen. As experts had warned for years, it emerged out of the complex interactions between the ever expanding human world and the shrinking natural one. It’s warnings were heeded by East Asian bureaucrats tested by similar outbreaks over the last two decades. It’s remarkable infectiousness shutting societies attuned to taking collective action and a strong sense of civic responsibility. The virus would be stopped by giving it no further flesh to leap to. 

In Trumpland, where commercial and electoral imperatives are paramount, it seems that even shockingly high death tolls couldn’t hold back the fury of the populace that, sparked by yet another brutal episode of Americana, has burst into a global movement for racial justice. Anti-blackness is a disease endemic to how the world operates, from the ethnocracy of Sri Lanka to the homogeneity of Russia. Rooting it out will require more than merely electing Biden - as his old boss’ tenure should have made evident. The challenge of addressing implicit bias presents a historic opportunity to rethink how equitable policy solutions can guide modern societies to better outcomes. To squander said chance, as is most likely the case, is to push forward yet another ticking time bomb of resentment and alienation. 

Two systems of American power, federalism and finance, seem particularly incapable of dealing with this moment. It’s political culture, blighted by rifts that would make Byzantine eunuchs blush, is practically incapable of reform or action. The federal government has left a vacuum of leadership, leaving states to competitively vie for necessary supplies in a bidding war that would make the Founding Fathers turn in their graves. The fact that the initial sell-off of equity markets has been stymied by an endless supply of bailouts is a further cause for concern. Rather than adapting to a changing world and accepting reduced returns, the nation’s elite seems wedded to their surplus gains and forcing the Federal Reserve to print greenbacks to preserve the status quo. The United States has sat astride the world for the last hundred years. In that time we have gone from a global population of less than 2 billion to one of over 7.5. The prosperity of so many owes to their stewardship. In failing to meet this crucial moment, however, their claim to and appetite for leadership has effectively ended. 

As we see Coronavirus move its way into and through every polity, we wait to see what the other end of this crisis will look like. Most expected little of their government and will thus not be surprised with the first-order and subsequent effects on the health, wealth and viability of the state. Some, like the Chinese, perversely seem to have rebounded so quickly as to move from the originator to the only international actor capable of providing assistance. The vacuum of leadership on the multinational stage is the mandate that Americans voted for in 2016. However, as that isolationism now governs their private lives too, they will feel unquestionably burnt. America’s unrivalled ascendancy was meant to end history and stop pestilence at the water’s edge. Rather it seems a controllable pathogen has done the very opposite.

A Leaderless Age

Placated by consumerism and busied by the altar of success we have been blindsided by a preventable calamity. Like the forest fires of Australia only months ago, all the machinery of 21st century democratic capitalism can do is wait for it to burn itself out. Try move people out of the way, or rather out of each other’s way, and hope that the populace can be dulled back into tacit obedience to a superstructure based on Gilded Age inequities and dystopian ecological collapse. 

Counterintuitively, this emergency has provided us the means to make a peaceful revolution possible. At this early stage in the pandemic response, we can direct the forces at our disposal in a manner that leaders of the past could only have dreamed. There is no inevitability to this. The stark set of choices ahead are sobering. A painful second wave, disputes on vaccine distribution or another shock Trump win could all push this crisis from the sphere of the transformative into the truly frightening. 

It is frustrating to recall how quickly the policy response to the 2008 financial crisis was thought of as a catastrophic missed opportunity at structural reform. We returned to business as usual and enabled the further concentration of power and wealth amongst well-connected corporates and individuals. From the EU to the AU, the public domain was to remain in thrall with the forces of private capital. The institutions of governance - local, national and supranational - continued to be toothless by design. We must heed to the lesson from this response as its character has given us the insipid systems that failed to hold another crisis at bay. 

Is it wishful thinking to seek a renewal of our political and economic systems to address the growing risks of existential breadth ahead, from climate change to unparalleled inequality? If democracies miss this opportunity, may we deserve to live in a world where the CCP dictates right and wrong. The absence of order among nations is not tolerable in a world where the forces of history that lie over the next hill are unknown. A critical point to understand here is that we got here on purpose. Weak governments, placid regulation and an obsession with individualism pushed the DJIA over 20,000. It also made international cooperation and instilling a culture of sacrifice impossible.

When this virus is behind us, whether by herd immunity or inoculation, we will speak of healing. The ultimate underlying condition, laid bare by the disparities in death tolls the world over, seems to be the inequity of our lived experience. The rich can quarantine and the poor must work. The wretched are already sick, Corona only made that clear to us. History can be overwhelming when social solidarity is threatened. Americans speak of their original sin and continue to deal with its legacy. The global order too needs to list it’s foes and clarify the challenge ahead. Anti-intellectualism, nationalism and inequality are all forces that need to be overcome. Cults of personality cannot begin to consider the wider consequences of Siberian heat waves or the mountains of personal data for sale to the highest bidder. A culture of competency can enable innovative and collaborative responses like the Africa Medical Supplies Platform to take root. We got here on purpose. We can decide to go elsewhere.

Contemporary arguments around how the past is memorialized seems to be the most potent example of the return of history. The debate goes to the hard questions that peoples of the past asked themselves far more often. The Romans regularly tore down statues of former emperors in times of strife. Ancient metropolises around the world have waterways dotted with the remnants of idols old and disputed. If we allow these great men to stand without scrutiny, we inherently limit our ability to imagine replacing them and their ideas. The sight of vacant plinths should instill wonder and ambition, maybe even shape a leader to meet the challenge of this next age.

(January 3, 2020)

Ten years ago as I entered law school with the somewhat cynical objective of leveraging a corporate law background to create career opportunities in policy and development, I wasn’t expecting a decade of global progress. I wouldn’t have been surprised by tribalist backlashes like Brexit, a right-wing resurgence from Manilla to Brasilia or even a cartoonish American president. I hope below to encapsulate my thoughts on the years gone by and posit ideas for the road ahead.

A Decade Past and a Decade Wasted

To those who feared technology and demography could fuel radical transformation in the 2010’s, it should come as strange comfort that humanity’s aptitude to lurch from one crisis to another while failing to heed the lessons of the past remains unchanged. We went from decrying Darfur to being exhausted by the news coming out of Yemen and the bodies finding their way to the bottom of the Mediterranean. Extreme climatic phenomena simultaneously threaten mass water shortages, dramatic flooding and unpredictable forest fires, but the unimaginative popular consensus that fossil fuels are critical for industry remains unchanged. The Middle East see-saw swings amidst an inexperienced prince in the Kingdom against an intransigent Persian regime. A resurgent power source from the Bosphorus Strait and over-adventurous Western powers have added tantalizing drama to this combustible mix. In fact, the last two sentences have remained the same for over a millenia.

All the ebb and flow of the last decade isn’t that remarkable then. Neither has it been all doom and gloom nor the harbinger of great things ahead. Certain personalities have stuck around and made their mark felt. Putin and Merkel are a couple of names that stand out as being in power at the beginning and still at the helm at the end, but the most sustained power player certainly is Xi Jinping. His ambition stands likely to be critical to how the next decade takes shape as well. Will China’s presence play a constructive role in solving our collective problems? Or will the absurd contradictions of state capitalism coupled with draconian authoritarianism ask questions too hard even for the world’s most advanced technocracy. As in the previous three decades, Chinese growth over this last one has continued to make extreme poverty seem like a distant memory. This dream, however, comes at a high cost to minorities like the Uighurs suffering in nightmarish circumstances in what may be the largest incarceration of innocents since the Second World War. The Chinese Communist Party still has many critical decisions to make in their nation’s reemergence, but one system of glittering success and another of despairing tyranny was not the example they wished to send to the surfeit of countries seeking a workable governance model to replicate.

Another key consideration in any analysis of what has come before and is to come is precipitous ecological collapse. It’s deleterious effects will finally start affecting the everyday lives of the global elite enough to actually spur action. Europeans seem to be leading the way on both this front and privacy protection in our new digital economy. However, their limited influence is reflected in how poorly their lead has been followed around the world. Americans remain beholden to a wild west approach on such regulatory protections, far too wedded to their anarchic notion of freedom to bother with stewardship of the future. Better seed control to algorithms designed by Zuckerberg, Google and Bezos, then concern ourselves with evidence-based policy making in the interest of the public good. A great New Yorker cartoon from November 2012 encapsulated this sentiment excellently. In it, a group of survivors in a dystopian future sit around a fire and the older man tells the young: “Yes the planet got destroyed. But for a beautiful moment in time we created a lot of value for shareholders.”.

A Discredited, Unpopular but Badly Needed Idea

So what next and more importantly what can we do to shape it. I return to the idea epitomized by the title of this website - To A Smaller World - of a cultural shift that can create a social solidarity beyond our traditional understanding of identity. Melinda Gates once noted: “Every society says its outsiders are the problem. But the outsiders are not the problem; the urge to create outsiders is the problem.” This is not a simple call to the oft-repeated notion of global citizenship, which has had a difficult decade. Citizens of nowhere are in fact increasingly branded as part of the out-of-touch elite responsible for runaway globalisation and its correlated inequities. For all its vilification, however, this broader social tier certainly has had a good decade. The Nasdaq crossing 9000 as we pivot into the new decade should be a very clear indication that the haves are doing just fine. Their predilection to feed the have-nots a fantasy that it is those on the outside of their imagined community that undermine their future is the dangerous narrative we must challenge.

We cannot continuously pull ourselves apart and together at the same time. Practically, we must prioritize the transition of power downwards to local bodies to enfranchise citizens on the economic periphery angered by neoliberal neglect. The importance of a tangible connection between the governed and the mundane issues that affect their everyday lives seems to have been quickly forgotten after the Cold War. Policymakers, besotted by efficiencies in the public sphere and monopolistic practices in the private, forgot the simple reality that communities are critical to shaping educational institutions, healthcare bodies and generally allocating the limited resources they are afforded. It is in developing democracies that this decentralizing theme has been most championed to encouraging results. At the same time we must push power upwards to international institutions to make them capable of achieving ambitious agendas like the Sustainable Development Goals by the end of the next decade. Missing that deadline would be calamitous for the United Nations system already battered reputation and spell a dangerous indictment on our ability to address the growing systemic risks we face as a civilization. The loser of the next decade, in essence, needs to be the two obvious winners of the last - the nation state and the capitalist forces that guide it. 

The nation-states reassertion in a multipolar global order was a strategic inevitability. After all, Japan cannot be asked to respect a pacifist constitution as China arms itself for imperial conquest. Hope for how it’s evolution can continue progressively can be seen out of the world’s forgotten giant - Africa. If regional ties and a critically important generational transitions for leaders across the continent move smoothly, the African Union could realize the once naive notion of truly resurgent and united continent. A decade ago though one may even have said the same for the Gulf Cooperation Council, before the vanity of princes tore it apart with disdain. As with all institutions, devolving or consolidating power legally is relatively simple, but the perceptions of men are not so fickle. As long as the soldier’s sleeve is adorned with a flag, it is there that men will perceive power to lie. The burgeoning post-nationalist African consciousness is born less out of a transformation of mindset, but a failure of capability. It was exasperation with the nation-state that has empowered regional consortiums like the Economic Community of West African States or the Southern Africa Development Community. It was a mix of corporate and civil society actors that strategically pushed decision-making to more effective forums and we need to see similar actions take place around the world in the coming years.

There are many limitations on any individual nation’s capabilities, whether that be in redirecting it’s unsustainable economy or in placing a human on Mars. The hurdles we need to cross to accomplish the next decade’s goals cannot be done by any one country alone (or for that matter by a megalomaniacal billionaire). It is for that reason that I enthusiastically support progress on projects that require multinational collaboration - spacefaring certainly included. In a more imaginative twist, could the tax collectors of an empowered global body designed to enforce a wealth tax be the impetus to unite the Albertan cattle farmer and the Egyptian mason against the three-passport-holding oligarch. A generation ago, the only emblem one could imagine on such officials would be a hammer and sickle. Thankfully, reasonable intellectual consensus has found the unfettered capitalism that gave us the 2008 disaster and it’s cheap-money-infused recovery unsatisfying for the vast majority and, critically, the ecosystem on which we depend. Making the world smaller as such, will also need it to be made fairer.

Urgent and cascading crises do not give us the luxury of time in waiting for the world to control the urge to other in the aim of shared prosperity. We must therefore seek a means to promote such a cultural identity in the decade to come. We cannot leave a vacuum for identity politics to be dominated by a right reasserting discarded language from the Clash of Civilizations hypothesis to a left preoccupied with obscure issues surrounding gender. How we take control of this dialogue as individuals is unclear. We only know that no simple answer will suffice. Hard-nosed pragmatism, open to compromise and eager to adapt to changing circumstances, is the only acceptable ideology of leaders today that intend to bend the arc of history towards something better. As the boomers finally make their way off the stage, the drama of the next decade will play out on the steps leading up to the front. However, if the current Democratic primary has shown us anything it is that a generation of asset accumulation will make convincing boomers to give up political power challenging. They are not a generation, however, averse to bold and ambitious agendas. They elected a charismatic upstart Senator and then his nemesis for good measure. Each fell short of their expectations, one tragically and the other thankfully (thus far). We hope on this next go they have the courage to match that openness with a sense of intergenerational responsibility. This is the first test among many we must pass in this next decade if we are to stand a chance of building a more resilient global system.

What can and might an individual do?

I entered the full-time workforce in 2013 and it’s been an unconventional ride since. Starting from a large Canadian law firm, I found my way through two fascinating roles in the development space before landing in London. Here I have been in the startup sector for three years now. The dance from the corporate to public interest and into the legaltech world has yielded a lifetime’s worth of the extraordinary. Placing a premium on building an adaptable set of skills, however, has limited my focus on mastering a narrow range of capabilities and clearly advancing a value-based professional arc. It is these two points I hope to focus on in guiding what is a nascent career over the coming decade into an established one {Inshallah}.

In the broader scheme of affairs, I feel exceptionally well-positioned to take on the challenges that lie ahead and, most importantly, grow and learn at every corner. Personally, I have been fortunate to have a loving and privileged upbringing and found a wonderful life partner to inspire me out of my comfort zone to a shared life worth celebrating. Residing in London has also provided a fascinating platform for endless opportunity and a vantage point on an effervescent city in the midst of decline. As with so much of the deterioration that marrs our view of the decade ahead, we can say times have been worse. Myopic public discourse and status quo thinking have been overcome before. The greatest resource to make the giant leaps needed are seemingly in abundance and recently they have not been afraid to show resilience to power both on the streets and in boardrooms. Our numbers had just crossed 5 billion when I was born in 1987, and will reach 8.5 billion by 2030. Let’s hope the collective capabilities of the most complex organism in the universe is enough to make this next decade worth remembering for all the right reasons.

The article below was published on April 3, 2017 on the blog of the Ontario Justice Education Network and is available with additional media attachments at the following link: http://ojen.ca/en/inuit-youth-ask-trudeau-for-help.

In late November of last year, the Law Society of Nunavut (LSN), in partnership with the Ontario Justice Education Network (OJEN), ran a pilot program for a capacity-development initiative aimed at Inuit youth in the community of Hall Beach.

Over three days, students from middle school to high school grappled with challenging ideas about citizenship and the legal system as a whole. While the programming varied between the age groups, each had a chance to ask tough questions about what they expected of their representatives at each level of government and what their own responsibilities were to ensure the future shape of society reflected their vision.

The end product of the exercise was a sizable number of letters directed at the Prime Minister’s Office, the territorial legislature in Iqaluit, the local mayor and even the Governor General. The three attached samples indicate a range of concerns with the local community, specifically on the availability of quality facilities for youth. As is a concern across the North, a large youth bulge has not been met with commensurate investment in facilities and upgrades to ensure safe and productive activities are available to all. The lack of such programs has been noted as factor in a range of issues stemming from youth disengagement with civic and community life. The much heralded launch of the new recreational facility and pool in the territorial capital, Iqaluit, is a positive step in the right direction, but it does not address systemic issues in smaller communities that have not seen adequate support.

Both administrators and teachers were impressed with how the short program was able to evoke some strong reactions in students. As opposed to prior generations, digital media has made youth very knowledgeable of amenities that other Canadian children enjoy. It was encouraging that even young students were able to identify and discuss this disparity without resentment, but rather with a mature sense that resource allocation is a matter of political decision-making and that is something that citizens can influence. This is the motivation of the many letters that were sent out from the program and the few examples you see attached below. The excitement at the prospect of the Prime Minister himself seeing their urgent requests for an improved Youth Center in their small community was palpable. Even a cursory acknowledgement of their concerns calling out loudly from their isolated Arctic alcove would do wonders to bolster these young voices as they seek to find a way to shape the future of their communities.

It has taken me extraordinarily long to put together a post summarizing my experiences over the past year. At the macro scale sensible people will write off 2016 as an anomaly. On the personal level, it will go down as something quite remarkable. As I like to say, I went from the roof of the world to the edge of it while the rest of it seemed to fall apart. It’s challenging to string a singular and cohesive narrative through my story as it were. But spending the past 12 months working far outside my comfort zone has reminded me of how little I understood my own capabilities and engendered in me a new confidence in the ability of communities to overcome hardship and build healthy societies. 

The Lawyer

To give some context to where I am now we will need to start good deal earlier. I’m a Pakistani-Canadian who grew up in Dubai and have lived, worked and studied around the world since. It’s an unconventional identity but the concept of a Third Culture Kid (TCK) applies aptly. After studying politics and law, I started my career as a corporate solicitor in the serene surroundings of Vancouver, British Columbia. Some who have known me would say that that I never really stood a chance of doing anything else. I have an intellectual and argumentative disposition with a keen interest in global affairs and the evolution of society and its institutions. If we accept that the rule of law has become the secular faith of our age, then lawyers today occupy a role akin to the clergy of times past. It was the power of the profession to open doors and with them unique opportunities across sectors and borders that attracted me to the calling.

My practice initially focused on securities law. There I developed the skills, financial literacy and business acumen to advise both private and public companies and strategic investors on transactional and operational matters. While the work and the mentors I had the chance to hone my skills under were tremendous, I resigned from the large national law firm I worked with in late 2015. I had thought considerably on how to build a career over a lifetime to continuously broaden my exposure and where technological disruption would dramatically change the nature of work itself. The TCK inside me had a simple solution: move your feet. Inspiration came from an unlikely source, a Canadian Bar Association program funded by Global Affairs Canada that places young lawyers seeking to explore alternative legal careers in development organizations around the world [http://www.cba.org/CBA-International-Initiatives/Young-Lawyers-International-Program].  

Playing Politics in Nepal

I had followed Nepalese affairs superficially since my first visit there as a schoolboy in 1999, but was thrilled to be returning at this critical juncture in its history. A new constitution, hammered out after nearly a decade of negotiations, had been enacted in late 2015 to much disagreement. One of the world’s newest republics seemed at an impasse and I was to dive into the confusion as a consultant with a democracy-promotion organization working on constitutional implementation called the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (International IDEA). 

Nepal has never been associated with the notion of untapped potential. It does not feature on lists of developing countries poised to boom and make its mark on the global arena. It is a landlocked mountain range sandwiched between the giants of Asia. From ancient times, Nepal has been a waystation for those traversing the great Eurasian landmass, always stopping to note the beauty of its natural monuments and the warmth of its people. As we begin 2017, it is a nation beset by crisis fatigue after decades of repeated failed experiments in socio-economic and political progress. Each progressive lurch forward follows a predictable crash back to reality that punctures the stability and solidarity of the state. 

Nepal has made multiple small and futile steps toward democratization and economic modernization since the kingdom attained relative autonomy in 1768. Foreign aid, tourism revenue and remittances have sustained a depilated and somewhat feudal economic infrastructure, but the nation’s people have more or less since time immemorial been overwhelmingly poor. Dysfunctional governance and unbalanced growth provided little in the form of progress for a vast majority of Nepal’s young and mostly agrarian populace. The pot of discontent eventually boiled over in 1996 with the emergence of a communist militant group in the form of the Maoists. The decade-long civil war riled the Nepali people into a democratic revolution against the increasingly despotic monarch in 2006 and established the People’s Republic that stands today. 

A broad spectrum of political groups managed the transition on the basis of an interim constitution and effectively managed democratic elections in April 2008. The inability of elected representatives to meet their lofty ambitions quickly punctured the sense of euphoria that the people’s movement and subsequent elections had built. Even Nepal’s emergence as the darling of the international and development community could not bring about the semblance of effective governance. As the first Constituent Assembly (CA) failed to agree upon a constitution, new elections were called for in 2013. The second CA faced the same daunting task of the previous to draft a new constitution. While the secular and federal nature of the state were agreed upon, intractable issues of balancing representation between minorities, women and regions limited real progress.

Incremental progress was paradoxically jumpstarted in 2015 when earthquakes devastated the country. Without any strong state institutions, disaster recovery was poorly planned and executed. Hoping to capitalize on renewed national solidarity, the federal parliament hastily pushed through a new and still contested constitution in September 2015. The framework for the state was superficially quite visionary in its adoption of progressive ideals. Inclusion and non-discrimination were to be the values of the new state which provided quotas of female representation, acknowledged the structural disadvantages of minorities and lower-castes and made pledges on socio-economic rights vastly beyond the capacity of the state. However, it was the division of the federal state into seven provinces that has undermined its effective adoption and implementation. 

The people living in the populous southern regions, known as the Madhesh, rejected the document outright as reflecting a discriminatory status quo wherein the dominant urban elites of the hill region would continue to control the levers of state power over their poorer brethren. Ethnic and caste divisions further strained the divisive issue. The constitution was to erase structural power dynamics and allow minorities an effective say in their own affairs in a federal nation. An alliance of groups, supported implicitly by India’s failure to acknowledge and applaud the new constitution, took their protest movement into uncharted territory in late 2015 with the decision to blockade the critical trade routes that brought essential goods into Nepal from the south. 

It is into this geopolitical dynamic that I arrived in Nepal in January 2016. The blockade was causing economic havoc and shortages of basic goods for a people already struggling to recover from the misery of earthquakes and perennial infrastructure issues. Without a stable supply of petroleum products, lines at retailers stretched for kilometers when word spread of the availability of gasoline or cooking gas spread. In an effort to unite the nation following the trauma of earthquakes, Nepal once again found itself in a crisis. One of the poorest nations in the world was getting poorer. For a short period of time before the détente in late-February, Nepal was the only nation in Asia with rising infant mortality.

From a professional perspective, we viewed the ongoing crisis as a consequence of the process by which the constitution was drafted and promulgated rather than the content of the document. In the drafting process, the ruling parties failed to properly include the minority groups at the decision-making table. There was also a collectively failure to understand the seriousness with which the Madhesi groups would resist the constitutional framework if it did not accommodate their vision for the federal state. Timelines were rushed to harness the broad national consensus on reconstruction and the result was a crisis that severely damaged the cohesion of the nation-state. 

I worked with International IDEA to design new and manage existing programs to guide policymakers on the constitutional implementation process, including working on legislative reform and policy formulation. We also provided objective analysis of the contents of the new constitution for the public and engaged stakeholders on controversial issues to bring perspective and ensure constructive dialogue on future reforms. Our efforts were centered on advising state institutions, but our work also sought to ensure that the long-term implementation of the constitution respected the rights of Nepal’s diverse groups and women. 

In a nation where even democratic forces have begun to speak in the language of tribalism, the importance of social solidarity is critical. In my short time in Nepal the nation’s fate seemed to constantly hang in the balance. Today, Nepal is still stuck in a position where it is unable to push forward with the implementation of its ambitious constitution without resolving the question of how to frame the state. It is not a grave political crisis though, as bold and inclusive leadership could effectively redirect Nepal to a very different future. It was that route that the people had called for on the streets years earlier and I hope my work contributed ever so slightly in guiding it back that way.

The Responsibility of the North

The North occupies a unique place in Canadian mythology. It is part of the modern nation’s understanding of itself, yet hardly plays even the slightest role in any of their lives. Come election season, any would-be Prime Minister will certainly visit one of the three Territories with promises of new programs and funding to develop the economy and resolve social issues stemming from centuries of cruel colonial exploitation. The fanciful idea of exploring the Arctic became a reality when an opportunity to work with the Law Society of Nunavut (LSN) in Iqaluit arose shortly after my return from Nepal.

Nunavut is Canada’s newest territory. It was born in 1999 following the settlement of the Nunavut Land Claims Agreement some years earlier. The region is the size of Western Europe and the vast majority of its 35,000 people are Inuit. It is a vast treeless expanse that stretches Canada’s borders close to the top of the world. Many Canadian children only know Nunavut as the difficult part of the map to draw or color in with its innumerable islands and jagged borders. Most commercial activity in the North is centered on larger hubs in the East like Yellowknife and Whitehorse. Nunavut is unique. It is unique not only because of its rich Inuit identity, but also its decentralized and unconventional political institutions. Each of the small and remote 23 communities have a strong say in the manner their communities are governed. As devolution from the federal government continues, it will be fascinating to see how Nunavut uses its resources to develop and modernize society.

The short contract was a fascinating personal and professional journey. Living in a town of six-thousand only accessible by air for most of the year with a remarkable cultural history was eye-opening. Interestingly, in terms of simple everyday luxuries, life in Iqaluit was far more comfortable than that in Kathmandu. The electricity did not go and the water in the taps was both drinkable and, on demand, warm. As it turns out, life north of the tree line is not as far away from contemporary bourgeois living as one would imagine. That being said, these were privileges afforded to a highly-paid professional, something far outside the reach of most in the community. The rates of poverty, food insecurity and overcrowding in Nunavut are scandalous for a country as prosperous as Canada. The North, it seems, is not important enough to escape the realm of myth and actually be a subject of priority in Ottawa. 

Professionally I occupied an executive-level role in the smallest law society in the country. For a majority of my time, the office and all its functions were entirely managed by me. Along with the standard expectations of an administrative legal regulatory body, the LSN also ran a number of outreach programs to address public distrust with the justice system and reach out to those in need of legal services. My work extended from advising on policy reform to program implementation in remote communities. I also had the good fortune to travel to Greenland, which is discussed further in an article I wrote that is posted separately below. 

Contrary to what most would believe it is not the memory of the bitter cold that sticks with me, but, rather, the warmth and solidarity of the people and their revived culture. As I ended the year I couldn’t help but note the similarities between my time in Nepal and Nunavut. Each ascribes to an idea of community that seems lost in much of cosmopolitan life. They own their struggles as they are without any hope that help will come from elsewhere. I also had a similar sense of foreboding. Here we had another jurisdiction on the periphery of the world system struggling to escape the cycles of poverty and crisis. Without effective institutions and sustained investment it is hard to see life changing in either. But the ability of the Nunavummiut to reclaim their land and history is truly admirable. We must take their example of resilience and solidarity to heart when seeking to rebuild troubled communities in all corners of the world.

And then the World Stopped Dancing

One doesn’t need to ask too many for an opinion before one comes upon an apocalyptic viewpoint. It seems everywhere the sense of crisis has reached a fever pitch. Whether they blame unhinged markets or human nature, we are being told people have lost their way and society will soon follow. I have never been much of an optimist, but in contrast to today’s doomsayers I am certainly so and I conclude here with optimist’s take on 2016 and what comes next.

One of the more curious reactions to the shock referendum result which takes the British a little further away from their European brethren was the call for an independent London. A similar campaign for an independent California, dubbed Calexit, quickly gained traction online following the election of the reality TV star. Both exercises were a bit tongue and cheek, but illustrate the kind of tone-deafness that precipitated the populist wave. People are angry. They are so from Cape Town to Caracas. In the last twenty-five years, unprecedented technological innovation and global interconnectedness has created more wealth and prosperity than ever seen before. The beneficiaries of these systems all seem to ask the same question: Why then are people so angry? The answer is fairly simple. Our economic and political systems have failed to distribute the gains of globalization equitably. They are, in essence, the losers in the vast capitalist game that is modern life. And they are not happy about it.

Those that voted to drag Britain out of the EU and America back to the 18th century are voicing a particularly modern kind of anger. We witnessed it across the Arab world only a few years back and continue to watch the painful struggle to restore order in Syria that disintegrated as a consequence. I do not envision any such grave consequences for the rest of the world, but I do have some fear of what the spread of resentment amongst a stagnant and culturally isolated middle class means for the future. The Tunisian who lit himself on fire back in 2011 did so because he was starving, the Brits and Americans have lit the fuse on the post-WWII global order because they were hungry for change. Change is an oft repeated mantra in modern politics. Obama may have run on it, but Donald Trump truly represents it; albeit a potentially chaotic type of change. 

I am not a techno-utopian optimist. Those visions, like paintings drawn of the future in the early 20th century, dramatically oversee the potential of our technologies. Artificial intelligence will augment our capabilities and increased connectivity will continue to reshape human relations, but neither force will save us from the harshest challenges we face. How then can I be an optimist and recognize that we face enormous challenges in rebalancing our natural environment, taming the inequities of capitalism and bringing dignity to the billions who have never known it? It is quite simply because I am confident that at the micro-scale communities and individuals are continuing to build an effective and compassionate social order. To overcome our challenges certainly does require state and multilateral action, but the foundation for those future initiatives are being built in schools and offices around the world. They are shaping not nations but, much more importantly, communities. They are placing in people a sense of ownership of their future and asking them to take a stake in caring for it. Prosperity, it turns out, comes from everybody working for everybody else. This is how you resist regressive forces. It will take time and things are likely to get more unpredictable before we return to the path of progress. For my part, I will continue to seek out a constructive role in shaping local and global systems that push us towards greater levels of trust, mutual dependence and sustainability. As of this writing, few would confidently state life is getting better. I challenge myself and you to change that.

The article below was published in the Law Society of Nunavut’s Polar Barrister Newsletter of Winter 2016/2017 and is available with additional media attachments at the following link: http://lawsociety.nu.ca/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/2017-Polar-Barrisers-Newsletter-Final-G1.pdf.

Nunavut has a unique story, but just four hundred miles east of Iqaluit is another place where northern aboriginal people have clawed back political power from a distant southern capital. The similarities between the Greenland and Nunavut are wide-ranging, each having spent the last three decades reasserting authority over their land, culture and government. Greenland’s fifty-seven thousand people are 88% Greenlandic Inuit, predominantly bilingual – speaking both Danish and Greenlandic – and are spread sparsely around the southern and western coast, with a concentration of seventeen thousand in the capital of Nuuk. This article will explore Greenland’s history and development, highlighting the lessons for Nunavummiut as they shape their own path forward.

I visited the cosmopolitan capital of Greenland in early October and had the chance to meet with Rebekka Bisgaard, an attorney at Greenland’s largest private practice - Nuna Law Firm. The offices of Nuna Law occupied the sixth floor of one of the handful of office towers in the city and with its shiny boardrooms and glossy artwork could have been mistaken for any Seven Sisters office in Canada. The firm has a staff of seven lawyers and deals with a broad range of corporate and civil matters.  The fact that a firm of this size and nature can prosper in Nuuk indicates the volume of commercial activity underway in Greenland and the breadth of the economic gap between the island and Nunavut. While much more in-depth comparative research is needed on how the varying process of devolution led to these outcomes, professionals in Nunavut should acknowledge the strategic value in partnering to strengthen economic linkages and advance the progress of the broader circumpolar region.

For almost three hundred years the enormous glacier covered island was a colony of Denmark, but Greenlanders began disentangling themselves from Copenhagen in 1972 by rejecting Denmark’s referendum to join the European Community. While rising nationalism and natural resources were important factors, it was the fishing restrictions and the sealskin ban that galvanized opposition. In 1979 the Greenland Home Rule Act (GHRA) was passed, and Greenland officially became a politically autonomous country within the Kingdom of Denmark. The GHRA did not pass on title to property in the same sense as the Nunavut Land Claims Agreement (NLCA), but the end result was the same. Greenlanders were to control the use of their land and set about building up an autonomous government and political apparatus. In 2008, Greenlanders voted to further repatriate authority from Denmark. Greenland’s official language was changed from Danish to Greenlandic. The new arrangement also envisioned the sharing of revenues from future oil and gas development, so that the Danish subsidies could be phased out. Greenland is now firmly on the path to full and complete independence.

The GHRA and the NLCA have obvious similarities. Politically they portend a fundamental shift of power from central to aboriginal governments. Economically, they signify the abolishment of a culture of paternalism and welfare in favor of engaging aboriginal people in the modern global economy. Greenland, much like Nunavut, is facing significant changes in the composition of its economy, and is moving rapidly in the direction of becoming a commodities economy.  While market factors have limited the mining sector’s growth thus far, there is an evident public campaign to revive economic optimism in Greenland. An example is organizations like Vaekstfonden, a Danish state investment fund that provides capital and strategic support to new growth companies. Focus has also shifted to the growing tourism sector. In 2008, there were nearly four hundred cruise ship arrivals in Greenland and, in 2014, close to eighty thousand overnight visitors. A vast majority of these were Danish. We can be inspired by Greenland’s pathway leading to a world-class adventure tourist destination. Nuuk has for instance, a modern museum and art gallery to showcase local history and artists and offers a range of food, hotel and shopping experiences that mix tradition with modernity. Most visitors, the author included, are left surprised by the city’s natural beauty and its vibrancy. Nunavut most certainly has the scenery and cultural dynamism to raise its profile amongst domestic tourists seeking original experiences. Accordingly, Canada can tap into the growing public interest in the Arctic and build on, and further develop attractions to increase interest in travelling to Nunavut.

Regardless of its ambitions, Greenland's economy today relies on the fisheries sector. However, there is growing interest in Greenland’s gemstone, rare earth and uranium deposits from Europe, North America and as far away as China. But before any extraction project can go into production, companies need to garner broad support and ensure the project will benefit not exploit the local population in an Impact and Benefit Agreement with the Greenlandic government and the relevant municipality. Development is complicated by the small local labor pool, skepticism about Greenlandic regulations meeting international standards and the logistical challenges of a nation with no roads outside of its cities and towns. Further, there is a prevalent fear that mining could destroy the environment and traditional ways of life, but it may also offer the best solution to social problems by creating jobs and funding public services. Many in Nunavut will recognize the dilemma and sympathize with the difficulty of putting in place the legal frameworks that ensure the process results in broad and sustainable social gains.

The court system of Greenland is composed of four district courts, the Court of Greenland, the High Court of Greenland and, at its apex, the Danish Supreme Court. There is a district or magistrate court to hear criminal matters in each local district of the country and proceedings are conducted in Greenlandic. These remote forums are presided over by judges without any legal background aside from a district court judge course. In a contrast to the Canadian justice system in the north, Denmark has incorporated traditional practices into the justice system rather than imposing European norms and committed to establishing the physical infrastructure for communities to address their own legal concerns rather than rely on periodic court visits. Further, suggestive of the Gladue principles not adopted into Canadian jurisprudence till that the late 1990s, the sanctions of the Greenland Criminal Code of 1954 are inspired, not by the severity of the offense itself, but by a desire to rehabilitate the offender and to protect society. All this, however, does not change the fact that there is a substantial barrier in understanding legal matters for a majority of the Greenlanders and this places a heavy burden on a small bar. The Nunatsinni Advokatit is the union of lawyers working in Nuuk and they number a partly twenty. Attracting and retaining talent in Greenland, as in much of Arctic, is challenging. Perhaps as a result, the conduct of district courts in Greenlandic makes burdensome translation services necessary as many lawyers are non-native speakers. However, Greenland’s bar is highly active in serving its community needs. Rebekka and her colleague, Kista Høegh, allowed me to attend on their pro-bono outreach work with an organization called IKIU (Greenlandic for “help”). The legal aid service for non-criminal concerns arranges calls between clients and lawyers and also coordinates field visits to communities. While Greenland’s economy may be more prosperous than Nunavut, the demands on the bar are comparable to our local Bar.  However,  the Greenlandic bar does not benefit from the convenience of a vast pool of non-resident practitioners to call on, but must address a similar burden of legal complaints; as such, the Greenlandic bar, much like the nation as a whole, faces many challenges ahead. 

Greenland has done much to transform its image from that of an empty fortress to a region of business opportunity. With the end of the periodic Air Greenland connection between Iqaluit and Nuuk in 2015, both regions lost a critical pathway to continued economic interaction and cultural exchange. One would hope that in the future renewed access to Greenland would lead to a new commitment to enhanced connectivity amongst the two emerging political entities and developing economies.

The article below was published on May 9, 2016 in The República, a major English-language newspaper in Nepal. The piece was co-authored by Sheri Meyerhoffer and myself and was part of an initiative by International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance to increase public awareness of constitutional processes and engender confidence in Nepal's judicial institutions.

The Supreme Court of Nepal is the apex of the nation's judicial system. It serves Nepalis by deciding legal issues of public importance, thereby contributing to the development of all branches of law. The independence of the Court, the quality of its work and the esteem in which it is held both in Nepal and abroad contribute significantly as foundations for a secure, strong and democratic country. The public perception of the administration of justice is therefore crucial at this juncture in Nepal's history. The issue of the judges' nomination process could potentially generate either support or dissent from the public as to the merits of the justice system. Consequently, the criticisms that have been made regarding the recent slate of judicial nominees to Supreme Court require a full and thorough analysis.

Qualifications sound

In accordance with the Constitution of Nepal 2015 (the "Constitution"), the Supreme Court of Nepal should consist of the Chief Justice and 21 justices appointed by the President, on recommendation of the Judicial Council. Currently, ten seats are filled and eleven remain vacant. The nomination process was initiated on March 1st, 2016 when the Judicial Council announced the names of eleven nominees to the court. The nominee list includes seven sitting chief judges of the Appellate Courts and four senior advocates.

The Constitution states in Article 129(5) that the justices of the Supreme Court may be selected from among the justices of the High Courts who have served for a minimum of five years or from among those jurists and advocates who have practiced in the legal field for at least 15 years. According to the transition provisions of the Constitution, specifically Article 300, existing Appellate Courts are to transition into the High Courts within a year of the commencement of the Constitution. The High Courts are yet to be constituted, and, as such, the justices nominated to the Supreme Court with the requisite qualifications and experience must necessarily come from the Appellate Courts.

Indeed it was on the basis of Article 300 that the Supreme Court dismissed a writ claiming that the nominees from the Appellate Courts did not qualify as they had not served the requisite time on the High Courts. The decision noted that any finding that the Supreme Court could not fill its vacancies until the High Courts were established would be unreasonable and impractical thus allowing for the inference that the drafters intended prior experience on the Appellate Courts to qualify nominees in this transitory phase of institution building. As such, any debate on whether the seven judicial nominees meet the explicit constitutional qualifications should be considered resolved.

Process sound

The Judicial Council is the constitutional body mandated to consider candidates for all levels of the judiciary, including the Supreme Court. It should consist of five members, including the Chief Justice, who is the head of the council, the second senior most Supreme Court Justice, the law minister, a representative from the Nepal Bar Association and a nominee of the Prime Minister. Currently, the council is composed of only three members as the Nepal Bar Association and the Prime Minister are yet to nominate their representatives.

This created controversy regarding the validity of the nominations. In a writ filed with the Supreme Court days following the announcement of the nominees, it was argued that as the Judicial Council was not properly constituted it was in breach of the Constitution by recommending the nominees. This writ was dismissed on the grounds that the arguments did not have legal and constitutional merit. The court's decision is based upon the premise that the constitutional implementation process cannot be imperiled by the political infighting that has left the Judicial Council incomplete. Nepal is unquestionably better served with a fully functioning judiciary and not by one held at limited capacity because of political wrangling.

Political Affiliation no Issue

Criticism of the nominations related to previous political activity or affiliation reflects a misunderstanding of the concept of judicial independence. The United Nations declaration on the Basic Principles on the Independence of the Judiciary and the Role of Lawyers states explicitly that: "In the selection of judges, there shall be no discrimination against a person on the grounds of race, color, sex, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or status."

Judicial independence is based upon the concept that the judiciary should not be subject to improper influence. Upon appointment, judges uphold this principle by impartially evaluating the facts presented to them on a case by case basis. Justices relinquish their biases and dispense their duties in an independent manner. The critique of nominees with previous political positions and affiliations ignores the fact that almost all educated professionals that make up the bar hold partisan views and opinions. Participation in public dialogue on issues of relevance would be difficult if lawyers were expected not to have such opinions or associate in groups that share similar views.

The argument that a former member of one branch of the state (the Constituent Assembly-Legislature Parliament) is automatically disqualified from subsequently serving another branch (the Supreme Court) is unsubstantiated in both fact and law. Elected Members have been appointed to the Supreme Courts in various countries numerous times. To give but a few examples, in India, Justice K.S. Hegde, Speaker of the Lok Sabha in India later became a prominent Supreme Court judge. Justice Krishna Iyer, another renowned Indian Supreme Court Justice, was a former Minister in the Kerala Government. In the case at hand, the argument for automatic disqualification ignores the benefits of having among the Supreme Court nominees individuals who participated in the constitution drafting process. The competency of the Supreme Court depends on the depth of expertise brought by each individual justice and experience in constitution drafting in the legislative branch of government only adds to this pool and strengthens the institution overall.

Proportional inclusiveness

Articles 38(4) and 42 of the Constitution call for the application of proportional inclusion in the composition of all state bodies. The Supreme Court is a state body and the nominees include only one Madheshi, two women and two individuals of indigenous descent and none from the historically marginalized communities of Dalits or Muslims. The fact that only 18 percent of the nominees are female and that almost 64 percent of the nominees are Brahmin-Chetri represents a failed opportunity to comply with and respect the new constitutional norms. There is no question of the depth of the talent pool of female, Madheshi, Dalit and Muslim jurists in Nepal.

As such, the Judicial Council and the institutions that advise it missed a clear opportunity to commence the building of a judicial system truly reflective of Nepali society. There is currently, however, a third writ before the Supreme Court on the question of proportional inclusion and, depending on the court's decision, there is still a possibility that another opportunity will be created and availed.

Much has been written about the anxiety crisis in our modern world. Intellectuals of all stripes identify unrealistic ambitions as a pivotal cause of the condition amongst the younger generations. I posit a different notion, one I will call ‘Go Fever’. I define ‘Go Fever’ as the sense of unease generated by the predictability of one’s own life as compared to the opportunities one will never experience. One can draw parallels to Francis Fukiyama’s concept of the ‘End of History’, which may be irrelevant to the international system as it now looks, but is instructive when applied to personal affairs. When one reaches an End of History moment they have attained a degree stability in both the personal and professional sense. Radical shifts become ideas of the past. Whether this comes in the form of ink on the final page of the mortgage or an office hallway that shows exactly where you will be in five and ten years hence, it is the epitome of modern bourgeois success. Realizing an End of History moment together with the contradictory sense that your life lacks direction or purpose is what I call ‘Go Fever’. This is not a privileged notion. As anyone who has ever strolled through a slum will attest, it is not just the physical deprivation that strikes you but the restlessness that seems to stare at you. The poor are desperate to escape deprivation, but also the idleness that a lack of opportunity brings. The comfortable empathize hunched over their office desks staring at an inbox that may take a lifetime to empty.

There is no comparing the living standards of the two, but there is value in exploring this restrained aspect of human nature. ‘Go Fever’ was originally coined to refer to the pre-launch frenzy at NASA that leads engineers to overlook key details that should stall or delay lift-off. It has been blamed for the Challenger disaster. As humans we impatiently long for the infinite possibilities of the road ahead, but they are always obstacles in our way. Even those who seemingly have unlimited resources at their disposal seem unsatisfied with what they cannot accomplish. Throughout history, great men sought to conquer in known world. In our times, James Cameron uses his millions to explore the ocean depths in remarkably expensive private expeditions. Richard Branson seeks to take his airline brand into the stratosphere. Others titans seek to mine asteroids and even seek a means to extend life indefinitely. The stoic and Buddhist philosophies teach a separation from the cycle of suffering that is life. Only if one gets of the road that calls ahead like a fever, they would say, can you attain any semblance of peace.

So how does ‘Go Fever’ relate to our modern sense of crisis? Firstly, the vast unrequited ambitions of billions the world over creates mental roadmaps of lives that will simply never be lived. Mark Zuckerberg wears a t-shirt to his meetings and embodies and everyman aura. His life seems attainable; he repeatedly states how anybody can reach his level of wealth and power. Long gone are the days were such concentrations were limited to those chosen only by lineage. Failure to do so today is correlated only to a personal defect. ‘Go Fever’ haunts the professional who will spend most of his life doing work he does not enjoy. He or she will live for two weeks a year in an exotic location. The instability of generations past made keeping a career for life a feat of immense pride. Today’s youth consider life’s worth as an accumulation of divergent experiences. The internet has made the vastness of the opportunities available more apparent than ever. This ‘Go Fever’ creates in individuals a selfish impulse that neglects broader social goods. We feel something terribly wrong in our unfilled lives that we impose this unsatisfactory vision on the world as a whole. If our expectations cannot be attained, it is doubtful that together we can save ourselves. It is a pervasive negativity and a transference of a crisis essentially of individuals onto broader society.

‘Go Fever’ is not something unique to unhappy people. It is something unique though to the unsatisfied. It is wrong to blame educational systems that instilled unrealistic ambitions for this condition. It is rather the manner in which we conceive of adult life that requires reimagining. The opportunity to explore various career and life paths leads to better rounded adults with more empathy for those from different backgrounds. The rigid career path must be relegated to the 20th century. Freedom of movement for those from developing countries with undue visa restrictions is another massive barrier for most of the world’s population and not one’s whose resolution can be touched on in this short post. If we are to create individuals who seek out means of solving our shared problems we need to focus on ensuring that their lives do not feel like cages. We must shape our institutions to ensure that individuals feel confident in following their instincts away from the mundane. In contrast to the stoic prescription, I am not advocating getting off the road, but facilitating the clearance of the obstacles on it so one can actually see all paths ahead and make a conscious choice of which one to take.

(November 3, 2015)

The longest Canadian election in modern history culminated with the inauguration of Justin Trudeau as the Prime Minister of Canada in Ottawa today. It is an occasion to celebrate for most Canadians. His predecessor, Stephen Harper, had failed to convince Canadians to stay the course with a haphazard and negative campaign concluded a little over two week ago. Canadians overwhelmingly endorsed progressive notions of collective responsibility and multiculturalism over the conservative impulse to limited government and distrust of otherness. As a Canadian statesman, Harper befuddled many by shunning dialogue through international institutions, undermining efforts to defend the environment and bringing a ‘the government is the problem’ mentality to a social-democratic heartland. The fact that Harper did not resign in his concession speech on the eve of his election defeat aptly characterizes his seeming inability to relinquish control without it being wrested from him. The tone of his campaign the  final days of the election may have also done immeasurable damage to the Conservative Party brand as it sought to exploit the cynicism of an angry, greedy and shrinking base.

Trudeau had fought hard to brand his party as the young and innovative alternative to Harperism. Pivotally, he outflanked Thomas Mulcair’s New Democrats with a pledge to scrap the ideology of austerity and increase the federal deficit spending on infrastructure to the tune of $50 billion. He has proposed legalizing recreational marijuana use and bringing back Canadian values of openness and optimism to governance and international diplomacy. These are not difficult promises to keep. Austerity is a bankrupt economic ideology. Drug prohibition is increasingly unjustifiable. Transparency can only improve with the transition from the command-and-control style of the Harper government. Rebuilding the government programs gutted by Harper will start on day one with the restoration of the national census, inexplicably axed by the Conservatives in 2010. Trudeau has the good fortune of being able to garner acclaim for undoing many unpopular and plainly irrational decisions made by his predecessor. In regards to foreign policy, Trudeau’s charming sense of internationalism and growing celebrity could give him an outsized influence for a man of his experience. Canadians can also rest assured that the scenario painted by the Conservatives, that of a naive princeling unprepared for a one-on-one meeting with a ruthless strongman like Vladimir Putin, will likely never materialize. For most of the world, Trudeau represents a reassuring throwback to a more harmless kind of Canadian politician. Commentators speak of Trudeau’s emotional intelligence in contrast to the supposedly towering intellect of his father, former Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau. This is not necessarily a weakness. Justin Trudeau quite evidently comes to the political arena a relative freshman, but one whose positive approach to politics is both refreshing and uplifting to Canadians tired of a decade of dispiriting politics.

One inevitable curiosity to emerge from Trudeau’s campaign and election are the discussions surrounding dynastic politics. Like most other Westerners, Canadians bemoan how so foreign a concept has crept into their democratic institutions. The often cited examples of the Gandhis of India or the Parks of South Korea are used to show how only immature democracies are susceptible to such practices. Little heed is paid to the American elections, which will likely be won by the wife of a former president, much like the often-derided tenure of Cristina Fernández de Kirchner in Argentina. And that is discounting the challenge posed by the brother of another former president. Millennia of human history, as well as the plethora of occupational surnames in use all around the world, all indicate that dynasties exist in all corners of human society. To combat their influence requires low barriers to entry into the political elite, not derision. Trudeau, for his part, has distinguished himself from his father’s more confrontational approach, but his name unquestionably opened the doors that led to his return to the corridors of power he once roamed as an infant.

It’s difficult to compare the recently concluded Canadian election to the labyrinthine process undergoing in their neighbor to the South. In the time since the Canadian election began, Hillary Clinton has experienced and recovered from her summer slump and Donald Trump has somehow transformed a luxury real estate brand into a formidable primary campaign. Before the first 100 days of the Trudeau administration have been completed Hillary will have allayed her doubters and Trump will have imploded, and the American elections will still be another 272 days away. In the age of Super PACs, anticipated spending by American presidential candidates, parties and outside groups and individuals is about US$10 billion. Conversely, there is a C$1,200 annual limit on donations by each Canadian to each federal political party and corporations, unions and other organizations are banned from making donations. While certain loopholes exist to manipulate these restrictions, Ottawa is relatively free of the kind of heavy-handed corporate and special-interest lobbying that characterizes Washington D.C. Indeed, the only vaguely similar figure is the salary afforded to each head of state, with the Prime Minister receiving an annual salary of C$327,400 and the President a slightly higher US$400,000. The leader of the free world should be suitably aggrieved.

The surprising electoral sweep by the Liberal Party also served as yet another reminder of the futility of advance polling in recent times. Drawing parallels to the English elections in May of this year, citizens seemed to ignore the progressive social-democratic values they had espoused to the strangers conducting surveys and allowed self-interest to guide their decision slightly rightward on voting day. In Canada’s case, the Liberals prevailed at the expense of the New Democrats. In England, Labour was pushed into the backbench as voters flocked to the Conservatives in the face of a healthy challenge from the Scottish Nationalist Party. One imagines the primary of the Democratic Party in the U.S. to follow suit and show that Bernie Sanders was never more than a flight of fancy. What does it say about our status and social-media obsessed age that voters are inclined to lean left in public settings prior to elections and right in privacy of the polling booth? The left, it seems, has won the battle for our heartstrings, but the logic of the center-right has conquered our pocketbooks. And as by James Carville’s oft-repeated mantra ("It's the economy, stupid"), voters of all stripes make their decisions according to whom will protect what is in their pockets.

The political shifts of 2015 across the developed world also lend credence to Tariq Ali’s recent categorization of the political space between the parties of the slightly right or left-leaning variety as the ‘Extreme Center’. As a child who was introduced as the next prime minister of Canada by Richard Nixon at a state dinner at the White House in 1972, Trudeau would find much to relate to with an Etonian like David Cameron. Aside from views on fiscal austerity, the Australian Liberal Party without Abbott, the Eurozone governments and the Asian Tiger economies also all seem to espouse a broadly similar set of socio-economic policies. Long dead are the cultural battles that keep American Tea Party types awake at night. Leaders within the ‘Extreme Center’ fret about how to make globalized free market capitalism palatable to the general public without any fundamental change to the systems or institutions in place. The thesis is that policy initiatives to fight inequality, environmental degradation or divisive politics rarely go far enough to address the root causes of problems and are nothing more than cosmetic gestures.  The Liberal Party of Canada and the Blairites of Labour would self-identify as centrist and would safely fit within this broader paradigm. The surprising election of Jeremy Corbyn as leader of the British Labour Party has undermined this consensus somewhat. If the Republican Party is not capable of restoring order to the traveling circus that their primary process has become, a reactionary ideologue may try to redefine American conservatism outside of this spectrum as well. Ali’s critique of the existing status quo comes from a radical perspective, but even he could not quite conjure up the risks posed by the largest military on earth being run by a megalomaniac like the current frontrunner. The question thus remains is a broad consensus on policy positions inherently problematic to address our seemingly intractable global issues or does it represent a semblance of stability in how we choose to do so.

What we can expect from Justin Trudeau's tenure over the next four years will be dictated largely by the voices he surrounds himself with. His cabinet is expected to be more diverse than any before and his initial attempt at creating a multi-party consensus on climate change indicates a willingness to forget the partisan bickering of the months prior. His honeymoon period will not be long, as Canadians working across a largely struggling economy have set their expectations too high. Barack Obama rode to power on a similar wave of enthusiasm only to disappoint as economic realities, political partisanship and the complexities of governance undermined his idealistic narrative. Trudeau will falter and have to eventually transition his brand to that of an optimistic pragmatist. For the time being, however, there is no shame in hoping the blue-eyed boy wonder takes the reins with authority and transformative zeal. Canada, and maybe even the rest of the world, needs something to root for. Maybe he can be it.