tag:theconversation.com,2011:/global/topics/freedom-9823/articlesFreedom – The Conversation2024-02-29T13:38:58Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2235332024-02-29T13:38:58Z2024-02-29T13:38:58ZHow teens benefit from being able to read ‘disturbing’ books that some want to ban<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/578696/original/file-20240228-24-s5xddp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=47%2C59%2C7892%2C5190&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Young readers report becoming more thoughtful after reading stories that feature characters who face complex challenges.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/student-choosing-a-book-on-library-royalty-free-image/959761242?phrase=teens+books&adppopup=true">FG Trade via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Should we worry, as <a href="https://pen.org/report/book-bans-pressure-to-censor/">massive book-banning efforts</a> imply, that young people will be harmed by certain kinds of books? For over a decade and through hundreds of interviews, my colleague, literacy professor <a href="https://www.albany.edu/education/faculty/peter-johnston">Peter Johnston</a>, and I have <a href="https://www.tcpress.com/teens-choosing-to-read-9780807768686">studied</a> how adolescents experience reading when they have unfettered access to young adult literature. Our findings suggest that many are helped rather than harmed by such reading.</p>
<p>For one study, we spent a year in a public middle school in a small, mid-Atlantic town, observing and talking to eighth grade students whose teachers, rather than assigning the “classics” or traditional academic texts, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1002/rrq.46">let students choose what to read</a> and gave them time to read daily in class. To support student engagement, they made available hundreds of contemporary books that are relevant to the students’ lives. The books included many of the <a href="https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1a6v7R7pidO7TIwRZTIh9T6c0--QNNVufcUUrDcz2GJM/edit#gid=9827573720">titles currently being challenged</a>, according to PEN America, which is a nonprofit that advocates against censorship, among other things. The titles include Ellen Hopkins’ “<a href="https://www.simonandschuster.net/books/Identical/Ellen-Hopkins/9781416950066">Identical</a>,” Jay Asher’s “<a href="https://penguinrandomhousehighereducation.com/book/?isbn=9780451478290">Thirteen Reasons Why</a>,” Patricia McCormick’s “<a href="https://www.encyclopedia.com/arts/educational-magazines/sold">Sold</a>,” and others that were banned because of themes of sex and violence.</p>
<p>We were interested in what the students perceived to be the consequences of reading young adult literature. They tended to read books they described <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/09500782.2024.2317944">as “disturbing</a>.” At the end of the school year, we interviewed 71 of the students about changes in their reading and relationships with peers and family. </p>
<p>We also asked open-ended questions about how, if at all, they had changed as people since the beginning of the year. Beyond reading substantially more than they had previously, they reported positive changes in their social, emotional and intellectual lives that they attributed to reading, the kinds of books they read and the conversations those books provoked.</p>
<p>Here are six ways students told us they had been changed by reading and talking about edgy young adult books. </p>
<h2>1. They became more empathetic</h2>
<p>The students chose mostly fiction, with characters whose life circumstances in many cases differed from their own, including those associated with race, gender, sexuality, culture, language, mental health and household income. Because fiction <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tics.2016.06.002">provides windows into the minds of others</a>, it has the <a href="https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.1239918">potential to improve empathy</a>, which becomes <a href="https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0055341">more probable when readers get emotionally involved in stories</a>.</p>
<p>This is consistent with what the students reported. As one student explained after reading a book about a bullied character, “Like when you see people … you think, well, they don’t have problems or whatever, but then some of the ones I’ve read, you can just understand people better.”</p>
<h2>2. They improved relationships</h2>
<p>The books contained stark realities about humanity. For instance, some books dealt with how children and teens might be exploited by adults or how mental illness might radically affect a person’s behavior.</p>
<p>Students shared that as they read, they were encountering some of this information for the first time. Their initial instinct, they said, was to find someone else who had read the book and talk about it. </p>
<p>Consequently, students who rarely talked to each other came together over books. In the process, they learned about each other, became friends or at least developed greater appreciation for each other. They also talked to family members, including parents, some of whom they convinced to read the books. </p>
<p>Relationships in books made teens rethink their own relationships. “Her mom was all rude to her,” one student recalled about a character. “It kind of had me feeling bad, ‘cause I was rude to my aunt, and my situation could have been worse.” </p>
<p>Students shared that reading about characters in dire circumstances changed how they thought about their own families. For instance, several admitted that reading a book about a girl their age who was abducted and abused by an adult male made them more likely to listen to their parents’ advice about safety. Others reading that same book reported becoming more protective of siblings.</p>
<h2>3. They became more thoughtful</h2>
<p>Reading about the decisions characters made gave the teens a chance to see the potential consequences of their own future choices.</p>
<p>Some described positive characters as role models. Others described using characters who made questionable decisions as cautionary tales and tools of self-reflection. </p>
<p>Statements such as one student’s comment that “I have changed because I think more about things before I do them” were common and were related to problems teens were already facing or could see on the horizon. These problems included toxic relationships, substance abuse, gang-related activity and risky sexual behaviors. </p>
<h2>4. They were happier</h2>
<p>Despite the fact that many students chose books with serious and unsettling content, students claimed reading made them feel better.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A girl lies on her back on a bench reading a book that she is holding." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/578709/original/file-20240228-26-6snxit.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/578709/original/file-20240228-26-6snxit.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/578709/original/file-20240228-26-6snxit.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/578709/original/file-20240228-26-6snxit.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/578709/original/file-20240228-26-6snxit.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/578709/original/file-20240228-26-6snxit.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/578709/original/file-20240228-26-6snxit.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Teens say reading books can boost their mood.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/teenage-girl-reading-book-outdoors-royalty-free-image/1223187399?phrase=teens+books&adppopup=true">Westend61 via Getty Images</a></span>
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<p>Some explicitly attested to the pleasure of reading. “It’s the happiest I’ll get,” one student stated about the time she spent with the books.</p>
<p>More frequently, students described how mental trips through books helped them reconsider their own worries compared with characters with much harder lives.</p>
<p>“You do get an appreciation for what you do have, and, like, for being thankful for the happiness and joy in your life,” one explained. “Some of those books, it’s crazy what’s in there.”</p>
<h2>5. Books helped students heal</h2>
<p>Some students reported that books helped them heal from depression and grief.</p>
<p>“When I was younger, I lost my best friend,” one student shared after reading about a character whose mother died. “It was really hard for me, but books like that really take me back and help me remember her but without getting really upset.” </p>
<p>Many pointed to good feelings they got from meaningful book conversations with peers. That is not surprising given the link between <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s10902-007-9083-0">positive social relationships and young people’s happiness</a>.</p>
<h2>6. They became better readers</h2>
<p>Some of the books were difficult for students to read, but they persisted even though they had to work harder to understand them. Other research has found that this persistence is <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/00220973.2010.481503">related to the interest</a> that students had in the subjects of the books.</p>
<p>Students reported rereading large chunks of books or even entire books to clear up confusion about storylines, and asking teachers and peers for help with problems such as unfamiliar vocabulary. Their scores on <a href="https://doi.org/10.1002/rrq.46">end-of-year reading tests improved</a>, whereas scores for other students remained flat. That is not surprising, since the students in our study <a href="https://doi.org/10.1002/rrq.404">read so much</a>. Also, they read mainly fiction, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1002/berj.3498">which is correlated with better reading skills</a> compared with other genres.</p>
<p>Students said they started visiting public libraries and bookstores. Declarations like “I’m a bookworm now” suggested they began viewing themselves as readers. They also reported larger changes. “I think I got smarter,” one student remarked. </p>
<p>The positive transformations reported by students we interviewed cannot be generalized, but experimentally controlled studies yield related findings. For instance, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.learninstruc.2019.101216">adolescents who read and talk to each other</a> about stories with social themes report greater motivation to read, greater use of reading strategies, such as rereading what they don’t understand, and insight into human nature than those who do not.</p>
<p>Our research left us reflecting on why we want young people to read in the first place. Do we want them to reap the social, emotional, moral and academic benefits that reading confers? If so, preserving their access to relevant books – even the “disturbing” ones – matters a lot.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/223533/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Gay Ivey does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Amid calls to ban certain books from libraries and schools, research shows that students benefit when they have the ability to choose which materials they want to read.Gay Ivey, Professor of Literacy, University of North Carolina – GreensboroLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2146272023-11-20T13:16:45Z2023-11-20T13:16:45ZBeing homeless means not being free − as Americans are supposed to be<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/559744/original/file-20231115-15-cxj832.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=31%2C7%2C5188%2C3467&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Portland, Maine, officials ordered that a park be cleared on Sept. 28, 2022, of people who were homeless and that any trash be removed before a visit by a candidate for governor. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/Election2022MaineGovernor/2c3b041710c14c9d92586aeb93531c25/photo?Query=(renditions.phototype:horizontal)%20AND%20%20(homeless%20eviction)%20&mediaType=photo&sortBy=arrivaldatetime:desc&dateRange=Anytime&totalCount=271&currentItemNo=27">AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Homelessness is a state of deprivation. Those who are homeless need shelter to be safe; they don’t have it. They need a toilet for basic bodily functions; they don’t have one. They need a shower to keep clean; they don’t have that, either. </p>
<p>Because such deprivation dramatically affects the well-being of people who are homeless, public discussion of homelessness tends to focus on whether and to what extent the government should carry out anti-homelessness policy as a <a href="https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/21528569/homeless-poverty-cash-transfer-canada-new-leaf-project">way of improving</a> <a href="https://denvergazette.com/homeless/annual-homeless-person-count-uncovers-the-misery-of-cold-colorado-streets/article_86d46dd6-a1c0-11ed-a89f-f71c071410fd.html">people’s overall</a> <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/colorado/news/denver-mayor-mike-johnston-provide-housekeeping-hygiene-homeless-encampments/">quality of life</a>.</p>
<p><a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/13698230.2022.2057025">Some philosophers</a> <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/us/universitypress/subjects/philosophy/political-philosophy/liberal-rights-collected-papers-19811991?">have argued that</a> <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/papa.12080">while homelessness</a> is clearly a state of deprivation, it is also a condition in which a person’s freedom is profoundly compromised.</p>
<p>These theorists insist a society that cherishes freedom – such as the U.S. – must implement anti-homelessness policy as a way of liberating people who lack housing. </p>
<p>Because the number of people experiencing homelessness continues to rise <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/homelessness-increasing-united-states-housing-costs-e1990ac7">at a record rate</a>, these academic ideas have become increasingly relevant to the real world. <a href="https://www.paulschofieldphilosophy.com/">I am a philosopher</a> interested in exploring the <a href="https://blog.apaonline.org/2022/04/18/the-necessity-of-guaranteed-housing/">moral dimensions of homelessness</a>, as well as shining a light on <a href="https://slate.com/human-interest/2023/08/homelessness-homeless-shelter-sex.html">underdiscussed</a> <a href="https://www.insidehighered.com/opinion/views/2023/11/01/affordable-housing-higher-ed-issue-opinion">aspects of it</a>. I believe that public debate would benefit greatly from increased attention to the ways homelessness limits Americans’ freedom.</p>
<h2>Freedom to be somewhere</h2>
<p>Since homelessness is usually discussed in terms of deprivation, the claim that homelessness has much to do with freedom can seem surprising. </p>
<p><a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/019924989X.003.0004">Freedom is commonly understood</a> as the ability to do what one chooses without being interfered with. My freedom is limited if you lock me in a cell or place a boulder on the street I want to drive down. </p>
<p>Homelessness, on the other hand, seems at first glance like a condition in which a person is mostly able to do as they choose, albeit without important resources that would make their life better. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/559746/original/file-20231115-21-v05q1e.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Police standing next to a chain-link fence around a park with tents in it." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/559746/original/file-20231115-21-v05q1e.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/559746/original/file-20231115-21-v05q1e.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/559746/original/file-20231115-21-v05q1e.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/559746/original/file-20231115-21-v05q1e.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/559746/original/file-20231115-21-v05q1e.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/559746/original/file-20231115-21-v05q1e.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/559746/original/file-20231115-21-v05q1e.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Los Angeles Police officers stand by a newly installed fence after moving on March 26, 2021, to evict residents of a large homeless encampment in Echo Park.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/LosAngelesHomeless/22b26f0e2cc44ca28abfc9b280438e5b/photo?Query=(renditions.phototype:horizontal)%20AND%20%20(homeless%20eviction)%20&mediaType=photo&sortBy=arrivaldatetime:desc&dateRange=Anytime&totalCount=271&currentItemNo=62">AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes</a></span>
</figcaption>
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<p>The <a href="https://its.law.nyu.edu/facultyprofiles/index.cfm?fuseaction=profile.overview&personid=26993">philosopher and legal theorist Jeremy Waldron</a> sees things differently. Waldron <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/9780521436175">says that</a> private property often serves to interfere with people’s choices. If a person wants to walk in New York City from midtown Manhattan to Harlem, others’ property interferes with their ability to choose the most direct route. If a person wants to see a particular Andy Warhol painting, the fact that it is <a href="https://www.artelier.com/post/the-15-most-interesting-private-art-collections-from-around-the-world">kept at a private residence</a> interferes with their ability to choose to view it.</p>
<p>In itself, this isn’t a problem, as no one should be free to go anywhere and do anything they want. The trouble, says Waldron, comes when a person who is homeless does not have private property that they are able to occupy, free from interference. In such instances, the person will be confined to public spaces, such as sidewalks and parks.</p>
<p>But public spaces themselves are highly regulated through local ordinances, limiting who may use them and for what purposes. </p>
<p>A person who is homeless and <a href="https://www.kmbc.com/article/new-law-makes-it-illegal-for-homeless-people-to-sleep-on-state-owned-land-in-missouri-kansas-city/42380842">sleeps on a public bench</a> will often be told by the police to move. Someone who <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2023/01/13/homelessness-us-more-tent-cities-banned/11024116002/">sets up a tent</a> on a sidewalk will usually have it confiscated. Someone who <a href="https://www.criminaldefenselawyer.com/resources/criminal-defense/sex-crimes/public-urination-law-penalty.htm">urinates or defecates</a> in a park can be arrested. </p>
<p>Now you can see why some think that homelessness compromises a person’s freedom. Sleeping and relieving oneself are necessary, life-sustaining tasks. </p>
<p>But as Waldron points out, “Everything that is done has to be done somewhere. No one is free to perform an action unless there is somewhere he is free to perform it.” </p>
<p>Given the way society protects private property and regulates public spaces, it seems that people who are homeless are left with no space at all in which they are free to do the things they need to do in order to live. This is about as severe an infringement on freedom as you can imagine, and Waldron’s point is that a society that loves freedom simply cannot tolerate it. </p>
<p>Anti-homelessness is not just about benevolence and generosity, then. It is about protecting liberty.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/559750/original/file-20231115-29-wb3b7b.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A dark-haired man sleeping in a red sleeping bag on a sidewalk." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/559750/original/file-20231115-29-wb3b7b.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/559750/original/file-20231115-29-wb3b7b.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/559750/original/file-20231115-29-wb3b7b.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/559750/original/file-20231115-29-wb3b7b.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/559750/original/file-20231115-29-wb3b7b.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/559750/original/file-20231115-29-wb3b7b.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/559750/original/file-20231115-29-wb3b7b.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">A homeless man sleeps on a sidewalk on June 6, 2023, in the Tenderloin district of San Francisco.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/homeless-man-sleeps-on-a-sidewalk-in-tenderloin-district-of-news-photo/1258552273?adppopup=true">Tayfun Coskun/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images</a></span>
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<h2>Freedom from others</h2>
<p>Of course, people who are homeless do sleep and relieve themselves. So, in what sense do they actually lack the freedom to do so? </p>
<p>The <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/papa.12080">political philosopher Christopher Essert</a> argues that Waldron’s analysis should be taken one step further by considering its implications for interpersonal relations.</p>
<p>Since a person who is homeless has nowhere to freely perform life-sustaining tasks, typically they will either seek permission from someone to use their property, use the property and hope to not be noticed or, at worst, seek forgiveness. Either way, they depend upon the grace of another in order to do the things they need to do.</p>
<p>This puts people who are homeless at the mercy of those who have property. </p>
<p>Whether a homeless person has a place to sleep or whether they are arrested for sleeping somewhere without permission is completely determined by the wishes of others. Keesha might sleep on Felix’s couch for a few nights. But as soon as Felix is in a bad mood, he can throw her out. Or Felix might make access to his couch conditional upon her attending church services, supporting his preferred political candidate or performing sexual acts. What she does and does not do is now up to Felix.</p>
<p>Essert connects this set of observations to what is called a <a href="https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/republicanism/">“republican” conception of freedom</a>. This way of understanding freedom is less about whether a person is actually interfered with and more about the way they are placed under the arbitrary power of another. </p>
<p>The intuitive idea is that if someone else always has the power to determine your choices, then you aren’t free. Since a homeless person is always on property over which someone else has authority, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/papa.12080">they are always</a>, writes Essert, “under the power of others, dependent on them, dominated by them, unfree.”</p>
<p>In the U.S. especially, arguments that appeal to freedom <a href="https://news.gallup.com/poll/159716/americans-consider-individual-freedoms-nation-top-virtue.aspx">are taken very seriously</a>. Even those who insist that it is not the government’s job to ensure everyone a good quality of life believe that it must ensure freedom. Even those whose ears close when they hear calls for charity and beneficence seem to pay attention when freedom is at stake. </p>
<p>By proposing this way of seeing the life of someone who is homeless, then, philosophers have raised the possibility that allowing homelessness to persist contradicts values that are, at heart, fundamentally American.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/214627/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Paul Schofield does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>To be homeless is a condition in which a person’s freedom is profoundly compromised. And that’s un-American, says a philosopher.Paul Schofield, Associate Professor of Philosophy, Bates CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2175562023-11-20T01:45:01Z2023-11-20T01:45:01ZThe rule of law is fundamental to a free society – so why don’t NZ courts always uphold it?<p>Ever since the 17th century, the <a href="https://www.justice.govt.nz/about/learn-about-the-justice-system/how-the-justice-system-works/the-basis-for-all-law/">rule of law</a> has been regarded as one of the fundamental values of a free society. It means you cannot be forced to do something unless there is a law requiring you to do it. </p>
<p>It also means people in power can coerce you only if there is a rule justifying it. This is the opposite of the “rule of persons”, in which the rulers have arbitrary power: they have the authority to force you to do things simply because they think those things should be done. </p>
<p>In free societies, the courts are the chief institution tasked with upholding the rule of law. It is their job to police government and other officials, to make sure they act only in accordance with the law. </p>
<p>But no one polices the courts. If they uphold the rule of law in their own decisions, that’s fine. But increasingly often, they don’t. And this raises important questions about how we want to be governed as a society.</p>
<h2>The role of judges</h2>
<p>Take, for example, the law of negligence. This is an area of law that allows one person to sue another for injuries that have been carelessly inflicted. To work, the law requires a test that will tell us when a person can sue. </p>
<p>The current approach reads like a set of rules, but basically comes down to <a href="http://www.nzlii.org/nz/cases/NZHC/2016/1945.html">two steps</a>: a judge needs to consider everything that relates to the relationship between the parties; and the judge then needs to consider everything else. </p>
<p>In the end, then, the “rule” is to consider everything. It is surely clear that this not really a rule. It is rather an open discretion pretending to be a rule. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/high-supreme-federal-family-county-what-do-all-our-different-courts-actually-do-193228">High, Supreme, Federal, Family, County – what do all our different courts actually do?</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Consider also the law of trusts. This is a difficult and technical area of the law, but we can describe what the New Zealand courts have permitted in simple terms.</p>
<p>Imagine you own some property that I am looking after. I then enter into a relationship. My partner helps me look after the property. Eventually, our relationship breaks down and she wants some reward for the work she has done. </p>
<p>She may well be entitled to reward from me, but the courts in this country have dealt with this problem by allowing partners to claim part ownership of the property (as happened in the case of <a href="http://www.nzlii.org/nz/cases/NZCA/2014/377.html">Murrell v Hamilton</a> in 2014, for example). </p>
<p>The problem is this violates fundamental principles of property law. You owned the house from the beginning. How, then, can what went on in my relationship mean my partner came to own what was your property? </p>
<h2>The ‘rule of persons’</h2>
<p>That this was possible saw one leading legal commentator <a href="https://ojs.victoria.ac.nz/vuwlr/article/view/4791">observe</a> that, “in effect theft was being sanctioned by the courts”. </p>
<p>Why has this happened? Because, although the rules of property law would not permit it, the judges think the outcome is fair. If this is not the “rule of persons”, what is? </p>
<p>There are other examples, but one more will suffice. Imagine I do something horrible to you. If it’s a crime, I can be punished by the criminal law. But the courts have also said that if you sue me, a court may impose a monetary punishment on me that will go to you (effectively a fine). </p>
<p>When will such punishment be justified? Some leading New Zealand judges, including the previous chief justice, have said this punishment is justified not on the basis of some rule, but when a judge finds my behaviour to be sufficiently outrageous. (See, for example, the cases of <a href="http://www.nzlii.org/cgi-bin/LawCite?cit=%5b2001%5d%203%20NZLR%20622?query=bottrill">Bottrill v A</a> from 2001 or <a href="http://www.nzlii.org/nz/cases/NZSC/2010/27.html">Couch v AG</a> from 2010). </p>
<p>In other words, the position is that I can be punished if a judge thinks I behaved badly enough. Could it be any clearer this is the rule of persons and not the rule of law? </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/white-collar-criminals-benefit-from-leniency-provisions-in-nz-law-why-the-disparity-with-other-kinds-of-crime-205283">White-collar criminals benefit from leniency provisions in NZ law – why the disparity with other kinds of crime?</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>Rule by experts</h2>
<p>The judges who advanced this view were outvoted by the other judges who presided in those cases. But it would be wrong to conclude all is well. As another <a href="http://www.nzlii.org/nz/cases/NZHC/2023/2258.html">recent case showed</a>, the idea remains attractive to judges.</p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/560278/original/file-20231120-15-kgp62v.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/560278/original/file-20231120-15-kgp62v.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=923&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/560278/original/file-20231120-15-kgp62v.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=923&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/560278/original/file-20231120-15-kgp62v.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=923&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/560278/original/file-20231120-15-kgp62v.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1160&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/560278/original/file-20231120-15-kgp62v.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1160&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/560278/original/file-20231120-15-kgp62v.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1160&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<p>Why does this matter? The rule of law has been under pressure for about a hundred years. As I explain in my recent book, <a href="https://www.e-elgar.com/shop/gbp/freedom-under-the-private-law-9781035314515.html">Freedom under the Private Law</a>, society has become increasingly technocratic during this period, and the experts who govern it often prefer to do what seems right to them, rather than follow established rules.</p>
<p>It may not be surprising, then, if judges have come to see themselves similarly. But if the rule of law in our courts goes, where does it leave us? We will be ruled, rather than ruling ourselves, and this fundamental pillar of our liberty will be gone.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/217556/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Allan Beever does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Court decisions based on a judge’s discretion rather than the letter of the law are increasingly common. But this risks undermining some basic liberties.Allan Beever, Professor of Law, Auckland University of TechnologyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2118112023-08-23T12:26:04Z2023-08-23T12:26:04ZHow a hip-hop mindset can help teachers in a time of turmoil<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/543937/original/file-20230822-19-fzf2o0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=30%2C20%2C6679%2C4426&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Confidence is a critical component of hip-hop culture.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/confident-black-woman-in-classroom-royalty-free-image/1298999131?phrase=high+school+teacher+black+woman&adppopup=true">Manu Vega via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>While hip-hop has created a lot of good memories, good music and good times, the culture has gifted society much more than just entertainment.</p>
<p>As a <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=7BZ3GM8AAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao">researcher who specializes in hip-hop culture</a>, I know that one of hip-hop’s greatest gifts is a <a href="https://www.tcpress.com/the-hip-hop-mindset-9780807768709#:">certain mindset that focuses on freedom of thought, flexibility and truth-telling</a>. It also includes <a href="https://doi.org/10.25148/CLJ.16.1.010605">creativity, authenticity, confidence, braggadocio, uninhibited voice and integrity</a> as those things relate to one’s community and culture.</p>
<p>In order for educators to overcome the challenges of what politicians are turning into an <a href="https://theconversation.com/politicians-seek-to-control-classroom-discussions-about-slavery-in-the-us-187057">increasingly restrictive teaching environment</a> – particularly with regard to <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-teachers-can-stay-true-to-history-without-breaking-new-laws-that-restrict-what-they-can-teach-about-racism-205452">matters of race and racism in American history</a> – I believe the hip-hop mindset has taken on a new sense of relevance in the educational arena.</p>
<p><a href="https://theconversation.com/bans-on-critical-race-theory-could-have-a-chilling-effect-on-how-educators-teach-about-racism-163236">Many educators feel uncertainty</a> over what they can and can’t say in the classroom. They also want to stay true to themselves. Here, I offer five ways that educators can adopt the hip-hop mindset to confront the challenges they face:</p>
<h2>1. Claim your space</h2>
<p>When Run-DMC <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BcCaycrPIa0">took the stage in the 1980s</a>, they often began their show with Run – one half of the pioneering rap duo – walking on stage and saying to an eager crowd: “We had a whole lot of superstars on this stage here tonight, but I want y'all to know one thing: This is my house. And when I say ‘Who’s house?’ I want y'all to say ‘Run’s house.’”</p>
<p>Through this <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-25377-6_2">call-and-response</a> routine, the group claimed every arena in which they performed. Whether you call it posturing, braggadocio or swag, hip-hop culture has long rewarded those who confidently took control of the spaces where they work.</p>
<p>Hip-hop’s longevity is due in large part to this boldness – artists standing firm and <a href="https://wordpress.clarku.edu/musc210-hhp/hip-hop-culture-politics-exploring-the-narrative-and-power-of-rap-lyrics/fuck-tha-police-n-w-a/">fighting back</a> <a href="https://www.villagevoice.com/when-christian-america-and-the-cops-went-insane-over-n-w-a-rap-and-metal/">even when they were under attack</a>.</p>
<p>Strong confidence gives artists the guts to be nonconformists, to tell the truth and to try something new – practices that I believe will benefit teachers in the midst of political efforts to control what they say.</p>
<h2>2. Form a squad or a crew</h2>
<p>From the early days to now, hip-hop artists have always formed
<a href="https://www.seoultherapy.co.uk/post/a-guide-to-k-hip-hop-crews#">squads or crews</a> to perform as emcees or dancers, who often battle to show who has the best lyrics or dance moves.</p>
<p>Early examples include the Rock Steady Crew and New York City Breakers, who famously squared off against one another in an <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Xu48tnr4qQ">iconic scene</a> from the 1984 hip-hop movie “Beat Street.”</p>
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<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/-Xu48tnr4qQ?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Breakdancing battle scene from the movie “Beat Street.”</span></figcaption>
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<p>Your squad isn’t just your personal friends – they are your colleagues and comrades in the struggle. They are your trusted village of truth tellers, possibility partners and strategic thinkers. Educators can lean on their squad to help strategize and stay sane. </p>
<p>A squad or crew need not be confined to just one school. Queen Latifah, Monie Love, A Tribe Called Quest and De La Soul – who were either solo acts or individual groups – were all part of an even larger artistic community called <a href="https://www.avclub.com/a-beginner-s-guide-to-hip-hop-collective-native-tongues-1798239179">Native Tongues</a>. </p>
<p>Just as hip-hop artists are often part of larger groups, educators can similarly build a larger community of support.</p>
<p>Partnering with local nonprofits and community organizations could prove important now more than ever. These organizations can host and facilitate learning experiences that might be prohibited in a classroom. Through these partnerships, students can get free, community-based programs that enable them to have freer discussions that might not be allowed within a public school in a state that restricts what educators can say.</p>
<h2>3. Remix</h2>
<p>One of the most popular strategies of creating hip-hop music is the remix – where a song’s producer will create a new version of a song, sometimes by borrowing or sampling beats from other songs, changing up the pace, or even introducing new lyrics that weren’t part of the original.</p>
<p>A classic example would be KRS-One’s 1988 song “Still #1.” Whereas the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hw_UMdFSSlo">original version</a> was laid back, the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5gZ6tLhUAHY&t=42s">“Numero Uno” remix</a> featured a sample of an upbeat Latin jazz song and even opened in Spanish.</p>
<p>Embracing the art of remixing might offer a viable way for educators to respond to efforts to censor what students can read in school or educators can teach in class.</p>
<p>For instance, in school districts or states where certain books or topics have been outlawed, educators can use <a href="https://www.cnet.com/culture/how-teenagers-can-borrow-banned-books-for-free-from-brooklyn-public-library/">Books Unbanned</a> – a program in which teens and young adults can access e-books using a national library card. Educators can create a free guide of resources for families that include information on similar programs.</p>
<p>A remix may also be helpful with school funding. Schools at all levels could <a href="https://www.yesmagazine.org/social-justice/2022/01/11/critical-race-theory-scholars-counter-funded-attacks">secure grant and foundational support</a>, which can provide the resources to fund community-based partnerships and the freedom to establish specialized initiatives.</p>
<h2>4. Go crate digging</h2>
<p><a href="https://medium.com/cuepoint/the-lost-art-of-cratedigging-4ed652643618">Crate digging</a> is a critical part of the remix. It is the process of sifting through old vinyl records, typically stored in old milk crates or cardboard boxes, to find a long-forgotten song to use in a remix.</p>
<p>Similarly, teachers can turn to the tactics and strategies employed by educators from different eras to see how they dealt with the educational exclusion and erasure of their day. After desegregation, for instance, a new struggle emerged in the 1960s and 1970s to make school lessons more <a href="https://doi.org/10.2307/2668212">culturally and racially inclusive</a>. </p>
<p>By examining the work of legendary educators like <a href="https://www.cnet.com/culture/how-teenagers-can-borrow-banned-books-for-free-from-brooklyn-public-library/">Septima Clark</a>, today’s teachers can uncover ideas and opportunities to re-imagine historical efforts like the <a href="https://snccdigital.org/people/septima-clark/">Citizenship Schools</a> initiative that Clark developed. These mobile schools – or <a href="https://snccdigital.org/people/septima-clark/">“rolling schools”</a> as they were called – took learning into community spaces. These schools paved the way for programs like the Freedom Schools that were later developed by the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, or SNCC, and are still in operation today by the <a href="https://www.childrensdefense.org/programs/cdf-freedom-schools/">Children’s Defense Fund</a>. Communities around the country partner with the Children’s Defense Fund to offer local Freedom Schools.</p>
<h2>5. Still keep it real</h2>
<p>As a teenage fan of hip-hop in the early 1990s, I remember the phrase “keep it real” – which is an expression of authenticity – as being <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2022/06/08/keeping-it-real-has-lost-its-true-meaning/">extremely popular</a>. At the time, it felt like intense pressure to keep it real and to represent your community. I now look back and appreciate that it actually wasn’t pressure, but rather permission to be authentic.</p>
<p>Educators don’t have to champion the new laws and policies that restrict what they can teach – they just have to follow them. But there’s no restriction against “keeping it real” and discussing the new laws and policies as a civics lesson.</p>
<p>So, when the lesson or class is about current events, students could examine various laws being enacted to restrict the teaching of Black history.</p>
<p>Educators may find themselves facing a growing number of challenges from state legislatures as they increasingly invade their classroom spaces and curtail the kind of content they can teach in class. I believe by adopting the hip-hop mindset, educators will be better prepared to do the kind of battle required to prevail on behalf of truth-telling, authenticity, creativity and all the other habits of mind that made hip-hop the defiant and resilient culture that it has become.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/211811/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Toby Jenkins does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The same boldness that enabled hip-hop to endure can benefit teachers in the classroom, a hip-hop scholar writes.Toby Jenkins, Professor of Higher Education, University of South CarolinaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2118822023-08-21T21:52:21Z2023-08-21T21:52:21ZRon DeSantis shows how ‘ugly freedoms’ are being used to fuel authoritarianism<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/543728/original/file-20230821-23-xfr6rf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C3000%2C1985&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Republican presidential candidate Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis delivers a speech in Iowa City, Iowa, on Aug. 10, 2023. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Geoff Stellfox/The Gazette via AP)</span></span></figcaption></figure><iframe style="width: 100%; height: 100px; border: none; position: relative; z-index: 1;" allowtransparency="" allow="clipboard-read; clipboard-write" src="https://narrations.ad-auris.com/widget/the-conversation-canada/ron-desantis-shows-how-ugly-freedoms-are-being-used-to-fuel-authoritarianism" width="100%" height="400"></iframe>
<p>At a time when conspiracy theories and far-right nationalist groups are gaining strength, it’s crucial to understand how authoritarians are using the rhetoric of freedom to undermine crucial notions of justice and liberty. </p>
<p>In the United States, under the banner of right-wing demagoguery, “freedom” is being touted as <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/banned-books-list-increased-schools-ban-critical-race-theory-sexuality-pen-america-report/">an excuse to ban books</a> by people of colour, Indigenous people and members of the LGBTQ community. </p>
<p>For example, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has signed into law the <a href="https://www.wptv.com/news/education/floridas-governor-to-sign-critical-race-theory-education-bill-into-law">Individual Freedom bill, which bans educators from teaching topics relating mostly to race</a>. </p>
<p>This regressive notion of freedom is used to advance a right-wing education agenda in the name of what DeSantis calls the “war on woke,” which is code for attacking educators and others who refuse to <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/made-by-history/2023/03/28/desantis-wokeism-racism-marginalized/">whitewash history and address a range of systemic injustices</a>.</p>
<p>In Canada, the “universal” concept of freedom has failed to include the inherent rights of Indigenous Peoples and has often served as a cloak for <a href="https://www.ubcic.bc.ca/canadafailingindigenouspeoples">maintaining illegitimate relations of power</a>.</p>
<p>In Canada as well as in the U.S., freedom has historically been shaped by what American historian <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/17/opinion/freedom-liberty-racial-hierarchies.html">Tyler Stovall has called “white freedom”</a> — the belief and practice “that freedom is central to white identity, and that only white people can or should be free.”</p>
<p>Freedom in this context has given Canada and the U.S. the right to dominate, colonize and exploit.</p>
<h2>‘Ugly’ freedoms</h2>
<p>The presence of what U.S. academic Elisabeth Anker calls <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2022/02/04/opinion/ugly-freedom-discrimination-racism-sexism.html">“ugly freedoms”</a> is not new. Its history is repeating itself with a politics that is as cruel as it is dangerous and widespread.</p>
<p>Central to this history has been a struggle over the meaning of freedom and which vision of freedom society should adopt. Those holding up the importance of freedom are no longer just advocates of social justice but also emerging authoritarians.</p>
<p>The appeal to these “ugly” freedoms is being used to legitimize and promote censorship, systemic racism and naked forms of political opportunism. Nowhere is this more apparent than in the state of Florida.</p>
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<img alt="A dark-haired man speaks at a podium with American flags behind him." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/543729/original/file-20230821-14265-g9dtmm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/543729/original/file-20230821-14265-g9dtmm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/543729/original/file-20230821-14265-g9dtmm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/543729/original/file-20230821-14265-g9dtmm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/543729/original/file-20230821-14265-g9dtmm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/543729/original/file-20230821-14265-g9dtmm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/543729/original/file-20230821-14265-g9dtmm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Ron DeSantis speaks during a news conference at the Celebrate Freedom Foundation Hangar in West Columbia, S.C., in July 2023.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Sean Rayford)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>DeSantis’s ‘freedom’ fixation</h2>
<p>DeSantis has hijacked the notion of freedom.</p>
<p>His political career is marked by an obsessive appropriation and relentless defence of freedoms that are false and illusory. <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/04/desantis-disney-lawsuit-free-speech-florida/673903/">He defines himself as “governor of the free state of Florida”</a> and fills his public appearances with self-congratulatory references to freedom.</p>
<p>As a member of U.S. Congress before he became governor, <a href="https://www.news-journalonline.com/story/news/politics/state/2023/05/23/ron-desantis-time-in-congress-represented-volusia-flagler/70169117007/">he was one of the founders of the far-right Freedom Caucus</a>. </p>
<p>He <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/alisondurkee/2023/02/27/heres-what-we-know-about-ron-desantis-book-as-it-hits-the-shelves/?sh=4fc52c012328">launched his presidential campaign with a tour promoting his book titled <em>Courage to Be Free</em></a>. In naming Florida as the freest state in the nation, DeSantis claims he is engaged in a movement for freedom.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1630730107957518338"}"></div></p>
<p>In doing so, <a href="https://spectrumnews1.com/oh/columbus/news/2023/04/13/summit-county-republicans-hear-florida-gov--ron-desantis-talk-successes-in-education--immigration--the-economy">he states repeatedly</a> that in Florida: “We’re No. 1 in economic freedom, No. 1 in education freedom, No. 1 for parental involvement in education … and we’re No. 1 for public higher education. So we lead in Florida, not merely with words.” </p>
<p>Ironically, DeSantis has become the sneering face <a href="https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2023/03/ron-desantis-war-on-freedom/">for the suppression of freedom</a> while proclaiming to be its foremost advocate. </p>
<h2>Authoritarian values</h2>
<p>Freedom for DeSantis is divorced from civic culture and isolated in the regressive discourse of authoritarian values, manufactured ignorance and nefarious power relations. </p>
<p>In the name of individual freedom, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/aug/16/florida-ron-desantis-academic-freedom">he bans books from classrooms and libraries. He also passes legislation forbidding teachers from teaching about slavery and racial injustice</a> while <a href="https://apnews.com/article/desantis-slavery-election-2024-1fb51d663e6051051aa23b71421b9479">defending his attacks</a> on diverse and inclusive forms of education with the spurious notion of <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2022/01/19/us/florida-education-critical-race-theory-bill/index.html">protecting young people from feeling uncomfortable</a>.</p>
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<p>Echoing the rise of past and emerging forms of authoritarianism, <a href="https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2023/05/us-education-state-school-laws.html">he bans teachers</a> from addressing Black history, critical ideas and issues related to gender, sexuality and systemic racism. </p>
<p>Amid the wave of repressive policies that make up <a href="https://www.msnbc.com/opinion/msnbc-opinion/new-poll-ron-desantis-anti-woke-backfire-rcna74350">DeSantis’s so-called anti-woke agenda</a>, his anti-democratic model of governance is in direct contradiction of his claim that Florida is the freest state in the union.</p>
<p>He has used state power to punish both his critics and individuals and groups he suggests are unworthy of citizenship. He has <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/apr/13/ron-desantis-transgender-education-laws-florida-woke-act">waged a vicious attack against the civil rights of women, gay, transgender and queer youth.</a> </p>
<p>He’s also signed <a href="https://jacobin.com/2022/07/ron-desantis-freedom-branding-rights-education-abortion">a six-week abortion ban</a>, restricted transgender bathroom access, banned gender-affirming care for minors, <a href="https://apnews.com/article/desantis-florida-lgbtq-education-health-c68a7e5fe5cf22ab8cca324b00644119">signed bills that target drag shows</a> and attacked businesses like Disney that disagree with his policies. </p>
<p>He’s also <a href="https://www.vox.com/policy/2023/6/2/23742508/ron-desantis-florida-higher-education-ideological-war">waged a vicious assault on public and higher education</a>, creating a culture that requires teachers to function as agents of state indoctrination.</p>
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<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/florida-republicans-row-with-mickey-mouse-highlights-widening-gap-between-historical-bffs-gop-and-corporate-america-182401">Florida Republicans' row with Mickey Mouse highlights widening gap between historical BFFs GOP and corporate America</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>Remembering what freedom really is</h2>
<p>What can be done to preserve freedom as a crucial element in the struggle for democracy in Florida and around the world? </p>
<p>Educators, parents, young people and other stakeholders need to rediscover freedom as an emancipatory force. This requires language that enables people to fight against the ideological and economic conditions that strip them of their liberties and rights.</p>
<p>It’s also essential for the public to develop strategies capable of organizing a mass multicultural struggle in support of a fundamentally democratic conception of freedom — one that enables people to reject “ugly” freedoms that reinforce the scourge of domination and prevents them from living meaningful and just lives.</p>
<p>Genuine freedom must be used in the fight for justice and equality. It should address staggering, ongoing levels of inequality in wealth and power, the poisonous legacy of systemic racism and an anti-intellectual culture that rejects reason.</p>
<p>The hijacking of freedom by far-right politicians like DeSantis not only raises crucial questions about whose freedom is at stake in a time of tyranny, but also how to fight for a version of freedom that is expansive and just. </p>
<p>True freedom furthers rather than destroys the promise of democracy. In an era of rising authoritarianism, a return to a concept of truly democratic freedom is urgently needed, as is collective resistance that makes it possible.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/211882/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Henry Giroux does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The hijacking of freedom by far-right politicians like Florida’s Ron DeSantis raises crucial questions about whose freedom is truly at stake in a time of tyranny.Henry Giroux, Chaired professor for Scholarship in the Public Interest in the Department of English and Cultural Studies, McMaster UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2110812023-08-08T13:41:05Z2023-08-08T13:41:05ZInternet shutdowns: here’s how governments do it<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/541286/original/file-20230804-17-3ju57z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">BigNazik/GettyImages</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Senegal’s government has shut down internet access in response to <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/africa/senegal-government-cuts-mobile-internet-access-amid-deadly-rioting-2023-06-04/">protests about the sentencing of opposition leader Ousmane Sonko</a>. This is a <a href="https://www.accessnow.org/campaign/keepiton/">tactic</a> governments are increasingly using during times of political contention, such as elections or social upheaval. The shutdowns can be partial or total, temporary or prolonged. They may target specific platforms, regions, or an entire country.</p>
<p>I’m a researcher who investigates the <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11558-022-09483-z">causes</a> and <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/00223433231168190">consequences</a> of internet access disruptions and censorship in various African countries. This includes understanding how shutdowns work. </p>
<p>It’s important to understand the complex technicalities behind internet shutdowns, for at least two reasons. </p>
<p>First, understanding how an internet shutdown works shows whether or how it can be circumvented. This makes it possible to support affected communities. </p>
<p>Second, the way a shutdown works shows who is responsible for doing it. Then the responsible actors can be held to account, both legally and ethically. </p>
<p>Different forms of shutdowns require different levels of technical sophistication. More sophisticated forms are harder to detect and attribute. </p>
<p>There are two common strategies governments use to disrupt internet access: <a href="https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/6678649">routing disruptions and packet filtering</a>.</p>
<h2>How to shut down the internet</h2>
<p><strong>Routing disruptions</strong></p>
<p>Every device connected to the internet, whether it’s your computer, smartphone, or any other device, has an IP (internet protocol) address assigned to it. This allows it to send and receive data across the network. </p>
<p>An autonomous system is a collection of connected IP networks under the control of a single entity, for instance an internet service provider or big company. </p>
<p>These autonomous systems rely on protocols – called border gateway protocols – to coordinate routing between them. Each system uses the protocol to communicate with other systems and exchange information about which internet routes they can use to reach different destinations (websites, servers, services etc). </p>
<p>So, if an autonomous system, like an internet service provider, suddenly withdraws its border gateway protocol routes from the internet, the block of IP addresses they administer disappears from the routing tables. This means they can no longer be reached by other autonomous systems. </p>
<p>As a consequence, customers using IP addresses from that autonomous system can’t connect to the internet.</p>
<p>Essentially this tactic stops information from being transmitted. Information can’t find its destination, and people using the internet will not be able to connect. </p>
<p>The disruption of border gateway protocols can easily be detected from the outside due to changes in the global routing state. They can also be attributed to the internet service provider administering a certain autonomous system. </p>
<p>For instance, data suggests that the infamous <a href="https://policycommons.net/artifacts/1302785/egyptian-government-attacks-egypts-internet/1906077/">internet shutdown in Egypt in 2011</a> – an unprecedented blackout of internet traffic in the entire country – was the result of tampering with border gateway protocols. It could be <a href="https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/6678649">traced back to individual autonomous systems</a> and hence internet service providers. </p>
<p>Border gateway protocol disruptions that entirely disconnect customers from the internet are rare. These disruptions can easily be detected by outside observers and traced back to individual organisations or service providers. In addition, shutting down entire networks is the most indiscriminate form of an internet shutdown and can <a href="https://freemyinternet.info/3_about_internet_shutdowns">cause significant collateral damage</a> to a country’s economy.</p>
<p><strong>Packet filtering</strong></p>
<p>To target specific content, governments often use packet filtering – shutting down only parts of the internet. </p>
<p>Governments can use packet filtering techniques to block or disrupt specific content or services. For instance, internet service providers can block access to specific IP addresses associated with websites or services they wish to restrict, such as 15.197.206.217 associated with the social media platform WhatsApp. </p>
<p>Governments also increasingly use <a href="https://democracyinafrica.org/a-new-anti-democratic-tool-the-deep-packet-inspection-technique/">deep packet inspection</a> technology as a tool to filter and block specific content. It’s commonly used for surveillance. Deep packet inspection infrastructure enables the inspection of data packets and hence the content of communication. It’s a more tailored approach to blocking content and makes circumvention more difficult. </p>
<p>In <a href="https://ooni.org/post/2023-senegal-social-media-blocks/">Senegal</a>, internet service providers likely used deep packet inspection to block access to WhatsApp, Telegram, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and YouTube. </p>
<p>When internet shutdowns are done through packet filtering, only individuals within the affected network are able to detect the shutdown. Therefore, <a href="https://ensa.fi/active-probing/">active probing</a> is required to detect the shutdown. This is a technique that’s used by cybersecurity researchers and civil society actors to study the extent and methods of internet censorship in different regions.</p>
<h2>Violation of rights</h2>
<p>Though the two most common strategies are <a href="https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/6678649">routing disruptions and packet filtering</a>, there are many other tools governments can use. For instance, <a href="https://www.ncr-iran.org/en/news/iran-protests/iran-is-moving-towards-a-complete-internet-shutdown-one-bite-at-a-time/">domain name system manipulation</a>, <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/political-science-research-and-methods/article/hot-topics-denialofservice-attacks-on-news-websites-in-autocracies/A50BD0533D1132765F64C2700E5822FC">denial of service attacks</a>, or the blunt sabotage of physical infrastructure. A <a href="https://www.accessnow.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/A-taxonomy-of-internet-shutdowns-the-technologies-behind-network-interference.pdf">detailed overview</a> of techniques is provided by Access Now, an NGO defending digital civil rights of people around the world.</p>
<p>There is wide agreement that internet shutdowns are a violation of fundamental rights such as freedom of expression. However, governments are developing increasingly sophisticated means to block or restrict access to the internet. It’s therefore important to closely monitor the ways in which internet shutdowns are being implemented. This will help to provide circumvention strategies and hold the implementers to account.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/211081/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Lisa Garbe does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>There are different tactics that governments can use to block the internet, some more sophisticated than others.Lisa Garbe, Research Fellow, WZB Berlin Social Science Center.Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2036092023-05-09T15:28:22Z2023-05-09T15:28:22ZFrench universalism sidelines ethnic minorities – why that must change<p>French MP Olivier Serva has urged his government to tackle discrimination against people with afro hair. In <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/apr/28/france-urged-to-outlaw-hair-discrimination">a recent interview</a> on the national radio station France Info, he reportedly introduced plans to present a cross-party bill to parliament by appealing to the republic’s values of “liberty, equality, fraternity”. </p>
<p>He said:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>This is about allowing everyone to be as they are and as they want to be, whether in it’s in the workplace or anywhere else. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Diversity in the public sphere is not something <a href="https://researchportal.northumbria.ac.uk/en/publications/pluralism-and-the-idea-of-the-republic-in-france">French republicanism</a>, as it is currently defined, does very well. As opposed to the American and British approach to immigration that <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13691831003764367">has tended to promote multiculturalism</a>, Republican France espouses an “<a href="https://www.cairn.info/revue-francaise-de-sociologie-1-2008-5-page-3.htm">assimilationist</a>” model. </p>
<p>There is broad political consensus, from the left to the far right, that what matters is to integrate minorities, culturally, into the national community. People are free to entertain personal allegiances, as individuals, as long as they integrate into the national community and respect its rules. </p>
<p>Every French citizen must fit, either voluntarily or under duress, into the framework of “<a href="https://theconversation.com/crimes-of-solidarity-liberte-egalite-and-frances-crisis-of-fraternite-90010">republican values</a>”. Ostensibly, these values are enshrined in the constitution as freedom, fraternity and equality, as well as <a href="https://theconversation.com/frances-la-cite-why-the-rest-of-the-world-struggles-to-understand-it-149943"><em>laïcité</em></a> (secularism). But they are actually ill-defined.</p>
<p>This universalism is intended to settle any class, gender or race-related inequalities. France sees itself as an exception in the world, on a mission to defend universal values. Anglo-Saxon societies, by contrast, are often branded, by French <a href="https://www.institutmontaigne.org/expressions/la-spectaculaire-derive-de-nos-societes-democratiques">political thinkers</a> and <a href="https://www.lefigaro.fr/vox/monde/etats-unis-la-fragmentation-culturelle-est-la-plus-grande-menace-qui-pese-sur-la-democratie-20210111">pundits</a> alike, as “fragmented” along religious and ethnic divisions. </p>
<p>However, proclaiming that the state upholds universal principles does not, in itself, act as a safeguard against institutional discrimination and racism. Instead, it leads to the issue being intentionally overlooked. France <a href="https://repository.uclawsf.edu/hastings_international_comparative_law_review/vol31/iss2/7/">does not collect</a> data on race. It has never critically reflected on its colonial past. And <a href="https://gjia.georgetown.edu/2021/04/01/race-a-never-ending-taboo-in-france/">it sees no problem</a> in having a <a href="https://www.lse.ac.uk/media@lse/research/EMTEL/Minorities/papers/franceminorepres.pdf">disproportionately low representation</a> of ethnic minorities in the media, politics, <a href="https://theconversation.com/quand-le-racisme-est-devenu-une-question-politique-dans-le-cinema-francais-155189">culture</a> or business.</p>
<h2>Republican values</h2>
<p>French republicanism seeks to promote a specific, yet diffuse national culture. <a href="https://www.cairn.info/racismes-de-france--9782348046247-page-339.htm">I call it</a> <em>catho-laïque</em>, a blend of catholic, Christian values and militant atheism. It is a type of partisan patriotism based on an authoritarian communitarianism.</p>
<p>While purporting to defend universal values, <a href="https://link.springer.com/book/10.1057/9780230590960">classic republicans</a> are in fact defending the interests of a predominantly male, bourgeois and white population. They do not want to share political and economic power with women, young people and <a href="https://www.lemonde.fr/en/france/article/2023/02/15/91-of-black-people-in-metropolitan-france-say-they-are-victims-of-racist-discrimination_6015940_7.html">racialised minorities</a>.</p>
<p>In his 1988 study, Le Creuset Français (The French Melting Pot), French historian Gérard Noiriel showed how <a href="https://theconversation.com/macaronis-ritals-quand-les-migrants-italiens-etaient-eux-aussi-victimes-de-racisme-196990">Italian</a> and <a href="https://theconversation.com/la-france-est-elle-vraiment-un-pays-assimilationniste-51145">Polish</a> immigrants during the interwar period were made to integrate in a rather brutal manner. French workers saw their Italian counterparts as competitors and “scabs”; the public in general labelled them “dirty” and “dangerous enemies of the Republic”. The fact that Polish workers were openly demonstrative of their Catholic faith only made things worse, particularly in the mining areas of north-east France.</p>
<p>In 1974, Valéry Giscard d'Estaing’s centre-right government closed the nation’s borders and suspended all immigration, in an effort to protect French workers. An exception was made for family-based immigration, also known as <a href="https://www.cairn.info/revue-annales-de-demographie-historique-2014-2-page-187.htm"><em>le regroupement familial</em></a> (family reunion). This particularly affected people in former French colonies – Algeria, Tunisia and Morocco – in north Africa.</p>
<p>Nearly two decades later, in 1993, Jacques Chirac’s government voted in the “<a href="https://www.histoire-immigration.fr/les-50-ans-de-la-revue-hommes-migrations/1993-reforme-du-code-de-la-nationalite">Pasqua law</a>” on immigration. Until then, children born on French soil to foreign parents were automatically granted French citizenship. The new law now required them to apply. </p>
<p>New laws governing public life began to appear, from the late 1980s, which were rooted in partisan patriotism. In 1989, three Muslim schoolgirls refused to take off their headscarves at their college in Creil, near Paris, and <a href="https://www.lefigaro.fr/actualite-france/2018/07/27/01016-20180727ARTFIG00053-l-affaire-des-foulards-de-creil-la-republique-laique-face-au-voile-islamique.php">were sent home</a>. Subsequently, politicians from the left and the right passed a law in 2004 banning the wearing of religious symbols in schools. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.bloomsburycollections.com/book/after-charlie-hebdo-terror-racism-and-free-speech/ch2-the-meaning-of-charlie-the-debate-on-the-troubled-french-identity">I have argued</a> that, in the context of the 2015 terrorist attacks against Charlie Hebdo, the slogan “Je Suis Charlie” initially expressed solidarity with the victims of the attacks. However, it was quickly co-opted by the government as an injunction to support Charlie Hebdo’s cartoons and humour. </p>
<h2>Multicultural republicanism</h2>
<p>The concept of French citizenship could be expanded to include reference to ethnic or cultural backgrounds. It should be possible to present yourself as Franco-Algerian, Franco-Italian, Franco-Senegalese or Franco-Guadeloupean without being suspected of conspiring against republican universalism. </p>
<p>Similarly, in schools, the priority should be that pupils attend classes and receive an education. <a href="https://theconversation.com/de-la-mauvaise-defense-de-l-islamophobie-125780">Religious symbols</a> that do not hamper the curriculum being taught should be tolerated in school. Educational materials in history or philosophy, say, should recognise the existence of minority identities. The <a href="https://www.education.gouv.fr/bo/2004/21/MENG0401138C.htm#:%7E:text=141%2D5%2D1%20du%20code,une%20appartenance%20religieuse%20est%20interdit%E2%80%9D.">2004 law banning religious signs in schools</a> should be abolished on the grounds that it is teaching that emancipates, not the forced removal of a religious symbol or the expulsion of a student who does not want to comply.</p>
<p>A multicultural republic would guarantee, in practice, that everyone, including people from ethnic minorities, has access to management positions in business, in public services, in universities or in politics. A policy that actively promotes minorities in these areas would enable minorities to acquire the social visibility which they still so often lack.</p>
<p>In its fight for equality, however, France should not fall in the trap of identity politics. The glorified and exclusive defence of an identity, which would be more important than alliances between classes, genders and races, would prove classic republicans right. A multicultural republic should not despise universal rights. On the contrary, it should fight for all to have access to them.</p>
<p>What is at stake here is not the recognition of minorities or the withdrawal into stigmatised or invisible identities. Even if well intended, this approach would only serve to further exclude minorities from the nation.</p>
<p>Instead, it is a question of making the presence of diversity in the public sphere the norm. This would be the sign that the French Republic is no longer a “white”, but a universal community; one that is aware of its racial prejudices. Only then will minorities become full citizens.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/203609/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Philippe Marlière does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Saying the state upholds universal principles does not act as a safeguard against institutional discrimination and racism.Philippe Marlière, Professor in French and European Politics, UCLLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2024482023-04-03T13:57:39Z2023-04-03T13:57:39ZTanzania-South Africa: deep ties evoke Africa’s sacrifices for freedom<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/517946/original/file-20230328-16-hrrcio.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">South African president Cyril Ramaphosa, left, hosts his Tanzanian counterpart during a state visit in March 2023.
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">GCIS/Flickr</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Tanzania’s President Samia Suluhu Hassan recently paid a <a href="https://www.thepresidency.gov.za/speeches/opening-remarks-president-cyril-ramaphosa-during-official-talks-state-visit-tanzanian-president-samia-suluhu-hassan%2C-union-buildings%2C-tshwane">state visit to South Africa</a> aimed at strengthening bilateral political and trade relations. As the South African presidency <a href="https://www.thepresidency.gov.za/press-statements/president-host-her-excellency-president-hassan-tanzania-state-visit">noted</a>, ties between the two nations date back to Tanzania’s solidarity with the anti-apartheid struggle. </p>
<p>This history is an important reminder of the anti-colonial and pan-African bonds underpinning international solidarity with southern African liberation struggles. It’s also a reminder of the sacrifices many African countries made to realise continental freedom.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.britannica.com/place/Tanganyika">Tanganyika</a>, as Tanzania was known before independence in 1961, was the first safe post for South Africans fleeing in the aftermath of the <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/sharpeville-massacre-21-march-1960">Sharpeville massacre</a> on 21 March 1960, when apartheid police shot dead 69 peaceful protesters. The apartheid regime <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/origins-formation-sharpeville-and-banning-1959-1960">banned liberation movements</a> shortly thereafter. </p>
<p>Among those who left South Africa to rally international support for the liberation struggle were then African National Congress deputy president <a href="https://theconversation.com/south-africas-anc-is-celebrating-the-year-of-or-tambo-who-was-he-85838">Oliver Reginald Tambo</a>, Communist Party and Indian Congress leader <a href="https://overcomingapartheid.msu.edu/people.php?kid=163-574-661">Yusuf Mohammed Dadoo</a>, and the Pan Africanist Congress’s <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/people/nelson-nana-mahomo">Nana Mahomo</a> and <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/people/peter-hlaole-molotsi">Peter Molotsi</a>.</p>
<p>Not many people will know that on 26 June 1959 <a href="https://oxfordre.com/africanhistory/display/10.1093/acrefore/9780190277734.001.0001/acrefore-9780190277734-e-128;jsessionid=5715EBDE3CC6DEEF837F2753FC3A4D39">Julius Nyerere</a>, the future president of Tanzania, was among the speakers at a meeting in London where the first boycott of South African goods in Britain was launched. Out of this campaign, the <a href="https://www.aamarchives.org/">British Anti-Apartheid Movement</a> was born a year later. It spearheaded the international solidarity movement in western countries over the next three decades.</p>
<h2>Liberation struggle bonds</h2>
<p>Tanzania’s support for South Africa’s liberation struggle needs to be understood as part of its broader opposition to colonialism, and commitment to the achievement of independence in the entire African continent. In 1958, Nyerere <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/international-organization/article/abs/panafrican-freedom-movement-of-east-and-central-africa-pafmeca/A08CAFDC63C736384E47D52AA94191E2">helped establish</a> the Pan African Freedom Movement of Eastern and Central Africa to coordinate activities in this regard. This was extended to the Pan African Freedom Movement of Eastern and Central and Southern Africa at a conference in Addis Ababa in 1962. Nelson Mandela <a href="https://www.blackpast.org/global-african-history/1962-nelson-mandela-address-conference-pan-african-freedom-movement-east-and-central-africa/">addressed the conference</a> with the aim of arranging support for the armed struggle in South Africa. These efforts eventually led to the creation of the <a href="https://www.africanunion-un.org/history">Organisation for African Unity (OAU) in 1963</a>.</p>
<p>In February 1961, James Hadebe for the ANC and Gaur Radebe for the PAC opened an office in Dar es Salaam representing the <a href="https://www.marxists.org/history/international/comintern/sections/sacp/1962/pac.html">South African United Front</a>. It was the first external structure set up by the two liberation movements. Their unity was short-lived. But, Dar es Salaam, Tanzania’s capital, grew into a centre of anti-colonial activity after independence from Britain in December 1961. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A man with a serious look on his face rests his chin on his left shoulder. His watch shows." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/518130/original/file-20230329-20-z2y2c4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/518130/original/file-20230329-20-z2y2c4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/518130/original/file-20230329-20-z2y2c4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/518130/original/file-20230329-20-z2y2c4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/518130/original/file-20230329-20-z2y2c4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=499&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/518130/original/file-20230329-20-z2y2c4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=499&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/518130/original/file-20230329-20-z2y2c4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=499&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The late Julius Nyerere was a staunch supporter of the movement for Africa’s independence.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">William F. Campbell/Getty Images)</span></span>
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<p>At independence, Tanzania faced a shortage of nurses as British nurses left in droves rather than work for an African government. On President Nyerere’s request, Tambo arranged the underground recruitment of 20 South African nurses (“the 20 Nightingales”) to <a href="https://www.jamboafrica.online/clarence-kwinana-the-untold-story-of-the-20-nightingales-a-contribution-never-to-be-forgotten/">work in Tanzanian hospitals</a>. The remains of one of them, Kholeka Tunyiswa, who died on 5 March 2023 in Dar es Salaam, were repatriated to South Africa for reburial in <a href="https://www.citizen.co.za/news/remains-sa-nurse-tunyiswa-repatriated/">her home city of Gqeberha</a>, Eastern Cape.</p>
<p>In the early 1960s, Tanzania was the southernmost independent African country from which armed operations could be carried out into unliberated territories in southern Africa. Its capital was chosen as the operational base of the <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/41394216">OAU’s Liberation Committee</a>. The committee provided financial and material assistance to liberation movements. Its archives remain in Tanzania. </p>
<p>In 1963, the ANC officially established its Tanzania mission, with headquarters in Dar es Salaam. A military camp for guerrillas of its armed wing, <a href="https://oxfordre.com/africanhistory/display/10.1093/acrefore/9780190277734.001.0001/acrefore-9780190277734-e-1098?rskey=uSBACj&result=1">uMkhonto we Sizwe (MK)</a>
, who had returned from training in other African and socialist countries, was opened in Kongwa. The Tanzanian government donated the land. </p>
<p>Also stationed there were the armies of other southern African liberation movements – <a href="https://www.saha.org.za/collections/the_mafela_trust_collection_7.htm">ZAPU</a>, <a href="https://www.aluka.org/struggles/partner/XSTFRELIMO">Frelimo</a>, <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/41502445">SWAPO</a> and the <a href="https://www.tchiweka.org/">MPLA</a>.</p>
<p>In 1964, the PAC also moved its external headquarters to Dar es Salaam after it was pushed out of Lesotho. It <a href="http://www.scielo.org.za/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0018-229X2015000200002">established military camps</a> near Mbeya and later in Mgagao, and a settlement in Ruvu. Both the PAC and the ANC held important conferences in Tanzania, in Moshi in 1967 and in Morogoro in 1969, respectively. These led to internal reorganisation and new <a href="https://www.marxists.org/subject/africa/anc/1969/strategy-tactics.htm">strategic positions</a>.</p>
<h2>Hitches in the relationship</h2>
<p>In spite of Tanzania’s support for the liberation movements, their relationship was not without its contradictions or moments of ambivalence. </p>
<p>In 1965, for example, the ANC had to move its headquarters from Dar es Salaam to Morogoro, a small upcountry town far from international connections. The Tanzanian government had decided that only four members of each liberation movement would be allowed to maintain an office in the capital. This reflected Tanzania’s anxiety over the growing numbers of revolutionaries and trained guerrillas it hosted. </p>
<p>In 1969 Tanzania, Zambia and 12 other African countries issued the <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/45312264">Lusaka manifesto</a>, which was also adopted by the OAU. It expressed preference for a peaceful solution to the conflict in South Africa over armed struggle. There were also rumours of ANC involvement in an <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1970/07/13/archives/tanzanian-treason-trial-entering-third-week.html">attempted coup against Nyerere</a>. In this climate, the ANC had to evacuate its entire army to the Soviet Union. Its soldiers were allowed back in the country a couple of years later.</p>
<h2>Lived spaces of solidarity</h2>
<p>In the 1970s, ANC headquarters moved to Lusaka, in Zambia, and uMkhonto we Sizwe operations <a href="https://oxfordre.com/africanhistory/display/10.1093/acrefore/9780190277734.001.0001/acrefore-9780190277734-e-1098?rskey=uSBACj&result=1">moved</a> to newly independent Angola and Mozambique. But Tanzania remained a significant place of settlement for South African exiles. </p>
<p>In the late 1970s and 1980s, additional land donations from the Tanzanian government enabled the ANC to open a school and a vocational centre near Morogoro. The Solomon Mahlangu Freedom College in Mazimbu and the Dakawa Development Centre were set up <a href="https://www.hsrcpress.ac.za/books/education-in-exile">to address the outflow of young people</a> from South Africa following the <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/june-16-soweto-youth-uprising">June 1976 Soweto uprising</a>. Its other aim was to counter the effects of <a href="https://overcomingapartheid.msu.edu/sidebar.php?kid=163-581-2">Bantu education</a>, a segregated and inferior education system for black South Africans. </p>
<p>These became unique spaces of lived solidarity between the ANC and its international supporters. They accommodated up to 5,000 South Africans. Some of them died before they could see a liberated South Africa. Their graves are in Mazimbu. Besides educational facilities, the camps included an hospital, a productive farm, workshops and factories. They were all developed with donor funding.</p>
<p>Tanzanians, too, contributed to these projects through their labour. Many Tanzanian women became entangled in South Africa’s liberation struggle through intimate relationships, <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/03057070.2014.886476">marriage and children</a>. Thanks to these everyday social interactions, Tanzania became “home” for many South African exiles. The ANC handed over the facilities at Somafco and Dakawa <a href="https://www.conas.sua.ac.tz/historical-sites">to the Tanzanian government</a> on the eve of the first democratic elections in 1994. But these personal and affective connections live on.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/202448/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Arianna Lissoni does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Ties between the two nations date back to Tanzania’s solidarity with the anti-apartheid struggle.Arianna Lissoni, Researcher at History Workshop, University of the WitwatersrandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2010742023-03-30T12:26:18Z2023-03-30T12:26:18ZThis course uses science fiction to understand politics<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/517151/original/file-20230323-14-w936wx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C21%2C3594%2C2667&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Science fiction offers a glimpse of what governments of the world are – and can become.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/abstract-technology-eye-royalty-free-image/178077889?adppopup=true">agsandrew via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="Text saying: Uncommon Courses, from The Conversation" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/499014/original/file-20221205-17-kcwec8.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/499014/original/file-20221205-17-kcwec8.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=375&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/499014/original/file-20221205-17-kcwec8.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=375&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/499014/original/file-20221205-17-kcwec8.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=375&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/499014/original/file-20221205-17-kcwec8.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=471&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/499014/original/file-20221205-17-kcwec8.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=471&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/499014/original/file-20221205-17-kcwec8.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=471&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/topics/uncommon-courses-130908">Uncommon Courses</a> is an occasional series from The Conversation U.S. highlighting unconventional approaches to teaching.</em> </p>
<h2>Title of course:</h2>
<p>“Politics and Science Fiction”</p>
<h2>What prompted the idea for the course?</h2>
<p>While watching “<a href="https://disneyplusoriginals.disney.com/show/andor">Andor</a>” – a science fiction TV series that is part of the “Star Wars” galaxy of films, books and TV shows – I realized that what fascinates me most about science fiction is the political aspect, especially regarding power. </p>
<p>I decided to create an upper-level political science course that explores politics and government through the lens of science fiction, with a focus on literature. </p>
<h2>What does the course explore?</h2>
<p>We explore issues of racism, gender, anarchy and the end of civilization. I chose books that encourage students to focus on the political aspects of each work. At the beginning of the course, I ask students how closely they connect science fiction and politics. At the end of the course, students have the opportunity to revisit and revise their response to that question. By that point, students have participated in discussions, written papers and completed short assignments that ask them to explore and articulate political themes in each book.</p>
<p>I find that students in this course begin to take science fiction more seriously as a political genre, and those who come into the class as new readers of science fiction learn to appreciate its many subgenres and perspectives.</p>
<h2>Why is this course relevant now?</h2>
<p>As numerous state legislatures seek to restrict what can be taught regarding many issues, <a href="https://theconversation.com/advanced-placement-courses-could-clash-with-laws-that-target-critical-race-theory-186018">including race</a>, it’s important to understand the power structures behind racism. Science fiction is an ideal way to explore issues of power and oppression. </p>
<p>Derrick Bell, the author of “<a href="https://www.basicbooks.com/titles/derrick-bell/faces-at-the-bottom-of-the-well/9781541645530/">The Space Traders</a>,” is one of the originators of <a href="https://theconversation.com/critical-race-theory-what-it-is-and-what-it-isnt-162752">critical race theory</a>, which holds that racism has been codified in American law and society. Bell’s story blends science fiction and politics to illustrate how politicians could use the Constitution and the law to extend racist policies to an extreme degree, all for the benefit of white Americans. </p>
<h2>What’s a critical lesson from the course?</h2>
<p>In one of the writing assignments I ask students to compare the political themes of Ursula K. Le Guin’s “<a href="https://www.harpercollins.com/products/the-dispossessed-ursula-k-le-guin?variant=40991763988514">The Dispossessed</a>” – including utopia, anarchy, gender and power – to another work of science fiction that they enjoy. The goal is to help them make connections to political perspectives in other science fiction works and to get them to reexamine a piece of science fiction they’re already familiar with. </p>
<p>This semester, students made comparisons to political themes in multiple science fiction formats and subgenres including “Star Wars,” “<a href="https://www.hbo.com/the-last-of-us">The Last of Us</a>” and “<a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1392170/">The Hunger Games</a>.”</p>
<h2>What materials does the course feature?</h2>
<ul>
<li><p>Ursula K. Le Guin’s “<a href="https://www.harpercollins.com/products/the-dispossessed-ursula-k-le-guin?variant=40991763988514">The Dispossessed</a>,” a novel that closely examines anarchy, utopia and gender relations.</p></li>
<li><p>Stanislaw Lem’s “<a href="https://www.harpercollins.com/products/the-futurological-congress-stanislaw-lem?variant=40968643313698">The Futurological Congress</a>,” a novel about a future in which the government uses hallucinogenic drugs to create the illusion of utopia.</p></li>
<li><p>Naomi Alderman’s “<a href="https://www.littlebrown.com/titles/naomi-alderman/the-power/9780316547659/">The Power</a>,” a novel that imagines a world in which women gain physical and political power.</p></li>
</ul>
<h2>What will the course prepare students to do?</h2>
<p>This course is designed to expose students to themes in science fiction that will expand their understanding of politics and power. I ask students to explore and articulate the explicitly political aspects of science fiction. My goal is for students to leave the class with a new perspective on politics and government that will make politics more interesting to them and inform how they engage with works of science fiction, whether as books, movies or some other format.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/201074/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Nicole Pankiewicz does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Science fiction does more than entertain – it can also be used to better understand the political forces that shape the societies in which we live.Nicole Pankiewicz, Assistant Professor of Political Science, College of Coastal GeorgiaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2019982023-03-18T16:01:27Z2023-03-18T16:01:27Z20 years on, George W. Bush’s promise of democracy in Iraq and Middle East falls short<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/516090/original/file-20230317-1658-o8gjxt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">An Iraqi person walks down a road blocked by burning tires in Basra in August 2002. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://media.gettyimages.com/id/1242803428/photo/topshot-iraq-politics-sadr-demo.jpg?s=1024x1024&w=gi&k=20&c=S4tOIc6I7PC-scxNWjeb_aZUVwt5U2jKeyr1k5lyhzo=">Hussein Faleh/AFP via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>President George W. Bush and his administration put forward a variety of reasons to justify <a href="https://www.britannica.com/event/Iraq-War">the 2003 invasion of Iraq</a>.</p>
<p>In the months before the U.S. invasion, <a href="https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/iraq-justifying-war">Bush said the looming conflict</a> was about eradicating terrorism and <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2019/03/22/iraq-war-wmds-an-intelligence-failure-or-white-house-spin/">seizing weapons of mass destruction</a> – but also because of a “<a href="https://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/news/releases/2003/11/20031106-2.html">freedom deficit</a>” in the Middle East, a reference to the perceived lag in participatory government in the region.</p>
<p>Many of these arguments would emerge as poorly grounded, given later events. </p>
<p>In 2004, then Secretary of State Colin Powell reflected on the weak rationale behind the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/17/world/powell-says-cia-was-misled-about-weapons.html">main arguments for the invasion</a>: that there were weapons of mass destruction. He acknowledged that “it turned out that the sourcing was inaccurate and wrong and in some cases deliberately misleading.” </p>
<p>In fact <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna7634313">Iraq did not have a stockpile of weapons of mass destruction</a>, as Powell and others had alleged at the time.</p>
<p>But the Bush administration’s rhetoric of building a more free, open and democratic Middle East persisted after the weapons of mass destruction claim had proven false, and has been harder to evaluate – at least in the short term. <a href="https://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/news/releases/2003/02/20030226-11.html">Bush assured</a> the American public in 2003 that, “A new regime in Iraq would serve as a dramatic and inspiring example of freedom for other nations in the region.” </p>
<p>He focused on this theme during <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-11107739">the ground invasion</a>, in which a coalition force of nearly 100,000 American and other allied troops rapidly <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jul/08/toppling-saddam-hussein-statue-iraq-us-victory-myth">toppled Saddam Hussein’s regime</a>. </p>
<p>“The establishment of <a href="https://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/news/releases/2003/11/20031106-2.html">a free Iraq</a> at the heart of the Middle East will be a watershed event in the global democratic revolution,” Bush said in November 2003. He also said that the U.S. would be pursuing a “forward strategy of freedom in the Middle East.”</p>
<p>Twenty years on, it is worth considering how this “forward strategy” has played out both in Iraq and across the Middle East. In 2003, there was indeed, as Bush noted, a “freedom deficit” in the Middle East, where repressive <a href="https://www.eui.eu/documents/rscas/research/mediterranean/mrm2008/09ws-description.pdf">authoritarian regimes dominated the region</a>. Yet, in spite of tremendous upheaval in the Middle East over the past two decades, many authoritarian regimes remain deeply entrenched.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/516091/original/file-20230317-26-u42lcl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A group of men appear to be protesting in the street and raise Iraqi flags." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/516091/original/file-20230317-26-u42lcl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/516091/original/file-20230317-26-u42lcl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/516091/original/file-20230317-26-u42lcl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/516091/original/file-20230317-26-u42lcl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/516091/original/file-20230317-26-u42lcl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/516091/original/file-20230317-26-u42lcl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/516091/original/file-20230317-26-u42lcl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Iraqis demonstrate to show support for Saddam Hussein in February 2003 in Baghdad, Iraq.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://media.gettyimages.com/id/1798778/photo/activists-in-iraq-rally-for-peace.jpg?s=1024x1024&w=gi&k=20&c=oPWRXG5RzA-kS2bmMT5D9rlLapEelUW5FMqeyCxxqKQ=">Oleg Nikishin/Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Measuring the ‘Freedom Gap’</h2>
<p>Political science <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=1waDubkAAAAJ&hl=en">scholars like myself</a> try to measure the democratic or authoritarian character of governments in a variety of ways. </p>
<p>The non-profit group <a href="https://freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-world">Freedom House</a> evaluates countries in terms of democratic institutions and whether they have free and fair elections, as well as people’s civil rights and liberties, such as freedom of speech, freedom of assembly and a free press. Freedom House <a href="https://freedomhouse.org/reports/freedom-world/freedom-world-research-methodology">rates each country</a> and its level of democracy on a scale from 2 to 14, from “mostly free” to “least free.” </p>
<p>One way to think about the level of democracy in the region is to focus on the <a href="https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/arab-league">23 countries and governments that form the Arab League</a>, a regional organization that spans North Africa, the Red Sea coast and the Middle East. In 2003, the average Freedom House <a href="https://freedomhouse.org/sites/default/files/2020-02/Freedom_in_the_World_2003_complete_book.pdf">score for an Arab League member</a> was 11.45 – far more authoritarian than the global average of 6.75 at the time. </p>
<p>Put another way, the Freedom House report in 2003 <a href="https://freedomhouse.org/sites/default/files/2020-02/Freedom_in_the_World_2003_complete_book.pdf">classified a little over 46%</a> of all countries as “free,” but no country in the Arab League met that threshold.</p>
<p>While some <a href="https://www.brookings.edu/blog/order-from-chaos/2021/03/08/heavy-lies-the-crown-the-survival-of-arab-monarchies-10-years-after-the-arab-spring/">Arab countries, like Saudi Arabia</a>, were ruled by monarchies around this time, others, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/dec/14/arab-spring-autocrats-the-dead-the-ousted-and-those-who-survived">like Libya</a>, were ruled by dictators. </p>
<p>The nearly <a href="https://www.pbs.org/tpt/dictators-playbook/episodes/saddam-hussein/">30-year-long regime</a> of Hussein in Iraq fit this second pattern. Hussein was part of a 1968 coup led by <a href="https://www.britannica.com/topic/Baath-Party">the Ba'ath political party</a>, a group that <a href="https://www.encyclopediaofmigration.org/en/the_bath_party_in_iraq/">wanted all Arab countries</a> to form one unified nation – but also became known for human rights violations. The Ba'ath Party relied upon <a href="https://www.opec.org/opec_web/en/about_us/164.htm">Iraq’s oil wealth</a> and <a href="https://news.stanford.edu/2018/03/29/baath-party-archives-reveal-brutality-saddam-husseins-rule/">repressive tactics against civilians</a> to <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/2745001.stm">maintain power</a>. </p>
<p>The fall of <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/saddam-hussein-fell-then-violence-iraq-spiralled-2023-03-14/">Hussein’s regime in April 2003</a> produced a nominally more democratic Iraq. But after fighting a <a href="https://carnegieendowment.org/sada/21172">series of sectarian insurgencies</a> in Iraq over an eight-year period, the U.S. ultimately left behind <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/all-us-troops-to-leave-iraq/2011/10/21/gIQAUyJi3L_story.html">a weak and deeply divided government</a>. </p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/516142/original/file-20230318-5624-50d8gi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A row of newspapers show a bearded man with words like 'We got him' and 'Saddam captured.'" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/516142/original/file-20230318-5624-50d8gi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/516142/original/file-20230318-5624-50d8gi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=380&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/516142/original/file-20230318-5624-50d8gi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=380&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/516142/original/file-20230318-5624-50d8gi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=380&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/516142/original/file-20230318-5624-50d8gi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=477&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/516142/original/file-20230318-5624-50d8gi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=477&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/516142/original/file-20230318-5624-50d8gi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=477&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">A newsstand sells papers reporting the capture of Saddam Hussein, former leader of Iraq, by U.S. forces in 2003.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://media.gettyimages.com/id/2811512/photo/papers-run-story-on-saddam-capture.jpg?s=1024x1024&w=gi&k=20&c=1H9qDW1rPW1wVPbyKH3HUrgRll8pRZ36ZhzVeS-rM6A=">Graeme Robertson/Getty Images</a></span>
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<h2>Post-invasion Iraq</h2>
<p>The U.S. <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-iraq-usa-pullout-idUSTRE7BE0EL20111215">2003 invasion</a> succeeded in ousting a brutal regime – but establishing a healthy and thriving new democracy proved more challenging. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.usip.org/publications/2003/05/religious-politics-iraq">Rivalry between</a> Iraq’s three main groups – the Sunni and Shiite Muslims as well as the Kurds, the largest ethnic minority in the country – paralyzed early attempts at political reorganization. </p>
<p>While Iraq today has a constitution, a parliament and holds regular elections, the country struggles both with <a href="https://www.brookings.edu/opinions/bdc-snapshots-the-iraqi-states-crisis-of-legitimacy/">popular legitimacy</a> and with practical aspects of governance, such as providing <a href="https://www.unicef.org/iraq/what-we-do/education#:%7E:text=Decades%20of%20conflict%20and%20under,Iraqi%20children%20out%20of%20school.">basic education</a> for children. </p>
<p>Indeed, in 2023, <a href="https://freedomhouse.org/country/iraq/freedom-world/2023">Freedom House</a> continues to score Iraq as “Not Free” in its measure of democracy.</p>
<p>Since the U.S. <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/oct/21/obama-us-troops-withdrawal-iraq">military withdrawal in 2011</a>, Iraq has lurched from one political crisis to another. From 2014 to 2017, large portions of western Iraq were controlled by the extremist militant <a href="https://www.wilsoncenter.org/article/timeline-the-rise-spread-and-fall-the-islamic-state">Islamic State group</a>. </p>
<p>In 2018 and 2019, <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-iraq-protests-economy-analysis-idUSKBN1WH1S8">rampant government corruption</a> led to a string of <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-50595212">anti-government protests</a>, which sparked a <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/fear-spreads-among-iraqi-protesters-as-government-cracks-down-keeps-death-toll-secret/2019/11/11/be210a28-03f9-11ea-9118-25d6bd37dfb1_story.html">violent crackdown</a> by the government. </p>
<p>The protests prompted early <a href="https://www.npr.org/2021/10/11/1045092941/iraq-election-results-sadr">parliamentary elections in November 2021</a>, but the government has not yet been able to create a coalition government representing all competing political groups. </p>
<p>While Iraq’s most recent crisis avoided descending into civil war, the militarized nature of Iraqi political parties poses <a href="https://www.brookings.edu/blog/order-from-chaos/2023/03/01/shiite-rivalries-could-break-iraqs-deceptive-calm-in-2023/">an ongoing risk of electoral violence</a>. </p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/516141/original/file-20230318-14-aztvn4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A man pushes a cart in a desolate looking area with sandy, dirt ground and blue skies." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/516141/original/file-20230318-14-aztvn4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/516141/original/file-20230318-14-aztvn4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/516141/original/file-20230318-14-aztvn4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/516141/original/file-20230318-14-aztvn4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/516141/original/file-20230318-14-aztvn4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/516141/original/file-20230318-14-aztvn4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/516141/original/file-20230318-14-aztvn4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">An Iraqi man pushes a cart in Mosul after the government retook control from the Islamic State in 2017.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://media.gettyimages.com/id/632292674/photo/topshot-iraq-conflict-mosul.jpg?s=1024x1024&w=gi&k=20&c=Nhx4QWu-dMm2zA-P6RdP4cf62WwjFwQMUkSrHcfjkf4=">Ahmad Al-Rubaye/AFP via Getty Images</a></span>
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<h2>The post-invasion Middle East</h2>
<p>While Iraq continues to face deep political challenges, it is worth considering the U.S. efforts at regional democracy promotion more fully. </p>
<p>In 2014, widespread protest movements associated with the <a href="https://www.npr.org/2011/12/17/143897126/the-arab-spring-a-year-of-revolution">Arab Spring</a> <a href="https://www.cfr.org/article/arab-spring-ten-years-whats-legacy-uprisings">toppled dictators in Tunisia, Egypt, Yemen and Libya</a>. In other countries, <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-12482680">such as Morocco</a> and <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-12482679">Jordan</a>, monarchs were able to offer concessions to people and remain in control by delaying public spending cuts, for example, and replacing government ministers. </p>
<p>Yet sustaining stable democracies has proved challenging even where the Arab Spring seemed to succeed in changing political regimes. In <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-19256730">Egypt, the military</a> has reasserted itself and the country has slid steadily back to authoritarianism. In <a href="https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/yemen-crisis">Yemen, the political vaccum</a> created by the protests marked the start of a devastating civil war. </p>
<p>The average Freedom House democracy score for <a href="https://freedomhouse.org/countries/freedom-world/scores">members of the Arab League</a> is today 11.45 — the same as it was on the eve of the Iraq invasion. </p>
<p>It is hard to know if U.S. efforts at democracy promotion accelerated or delayed political change in the Middle East. It is hard to know if a different approach might have yielded better results. Yet, the data – at least as social scientists measure such things – strongly suggests that the vision of an Iraq as an inspiration for a democratic transformation of the Middle East has not come to pass.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/201998/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Brian Urlacher is affiliated with North Dakota Dem/NPL and serves as vice chair for District 18.</span></em></p>The Bush administration invaded Iraq with plans for it to become a democracy. But according to some social science measures, the country isn’t any more democratic than it was before 2003.Brian Urlacher, Department Chair and Professor, Political Science & Public Administration, University of North DakotaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2015102023-03-14T19:45:04Z2023-03-14T19:45:04ZWhy a new centre for civic engagement in Ukraine could help counter Russia’s invasion<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/515217/original/file-20230314-3634-rv145j.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=44%2C164%2C4947%2C2709&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">People listen to the national anthem of Ukraine during the funeral of Yurii Kulyk, 27, in Kalynivka, near Kyiv, Feb. 21, 2023. Kulyk, a civilian who was a volunteer in the armed forces of Ukraine, was killed during a rocket attack on Feb. 15 in Lyman in the Donetsk region of Ukraine. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti)</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Shortly after Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, I set aside my <a href="https://www.kcl.ac.uk/people/aaron-james-wendland">academic work</a> as a fellow in public philosophy to report on <a href="https://www.thestar.com/opinion/contributors/2022/06/24/air-raid-sirens-coffee-and-cake-how-life-goes-on-in-the-ukraine-russia-war-zone.html">civilian life</a> in Kyiv, Lviv, Kharkiv and other Ukrainian cities and to examine the state of higher education in Ukraine. </p>
<p>Public philosophy, in dialogue with other forms of scholarship, <a href="https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/2021/05/agora-a-marketplace-of-ideas">journalism and</a> thinking, translates <a href="https://dailynous.com/2020/05/25/philosophy-popular-philosophy-miniseries-guest-post-aaron-wendland/">esoteric ideas into accessible writing and then applies those ideas to daily life</a>. </p>
<p>At its best, philosophy is an antidote to bad ideas — and as historian Timothy Snyder, an expert on Ukrainian history, recently noted <a href="https://ukraineworld.org/podcasts/ep-144">in an interview, bad ideas can kill people</a>: Russian ideas about history, culture and language have been catalysts to the current conflict. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/we-should-all-be-concerned-that-putin-is-trying-to-destroy-ukrainian-culture-179351">We should all be concerned that Putin is trying to destroy Ukrainian culture</a>
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<p>This is one of the reasons Ukrainian academics are working to establish a <a href="https://civic.ukma.edu.ua/">centre for civic engagement</a> at <a href="https://ukma.edu.ua/eng">Kyiv Mohyla Academy</a>. This centre will provide support for academic and civic institutions in Ukraine to counteract the aforementioned <a href="https://civic.ukma.edu.ua/background/">destabilizing impact</a> that Russia’s invasion has had on higher education and civilian life. </p>
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<img alt="A soldier is seen looking at ruins of a building." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/514836/original/file-20230313-18-gqg47t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C1215%2C6764%2C4177&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/514836/original/file-20230313-18-gqg47t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/514836/original/file-20230313-18-gqg47t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/514836/original/file-20230313-18-gqg47t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/514836/original/file-20230313-18-gqg47t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/514836/original/file-20230313-18-gqg47t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/514836/original/file-20230313-18-gqg47t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">A Ukrainian serviceman looks at National Pedagogical University ruins destroyed by a Russian attack in Kharkiv, Ukraine, July 6, 2022.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)</span></span>
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<h2>State of Ukrainian post-secondary education</h2>
<p>When I arrived in Ukraine, unsurprisingly, I found Ukrainian colleges and universities in a state of disarray.</p>
<p>At the time, 7,000 scholars <a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/1kGTFHTKRuhSGEFYZnCGQHOo1StuQ-CgP/view">had fled</a> Ukraine and thousands more had been displaced within the country. </p>
<p>To date, more than 170 Ukrainian institutions of higher education <a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/1EWkRpho55tAcmIhdewmnZDsnNgqxTmjf/view">have been damaged</a> and more than 20 have been completely destroyed. The academics who remain in Ukraine now conduct their research, teaching and public service in <a href="https://saveschools.in.ua/en/">very challenging</a> circumstances.</p>
<h2>Academics remaining in Ukraine</h2>
<p>Nearly every senior administrator noted that western universities were providing <a href="https://allea.org/support-for-ukraine/">plenty of support</a> for Ukrainian students and scholars who had left the country, but that there was little or no help for Ukrainian academics working in Ukraine. </p>
<p>Ukrainian students and scholars were also doing amazing work in and out of the classroom, despite <a href="https://mon.gov.ua/ua/news/derzhbyudzhet-na-2023-rik-vidatki-na-osvitu-ta-nauku">nationwide cuts</a> to education in order to fund the war.</p>
<p>At <a href="https://www.ukma.edu.ua/eng/">Kyiv Mohyla Academy</a>, for example, students were volunteering their time to visit elderly citizens whose families had left the country. </p>
<p>Post-doctoral researchers were running public seminars on Ukrainian history to counter Russian propaganda. Psychology professors were volunteering their expertise to counsel civilians who spent months under Russian occupation. And political scientists were drawing on their research to offer much needed insight to foreign correspondents and the international community, generally.</p>
<h2>A whole society effort</h2>
<p>Of course, Ukrainian students and scholars weren’t the only ones doing exceptional work in Ukraine. I met nurses and medics who were taking double shifts and then using the extra money they earned to buy necessary medical supplies for their patients. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.thestar.com/news/world/2022/07/07/jokes-from-the-bomb-shelter-ukrainian-comedians-show-power-of-humour-amid-wartime-horror.html">Comedians were putting on benefit gigs and donating the proceeds</a> to the Ukrainian army. Computer programmers were using their spare time to help secure Ukraine’s digital network. And just about everyone I spoke to saw doing their day job as an act of defiance and their own small way to help keep their country going.</p>
<p>Witnessing daily life inside and outside the academy in Ukraine made me realize how important maintaining a functional and lively civil society is to keeping supplies moving and elevating the country’s morale.</p>
<h2>Fighting for freedom</h2>
<p>Based on my experiences from Kharkiv to Lviv and from Odessa to Kyiv, it was also clear to me that Ukrainians from all walks of life were fighting for something we hold dear: freedom. </p>
<p>And they were doing this with limited resources in a state that recently took a <a href="https://bm.ge/en/article/ministry-of-economy-preliminary-estimates-fall-in-ukraines-gdp-in-2022-at-304/124171">30 per cent hit</a> to its GDP.</p>
<p>The extraordinary work Ukrainians were doing to keep their country running was inspiring, but I kept returning to the fact that as identified by senior administrators, there was little international support for students and scholars at universities staying in Kyiv, Kharkiv and Lviv.</p>
<p>Following the example set by Ukrainian students and scholars, I’ve spent much of the past year thinking about the conflict and working on an event, <a href="https://civic.ukma.edu.ua/benefit/">What Good Is Philosophy? – A Benefit Conference for Ukraine</a>.</p>
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<img alt="A woman stands outside looking at blue and yellow flags." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/515215/original/file-20230314-26-ywjbx1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/515215/original/file-20230314-26-ywjbx1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/515215/original/file-20230314-26-ywjbx1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/515215/original/file-20230314-26-ywjbx1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/515215/original/file-20230314-26-ywjbx1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/515215/original/file-20230314-26-ywjbx1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/515215/original/file-20230314-26-ywjbx1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">A woman looks at Ukrainian flags placed in memory of those killed during the war near Maidan Square in central Kyiv in January 2023.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Daniel Cole)</span></span>
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<h2>The Centre for Civic Engagement</h2>
<p>This online benefit event will be broadcast on the <a href="https://munkschool.utoronto.ca/">Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy’s</a> <a href="https://www.youtube.com/c/munkschool">YouTube channel</a> on March 17-19, 2023. It aims to raise the funding required to establish a <a href="https://civic.ukma.edu.ua/">Centre for Civic Engagement</a> at <a href="https://ukma.edu.ua/eng">Kyiv Mohyla Academy</a>.</p>
<p>By assisting Ukrainian students and scholars today, the centre will also help pave the way for a vibrant and engaged post-war Ukraine.</p>
<p>Keynotes at <a href="https://blog.apaonline.org/2023/03/13/fighting-for-freedom-with-philosophy-an-interview-with-a-j-wendland/">this benefit conference</a> will be delivered by two of Ukraine’s pre-eminent public intellectuals, <a href="https://dfc.ukma.edu.ua/coming-to-naukma/lectureres/mychailo-wynnyckyj">Mychailo Wynnyckyj</a> and <a href="https://twitter.com/yermolenko_v">Volodymyr Yermolenko</a>, who in the current conflict have been drawing on their scholarship and academic background to counter Russian mythology. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/putins-war-on-history-is-another-form-of-domestic-repression-176438">Putin’s war on history is another form of domestic repression</a>
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<p><a href="http://margaretatwood.ca/">Margaret Atwood</a> and <a href="https://history.yale.edu/people/timothy-snyder">Timothy Snyder</a> will also deliver lectures, as will a long list of influential philosophers writing today, including <a href="https://www.sydney.edu.au/science/about/our-people/academic-staff/peter-godfrey-smith.html">Peter Godfrey-Smith</a>, <a href="https://philosophy.mit.edu/haslanger/">Sally Haslanger</a> and <a href="https://philosophy.utoronto.ca/directory/jennifer-nagel/">Jennifer Nagel</a>.</p>
<p>Ukraine’s ambassador to Canada, <a href="https://canada.mfa.gov.ua/en/governance/yuliya-kovaliv">Yulia Kovaliv</a>, will deliver the closing remarks.</p>
<p>This conference will be broadcast for free. But the benefit event is meant to provide members of the public, individual academics, colleges and universities, professional societies, charitable foundations and private companies a way to support students, scholars and civic institutions in Ukraine. </p>
<p>Finally, I appreciate that the responsibility for pushing back the Russian army belongs to the Ukrainian military and its allies in NATO. But I nevertheless believe that by doing our part to support academics in Ukraine who are defending a democratic and peaceful society, we can help keep Ukraine running — and help ensure Ukrainian civil society flourishes in the 21st century.</p>
<p><em>Parts of this story appeared on the <a href="https://blog.apaonline.org/2023/03/13/fighting-for-freedom-with-philosophy-an-interview-with-a-j-wendland">American Philosophical Association blog</a>.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/201510/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Aaron James Wendland does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Maintaining a functional and lively civil society in Ukraine is crucial to keeping supplies moving and keeping up the morale of the country.Aaron James Wendland, Senior Research Fellow, University of TorontoLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1946262022-12-20T17:30:05Z2022-12-20T17:30:05ZNZ report card 2022: some foreign bragging rights but room for improvement at home<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/498871/original/file-20221205-73820-8y8uz9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=16%2C0%2C5321%2C3545&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>It’s that time of year when school and university students eagerly (or nervously) await their end-of-year results – but also an opportunity to see where the country in general might have passed or failed.</p>
<p>Although international and domestic indices and rankings should be read with a degree of caution – measurements and metrics only tell us so much, after all – it’s still possible to trace the nation’s ups and downs relative to past years.</p>
<h2>Good global rankings</h2>
<p>Overall, the country held its own internationally when it came to democratic values and standards. <a href="https://www.transparency.org/en/cpi/2021">Transparency International</a> ranked us top, equal with Denmark and Finland, for being relatively corruption-free.</p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.visionofhumanity.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/GPI-2022-web.pdf">Global Peace Index</a> placed New Zealand second best in the world for safety and security, low domestic and international conflict, and degree of militarisation. And human rights and civil liberties watchdog Freedom House again <a href="https://freedomhouse.org/country/new-zealand/freedom-world/2022">scored New Zealand</a> 99 out of 100 – three Scandinavian countries scored a perfect 100.</p>
<p>On the <a href="https://www.elmundofinanciero.com/adjuntos/98982/WIMF-2022.pdf">Index of Moral Freedom</a> (a libertarian think tank that benchmarks countries’ levels of “individual
freedom regarding ethics and morality”), New Zealand moved to 14th, up five places on 2020.</p>
<p>The <a href="https://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_GGGR_2022.pdf">Global Gender Gap Report</a> recorded New Zealand holding its position as the fourth-most-gender-equal country. New Zealand stayed in seventh place in the World Justice Project’s <a href="https://worldjusticeproject.org/rule-of-law-index/country/2022/New%20Zealand">Rule of Law Index</a>. We went up one spot to 13th on the <a href="https://hdr.undp.org/data-center/country-insights#/ranks">Human Development Index</a> of life expectancy, education and income.</p>
<p>New Zealand also remained sixth best for internet affordability, availability, readiness and relevance, according to the <a href="https://impact.economist.com/projects/inclusive-internet-index/2022">Economist Intelligence Unit</a>. And on the <a href="https://www.wipo.int/edocs/pubdocs/en/wipo-pub-2000-2022-section3-en-gii-2022-results-global-innovation-index-2022-15th-edition.pdf">Global Innovation Index</a>, we came in at 24th out of 132 economies – two spots better than last year.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1572556415381774337"}"></div></p>
<h2>Freedom and happiness</h2>
<p>On the other side of the ledger, New Zealand’s rankings fell in a variety of political, economic and health indices.</p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.heritage.org/index/">Index for Economic Freedom</a>, for instance, which covers everything from property rights to financial freedom, placed us fifth, three spots below last year. And we fell three places to 11th in the Reporters Without Borders <a href="https://rsf.org/en/index">Press Freedom Index</a>.</p>
<p>New Zealanders, it seems, aren’t as happy as they were. We fell a place in the <a href="https://worldhappiness.report/ed/2022/happiness-benevolence-and-trust-during-covid-19-and-beyond/#ranking-of-happiness-2019-2021">World Happiness Report</a> to tenth-cheeriest place – although we’re still a bit happier than Australia. The <a href="https://www.socialprogress.org/global-index-2022-results">Social Progress Index</a> had us fall from 12th to 15th position, and we dropped 11 spots in the 2022 <a href="https://www.imd.org/centers/world-competitiveness-center/rankings/world-competitiveness/">Global Competitiveness Report</a>, down to 31.</p>
<p>A little surprisingly, New Zealand placed 41st on the <a href="https://www.visionofhumanity.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/GTI-2022-web-04112022.pdf">Global Terrorism Index</a>, apparently worse than Russia at 44. Although New Zealand recently reduced its <a href="https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/political/479798/new-zealand-drops-terror-threat-level-to-low">terror threat level</a> from medium to low, the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/sep/03/man-shot-dead-in-new-zealand-after-injuring-people-in-supermarket-police-say">2021 supermarket attack</a> in Auckland and the ongoing fallout from the Christchurch attacks will have affected our ranking.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/with-a-covid-variant-soup-looming-new-zealand-urgently-needs-another-round-of-vaccine-boosters-193616">With a COVID 'variant soup' looming, New Zealand urgently needs another round of vaccine boosters</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Also maybe surprisingly, Bloomberg’s <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/covid-resilience-ranking/?leadSource=uverify%20wall">COVID resilience index</a>, which ranks the “best and worst places to be as the world enters the next COVID phase”, placed New Zealand at 35. This was possibly due to the Omicron wave and increase in deaths since reopening borders, rather than a verdict on the country’s overall response.</p>
<p>And New Zealand continues to struggle environmentally, falling from 19th to 26th on the 2022 <a href="https://epi.yale.edu/epi-results/2022/country/nzl">Yale Environmental Performance Index</a>, which measures environmental health and ecosystem vitality.</p>
<p>While our overall assessment on the <a href="https://climateactiontracker.org/countries/new-zealand/">Climate Action Tracker</a> (which measures progress on meeting agreed global warming targets) hasn’t changed, it’s still categorised as “highly insufficient”. The <a href="https://ccpi.org/country/nzl/">Climate Change Performance Index</a> is a little more generous, pegging New Zealand at 33rd, up two spots on last year.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1565595381345419264"}"></div></p>
<h2>Mixed news on the home front</h2>
<p>Domestically, New Zealand recorded better-than-expected results on four fronts:</p>
<ul>
<li><p>unemployment hit a <a href="https://www.stats.govt.nz/information-releases/labour-market-statistics-september-2022-quarter/">very low 3.3%</a> in September, <a href="https://www.oecd.org/newsroom/unemployment-rates-oecd-updated-november-2022.htm">better than most comparable</a> OECD countries.</p></li>
<li><p>median weekly earnings from wages and salaries rose <a href="https://www.stats.govt.nz/news/weekly-earnings-rise-as-more-in-full-time-employment/">by 8.8% to NZ$1,189</a>, the largest increase recorded since records began in 1998</p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://coronialservices.justice.govt.nz/assets/Documents/Publications/Media-release-Deputy-Chief-Coroner-251022.pdf">suicides decreased</a> in the year to June to 538, down from 607 the year before and significantly lower than the average rate over the past 13 years</p></li>
<li><p>incarceration rates continued to fall, with a prisoner population of <a href="https://www.corrections.govt.nz/resources/statistics/quarterly_prison_statistics/prison_stats_june_2022">7,728</a> (as of June), well down on the near 10,000 figure from 2020.</p></li>
</ul>
<p>On the other hand, inflation is rising. While lower than <a href="https://www.oecd.org/newsroom/consumer-prices-oecd-updated-4-october-2022.htm">October’s OECD average</a>, an <a href="https://www.stats.govt.nz/indicators/consumers-price-index-cpi/">annual rate of 7.2%</a> is still high by recent standards. Related to this, and either good or bad news according to your perspective, annual average house price growth <a href="https://content.knightfrank.com/research/84/documents/en/global-house-price-index-q2-2022-9334.pdf">slowed to 5.5%</a> in the year to June. Real prices are expected to <a href="https://www.reuters.com/markets/new-zealand-house-prices-down-75-year-reinz-2022-11-14/">drop considerably</a> from their 2021 peak, however.</p>
<p>Those falls don’t necessarily make houses affordable for many people, although the stock of public housing continues to increase by over 500 dwellings each year to a recent total of <a href="https://www.hud.govt.nz/stats-and-insight/the-government-housing-dashboard/housing-dashboard-at-a-glance/">76,834</a>. Even so, <a href="https://www.salvationarmy.org.nz/research-policy/social-policy-parliamentary-unit/state-nation-2022/housing">demand for social housing</a> is still growing. Recent <a href="https://orangesky.org.nz/lets-talk-about-it/">research suggests</a> one in six New Zealanders have been homeless, and about 41,000 don’t have adequate access to housing.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/coalitions-kingmakers-and-a-rugby-world-cup-the-calculations-already-influencing-next-years-nz-election-195010">Coalitions, kingmakers and a Rugby World Cup: the calculations already influencing next year’s NZ election</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>Rich and poor</h2>
<p>New Zealand’s poverty rate compares poorly with <a href="https://data.oecd.org/inequality/poverty-rate.htm">other OECD countries,</a> and <a href="https://www.msd.govt.nz/documents/about-msd-and-our-work/publications-resources/research/child-poverty-in-nz/2022-child-poverty-report-overview-and-selected-findings.pdf">child poverty</a> remains a critical challenge. However, in the year to June 2021, the <a href="https://www.stats.govt.nz/news/child-poverty-statistics-show-all-measures-trending-downwards-over-the-last-three-years">percentage of children</a> living in poor households had declined since 2018. </p>
<p>At the other end of the scale, the wealthy continue to hold the <a href="https://www.stats.govt.nz/news/distribution-of-wealth-across-new-zealand-households-remains-unchanged-between-2015-and-2021">lion’s share of assets</a>. The top 10% of households hold about 50% of the nation’s total household net worth (the value of a household’s assets, such as real estate, retirement savings and shares, less its debts). Conversely, the lowest 20% hold just 1% of total household assets, but 11% of total liabilities.</p>
<p>In short, while New Zealand can claim some bragging rights in many important areas and is making modest progress in others, that’s far from the whole picture. Any progress we make should not be taken for granted.</p>
<p>The final verdict has to be: a good effort, but room for improvement.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/194626/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Alexander Gillespie does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>As the year ends, how has New Zealand fared on global and domestic measurements, from social and economic freedoms to tackling poverty and homelessness?Alexander Gillespie, Professor of Law, University of WaikatoLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1853562022-07-11T15:31:50Z2022-07-11T15:31:50ZHow to talk about climate change: Highlight harms — not benefits — to alter behaviour<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/470827/original/file-20220624-14-stcwtf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=8%2C187%2C5934%2C3769&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Using language that stresses the "seriousness" or "importance" of climate change in protests and campaigns can lead to counterintuitive results.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Climate change is slowly, but drastically, influencing how we live, work and play. Governments, as well as for-profit and non-profit organizations, are now seeking ways to limit the effects of human actions on the planet. In many parts of the world, <a href="https://www.marineconservation.org.au/which-australian-states-are-banning-single-use-plastics/">including Australia</a> and <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2022/06/21/canada-is-banning-single-use-plastics-by-the-end-of-the-year-.html#:%7E:text=">Canada</a>, governments are limiting the use of single-use plastics.</p>
<p>To get people to be more sustainable in their daily lives, governments and environmental advocates have been communicating the harms of climate change for humans, animals and the planet. However, there is a right and wrong way to spread this message.</p>
<p>Research has recently begun examining how to best convey the importance of human action to the masses. While people are frequently bombarded with appeals to reduce water use and bring reusable bags to the grocery store, studies are now analyzing the language that should be used to make such appeals effective.</p>
<p>In a <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s10584-022-03372-5">recent paper</a> I co-authored with Jack Lin, a student at the California State University Northridge, we found that stressing the “seriousness” or “importance” of climate change could lead to counterintuitive results.</p>
<h2>The experiment</h2>
<p>We recruited randomly selected 762 Americans and had them read a passage outlining the effects of climate change. But, in the passage given to half of the participants, we added words such as “serious” and “grave” to stress the importance of the harmful effects of climate change. </p>
<p>We then asked the participants how likely they were to engage in various sustainable behaviours such as eating locally grown foods, taking public transportation and using less water.</p>
<p>You would think that saying that climate change is serious would promote more sustainable behavioural intentions. Instead, we found that using “serious” and other similar adjectives lowered behavioural intentions to make sustainable efforts. This effect was especially pronounced among participants who identified supporting the Republican Party.</p>
<h2>Word choice can trigger your sense of free will</h2>
<p>How could these results be explained? Well, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/17524032.2018.1548369">Republican supporters generally are higher on “psychological reactance.”</a> Meaning they are typically more averse to restrictions on their individual freedoms and sense of free will. Therefore, to say that climate change effects are “serious” are seen by these individuals as an attempt to influence their perceived views of climate change. Conservatives <a href="https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0246317">in other parts of the world</a> also tend to score higher on psychological reactance. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A group of people protesting with placards against poor climate change action." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/473413/original/file-20220711-26-pzpx7o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/473413/original/file-20220711-26-pzpx7o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473413/original/file-20220711-26-pzpx7o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473413/original/file-20220711-26-pzpx7o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473413/original/file-20220711-26-pzpx7o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473413/original/file-20220711-26-pzpx7o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473413/original/file-20220711-26-pzpx7o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">If the words used in awareness and social messaging sound restrictive, they can trigger individuals’ sense of free will.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>According to this theory, when people experience a sense of restriction, they can take opposite actions to re-assert their sense of free will. Consistent with this premise, Republicans’ higher scores on psychological reactance explained why they said they would, for example, use even more water when they see an appeal that uses adjectives like “serious” to convey the effects of climate change.</p>
<p>Other research has found similar results. For example, you would think that telling people that 97 per cent of the world’s prominent scientists believe that human-caused climate change is real. Yet <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/17524032.2021.1910530">Republican-aligned research participants</a> who see a statement like this become even less likely to act on it, compared to those that don’t see it.</p>
<p>These findings might seem to say that climate change communications and appeals might be futile, especially for Republicans. <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/poq/nfq073">Research published a decade ago</a> found that scientists consider the terms “global warming” and “climate change” to mean different things, while most lay people use them interchangeably. This research showed that Republicans are less likely to believe that “global warming is real” but more likely to believe that “climate change is real.” </p>
<p>Democrats are more likely to take action against climate change than Republicans, but Democrats themselves are more likely to act against “global warming” than “climate change” — the opposite effect among Republicans.</p>
<h2>The power of words</h2>
<p>Whether one is conservative or liberal, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0220320">research</a> has found that highlighting losses is better at promoting behaviours than highlighting gains. For example, indicating the harms to humans, animals and the environment from not acting is more effective than indicating the benefits from acting. <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s10584-014-1190-4">Other research</a> has also found that using pie charts to communicate statistics and figures is better at promoting comprehension than writing those figures down in text form.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A sign that reads 'There is no planet B'." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/473033/original/file-20220707-26-3yco38.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/473033/original/file-20220707-26-3yco38.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473033/original/file-20220707-26-3yco38.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473033/original/file-20220707-26-3yco38.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473033/original/file-20220707-26-3yco38.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473033/original/file-20220707-26-3yco38.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473033/original/file-20220707-26-3yco38.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Words that highlight losses are better at influencing behaviours than those that highlight gains.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>What does this all mean? The way we communicate the effects of climate change needs to be considered. How we communicate — and the language we use — are just as important as what we communicate. </p>
<p>People process the information they receive through their own lens — a lens that is shaped by individual as well as cultural histories, differences and expectations. In order to drive our message through to all these individuals of diverse perspectives, we need to ensure that the way we communicate is adapted to those recipients’ histories, differences and expectations.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/185356/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Eugene Y. Chan does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Messages about climate change must be adapted to people’s histories, differences and expectations.Eugene Y. Chan, Associate Professor, Marketing, Toronto Metropolitan UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1849322022-06-29T12:06:45Z2022-06-29T12:06:45ZAmerican gun culture is based on frontier mythology – but ignores how common gun restrictions were in the Old West<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/470869/original/file-20220624-18-mcz5ze.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=54%2C0%2C7276%2C3824&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Reenactments of Old West gunfights, like this one at a tourist attraction in Texas in 2014, are part of the mythology underpinning the United States' gun culture.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.loc.gov/item/2014632859/">Carol M. Highsmith via Library of Congress</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>In the wake of the Buffalo and Uvalde mass shootings, <a href="https://www.npr.org/2022/06/09/1103661684/gun-control-npr-pbs-marist-survey-uvalde-buffalo-biden">70% of Republicans</a> said it is more important to protect gun rights than to control gun violence, while 92% of Democrats and 54% of independents expressed the opposite view. Just weeks after those mass shootings, Republicans and <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/newyork/news/many-on-long-island-hail-supreme-court-gun-carry-law-decision-as-major-victory-for-law-abiding-citizens/">gun rights advocates hailed</a> the Supreme Court ruling that invalidated New York state’s gun permit law and declared that the <a href="https://www.oyez.org/cases/2021/20-843">Second Amendment guarantees a right to carry a handgun outside the home</a> for self-defense.</p>
<p>Mayor Eric Adams, expressing his opposition to the ruling, suggested that the court’s decision would turn New York City into the “<a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/videos/2022-06-23/adams-says-new-york-can-t-become-the-wild-wild-west-video">Wild West</a>.” Contrary to the imagery of the Wild West, however, many towns in the real Old West had <a href="https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/gun-control-old-west-180968013/">restrictions on the carrying of guns</a> that were, I would suggest, stricter than the one just invalidated by the Supreme Court.</p>
<p>Support for gun rights among Republicans played an important role in determining the contents of the <a href="https://www.npr.org/2022/06/25/1107626030/biden-signs-gun-safety-law">the bipartisan Safer Communities Act</a>, the first new gun reform bill in three decades. President Joe Biden signed it into law just two days after the Supreme Court’s decision was released. In order to attract Republican support, the <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/senate-bill/2938/text">new law</a> does not include gun control proposals such as an assault weapons ban, universal background checks or raising the purchasing age to 21 for certain types of rifles. Nevertheless, the bill was <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2022/06/22/politics/house-republicans-bipartisan-gun-bill/index.html">denounced by other Republicans in Congress</a> and was <a href="https://www.nraila.org/articles/20220621/nra-announces-opposition-to-senate-gun-control-legislation">opposed by the National Rifle Association</a>.</p>
<p>I have found that for those Americans who see the gun as both symbolizing and guaranteeing individual liberty, gun control laws are perceived as fundamentally un-American and a threat to their freedom. For the most ardent gun rights advocates, <a href="https://hub.jhu.edu/2022/05/02/highest-number-of-gun-related-deaths-in-2020-report/">gun violence</a> – <a href="https://www.gunviolencearchive.org/reports/mass-shooting">as horrible as it is</a> – is an <a href="https://www.thepriceoffreedommovie.com">acceptable price of that freedom</a>.</p>
<p>My analysis finds that gun culture in the U.S. derives largely <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/02722011.2019.1573843">from its frontier past</a> and the <a href="https://www.oupress.com/9780806130316/gunfighter-nation/">mythology of the “Wild West,”</a> which <a href="https://utpress.utexas.edu/books/brodre">romanticizes guns, outlaws, rugged individualism</a> and the inevitability of gun violence. This culture ignores the fact that gun control was widespread and common in the Old West.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/471244/original/file-20220627-20-klvqkz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A view of Dodge City, Kansas, in 1878 including a sign banning firearms." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/471244/original/file-20220627-20-klvqkz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/471244/original/file-20220627-20-klvqkz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=301&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471244/original/file-20220627-20-klvqkz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=301&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471244/original/file-20220627-20-klvqkz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=301&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471244/original/file-20220627-20-klvqkz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=378&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471244/original/file-20220627-20-klvqkz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=378&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471244/original/file-20220627-20-klvqkz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=378&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">It’s a bit hard to read, but the sign to the right of this view of Dodge City, Kansas, from 1878 reads ‘The carrying of firearms strictly prohibited.’</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.kshs.org/km/items/view/640">Ben Wittick via Kansas Historical Society</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>The prevalence of guns</h2>
<p>Guns are part of a deep political divide in American society. The more guns a person owns, the more likely they are to <a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/the-gun-gap-9780190064839">oppose gun control legislation</a>, and the more likely they are to vote for Republican candidates.</p>
<p>In 2020, <a href="https://news.gallup.com/poll/264932/percentage-americans-own-guns.aspx">44% of American households</a> reported owning at least one firearm. According to the 2018 international study <a href="https://www.smallarmssurvey.org/sites/default/files/resources/SAS-BP-Civilian-Firearms-Numbers.pdf">Small Arms Survey</a>, there were approximately 393 million firearms in civilian hands in the U.S., or 120.5 firearms per 100 people. That number is likely higher now, given <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/dec/20/us-gun-purchases-2020-2021-study">increases in gun sales in 2019, 2020 and 2021</a>.</p>
<p>Americans have owned guns since colonial times, but American gun culture really took off after the Civil War with the imagery, icons and tales – or mythology – of the lawless frontier and the Wild West. Frontier mythology, which <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/02722011.2019.1573843">celebrates and exaggerates the amount and significance of gunfights and vigilantism</a>, began with <a href="https://truewestmagazine.com/masters-of-western-art/">19th-century Western paintings</a>, popular dime novels and <a href="https://centerofthewest.org/learn/western-essays/wild-west-shows/">traveling Wild West shows</a> by Buffalo Bill Cody and others. It continues to this day with Western-themed shows on streaming networks such as “<a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4236770/">Yellowstone</a>” and “<a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt11006642/">Walker</a>.”</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/0gXxRsQGp60?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">A gunfight in the TV show ‘Yellowstone.’</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>A marketing move</h2>
<p>Historian Pamela Haag attributes much of the country’s gun culture to that Western theme. Before the middle of the 19th century, she writes, guns were common in U.S. society, but were <a href="https://www.basicbooks.com/titles/pamela-haag/the-gunning-of-america/9780465098569/">unremarkable tools</a> used by a wide range of people in a growing nation.</p>
<p>But then gun manufacturers Colt and Winchester started marketing their firearms by appealing to customers’ sense of adventure and the romance of the frontier. In the mid-19th century, the gun manufacturers <a href="https://www.basicbooks.com/titles/pamela-haag/the-gunning-of-america/9780465098569/">began advertising their guns</a> as a way people all around the country could connect with the excitement of the West, with its Indian wars, cattle drives, cowboys and gold and silver boomtowns. Winchester’s slogan was “<a href="https://www.grunge.com/310679/the-gun-that-won-the-west-isnt-what-you-think-it-is/">The Gun That Won the West</a>,” but Haag argues that it was really “the West that won the gun.”</p>
<p>By 1878, this theme was so successful that Colt’s New York City distributor recommended the company market the .44-40 caliber version of its Model 1873 single-action revolver as the “Frontier Six Shooter” to <a href="https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/nra/ar_201912/index.php?startid=37#/p/36">appeal to the public’s growing fascination</a> with the Wild West.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/471411/original/file-20220628-19-ymuld0.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A revolver with a wooden butt" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/471411/original/file-20220628-19-ymuld0.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/471411/original/file-20220628-19-ymuld0.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=344&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471411/original/file-20220628-19-ymuld0.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=344&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471411/original/file-20220628-19-ymuld0.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=344&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471411/original/file-20220628-19-ymuld0.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=432&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471411/original/file-20220628-19-ymuld0.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=432&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/471411/original/file-20220628-19-ymuld0.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=432&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Colt’s Frontier Six Shooter was marketed to take advantage of people’s romantic ideas of the Wild West.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.cabelas.com/shop/en/101208113">Cabelas</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>A different reality</h2>
<p>Gun ownership was commonplace in the post-Civil War Old West, but actual gunfights were rare. One reason was that, contrary to the mythology, <a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/guns-across-america-9780190621063?cc=us&lang=en&">many frontier towns had strict gun laws</a>, especially <a href="https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/gun-control-old-west-180968013/">against carrying concealed weapons</a>. </p>
<p><a href="https://wwnorton.com/books/9780393345834">As UCLA constitutional law professor Adam Winkler puts it</a>, “Guns were widespread on the frontier, but so was gun regulation. … Wild West lawmen took gun control seriously and frequently arrested people who violated their town’s gun control laws.” </p>
<p>“<a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0047736/">Gunsmoke</a>,” the iconic TV show that ran from the 1950s through the 1970s, would have seen <a href="https://www.historynet.com/letter-from-wild-west-april-2021/">far fewer gunfights</a> had its fictional marshal, Matt Dillon, enforced Dodge City’s <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1990/09/02/opinion/l-dodge-city-believed-in-strict-gun-control-237490.html">real laws banning the carrying of any firearms</a> within city limits.</p>
<p>The appeal of this mythology extends to the present day. In August 2021, a Colt Frontier Six Shooter became the world’s most expensive firearm when the auction house <a href="https://www.bonhams.com/auctions/27262/lot/11/">Bonhams sold “the gun that killed Billy the Kid” at auction for over $6 million</a>. As a mere antique firearm, that revolver would be worth a <a href="https://truegunvalue.com/pistol/colt/frontier-six-shooter-saa/price-historical-value-196">few thousand dollars</a>. Its astronomic selling price was due to its Wild West provenance.</p>
<p>The historical reality of the American frontier was more complex and nuanced than its popular mythology. But it’s the mythology that fuels American gun culture today, which rejects the types of laws that were commonplace in the Old West.</p>
<h2>A particular view of safety and freedom</h2>
<p>Hardcore gun owners, their lobbyists and many members of the Republican Party <a href="https://apnews.com/article/uvalde-school-shooting-nra-convention-212dfd1b57474f1ab208d4a72521a010">refuse to allow</a> the <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2022/02/03/what-the-data-says-about-gun-deaths-in-the-u-s/">thousands of annual gun deaths</a> and the additional <a href="https://doi.org/10.1001/jamainternmed.2020.6696">thousands of nonfatal shootings</a> to be used as justifications for <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2022/05/28/us/politics/nra-convention-guns.html">restricting their rights</a> as law-abiding citizens.</p>
<p>They are willing to accept gun violence as an inevitable side effect of a free and armed but violent society.</p>
<p>Their opposition to new gun reforms as well as the current trends in gun rights legislation – such as <a href="https://www.politifact.com/article/2022/apr/12/more-states-remove-permit-requirement-carry-concea/">permitless carry</a> and the <a href="https://www.k12dive.com/news/efforts-to-arm-teachers-spark-new-and-old-safety-concerns/625562/">arming of teachers</a> – are but the latest manifestations of American gun culture’s deep roots in frontier mythology.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/nra-board-re-elects-ceo-wayne-lapierre-signaling-no-change-direction-rcna31132">Wayne LaPierre</a>, executive director of the National Rifle Association, the country’s largest gun rights group, tapped into imagery from frontier mythology and American gun culture following the Sandy Hook massacre in 2012. In his call to arm school resource officers and teachers, LaPierre adopted language that could have come from a classic Western film: “<a href="https://www.npr.org/2012/12/21/167824766/nra-only-thing-that-stops-a-bad-guy-with-a-gun-is-a-good-guy-with-a-gun">The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun</a> is a good guy with a gun.” </p>
<p>This view of a <a href="https://www.pbs.org/newshour/nation/how-the-good-guy-with-a-gun-became-a-deadly-american-fantasy">lone, armed person</a> who can stand up and save the day has <a href="https://www.vox.com/2022/5/25/23140519/uvalde-school-shooting-nra-texas-good-guy-gun">persisted ever since</a>, and provides an answer of its own to mass shootings: Guns are not the problem – they’re the solution.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/184932/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Pierre M. Atlas has been a life member of the National Rifle Association since 1997 (but has not made any financial contributions to the NRA since 1997). </span></em></p>A scholar of gun culture looks at the roots of Americans’ love affair with firearms – and their willingness to accept gun violence as a price of freedom.Pierre M. Atlas, Senior Lecturer, Paul H. O'Neill School of Public and Environmental Affairs, Indiana UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1848952022-06-23T14:50:35Z2022-06-23T14:50:35ZWhy Uber drivers aren’t unionizing in Québec<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/468243/original/file-20220610-28309-qtm2nc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The Uber model hinders any possibility of drivers acting collectively and generates significant cognitive dissonance among them.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>As of mid-June, the Uber platform will extend its services to the entire province of Québec. On a global scale, Uber is in nearly <a href="https://s23.q4cdn.com/407969754/files/doc_downloads/2021/07/Uber-2021-ESG-Report.pdf">10,000 cities and 71 countries and has more than 3.5 million workers</a>.</p>
<p>This model, based on on-demand work and the algorithmic distribution of tasks, fundamentally transforms ways of thinking about, organizing and carrying out work, both on an individual and collective basis.</p>
<p>The expansion of Uber’s service across Québec provides an opportunity to examine the reality of the work being carried out by thousands of drivers and delivery personnel in the province. What is their work day like? How do they make social connections?</p>
<p>To try to answer these questions, I observed Facebook groups of drivers and interviewed about 50 Uber workers in Québec.</p>
<p>As a doctoral student in communications at Université du Québec à Montréal and a research student at the Université du Québec’s Institut national de la recherche scientifique, my research examines the profile and motivations of Uber drivers, their ideas about collective action and, more generally, the psychosocial issues involved in work that is mediated by algorithms.</p>
<h2>Many encounters, but solitary work</h2>
<p>Although Uber workers encounter many people on a daily basis (customers, restaurant owners, passengers), their activity is essentially solitary. Their work takes place without ever meeting another human from Uber. Their registration on the platform is done online and their daily tasks are distributed to them by an algorithm through the Uber app.</p>
<p>If a problem prompts a driver to contact the company’s technical service, the people they interact with are located in <a href="https://www.degruyter.com/document/doi/10.1525/9780520970632/html">out-of-country call centres</a>. What’s more, the answers they get are most often formatted by scripts, reinforcing the robotic nature of their relationship to work.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/467558/original/file-20220607-18-79q23t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="man wearing a mask driving a car with an Uber badge" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/467558/original/file-20220607-18-79q23t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/467558/original/file-20220607-18-79q23t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/467558/original/file-20220607-18-79q23t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/467558/original/file-20220607-18-79q23t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/467558/original/file-20220607-18-79q23t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/467558/original/file-20220607-18-79q23t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/467558/original/file-20220607-18-79q23t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The organization of their work limits Uber drivers’ possibilities to socialize and hinders the possibility of forming a union.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>As for the few moments when workers might meet — in restaurants waiting for orders or in drop-off areas at airports — drivers’ interactions are limited to brief exchanges about the number of orders they got that day, as expressed by Katia, an Uber Eats delivery driver in Montréal:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>When I pass another delivery driver, I say “Hey Uber! Lots of business tonight,” or “Not much business tonight,” and that’s about it. After that, I probably won’t ever see them again, but if I do, I just say hello. I don’t even know their name.</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>A competitive atmosphere</h2>
<p>Uber drivers’ Facebook groups do provide a place to share information and vent about frustrating situations. However, these spaces play a very limited role in building a collective since they don’t make it possible for drivers to have extended conversations about work.</p>
<p>The architecture of the groups favours short-term interactions, with posts quickly fading into the thread. Constructive exchanges would require conversations over a long period of time in an atmosphere of listening and trust. However, the competition felt by drivers, combined with the brief and anonymous interaction mode of social networks, contributes to a hostile climate. As Diane, an Uber Eats delivery driver in Laval, says:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I think that the negative comments are made to discourage others because it’s not a group where we encourage each other. It’s a group where we try to discourage others, because it’s competition. If I want to earn a living, I have to run more races than you.</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>Collective action is a threat</h2>
<p>Surprisingly, this absence of a collective identity is not perceived as a problem by most of the workers I interviewed. Despite difficult working conditions over which they have no control, workers do not tend toward gathering and mobilizing in an effort to establish a power relationship with Uber.</p>
<p>While Uber drivers in other jurisdictions <a href="https://globalnews.ca/news/8816204/uber-union-reach-settlement-ontario-unionization-case/">have tried to unionize</a>, the idea of collective action is perceived as a threat by most of the Québec workers. The competitive climate pushes drivers to develop a repertoire of tactics and tinkering to stand out, as Bertrand, an Uber driver in Québec City, said:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>We all go to the Facebook group for the same thing, to find others like us and see if they can give us tips and tricks to better understand how it works, to get information. But we quickly understand that, no, we are all in the same boat, we are all there for our own pocketbook.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Among the tactics used to optimize their income, some drivers will, for example, call customers to find out their destination before picking them up. If drivers feel the trip is unprofitable, given the distance to the customer, they will cancel the trip. Others use two phones to maintain access to the map and show the location of the surcharge zones.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/467536/original/file-20220607-13238-andol3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Uber app on a Samsung phone showing several available cars" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/467536/original/file-20220607-13238-andol3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/467536/original/file-20220607-13238-andol3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/467536/original/file-20220607-13238-andol3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/467536/original/file-20220607-13238-andol3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/467536/original/file-20220607-13238-andol3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/467536/original/file-20220607-13238-andol3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/467536/original/file-20220607-13238-andol3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">In Québec, many Uber users appreciate the app’s ease of use and the convenience of the service.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>No sense of belonging</h2>
<p>To many workers, a work collective that strives to harmonize practices and replace individual tactics with collective strategies, looks like a loss of competitive advantage.</p>
<p>Now that Uber drivers’ struggles against cab drivers is over — thanks to <a href="https://globalnews.ca/news/5096891/taxi-drivers-protest-montreal-quebec-city/">the adoption of Bill 17 in 2020</a> which deregulated Québec’s taxi industry — they no longer share a common enemy.</p>
<h2>Fraught consequences</h2>
<p>Each driver has to learn how the business works and cope with its challenges on their own, cobbling together their own tactics, conscious that not all drivers benefit from the same resources. Moreover, drivers are deprived of the opportunity to develop a collective reaction about their working conditions. </p>
<p>The absence of meaningful exchanges, opportunities to listen and the presence of other drivers hinders the development of any meaningful relationships and solidarity between drivers. Their activity is reduced to their relationship with technology.</p>
<p>In fact, without the power to act collectively in the face of rigid working conditions, the dysfunctions and health problems of workers are always treated <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/278777956_Collective_work_and_rules_re-writing_process_a_way_of_workers%27_health">as isolated realities rather than as a consequence of the way their work is organized</a>. As Kader, an Uber driver in Montréal, puts it:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I’ve never opened my heart on the Facebook group. All I have to do is make one comment and I feel attacked by the others. Often, drivers who speak honestly are verbally attacked. Drivers are suffering. We could discuss it. But the climate we need to do this does not exist in the group.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The profiles of Uber drivers in Québec vary greatly. For example, the fact that it’s impossible to negotiate higher incomes does not have the same consequences for a Tesla engineer, who drives three hours a week to take their mind off things, as it does for an immigrant who works 60 hours a week to support their family.</p>
<h2>Low revenues and lack of transparency</h2>
<p>For some individuals being an Uber driver brings in extra income, but the model also takes advantage of the precariousness of a part of the population. Those who carry out the activity as their only source of income, often do so because they lack a better option. </p>
<p>Although the majority of the drivers I interviewed do not aspire to become employees and are reluctant to join a union, many deplore the low income and the platform’s lack of transparency over how the algorithm and the remuneration system work.</p>
<p>Faced with this situation, they see the government as the only stakeholder that could establish a power relationship with Uber and force the platform to offer better working conditions to its drivers.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/184895/count.gif" alt="La Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Lucie Enel has received funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, the Fonds de recherche du Québec - Société et culture, Centre interuniversitaire de recherche sur la science et la technologie, and the J.A. DeSève Foundation.</span></em></p>When it comes to dealing with Uber’s difficult working conditions, Uber drivers are on their own.Lucie Enel, Doctorante en communication, Université du Québec à Montréal (UQAM)Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1838502022-05-30T14:13:26Z2022-05-30T14:13:26ZKenya’s ‘patriotic’ choral music has been used to embed a skewed version of history<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/465751/original/file-20220527-23-mveqt7.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A choir performs during independence day celebrations in Kenya.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Yasuyoshi Chiba/AFP via Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Choral music – patriotic choral music in particular – is a significant genre in Kenya’s political history. </p>
<p>Patriotic music is defined by how it engages citizen to praise and express sentiments of national affiliation. In the Kenyan context patriotic choral music has been used to influence behaviour and the forming of a national identity. </p>
<p>We <a href="https://journals.co.za/doi/epdf/10.10520/EJC-f184b6256">traced the history</a> of the music to explore how it has been used in this way in the country. We found that songs that were composed and performed in the immediate aftermath of Kenya’s struggle for independence urged the public to forget colonial injustices to build the new country. </p>
<p>This music was used to create political heroes out of individuals at the expense of the hosts of people who contributed to the country’s independence. It continues to be used as a political tool. This is primarily done through a distribution network that involves airplay on both private and state broadcasters, and during national holidays. </p>
<h2>A long tradition</h2>
<p>Choral music was used to amplify former President Jomo Kenyatta’s widely publicised rhetoric of “forgive and forget”. </p>
<p>Kenya’s first president introduced the idea in his speech to the nation at the first celebration of Kenyatta Day – later renamed Mashujaa (Heroes) Day – on 20 October 1964. He <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/279155301_Jomo_Kenyatta's_Speeches_and_the_Construction_of_the_Identities_of_a_Nationalist_Leader_in_Kenya">proclaimed that</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>the foundation of our future must lie in the theme: forgive and forget.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>It would later become a motto closely linked to his presidency. His policies inaugurated a national culture of selective socio-political amnesia.</p>
<p>This persists in contemporary Kenya. </p>
<p>Most of the choral music composed and performed in Kenya as ‘patriotic music’ has been embraced and influenced by the government through the Permanent Presidential Music Commission (PPMC). </p>
<p>The commission was established in 1988 under President Daniel arap Moi, Kenya’s second president. The government agency deals with the entertainment functions of the state, among others. </p>
<p>Music researchers <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/40319249">Hellen Agak and Kakston Mindoti</a> observe that the commission scrutinises all Kenyan patriotic choral music to ensure that it conforms to the social and political ideals of the government. The commission also examines the quality of music and messages communicated.</p>
<p>Over different government regimes, patriotic choral music has been presented to the public through the national broadcaster and during state celebrations of national days. The music presented is curated through the commission. </p>
<p>During these celebrations, a few selected canonical choral pieces have continued to dominate through different governments and political regimes. </p>
<h2>The telling of history</h2>
<p>Our research focused mainly on the music of Enock Ondego, one of Kenya’s pioneer composers. Ondego’s ‘Huu ni Wimbo wa Historia’ (This is a Song of History) is perhaps the main choral composition that has persisted through different regimes.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/ixZ2Mg-fEb4?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>‘Huu ni Wimbo wa Historia’ was composed in May 1964. It was <a href="https://www.kwani.org/publication/kwanini-series/7/the_life_of_mzee_ondego.html">first performed</a> before President Kenyatta by the children of Samburu Primary School. </p>
<p>The song foregrounds the importance of the anti-colonial struggle in Kenya’s history. It opens with a plea to the audience to pay attention to the message. </p>
<p>It is a narrative of the experiences of different victims during the <a href="https://uca.edu/politicalscience/dadm-project/sub-saharan-africa-region/british-kenya-1920-1963/#:%7E:text=British%20Government%20Evelyn%20Baring%20declared,militants%20on%20October%2022%2C%201952.">1952 emergency period</a>. The lyrics suggest that the struggle for Kenya’s independence was a collective moral phenomenon. Lines 7 and 8 – “there was sorrow in the country Kenya” and “all the people were very sad” – capture this reality. </p>
<p>In lines 14 and 15, the song further explains that there was “matata” (trouble) and that “many people died because of freedom”. </p>
<p>Yet, the history documented in the choral song is a selective one.</p>
<p>Despite the promise of its title, ‘Huu ni Wimbo wa Historia’ foregrounds only Kenyatta’s involvement in the freedom struggle. It does this by focusing on the supposed physical and emotional violence he faced as an individual. This erases the contribution of everyone else in the country’s struggle for independence. </p>
<p>The song initially mentions that Kenyatta was arrested together with other freedom fighters. But the others remain unnamed and unacknowledged (lines 4, 5 and 6). </p>
<p>Lines 20, 21, 22 and 23 invoke the memory of how Kenyatta and other representatives travelled to Britain to negotiate for Kenya’s constitution. Again, the lyrics foreground Kenyatta only. The promise of a collective identified by the idea of ‘representatives’ suddenly collapses into the singular. </p>
<blockquote>
<p>When he reached there … he was beaten with rotten eggs … The father of the nation did not mind … he won and came back with a constitution for our country, Kenya. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Rather than recognising that Kenya’s constitutional victory was the result of collective endeavour, the song suggests that it was produced by the individual efforts of Kenyatta. </p>
<p>This silencing takes on added significance when considering the original naming of the commemorative day upon which this song reflects: Kenyatta Day. </p>
<p>The individuality cult of Kenyatta is central in understanding how music became a site where heroes were purged from Kenyan history, or where their role in the making of the nation was undermined. </p>
<p>Such narratives risk promoting socio-political, historical and even economic exclusion in the process of nation formation. </p>
<p>To echo literary professor Pumla Dineo Gqola’s work on <a href="https://witspress.co.za/catalogue/what-is-slavery-to-me/">postcolonial slave memory in South Africa</a>, forgetting and remembering are framed within power hierarchies, where “unremembering is a calculated act of exclusion and erasure”. </p>
<p>In the current government, songs such as ‘Huu ni Wimbo wa Historia’ continue to get significant airplay, especially on national holidays. </p>
<h2>Influencing memory and history</h2>
<p>By relying on such music for entertainment during state commemorative events, the presidential music commission plays a crucial function in statecraft, especially in the context of influencing memory and history. </p>
<p>But the musical and performance component of the songs also reveals that it is multi-layered. </p>
<p>The emotive tone and mood of ‘Huu ni Wimbo wa Historia’ demonstrate the immensity of the pain endured in the anti-colonial struggle. Feelings of despair and sorrow are painted through repetition and by onomatopoeic sounds, such as ‘woooi woooi’ (line 11). </p>
<p>Such sounds capture the general mourning response of the public not only to Kenyatta’s arrest, but also to the deaths and torture witnessed after the state of emergency was declared. </p>
<p>Hence, the song’s text seems to call for a celebratory turn towards the future, while simultaneously ruminating in the pain of the past through non-linguistic verbal signifiers that reach their full effect only in performance. </p>
<p>This shows that patriotic choral music in Kenya, although repeatedly used as a political tool, also shares the potential for contesting meaning and drawing listeners’ attention to different layers of significance embedded in musical texts.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/183850/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Music has often been used as a political tool to urge Kenyans to forget the sins of colonial and post-colonial regimes.Doseline Kiguru, Research associate, University of BristolPatrick Ernest Monte, Lecturer of Music, Kabarak UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1787582022-04-14T16:48:06Z2022-04-14T16:48:06ZIt’s the 40th anniversary of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, but recent protests show a serious misunderstanding of what those mean<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/453434/original/file-20220321-27-poiodt.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=1094%2C1224%2C6131%2C3596&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Protesters who think the government is restricting their 'right to freedom' misunderstand the way that rights require us to consider how our actions impact others.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Nicole Osborne</span></span></figcaption></figure><iframe style="width: 100%; height: 100px; border: none; position: relative; z-index: 1;" allowtransparency="" allow="clipboard-read; clipboard-write" src="https://narrations.ad-auris.com/widget/the-conversation-canada/it-s-the-40th-anniversary-of-the-charter-of-rights-and-freedoms--but-recent-protests-show-a-serious-misunderstanding-of-what-those-mean" width="100%" height="400"></iframe>
<p>Recent protests, like the so-called “<a href="https://globalnews.ca/tag/trucker-convoy/">freedom convoy</a>,” have denounced government action in response to the COVID-19 pandemic by claiming that government mandates like mask and vaccine mandates <a href="https://www.therecord.com/opinion/community-editorial-board/2022/02/17/so-called-freedom-convoy-protesters-dont-understand-what-freedom-means.html">infringe on their rights and freedoms</a>.</p>
<p>But using the rights discourse in protests is not new.</p>
<p>Many slogans relating to rights and freedoms used by protestors are decontextualized from <a href="https://caul-cbua.pressbooks.pub/aep/chapter/rights-and-privileges/">the history and theory of rights and freedoms</a>, which unfortunately oversimplifies what rights and freedoms really are. As a PhD student in philosophy, with a strong background in ethics and rights theory, I argue that while rights and freedoms language is politically and socially powerful, most people don’t understand what they are, which ones they are entitled to and the morally binding duties they require of others. </p>
<p>As April 17, 2022, marks the <a href="https://www.canada.ca/en/canadian-heritage/services/anniversaries-significance/2022.html">40th anniversary of the signing of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms</a>, it is important people learn what it means to have a right. </p>
<h2>The history of human rights</h2>
<p>After the Second World War, <a href="https://www.un.org/en/about-us/udhr/history-of-the-declaration">world leaders came together to develop the Universal Declaration of Human Rights</a> with the goal of preventing future human suffering and atrocities of war. </p>
<p>In the development of the declaration, <a href="https://www.un.org/en/about-us/udhr/history-of-the-declaration">various ethical theories</a> were used to articulate the kinds of rights that every person should be afforded. At the heart of this document is the right to human equality — “<a href="https://www.un.org/en/about-us/universal-declaration-of-human-rights">All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights</a>.”</p>
<p>The Universal Declaration informed the rights legislation in many countries — including the <a href="https://www.justice.gc.ca/eng/csj-sjc/rfc-dlc/ccrf-ccdl/index.html">Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms</a>. </p>
<p>And although formal human rights developments have helped governments and organizations understand what qualifies as basic human rights, the separation of rights from its <a href="https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/rights-human/">roots in ethical theory</a> has led to many misconceptions about rights and freedoms and, consequently, its misappropriation by protesters for their movements. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A document that says CANADIAN CHARTER OF RIGHTS AND FREEDOMS across the top." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/453440/original/file-20220321-14810-ihvbl3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/453440/original/file-20220321-14810-ihvbl3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/453440/original/file-20220321-14810-ihvbl3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/453440/original/file-20220321-14810-ihvbl3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/453440/original/file-20220321-14810-ihvbl3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=631&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/453440/original/file-20220321-14810-ihvbl3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=631&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/453440/original/file-20220321-14810-ihvbl3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=631&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">The official English version of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(CANADIAN PRESS/stf)</span></span>
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</figure>
<h2>Limits to freedoms</h2>
<p>Recent protesters claim that <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/deena-hinshaw-court-cross-examination-calgary-alberta-1.6408154">COVID-19 mandates restrict their freedom</a> because the government is forcing them to act against their will. They assume that, because we live in a free society, anyone can act however they want. </p>
<p>But this claim assumes that someone’s freedom to act trumps everyone else’s.</p>
<p>Simply by being a member of a society, our rights and freedoms are limited. When someone’s actions have the potential to harm other people, as stated in <a href="https://www.justice.gc.ca/eng/csj-sjc/rfc-dlc/ccrf-ccdl/check/art1.html">Section 1 of the Charter</a>, those actions are prohibited or punished. </p>
<p>For example, <a href="https://www.justice.gc.ca/eng/csj-sjc/rfc-dlc/ccrf-ccdl/check/art2b.html">freedom of expression is protected in Canada</a>, but this fundamental freedom is limited as soon as people’s speech and expression becomes hateful and harmful to specific groups or individuals. </p>
<p>When an action — like hate speech or refusing to follow COVID-19 mandates — is deemed harmful to others, the government can limit one person’s freedom to protect the rights and freedoms of others. </p>
<p>The government declared <a href="https://www.justice.gc.ca/eng/csj-sjc/covid.html">public health orders for COVID-19</a> because refusing to follow these recommendations puts others at risk of contracting the virus. </p>
<h2>Obligations to protect the rights of others</h2>
<p>In some protests, arguing that one has a claim to a certain right obscures how those rights may infringe on someone else’s. If we think that we have a right to something, we need to make sure that it seems plausible that <a href="https://caul-cbua.pressbooks.pub/aep/chapter/rights-and-privileges/"><em>everyone</em> has that right and that the right doesn’t impede the rights of others</a>. </p>
<p>This is further complicated by the question <em>who</em> is responsible for protecting these rights? Because, in short, <a href="https://ishr.ch/about-human-rights/who-protects-human-rights">the answer is all of us</a>. And this <a href="https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/rights-human/#GeneIdeaHumaRigh">universality makes it difficult to determine which rights someone can have</a> in the first place. </p>
<p>A key problem in rights theory is how <a href="https://broadviewpress.com/product/readings-in-health-care-ethics-second-edition/#tab-description">to balance the different kinds of rights we all hold</a> and how these rights require us to act towards others.</p>
<p>Often, protesters leave obligations out of the picture — including the obligations they have to other people. </p>
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<img alt="A man stands in front of a crowd holding a sign that says 'FREEDOM NOTHING ELSE'" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/453439/original/file-20220321-27-zl6svx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/453439/original/file-20220321-27-zl6svx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/453439/original/file-20220321-27-zl6svx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/453439/original/file-20220321-27-zl6svx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/453439/original/file-20220321-27-zl6svx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/453439/original/file-20220321-27-zl6svx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/453439/original/file-20220321-27-zl6svx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">A convoy supporter holds a sign on Parliament Hill to in support of trucks lined up in protest of COVID-19 vaccine mandates and restrictions in Ottawa, Ont., on Feb. 12, 2022.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Ted Shaffrey)</span></span>
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<p>Although the rights and freedoms discourse used in protest is impactful, the failure to discuss these nuances increases polarization on controversial issues. For example, one protest may focus on one or two rights and freedoms and the desire to protect those, while another stakes a claim to different rights and freedoms. </p>
<p>When both claim their rights and freedoms are being violated, it becomes difficult to evaluate which side’s rights are worth protecting. And when this happens we often align with the side that <a href="https://press.princeton.edu/books/hardcover/9780691175515/republic">most closely resembles our own beliefs</a>. </p>
<h2>Rights are not self-exceptional</h2>
<p>Instead of discussing who should be protecting people’s rights and freedoms and how they might conflict with the rights and freedoms of others, protest slogans end up perpetuating attitudes of <a href="https://caul-cbua.pressbooks.pub/aep/chapter/exceptionalism/">self-exceptionalism</a> and <a href="https://caul-cbua.pressbooks.pub/aep/chapter/selfishness-and-self-interest/">selfishness</a>.</p>
<p>Rights and freedoms were formally established under the assumption that <a href="https://www.sfu.ca/%7Eaheard/intro.html">everyone in society matters</a> and that as a society, we need to ensure necessary protections of everyone’s rights. The language used in protests oversimplifies what rights and freedoms are and <a href="https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1057%2F9780230523630.pdf">how everyone has moral obligations to protect the rights and freedoms of everyone in their community</a>. </p>
<p>On the <a href="https://www.canada.ca/en/canadian-heritage/services/anniversaries-significance/2022.html">40th anniversary of the signing of the Charter</a>, it is important to reflect on the rights Canadians share and, more importantly, understand that these rights entail responsibilities to each other. </p>
<p>Perhaps if misunderstandings about rights and freedoms were clarified, there would be a greater sense of unity. And if they matter as much as protesters believe, then we need to evaluate how the support for some rights and freedoms might infringe on the rights and freedoms of others.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/178758/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Clarisse Paron receives funding from the Nova Scotian government. </span></em></p>Our freedom is limited as soon as our speech and behaviour become harmful to other people.Clarisse Paron, PhD Student, Department of Philosophy, Dalhousie UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1791032022-03-17T02:30:36Z2022-03-17T02:30:36ZWhy ‘freedom’ is not the only thing worth fighting for<p>With just two months to go before a federal election is due, we are being bombarded by broadcast ads and yellow billboards around Australia. Funded by Clive Palmer and endorsing his United Australia Party (UAP), they carry a simple message: FREEDOM FREEDOM FREEDOM.</p>
<p>Commentators have talked about the potential <a href="https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/disaffected-and-mad-as-hell-palmer-wooing-a-changing-demographic-20211229-p59kn9.html">demographic</a> these ads are designed to attract, and the relationship of the messaging and Palmer to the anti-vax movement, “freedom rallies” and convoys. </p>
<p>Then there is the extraordinary amount of money spent on the ads: Palmer has spent more than $31 million since August 2021 on political attack advertising for the UAP. His spending <a href="https://www.theage.com.au/politics/federal/clive-palmer-spends-100-times-more-than-major-parties-on-advertising-20220218-p59xq4.html?utm_medium=Social&utm_source=Twitter#Echobox=1645353236-1">dwarfs the outlay of the major parties by a hundred-fold</a>. He has promised to run <a href="https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/clive-palmer-spends-100-times-more-than-major-parties-on-advertising-20220218-p59xq4.html">the most expensive election campaign</a> in the nation’s history, based on “freedom”.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/is-it-curtains-for-clive-what-covid-means-for-populism-in-australia-153101">Is it curtains for Clive? What COVID means for populism in Australia </a>
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<p>We should not underestimate the power of <a href="https://www.fdrlibrary.org/four-freedoms">freedom</a> messaging. As a society, we have experienced unprecedented constraints on normal freedoms over the past two years. Regardless of any justification for relevant restrictions, a visceral backlash from a significant number of people should not be surprising.</p>
<p>In late July 2021, we conducted a human rights survey of 1,000 people in Queensland. The following question, which was not mandatory, garnered about 800 valid responses: What are the human rights that are most important to you?</p>
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<p>While issues relating to equality and discrimination attracted the most responses, the combined total for “freedom of speech” and “freedom” generally was 28.7%. If we add “freedom from vaccines”, that goes up to 29.9%. </p>
<p>While many have dismissed the “freedom protests” across Australia as <a href="https://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/politics/queensland/conservative-and-fringe-links-behind-qld-anti-mandate-groups-20211208-p59g7k.html">fringe movements</a>, this survey indicates that nearly 30% of those who responded to this question felt “freedom” of some sort to be the most important human right. And this was in Queensland, which did not have the same experience of lockdowns as Victoria and New South Wales.</p>
<p>“Freedom” tends to denote a preference for government non-interference. But the responses regarding vulnerability and safety (which a combined 12.3% listed as their top priority human rights issues, and, arguably, economic social and cultural rights and equality/discrimination, for a combined 31.97%), tend to favour greater government intervention and action.</p>
<p>There were divergent views on this question among different demographics. For example, men were significantly more concerned than women about freedom of speech (19.6% compared to 13.7%) and civil and political rights (20% compared to 12.2%). </p>
<p>The oldest respondents were those most likely to choose “freedom”, and especially “freedom of speech”. First Nations respondents were much more likely to choose economic social and cultural rights (19% compared to 12.6%), and less than one-third as likely to choose civil and political rights (4.8% compared to 15.6%).</p>
<p>We found the higher the respondents’ level of education, the less concerned they were with equality and discrimination, while concern with civil and political rights increased. As a final example, concerns about “freedom of speech” and “freedom” were much higher among lower-to-middle-income groups compared to wealthier respondents.</p>
<p>The demographic differences are not easy to interpret. The results might indicate the groups that are traditionally more vulnerable to rights abuses (for example, women, First Nations people, the less educated) are more likely to prioritise rights that seem to require proactive government. </p>
<p>However, the results are not entirely in keeping with this observation. Concerns over freedom were more apparent among lower-income groups compared to higher-income groups, and among older Queenslanders.</p>
<p>What it clearly tells us, though, is that it is vitally important to reclaim the word “freedom” as a human rights concept. The political conversation this year needs to remind people that “freedom” is important, but other concepts also inform human rights. These are, notably, equality, fraternity and dignity: freedom is not absolute. </p>
<p>“Freedom to” and “freedom from” are rights that must be balanced against one another: for example, the right to make religious statements and the rights of trans children to an education. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-debate-about-religious-discrimination-is-back-so-why-do-we-keep-hearing-about-religious-freedom-169643">The debate about religious discrimination is back, so why do we keep hearing about religious 'freedom'?</a>
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<p>Government non-interference might, for example, seem desirable to many when it comes to personal choices. But it is certainly undesirable when, for example, people need help recovering from floods or in gaining access to medical treatment. </p>
<p>Opponents of the UAP should avoid anti-freedom messaging. They should focus instead on reclaiming the word <a href="https://time.com/5882978/freedom-definition-history/">freedom</a> as an emancipatory ideal that is a core component of human rights, but not the only one.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/179103/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Susan Harris Rimmer receives funding from the Australian Research Council and ONI.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Sarah Joseph does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>New research shows a large percentage of Australians value “freedom” as the most important human right – but politicians need to offer a more sophisticated version of that ideal.Susan Harris Rimmer, Professor and Director of the Policy Innovation Hub, Griffith Business School, Griffith UniversitySarah Joseph, Professor of Human Rights Law, Griffith UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1782872022-03-04T00:27:17Z2022-03-04T00:27:17ZHow protesters demanding ‘freedom’ from COVID restrictions ignore the way liberty really works<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/449645/original/file-20220302-15-1kiwk0p.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C5422%2C3530&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">GettyImages</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Like the many similar movements against vaccine mandates and other pandemic restrictions around the world, New Zealand’s protests have expressed a unifying concern with personal freedoms.</p>
<p>One of the highest-profile groups at the occupation of parliament grounds in Wellington was “Voices for Freedom”. The occupation itself began with a “freedom convoy”, and many of the signs and placards around the makeshift camp made “freedom” their focus.</p>
<p>And while that particular protest <a href="https://www.1news.co.nz/2022/03/02/parliament-grounds-closed-after-protest-comes-to-violent-end/">ended in chaos</a>, it seems likely the various movements behind it will continue to make “freedom” their rallying cry.</p>
<p>The extent to which personal freedoms are limited as part of living in a functioning society is ultimately a moral concern about the role of government. But this also requires a clear understanding of the nature of freedom in the first place, and what it means to be a free person in a free society. </p>
<p>At the heart of this lies the distinction between a narrow conception of freedom known as “negative liberty” and the wider concept of “positive liberty”. The former, seemingly preferred by the protesters, implies a freedom <em>from</em> imposed restrictions on people’s behaviour – such as lockdowns and vaccine passes or mandates. </p>
<p>The counter-argument is that reasonable restrictions, if justified to prevent significant harm from COVID-19, actually increase overall freedom. In that sense, the freedom <em>to</em> behave in certain ways becomes a “positive liberty”.</p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/449646/original/file-20220302-30478-1duhy1l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/449646/original/file-20220302-30478-1duhy1l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/449646/original/file-20220302-30478-1duhy1l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/449646/original/file-20220302-30478-1duhy1l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/449646/original/file-20220302-30478-1duhy1l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/449646/original/file-20220302-30478-1duhy1l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/449646/original/file-20220302-30478-1duhy1l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Negative liberty: a sign erected by protesters camped outside parliament buildings.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">GettyImages</span></span>
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<h2>Understanding liberty</h2>
<p>Drawing on a <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-lockdowns-dont-necessarily-infringe-on-freedom-149205">long intellectual tradition</a>, the philosopher Isaiah Berlin defined the two forms of liberty in an <a href="https://berlin.wolf.ox.ac.uk/published_works/tcl/tcl-a.pdf">influential 1958 lecture</a> at Oxford University. </p>
<p>Negative liberty, he said, means the absence of external obstacles or constraints, such as coercive interference by governments. </p>
<p>By contrast, positive liberty means the ability to do the things you want to do. It is associated with self-realisation or self-determination – being in control of one’s own destiny. The protest slogan “my body, my choice”, for instance, is an appeal to individual negative liberty – freedom from mandates and restrictions. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/what-are-the-rights-of-children-at-the-parliament-protest-and-who-protects-them-177356">What are the rights of children at the parliament protest – and who protects them?</a>
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<p>But it’s not possible to simultaneously maximise both negative and positive liberty. There are inevitably trade-offs. If the protesters had their way, New Zealanders would have more negative liberty but less positive liberty. Overall, we argue, people would be less free.</p>
<p>Nearly all laws restrict negative liberty, but their effect on positive liberty varies dramatically. For example, laws prohibiting theft restrict negative liberty — they restrict people’s freedom to steal with impunity. </p>
<p>But do such restrictions make you feel un-free? Quite the contrary, laws against theft increase positive liberty. They allow us to feel more secure, and because we don’t have to keep a constant eye on our property, we can do other things.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/449657/original/file-20220302-23-11ocsmb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/449657/original/file-20220302-23-11ocsmb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/449657/original/file-20220302-23-11ocsmb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/449657/original/file-20220302-23-11ocsmb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/449657/original/file-20220302-23-11ocsmb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/449657/original/file-20220302-23-11ocsmb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/449657/original/file-20220302-23-11ocsmb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Positive and negative liberty: Isaiah Berlin (standing) at a music festival in Britain in 1959.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">GettyImages</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Justified limits on liberty</h2>
<p>Thinking of freedom only through a lens of negative liberty involves a critical problem – it ignores the fact that our actions affect other people: the freedom to drink and drive restricts other people’s ability to use the streets safely; the freedom to smoke in public places exposes others to the potential harms of secondhand fumes. </p>
<p>In general, the choices we make – even concerning our own bodies and what we choose to consume – have moral implications for how and where we can participate in society. Giving people freedom to visit certain places while unvaccinated against COVID-19 <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10730-013-9221-5">restricts other people’s ability</a> to visit those places safely.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/what-the-freedom-convoy-reveals-about-the-ties-among-politics-police-and-the-law-176680">What the 'freedom convoy' reveals about the ties among politics, police and the law</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Vaccinated New Zealanders currently enjoy high levels of positive liberty. Life is nearly normal. Crucially, though, this freedom depends on policies designed to reduce the threat of the disease – high rates of vaccination, vaccine certificates and mandates for certain key roles, masks and temporary restrictions on large gatherings to reduce the spread.</p>
<p>Such policies constitute a slight loss of negative liberty. Without these policies, however, positive liberty would be much reduced. New Zealanders could not visit places like gyms, pools, restaurants and shops without fear of catching a potentially deadly disease. </p>
<p>New Zealand has <a href="https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/freedom-index-by-country">enjoyed more freedom</a> over the past two years than nearly anywhere else, but it has only been possible through restrictions on negative liberty to reduce the risk of COVID-19.</p>
<h2>Restriction and risk</h2>
<p>Isaiah Berlin was rightly concerned about the potential slippery slope towards totalitarian control inherent in <a href="https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/liberty-positive-negative/#ParPosLib">appeals to positive freedom</a>, as witnessed in the USSR where severe restrictions on speech, movement, assembly, literary expression and much else were imposed in the name of “freedom” (namely the freedom to be a good Soviet).</p>
<p>But slippery slopes can be resisted and the risk here seems slight. For COVID policies that restrict negative liberty to enhance overall freedom, they must be necessary to promote positive liberty, responsive to the evidence, and proportional to the threat. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/vaccine-mandates-for-nzs-health-and-education-workers-are-now-in-force-but-has-the-law-got-the-balance-right-171392">Vaccine mandates for NZ’s health and education workers are now in force – but has the law got the balance right?</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>One sign we are not on a slippery slope to totalitarianism: COVID restrictions change with, and are proportional to, the risk. Last year, when New Zealand had zero COVID-19 cases, lockdowns ended and restrictions were few; when the threat increased, restrictions did, proportionally.</p>
<p>Restrictions on negative liberty should be adopted with care and subject to continual review. All citizens, protesters included, are right to value freedom and to be wary of heavy-handed, top-down control. </p>
<p>But that is not the same as calling for an end to COVID-19 rules because such rules limit freedom. A clearer understanding of positive liberty allows us to see that restrictions designed to protect us from COVID-19 actually enhance our overall freedom.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/178287/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>There is a difference between ‘negative liberty’ and ‘positive liberty’. Real freedom involves unavoidable trade-offs between the two.Andrew Vonasch, Senior Lecturer in Psychology, University of CanterburyMichael-John Turp, Senior Lecturer in Philosophy, University of CanterburyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1770482022-02-18T14:27:40Z2022-02-18T14:27:40ZStatephobia on display at the ‘freedom convoy’<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/446598/original/file-20220215-23-1ag0wz6.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C3900%2C2598&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">People rally against provincial and federal COVID-19 vaccine mandates and in support of Ottawa protestors outside the Manitoba Legislature in Winnipeg on Feb. 4.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/John Woods</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><a href="https://ottawacitizen.com/news/local-news/trucker-convoy-traffic-disruption-continue-downtown-as-mayor-urges-protesters-to-leave">The “freedom convoy”</a> demands COVID-19 mandates must end to restore the right of the Canadian citizen to make their own decisions free from control and influence. </p>
<p>The belief that people are free to make their own decisions, so long as they are outside of government control, serves a specific purpose: it emphasizes the amount of power exercised by the government, while obscuring other forms of power that influence and shape their behaviour and choices.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.thestar.com/opinion/star-columnists/2022/02/12/convoy-shows-how-far-right-has-co-opted-concept-of-freedom.html">The so-called “freedom fighters”</a> who reject COVID-19 mandates <a href="https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0245900">are not any more free or autonomous</a> than the person who follows mandates. Rather, they are governed through different relations of power and knowledge. </p>
<p>Investigating how power is highlighted and obscured in particular moments can help people think critically about resistance, freedom and the post-pandemic future Canada wants to build. </p>
<h2>Freedom per the convoy</h2>
<p><a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/02/07/freedom-convoy-ottawa-canada-vaccine/">Convoy participants</a> have waved signs that read “Mandate Freedom,” “End the Mandates” and “No More Restrictions,” among others. </p>
<p>Many signs are infused with anti-government sentiments, including the “<a href="https://www.winnipegfreepress.com/local/convoy-protesters-embrace-us-revolutionary-symbols-576201392.html">Don’t Tread On Me</a>” flag associated with the American Revolution — it is important to note that the protest has been condemned for including symbols of <a href="https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2022/02/07/nazi-flag-at-freedom-convoy-sparks-bill-to-ban-hateful-symbols-but-enforcement-is-seen-as-tricky.html">white supremacy and violence</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A crowd of people holding signs. One visible sign says 'MANDATE FREEDOM' and another says 'God Bless Our Truckers.'" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/446595/original/file-20220215-19-17mtjic.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/446595/original/file-20220215-19-17mtjic.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=389&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/446595/original/file-20220215-19-17mtjic.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=389&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/446595/original/file-20220215-19-17mtjic.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=389&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/446595/original/file-20220215-19-17mtjic.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=489&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/446595/original/file-20220215-19-17mtjic.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=489&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/446595/original/file-20220215-19-17mtjic.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=489&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Blue coloured smoke forms a haze as demonstrators gather at Queen’s Park in Toronto on Feb. 5.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Nathan Denette</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>According to the mission statement from the <a href="https://www.fc2022.ca/the-mission">convoy website</a>, the goals of the protest are to:
1) End vaccine mandates that are “in violation of our human rights.”
2) End “totalitarian” measures that cause “economical and mental damage.”
3) Reopen businesses.
4) Free children from school closures.
5) Ensure freedom from the current administration.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.fc2022.ca/">The statement also argues</a> that continuing the mandates despite the ongoing spread of COVID-19 demonstrates that the Canadian government has been using mandates for their own purposes. They argue that along with <a href="https://www.fc2022.ca/">the media and scientific community</a>, the government is using the mandates to exercise control over the population and normalize overreach.</p>
<h2>Statephobia</h2>
<p>This resistance to, and fear of, the government is not unique to COVID-19. French philosopher Michel Foucault argued in the 1970s that “<a href="https://us.macmillan.com/books/9780312203412">statephobia</a>,” or fear of the state, became prominent through the 20th century due to the rise and fall of communism, Nazism and post-war planning, leading to economic recession. </p>
<p>These crises led to a strong shift towards limiting the role of government, out of concern that too much government intervention into the economy and civil society would lead to social and economic problems.</p>
<p>Statephobia has the tendency to lump multiple and distinct forms of government together into a single, monstrous state with significant power. This belief is on display at the “freedom convoy,” where they see government mandates, closures and lock downs <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/truck-convoy-protest-some-key-players-1.6332312">as proof</a> of the spread of communism, Nazism and an infringement on the rights of the individual. </p>
<p>The convoy’s comparison of Canada’s current government to <a href="https://www.vancouverisawesome.com/local-news/this-is-why-we-shouldnt-ban-books-trevor-noah-weighs-in-on-canadas-freedom-convoy-5056297">Nazi Germany</a> draws on previously existing statephobia from these historical events, and falsely conflates today’s Canadian state with prior state forms.</p>
<h2>Crises of government</h2>
<p>Foucault argued that the rise of statephobia led to a “crisis of government” in which citizens lost faith in their heads of state. <a href="https://us.macmillan.com/books/9780312203412">To maintain their legitimacy</a>, governments needed to balance their desire to manage individuals so that they become more efficient, healthier, and hardworking, without noticeably infringing on individual human rights.</p>
<p>To address this crisis, the management of the population shifted away from the realm of government towards nonpolitical entities like healthcare, therapy, religion, education and social services. People are not only governed through the state, but also nonpolitical entities that provide support for people.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A truck is covered in signs saying 'freedom' 'communism has no home here' and 'lest we forget'" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/446620/original/file-20220215-27-5hbp3d.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/446620/original/file-20220215-27-5hbp3d.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/446620/original/file-20220215-27-5hbp3d.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/446620/original/file-20220215-27-5hbp3d.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/446620/original/file-20220215-27-5hbp3d.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/446620/original/file-20220215-27-5hbp3d.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/446620/original/file-20220215-27-5hbp3d.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A ‘freedom convoy’ supporter is shown near the Ambassador Bridge in Windsor, Ont. on Feb. 14 after protesters blocked the major border crossing for nearly a week.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Nicole Osborne</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>This crisis of government has been at the forefront of COVID-19. Subtle methods of regulation have been <a href="https://antipodeonline.org/2020/05/05/thinking-through-covid-19-responses-with-foucault/">overtaken by overt methods</a>, like restrictions on public space. </p>
<p>The government now faces a crisis of legitimacy, as there are measures in place that act against the autonomy of the individual. </p>
<h2>Other forms of power</h2>
<p>Convoy participants are questioning the legitimacy of the government. Recent attempts to <a href="https://globalnews.ca/news/8617879/ontario-covid-restrictions-masks-vaccine-passports-announcement-ford/">remove mandates</a> might be evidence of public officials scrambling to regain lost legitimacy. </p>
<p>The idea that resisting and removing these mandates will lead to a freer state obscures the fact that people were governed before COVID-19 mandates, and will continue to be governed after they are gone. </p>
<p>Resisting the state out of fear of previous — often unrelated — crises can cause people to reject measures that help them, and ignore other non-governmental forms of power that harm us. </p>
<p>Rather than resisting orders simply because they come from the government, Canadians should reflect on the multiple forms of power that influence them and to what extent. The scepticism that is applied to mandates simply because they come from the government might be wrongfully placed. </p>
<p>Instead of succumbing to statephobia and rejecting public health measures altogether for the sake of assumed freedom, people should think critically about how these measures can be mobilized in service of the population to move towards a post-COVID-19 future.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/177048/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Sydney Chapados does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The convoy’s comparison of Canada’s current government to Nazi Germany draws on previously existing statephobia.Sydney Chapados, Doctoral Fellow, Sociology, Carleton UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1765222022-02-18T14:27:39Z2022-02-18T14:27:39ZCanada’s legal disinformation pandemic is exposed by the ‘freedom convoy’<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/446786/original/file-20220216-17-1uxnhia.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C4490%2C3124&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A person holds a copy of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms during the so-called freedom convoy protest on Parliament Hill. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Justin Tang</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The small minority of Canadian truckers protesting vaccine mandates have made international news, prompted <a href="https://theconversation.com/canada-in-crisis-why-justin-trudeau-has-invoked-the-emergencies-act-to-end-trucker-protests-177017">the invocation of Canada’s Emergencies Act for the first time</a> and spurred <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/sloly-ottawa-resigns-behaviour-leadership-1.6352295">the resignation of Ottawa’s police chief.</a></p>
<p>The self-styled “freedom convoy” descended upon Ottawa in the spirit of the <a href="https://www.britannica.com/event/United-States-Capitol-attack-of-2021">Jan. 6. 2021, raid on the U.S. Capitol</a>, unwilling to retreat. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.upi.com/Top_News/World-News/2022/01/29/canada-trudeau-moved-undisclosed-location-trucker-covid-protest-ottawa/3121643481386/">As Prime Minister Justin Trudeau initially hunkered down in an undisclosed location</a>, some protesters waved Donald Trump flags, <a href="https://www.macleans.ca/opinion/the-curse-of-the-convoy/">swastikas and Confederate flags,</a> and even hoisted the Tea Party’s signature “don’t tread on me” flag alongside their signature “Fuck Trudeau” signage.</p>
<p>The protesters oppose any further government intervention, even if aimed at mitigating the risks of a deadly virus that has already killed more than 34,000 Canadians, lessening the burden on health-care workers dealing with overflowing hospitals or protecting those with compromised immune systems or other vulnerabilities. </p>
<h2>Pseudo-legal language</h2>
<p>Crucially, the protesters have a list of demands they frame in pseudo-legal language. Canadian lawyers Richard Warman and Donald Netolitzky define <a href="https://www.canlii.org/en/commentary/doc/2020CanLIIDocs498#!fragment/zoupio-_Tocpdf_bk_1/BQCwhgziBcwMYgK4DsDWszIQewE4BUBTADwBdoAvbRABwEtsBaAfX2zhoBMAzZgI1TMAjAEoANMmylCEAIqJCuAJ7QA5KrERCYXAnmKV6zdt0gAynlIAhFQCUAogBl7ANQCCAOQDC9saTB80KTsIiJAA">pseudo-legal phenomenon</a> as “spurious concepts that sound like law, and which may use legal terminology, but that are otherwise unrelated to ‘true’ or ‘conventional’ law.” </p>
<p>At the apparent centre of the so-called “freedom convoy” movement’s ideology is the mistaken belief that any individual freedom or liberty is absolute. However, the Canadian Constitution compels a proportionate weighing of all Charter rights against the threat of COVID-19.</p>
<p>This isn’t to suggest any individual rights-based or Charter objection to scientifically grounded public health directives is automatically in bad faith, or pseudo-legal. Obviously, every claim must be measured on its merits. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="The official English document of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms with the Canadian flag prominently displayed." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/446808/original/file-20220216-13-8n6zj3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/446808/original/file-20220216-13-8n6zj3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/446808/original/file-20220216-13-8n6zj3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/446808/original/file-20220216-13-8n6zj3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/446808/original/file-20220216-13-8n6zj3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=631&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/446808/original/file-20220216-13-8n6zj3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=631&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/446808/original/file-20220216-13-8n6zj3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=631&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The official English document of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(CP PHOTO)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>But vaguely asserted and unspecified Charter claims about rights arising from COVID-19 mask and vaccine protocols aren’t the same as actual claims that can be measured or adjudicated. </p>
<p>Nonetheless, the legal profession must earn the authority, trust and esteem that’s invested in it. After all, lawyers — like doctors and other professionals — rely on public trust. </p>
<p>Some might suggest legal or medical opinions are just that — opinions. One medical doctor might think X and the other Y, and the same goes for any two lawyers. But this is rarely true. Most medical and legal opinions are based on facts — for example, vaccination <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2667193X21000612?via%3Dihub">is the best way to prevent hospitalization or death</a> from COVID-19 and the <a href="https://www.justice.gc.ca/eng/csj-sjc/rfc-dlc/ccrf-ccdl/check/art1.html">Charter is about the proportionate weighing of rights rather than their absolute enforcement.</a> </p>
<p>The protesters, after taking down their <a href="https://canada-unity.com/mou/">Memorandum of Understanding</a> pledging to bring down the federal government, acknowledged <a href="https://www.saltwire.com/atlantic-canada/news/were-not-lawyers-ottawa-protest-organizer-says-mou-not-meant-to-endorse-toppling-the-canadian-government-100691492/">that some misunderstanding had been created by the document</a>. They “clarified” that the spirit of the document was to bring “the government of Canada and all Canadian citizens into agreement; that the Charter of Rights and Freedoms should be upheld for all.”</p>
<p>We agree and suspect most everyone does. However, “freedom convoy” organizers continuously demonstrate through their words and actions that they grossly misunderstand the nature of the protections the Charter provides and the types of rights and freedoms it encompasses. </p>
<h2>Misunderstanding the Charter</h2>
<p>As Errol Mendes, a constitutional law professor at the University of Ottawa, has stated: <a href="https://www.hilltimes.com/2022/02/02/the-mou-says-everything-you-need-to-know-about-the-truckers-protest/341596">“Freedom is not absolute, and not being vaccinated endangers the freedom of others.”</a></p>
<p>Missing from pseudo-legal iterations of “rights” or “liberties” is an understanding of the careful balancing act of Canadian constitutional law. The <a href="https://www.justice.gc.ca/eng/csj-sjc/rfc-dlc/ccrf-ccdl/cases.html">Supreme Court of Canada</a> has repeatedly ruled that the freedoms we enjoy in a democratic society are not absolute. </p>
<p>On the contrary, Charter rights, from religious freedom to freedom of speech, are subject to Sec. 1 that “<a href="https://laws-lois.justice.gc.ca/eng/const/page-12.html">guarantees the rights and freedoms set out in it subject only to such reasonable limits prescribed by law as can be demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society.</a>”</p>
<p>As all first-year law students in Canada know, the definitive legal test for the application of Sec. 1 was set out by the Supreme Court of Canada in <a href="https://scc-csc.lexum.com/scc-csc/scc-csc/en/item/117/index.do"><em>R. v Oakes</em></a> when it stated:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“In each case courts will be required to balance the interests of society with those of individuals and groups.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p><a href="https://www.cbc.ca/listen/cbc-podcasts/209/episode/15893211">Although media coverage</a> on the convoy has shown a lack of uniformity in what supporters believe the movement stands for or even whether they’re really truckers, there is credible reporting that some leaders of the movement hold <a href="https://globalnews.ca/news/8543281/covid-trucker-convoy-organizers-hate/">white supremacist views</a> and have association with far right and <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2022/02/07/world/canada/canada-protests-right-populists.html">extremist causes</a> that pre-date the pandemic. </p>
<p>Organizers retracted their earlier manifesto that called for the overthrow of the government and Trudeau’s resignation, but they still appear to support this agenda. They count among their ranks <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/convoy-protesters-police-tactical-knowledge-1.6345854">Daniel Bulford, a former RCMP officer</a> involved with the prime minister’s security until he refused a vaccine. Bulford <a href="https://ottawa.ctvnews.ca/here-s-what-we-know-about-the-police-operation-to-end-the-freedom-convoy-occupation-1.5787483">has reportedly surrendered to police</a> after serving as the convoy’s head of security.</p>
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<h2>Misinformation vs. disinformation</h2>
<p>Our ongoing research considers <a href="https://www.hewlett.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/Social-Media-Political-Polarization-and-Political-Disinformation-Literature-Review.pdf">the role of misinformation and disinformation about the law</a>. Misinformation is false information that may be unintentionally spread, while disinformation is a broader category that includes information, typically encountered online, that could lead to misperceptions. </p>
<p>More insidious than misinformation, disinformation includes false information that is deliberately spread.</p>
<p>In our view, since the pandemic began, there are a small portion of lawyers who themselves risk promoting legal misinformation and disinformation that’s damaging to the integrity of the profession. At least one not-for-profit group in Canada that is affiliated with lawyers operates close to, or on, the margins of legitimate legal advocacy and the spread of pseudo-legal misinformation and disinformation. </p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.jccf.ca/">Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms</a> in particular blurs the line between misinformation, disinformation and legal advocacy in their public education efforts online by relying on propaganda films and hyperbolic language, among other techniques. Slightly less radical outfits like the <a href="https://theccf.ca/">Canadian Constitution Foundation</a> have an extreme libertarian litigation strategy with an increasingly narrow focus on COVID-19. </p>
<p>We fear that some members of the public might rely on websites of these sort to misunderstand the reality of the law and their rights. We call upon provincial law societies that regulate the profession to issue more and clearer guidelines on these matters. </p>
<h2>Manifesto espouses falsehoods</h2>
<p>An equally alarming pseudo-legal intervention is the “<a href="https://freenorthdeclaration.ca/">Free North Declaration</a>,” a bizarre manifesto created by a group of lawyers, most of whom have opted to remain anonymous (probably a wise choice). </p>
<p>The manifesto is also pseudo-legal because it is replete with misinformation and disinformation about the Charter and Canadian constitutional law, stating that “vaccine passports create the infrastructure for a global digital surveillance system” and that, “particularly for children and healthy young adults, (the vaccine) may be riskier than the virus.” </p>
<p>COVID-19 is not the only pandemic that is threatening Canada. So too is the spread of misinformation and disinformation about Canadians’ legal rights. Any argument that the Charter contains absolute rights is false. Canadians must be aware of the presence of misinformation and disinformation about the Charter and their relationship to COVID-19 health protocols. </p>
<p>If the trend continues unencumbered, it risks weakening the rule of law in Canada and eroding Canadian literacy about legitimate Charter rights.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/176522/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The Canadian Constitution compels a proportionate weighing of all Charter rights against the threat of COVID-19, meaning that individual freedom is not absolute.Jeffrey B. Meyers, Lecturer, Faculty of Law, Thompson Rivers UniversityEmily Dishart, Law Student, Legal Researcher, Thompson Rivers UniversityRose Morgan, Law Student, Legal Researcher, Thompson Rivers UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1766532022-02-17T17:31:50Z2022-02-17T17:31:50ZBlack and Indigenous protesters are treated differently than the ‘convoy’ because of Canada’s ongoing racism<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/446625/original/file-20220215-21-ol62s5.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=273%2C71%2C4268%2C3125&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Participants of the freedom convey have been facing minimal police and state interference. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Nathan Denette</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Since the beginning of the supposed “freedom convoy” in Ottawa on Jan. 28, there have been complaints about the failure of the police and government to protect its citizens from <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/truck-convoy-weekend-1.6340533">verbal harassment, noise pollution and, in some cases, hate speech</a>. Experts have connected the convoy to <a href="https://globalnews.ca/news/8543281/covid-trucker-convoy-organizers-hate/">white supremacist ideologies.</a> </p>
<p>Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/trudeau-premiers-cabinet-1.6350734">a national state of emergency</a> on Feb. 14, invoking the Emergencies Act for the first time in Canadian history. Ontario Premier Doug Ford called <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/ford-announcement-ontario-protests-1.6347810">a provincial state of emergency</a> on Feb. 11. However, the convoy had grown for days before these actions were taken. </p>
<p>The convoy protest began as a statement against vaccination requirements for truck drivers crossing the border between Canada and the United States. But trucker unions have distanced themselves from the convoy and said that <a href="https://globalnews.ca/news/8533779/truckers-convoy-canada-vaccine-mandate/">90 per cent</a> of their members are vaccinated. </p>
<p>Two questions immediately come to mind. Why did it take so long for police and governments to protect Ottawa residents and businesses from reportedly volatile protestors? And if the convoy was <a href="https://thestarphoenix.com/opinion/columnists/cuthand-authorities-response-to-convoy-protests-shows-white-privilege-in-action">organized by Black and Indigenous groups</a>, would the response by both the police and government have been more severe?</p>
<p>The Canadian historian David Austin has explored the politics of race and protest in his book <a href="https://btlbooks.com/book/fear-of-a-black-nation"><em>Fear of a Black Nation</em></a>. Given his analysis of police responses to Black protest in Montreal during the 1960s, it is clear that the failure of the police to protect the residents of Ottawa by controlling this protest earlier is a part of the legacy of colonialism in Canada.</p>
<h2>Protest and Black Lives Matter</h2>
<p>Putting these events in the larger context and history of social protests for equity, and recognition of rights by racialized groups in Canada, these concerns have some legitimacy. </p>
<p>In contrast to the tolerance the convoy was given, the Canadian state via its police forces has demonstrated a low tolerance to Black protests in the fight for equity and justice.</p>
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<p>For example, in 2016, on the very first day of a peaceful demonstration in Toronto, <a href="https://www.newswire.ca/news-releases/toronto-police-attack-peaceful-black-lives-matter-toronto-protestors-573027871.html">participants of the Black Lives Movement were beaten and gassed by the police.</a> Four years later, in Ottawa, a protest at a key intersection advocating for Black and Indigenous lives resulted in 12 people being charged and the <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/protest-ottawa-arrests-day-of-action-for-anishinabeg-1.5811276">protests being removed</a> within three days.</p>
<p>The response of city police departments across the country to the Black Lives Movement leaves little doubt about how these colonial underpinnings shape the operation of government institutions even today. </p>
<p>In his book <em><a href="https://www.penguinrandomhouse.ca/books/536075/the-skin-were-in-by-desmond-cole/9780385686341">The Skin We’re In</a></em>, Toronto journalist Desmond Cole said: the Canadian state “works exactly as it was designed to.” </p>
<p>He goes on to explain that state institutions, such as the police, are a product of a white supremacist ideology informed by white European colonial thinking and practice. This starts, of course, with the theft of land from Indigenous peoples.</p>
<h2>A long history of Black protest</h2>
<p>The pattern of using state infrastructure and the law to regulate and police Black people in Canada goes as far back as the 17th century.</p>
<p>Up until the 19th century, there were white people on Canadian soil who had the legal right to own the bodies of Black people. This was written into the law so that enslaved people were denied all rights – including <a href="https://doi.org/10.7202/1065793ar"><em>the right to live</em></a>. </p>
<p>Even back then, people of African descent were participating in acts of resistance that were precursors to the Black Lives Matter protests of the 21st century.</p>
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<p><a href="https://www.erudit.org/en/journals/onhistory/2007-v99-n1-onhistory04967/1065793ar/">In her extensive research on Upper Canada</a>, historian Afua Cooper has shown how Black people living under slavery resisted the unjust laws that kept them oppressed. Sometimes they protested their enslavement through legal challenges in the court system. Other times, they openly rebelled against the system that denied them their humanity. </p>
<p>A shared and common story told by Canadians is that Canada was a place of refuge for enslaved Black people fleeing the United States. Cooper’s research validates these notions, but she also shows something else. </p>
<p>She shows that some of the enslaved in Upper Canada escaped to parts of the United States that had already prohibited slavery, or were in the process of passing legislation. These were places such as Michigan, Ohio and New York. Therefore, a little told story is how Black people escaped slavery in Upper Canada to find freedom <em>south</em> of the border. </p>
<h2>Policing Black people</h2>
<p>The racism that justified the existence of slavery in Upper and Lower Canada found new forms of expression after abolition — not just in its laws and policies, but in the attitudes of its populace. </p>
<p>What made the systems of inequity particularly insidious in the Canadian context, is that many forms of discrimination existed in practice but not in law.</p>
<p>For example, when Black Nova Scotian <a href="https://digitalcommons.schulichlaw.dal.ca/dlj/vol17/iss2/1/">Viola Desmond</a> refused to leave the whites-only area of a cinema in 1946, she was not fighting against a particular racist law. She was fighting against racial segregation as accepted Canadian practice.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A woman is standing with a drum amidst a large group of seated protesters" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/446665/original/file-20220216-13-1sbsxf6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/446665/original/file-20220216-13-1sbsxf6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=437&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/446665/original/file-20220216-13-1sbsxf6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=437&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/446665/original/file-20220216-13-1sbsxf6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=437&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/446665/original/file-20220216-13-1sbsxf6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=550&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/446665/original/file-20220216-13-1sbsxf6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=550&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/446665/original/file-20220216-13-1sbsxf6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=550&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">First Nations Mahlikah Awe:ri along with thousands of demonstrators stands up against the racists attitudes institutionalized across various Canadian systems during the Black Lives Matter protest in Toronto in 2020.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Nathan Denette</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Similarly, when Black and Indigenous people protest today, they are not doing so in opposition to any <em>explicitly</em> racist laws. They are protesting the racist attitudes that inform accepted Canadian practice which has been institutionalized into the systems of policing, the courts and education. </p>
<h2>The right to protest</h2>
<p>It is these historically accepted Canadian practices that have guaranteed participants in the “freedom convoy” minimal police and state interference, as they assume the right to occupy public space while displaying racist symbols and simultaneously claiming to fight for freedom. </p>
<p>On Sunday, the Ottawa mayor’s office announced that it <a href="https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/article-ottawa-mayor-says-deal-with-convoy-protesters-could-clear-residential/">“reached an agreement”</a> with the organizers of the convoy to relocate some of trucks, but that the protest continued. </p>
<p>This is in sharp contrast to protests organized by racialized peoples. What is the way forward? </p>
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<p>The first step must be a recognition and admission that racist and discriminatory practices have been institutionalized — even if they are not explicitly stated. </p>
<p>The second step requires developing specific strategies and actionable steps that will address the colonial practice of violence against racialized people by the state and its supporting institutions such as the police. </p>
<p>Finally, there must be harsh repercussions for those acting on behalf of the state <a href="https://toronto.ctvnews.ca/opp-launch-investigation-into-officer-who-appeared-to-support-ottawa-convoy-protest-in-video-1.5779944">who support illegal protests</a> and violate the right of racialized Canadians participating in organized protests in the fight for equity and justice.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/176653/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Audra Diptée does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Participants in the “freedom convoy” have been allowed to carry on with minimal police and state interference in contrast to how Black and Indigenous protesters have been treated in the past.Audra Diptée, Associate Professor, History, Carleton UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1769592022-02-14T18:02:34Z2022-02-14T18:02:34ZAlleging a commitment to ‘freedom,’ the convoy takes a page from the Cold War playbook<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/446282/original/file-20220214-13-1sswv5g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C681%2C3960%2C1950&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A man holds a sign on Parliament Hill to support trucks lined up in protest of COVID-19 vaccine mandates and restrictions. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Ted Shaffrey)</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>With the end of the <a href="https://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/ambassador-bridge-reopens-after-week-long-protest-1.5779561">blockade at the Ambassador Bridge</a> and the deal brokered by the City of Ottawa to <a href="https://twitter.com/Tamara_MVC/status/1493072750642180103">remove trucks from residential areas</a>, it might appear that the so-called freedom convoy is winding down. But the challenge of how to proceed remains. </p>
<p>Trucks are still in Ottawa, just being moved to different locations, and the numerous <a href="https://globalnews.ca/news/8616147/paris-france-convoy-protest-covid-19-restrictions/">copy-cat protests</a> suggest that this movement has sparked something larger. </p>
<p>Prime Minister Justin Trudeau must not only figure out how to address the immediate situation, but also how to resolve the protest in a way that doesn’t further divide civil society and give fuel to anti-government sentiments.</p>
<p>One of the reasons resolving this issue is so complicated is that the protests are being organized under the banner of freedom and patriotism. </p>
<p>In Ottawa, people have <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-canadian-flag-and-the-freedom-convoy-the-co-opting-of-canadian-symbols-176436">adorned themselves and their vehicles in the Canadian flag</a>. They have dared local residents and government authorities to <a href="https://ottawacitizen.com/news/trucker-convoy-protest-enters-day-17-in-ottawa-arrests-in-windsor">challenge their patriotism</a>. </p>
<p>It is a powerful strategy because they are using the very nation-building tools that states and political parties have used historically in the United States and Canada.</p>
<h2>Principles of freedom</h2>
<p><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/news/2020/jan/07/freedom-without-constraints-how-the-us-squandered-its-cold-war-victory">Freedom as a nation-building tool</a> was perhaps most palpable in the four and a half decades of <a href="https://www.history.com/topics/cold-war/cold-war-history">the Cold War</a>, which pitted western democracies — “the free world” — against the communist bloc. </p>
<p>It was a period in which the use of rhetoric and propaganda on both sides was <a href="https://brill.com/view/title/16758">instrumental in shaping the conflict</a> and the expectations that people had of the world in which they lived. As <a href="https://winstonchurchill.org/resources/speeches/1946-1963-elder-statesman/the-sinews-of-peace/">British Prime Minister Winston Churchill proclaimed</a> in 1947, the west stood for “the great principles of freedom and the rights of man.”</p>
<p>The rhetoric of freedom was <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195399684.001.0001">especially pronounced when refugee movements</a> provided an opportunity for the United States and its western allies to gain value propaganda points. </p>
<p>In 1954, when Vietnam was divided into the communist-controlled Democratic Republic of Vietnam and the State of Vietnam, the U.S. Navy organized “<a href="https://www.history.navy.mil/content/history/museums/nmusn/explore/photography/humanitarian/20th-century/1950-1959/1954-1955-vietnam-operation-passage-to-freedom.html">Operation Passage to Freedom</a>” which relocated 300,000 people from the communist north to the free south. </p>
<p>The U.S. Navy didn’t just undertake this operation quietly: ships were emblazoned with slogans that spoke to the spirit of the mission.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="People are boarding a ship, a big banner reads 'this is your passage to freedom'" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/446274/original/file-20220214-27-81io7y.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/446274/original/file-20220214-27-81io7y.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=429&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/446274/original/file-20220214-27-81io7y.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=429&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/446274/original/file-20220214-27-81io7y.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=429&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/446274/original/file-20220214-27-81io7y.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=539&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/446274/original/file-20220214-27-81io7y.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=539&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/446274/original/file-20220214-27-81io7y.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=539&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">‘Operation Passage to Freedom’ loads up passengers who wanted to leave North Vietnam.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:80-G-647057.jpg">(National Archives 80-G-647057)</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>The ‘freedom fighter’</h2>
<p>In November 1956, students and workers sought to overthrow <a href="https://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Hungarian_Revolution_of_1956">the Stalinist government of Mátyás Rákosi in Hungary</a>. The revolt was quickly suppressed, but out of that defeat emerged the undaunted spirit of the “<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/20/world/europe/hungary-refugee-1956.html">freedom fighter</a>,” somebody who was willing to die for their ideals, beliefs in freedom and democracy. </p>
<p>Although neighbouring countries — namely Austria — received the vast majority of the refugees, the U.S. and Canada resettled 38,000 and 30,000 refugees respectively, giving substance to the idea of freedom. </p>
<p>As <a href="https://archive.macleans.ca/article/1957/1/19/dear-mr-pickersgill-thanks-for-the-hungarian-refugees">an editorial in <em>Maclean</em>’s</a> observed: “Our brave phrases in the UN would sound awfully hollow in Eastern Europe if we didn’t show that Canada is, and always will be, a haven for those who must flee from tyranny.”</p>
<p>In the U.S., <a href="http://content.time.com/time/covers/0,16641,19570107,00.html"><em>Time</em> named the “Hungarian Patriot”</a> or the “Hungarian freedom fighter” its man of the year. The 1957 issue featured an image of a proud fighter holding a gun, with tanks and a shredded Hungarian flag in the background. The cover story declared that the freedom fighter had “shaken history’s greatest despotism to its foundations.”</p>
<h2>A bid for freedom</h2>
<p>As cultural studies scholar <a href="https://www.dukeupress.edu/the-gift-of-freedom">Mimi Nguyen has underscored</a>, the idea of freedom was again used as a powerful tool following the <a href="https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/u-s-withdraws-from-vietnam">American defeat in Vietnam in 1975</a> when the U.S. airlifted out thousands of people who had worked with the military or with civilian authorities. </p>
<p>As communist oppression worsened in subsequent years, people began to leave by boat, often in dangerous conditions, leading to an <a href="https://www.history.com/news/vietnam-war-refugees">international refugee crisis by 1979</a>. </p>
<p>In September 1976, Captain Bryan Oag Hunter Brown rescued 31 passengers from a leaking vessel in the South China Sea. Reflecting <a href="https://mqup.ca/running-on-empty-products-9780773548817.php">on their travails, Captain Brown wrote</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>The story for these Vietnamese is far from over but they were very lucky. They were originally from North Vietnam and flew south when the north turned communist. Now they have flown again this time, they hope and believe the American propaganda, to a land of freedom … They are alive, free and at least have some hope.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>He then mused: “How many have perished in their bid for freedom?”</p>
<p>Captain Brown’s words remind us of the powerful draw that the idea of freedom has had on the hearts and minds of people globally. It has propelled people to rise up, to resist, and in some cases to flee oppression. </p>
<p>But as a look back at the Cold War era suggests, it is also a concept that has long been politicized, and used to create enemies of those who think differently.</p>
<h2>A divisive tool</h2>
<p>In the context of the Cold War, it was state authorities, especially in the U.S. but also in Canada, who used the language of freedom to convince citizens and non-citizens alike of the virtue of their societies and their international interventions. </p>
<p>This time, with the “freedom convoy,” protesters are turning the language of freedom against their own governments. The implications, and repercussions of this, are enormous and go beyond the immediate question of how to resolve the various occupations and protests. </p>
<p>Governments know all too well — for it is a strategy they have used themselves — that the language of freedom is a powerful ideological tool, and a divisive one.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/176959/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Laura Madokoro does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>‘Freedom convoy’ protesters are turning the language of freedom against their own governments. The implications and repercussions of this are enormous.Laura Madokoro, Associate Professor, Department of History, Carleton UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1763362022-02-06T14:51:40Z2022-02-06T14:51:40ZWhose freedom is the ‘freedom convoy’ fighting for? Not everyone’s<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/444391/original/file-20220203-13-1qf1jw1.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=15%2C7%2C5187%2C3455&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A person holds a sign for the "freedom convoy" a cross-country convoy protesting a federal vaccine mandate for truckers, as people rally against COVID-19 restrictions on Parliament Hill.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Justin Tang</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The so-called “freedom convoy” has captured <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-60190452">worldwide attention</a> as a minority of truckers and their supporters have asserted their <a href="https://ccla.org/our-work/fundamental-freedoms/right-to-protest/">right to assemble</a> and oppose COVID-19 protocols imposed by the federal, provincial and territorial governments. No problem there. </p>
<p>The problem lies in what’s not being said or acknowledged. </p>
<p>The one-word rallying cry — freedom — is the activist mantra. Who could be against freedom? But let’s take stock of the freedom that some have exercised during the ongoing rally:</p>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://www.cnn.com/2022/01/31/us/ottawa-soup-kitchen-donations-truck-protesters-trnd/index.html">Descending upon a soup kitchen</a>, intimidating staff and demanding to be fed — all without masks. </li>
<li><a href="https://www.cnn.com/2022/01/30/americas/ottawa-canada-convoy-protests/index.html">Desecrating war memorials</a> that pay tribute to those who fought for the very freedoms the convoy supporters enjoy. </li>
<li><a href="https://nationalpost.com/news/politics/covid-19-freedom-convoy-2022-news-2">Defecating in public</a>, including on the property of people whose home displays a Pride flag. </li>
<li><a href="https://ottawa.ctvnews.ca/downtown-ottawa-mall-remains-closed-sunday-due-to-convoy-protest-1.5760081">Overrunning malls and shops</a> that have forced many to shut down, thereby denying the shop owners’ and employees freedom to earn a living. </li>
<li><a href="https://www.thestar.com/politics/2022/01/30/a-list-of-closures-and-disrupted-services-due-to-demonstrations-in-ottawa.html">Shutting down schools</a> in the wake of rallies, denying parents the freedom to go to work and children their freedom to go to school.</li>
<li><a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/31/world/canada/trudeau-truckers-anti-vax-protests.html">Uttering racist and threatening comments</a>, making many people in Ottawa’s downtown <a href="https://ottawa.ctvnews.ca/video?clipId=2372869">feel generally unsafe</a>.</li>
</ul>
<p>In the tantrum for so-called freedom, the majority of participants have not denounced or condemned these reprehensible, well-documented behaviours which, notably, <a href="https://www.nationalobserver.com/2022/02/01/opinion/its-not-clear-whether-ottawa-police-took-permissive-approach-trucker-protestors">have gone mostly without consequence</a>.</p>
<p>It’s worth noting that a freedom they’re demanding — the right to refuse COVID-19 vaccinations without curtailing their livelihood — poses immense risk not only <a href="https://www.factcheck.org/2021/09/covid-19-the-unvaccinated-pose-a-risk-to-the-vaccinated/">to themselves but to everyone else</a>, while also <a href="https://toronto.ctvnews.ca/ontario-woman-with-stage-4-colon-cancer-has-life-saving-surgery-postponed-indefinitely-1.5739117">draining the health-care system and denying treatments for others</a>.</p>
<h2>Whose freedom?</h2>
<p>But what might “freedom” mean to other Canadians? </p>
<p>Ask Indigenous people about freedom. Ask them about <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-canada-committed-genocide-against-indigenous-peoples-explained-by-the-lawyer-central-to-the-determination-162582">centuries of abuse and genocide</a> at the hands of colonists. Ask them about the <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/program/fly-on-the-wall/2021/11/4/canadas-residential-school-legacy">legacies of residential school horrors and abuse</a>. Ask them about the devastation of the <a href="https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2022/02/01/sharing-sixties-scoop-story-important-for-other-survivors-government-canadians-says-author.html">‘60s scoop</a> and continued government control over child welfare. </p>
<p>Ask Indigenous people about the <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/saskatchewan/point-of-view-kerry-benjoe-racism-george-floyd-canada-indigenous-1.5632918">ongoing subtle and overt racism</a> they face from Canadians every day. Where is their freedom from bigotry and prejudice that <a href="https://www.theglobeandmail.com/business/commentary/article-canada-must-face-its-deep-systemic-racism-against-indigenous-people/">continues to flourish</a>? </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A person walks on a sidewalk as a long banner that reads 'freedom' trails behind them." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/444392/original/file-20220203-23-wshoum.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/444392/original/file-20220203-23-wshoum.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=407&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/444392/original/file-20220203-23-wshoum.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=407&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/444392/original/file-20220203-23-wshoum.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=407&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/444392/original/file-20220203-23-wshoum.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=511&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/444392/original/file-20220203-23-wshoum.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=511&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/444392/original/file-20220203-23-wshoum.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=511&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A person walks towards Parliament Hill for a rally against COVID-19 restrictions.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Justin Tang</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Ask Muslim Canadians about their freedom from ignorance and discrimination in the form of <a href="https://globalnews.ca/news/8174029/9-11-islamophobia-canada/">Islamophobia</a> expressed in <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/hate-motivated-assault-ottawa-1.6224536">verbal and physical assault</a> and even <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/longform/2022/1/28/five-years-on-quebec-mosque-attack-still-haunts-muslim-community">mass murder</a>. </p>
<p>Ask Asian Canadians about <a href="https://www.uvic.ca/news/topics/2022+expert-qa-anti-asian-racism+expert-advisory">intolerance and racism</a> from other Canadians who blame them for COVID-19. Where is their freedom from the sheer stupidity of others? </p>
<p>Ask women and girls who continue to face sexism, sexual harassment, sexual assault and sexual exploitation at the hands of men. What about their freedom from <a href="https://canadianwomen.org/the-facts/gender-based-violence/">gender-based violence</a>?</p>
<p>Ask trans people who <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/anti-transgender-narratives-canada-1.6232947">regularly have to deal with transphobia</a>. Ask people who are immigrants, disabled, poor, overweight, speak a language other than English. Ask any of the <a href="https://www.equalityhumanrights.com/sites/default/files/research-report-56-processes-of-prejudice-theory-evidence-and-intervention.pdf">usual targets of social prejudice</a>, ignorance, discrimination and hate about how their freedoms are constantly trampled on by other Canadians. </p>
<h2>Not everyone’s freedom</h2>
<p>Freedom is important, but many Canadians aren’t being considered by the “freedom convoy.” </p>
<p>I have been conducting research on social exclusion and prejudice since 1996. It is my job to listen to people tell their stories in the classes that I teach. I listen carefully to the experiences of exclusion, ridicule and discrimination marginalized people face in a country that is supposedly equal for all. Maybe the “freedom convoy” should likewise listen carefully.</p>
<p>I also know about freedom first-hand. As a queer Canadian, <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/prince-edward-island/pei-egale-canada-survey-lgbtq-youth-homophobia-1.6073698">I can attest to how homophobia</a> raises its ugly head any time, anywhere. We don’t have the freedom to be ourselves the way many straight, cisgender people take for granted. </p>
<p>When I hear people at the rally passionately advocate for their freedom, but not others, I can’t help but see ignorance. Fortunately, <a href="https://www.seattletimes.com/opinion/education-is-the-antidote-to-ignorance/">education is a remedy for ignorance</a>. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/LHhbdXCzt_A?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">This scene from Seinfeld humorously captures the tension between individualism and the consideration of others.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The human rights struggles over the decades that continue to play out in Canada are about freedom. That is what <a href="https://historyofrights.ca/">Canada’s human rights history</a> and the <a href="https://humanrights.ca/">Canadian Museum for Human Rights</a> make clear — as do research hubs such as the <a href="https://chrr.info/">Centre for Human Rights Research</a>.</p>
<p>What this “freedom convoy” is really about is self-interest. It is a petulant demand for participants to be able to do whatever they want, whenever they want, regardless of anyone else. Freedom is limited to what they can see in the mirror.</p>
<p>Instead of a self-serving, diesel-stinking, neighbourhood-clogging mob that is having such an adverse effect on the freedom of others, they should consider going home and learning about Canada from the perspectives of others. </p>
<p>At home, no masks are required.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/176336/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Gerald Walton does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Instead of a self-serving, diesel-stinking, neighbourhood-clogging mob that negatively impacts the freedom of others, the convoy should consider going home and learning about different perspectives.Gerald Walton, Professor in Education of Gender, Sexuality and Identity, Lakehead UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1689472021-10-06T14:18:09Z2021-10-06T14:18:09ZCombating COVID-19 anti-vaxxers: lessons from political philosophy<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/424223/original/file-20211001-22-1otz9lz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Challenging the scepticism and resistance in the public response to the COVID-19 vaccine is deeply important to the state of public health. This is a critical conversation because people are protesting the COVID-19 vaccines not just in South Africa, but globally too. </p>
<p>As a teacher of political philosophy, I think it’s important to dispel the notion that the call to vaccinate is an infringement on acceptable liberal freedoms. </p>
<p>Based on a significant number of years of studying, reading and teaching the works of the world’s most important philosophies, I am of the view that the anti-vaxxer position that being “forced to take the vaccine is an infringement on their liberal rights” is a misinformed stance. </p>
<p>Through a liberal lens that looks at <a href="https://www.open.edu/openlearn/history-the-arts/culture/philosophy/two-concepts-freedom/content-section-3.3">positive freedom</a> versus <a href="https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/liberty-positive-negative/">negative freedom</a>, I want to show how taking the vaccine essentially creates positive (or nett) freedom. Anti-vaxxers against the COVID-19 vaccine may be considered selfish by demanding freedom in an absolute sense. Negative freedom supports the idea that there should be no restrictions or boundaries on any free activity. This can become incredibly problematic when it comes to public health.</p>
<p>For example, think of restricting where people can smoke. These are in place to ensure that the majority of people (non-smokers) are protected from the risks associated with passive smoke inhalation.</p>
<p>In a similar vein, anti-vaxxers should perhaps be reprimanded and regulated for not willingly taking the COVID-19 vaccine. The ethical focus is to promote universal immunisation and positive freedom for everyone in society.</p>
<p>The liberal philosophies that we might use to challenge the “anti-vaxxer’s freedom to choose” position are <a href="https://philpapers.org/rec/BENITT">Jeremy Bentham’s (1789) Utilitarianism</a>, <a href="https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/mill-moral-political/">JS Mill’s (1859) Harm Principle</a> and <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/3877074">Isiah Berlin’s (1969) reflections on Positive Freedom</a>. </p>
<p>This trajectory of liberal thought over the last 200 years is pivotal to the development of the liberal democratic freedoms we experience today. Let’s unpack the theories a little more.</p>
<h2>What the philosophers have to say</h2>
<p>Let me start by addressing the philosophical dilemma of the anti-vaxxer’s “freedom to choose”.</p>
<p>The need to maintain individual freedoms is the most important mandate of the modern liberal state. </p>
<p>Today’s liberal democratic understanding of freedom (with acceptable restraint) was an idea first conceived over 200 years ago. In political philosophy, Jeremy Bentham’s (1789) Utilitarianism suggests that policies should be created to provide the greatest amount of felicity (or happiness) for the largest portion of society. </p>
<p>This forms the crux of the conversation surrounding COVID-19 vaccinations. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/south-africas-immunisation-record-risks-being-dented-by-anti-vaccination-views-153549">South Africa's immunisation record risks being dented by anti-vaccination views</a>
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<p>Presently, it is understood that for the sake of public health and the “common good”, all citizens should take one of the certified COVID-19 vaccinations. The reason for this is that it will create a greater nett freedom for everyone in that given society. </p>
<p>The alternative is absolute and unrestrained freedom not to vaccinate, which puts pressure on our common freedoms and could prolong lockdown measures.</p>
<p>Continuing this theme on a positive application of freedom, J.S. Mill (1859) provides us with a sophisticated ethical proposition, the <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/utilitas/article/john-stuart-mills-harm-principle-and-free-speech-expanding-the-notion-of-harm/F1D77D5D5F9A4B8AA3BAD4058A9708B4">Harm Principle</a>. This principle suggests simply that we should be free to pursue our individual will, as long as it does not cause harm to someone else. </p>
<p>Whereas it may be an indirect influence, this principle nestles neatly into the ethical position held by many laws and policies passed in liberal democratic societies.</p>
<p>Many countries, including South Africa, have used it in public smoking legislation for instance, by regulating smokers to confined areas in public so that they do not bring harm to non-smokers.</p>
<p>This leads us to ask the same questions about the freedom of movement of unvaccinated people in public. It is unquestionable that someone who refuses the COVID-19 vaccine could effectively bring harm to their broader community. The science is clear on this, crowded hospitals all over South Africa are reporting that almost all COVID-19 related hospitalisations are presently coming from the unvaccinated portion of society. This creates a further detriment to the implementation of positive freedom in society.</p>
<p><a href="https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/berlin/">Isaiah Berlin</a>’s (1969) thoughts on positive freedom best diagnoses the dilemma of the anti-vaxxer, as it allows us to ponder their desire for the unrestrained “freedom to choose”. </p>
<p>Absolute and unrestrained freedom is also known by theorists as negative freedom. While negative freedom may sound enticing, it could be severely detrimental to society and communities if applied strictly. It is acceptable in a progressive society that we accept limitations on our freedom, so as not to infringe on the freedoms of others. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/compulsory-covid-19-vaccination-in-nigeria-why-its-illegal-and-a-bad-idea-167396">Compulsory COVID-19 vaccination in Nigeria? Why it's illegal, and a bad idea</a>
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<p>It is important then to convey that the verifiable science on vaccines should not be politicised further.</p>
<p>There is also a link to be made between the African communitarian philosophy of <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-archbishop-tutus-ubuntu-credo-teaches-the-world-about-justice-and-harmony-84730">Ubuntu</a> (Humaneness) and positive freedom. Ubuntu remains somewhat of a clichéd call to civic nationalism and the fostering of a mutual help society in a fractured South Africa. </p>
<p>However, the isiZulu phrase, <em>Umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu</em>, (I am, because we are) proves an important building block in society. “I am because we are” simply implies that: I am part of my community, where the good I do reflects back onto the society. This can be incredibly significant in the face of vaccine scepticism and anti-vaccination ideas. </p>
<p>South Africans in particular should heed the call of Ubuntu to mobilise toward vaccination, as it advocates for the “common good” and encourages communitarian benefits for broader society. This in turn promotes positive freedom.</p>
<h2>What it adds up to</h2>
<p>There are many debates to be had in an evolving society where freedom of speech and choice will take centre stage. But, in my view, the COVID-19 vaccination shouldn’t be one of them. Armed with ideas such as utilitarianism and the harm principle, the application of positive freedom might see many liberal democracies eventually prohibit the anti-vaxxer’s spread of misinformation and protests against vaccination.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/why-covid-19-vaccines-should-be-mandatory-in-south-africa-165682">Why COVID-19 vaccines should be mandatory in South Africa</a>
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<p>It is imperative that citizens are made to understand that this is a matter of public health, the science is verifiable, and that 99.9% of the global medical community backs the rollout of the COVID-19 vaccine. </p>
<p>Hence, getting vaccinated is for the “common good” of society and promotes the more desirable aspects of positive freedom.</p>
<h2>There is no time to delay</h2>
<p>South Africa is a tinderbox for COVID-19 outbreaks and potential virus mutation. Embracing positive freedom’s emphasis on utility and minimising harm, while emphasising the communitarian benefits of vaccinating, provides a clear imperative for action. </p>
<p>The country needs to vaccinate as quickly as possible so that its people can return to some semblance of normal life. A life where all can freely pursue their goals, remaining mindful that freedom without reasonable restraint will inevitably bring harm to others.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/168947/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Giovanni Poggi does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Many countries, including South Africa, use regulations to control smoking in public so that they do not harm non-smokers. Likewise, getting vaccinated is for the common good of society.Giovanni Poggi, Lecturer in Political Science, Nelson Mandela UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.