tag:theconversation.com,2011:/au/topics/twin-peaks-12781/articlesTwin Peaks – The Conversation2023-09-12T12:28:43Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2104362023-09-12T12:28:43Z2023-09-12T12:28:43ZWhy ‘Barbie’ and ‘The Little Mermaid’ made 2023 the dead girl summer<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/546713/original/file-20230906-15-7eas9t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C2946%2C1666&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">In one sense, Barbie is already dead, cheerfully doomed to repeat the same pink day, devoid of food, conflict and sex.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/nicole-morson-looks-at-a-barbie-of-swam-lake-doll-and-news-photo/2571814?adppopup=true">Chris Hondros/Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Ariel and Barbie have quite a bit in common: They’re both frozen in time, and they both yearn to live as humans do.</p>
<p>The fantastic seascapes and perfect dollhouses of “<a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt5971474/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0_tt_8_nm_0_q_the%2520little%2520merma">The Little Mermaid</a>” and “<a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1517268/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0_tt_5_nm_3_q_barbie">Barbie</a>” might appear whimsical. But I see these settings – and the characters who inhabit them – as figurations of death. </p>
<p>In my forthcoming book, I consider the relationship between mermaids and Barbie dolls. In the case of the 2023 films, I couldn’t help but think about how Ariel and Barbie make the same ironic choice: to leave the stasis of their deathlike existence for a human life – which ends in death. </p>
<p>These dead girls offer insights about living. Embracing death’s inevitability brings some freedom, as well as access to truths about time and the natural world.</p>
<h2>‘I am dead yet I live’</h2>
<p>Ariel and Barbie are not your typical dead girls – at least in the literary sense.</p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.harpercollins.com/products/dead-girls-alice-bolin?variant=32217989677090">dead girl trope</a> goes back to <a href="https://www.folger.edu/explore/shakespeares-works/hamlet/read/4/5/">Shakespeare’s Ophelia</a>, who drowns herself after being driven to madness by Hamlet’s erratic, abusive speech. But dead girls have long populated folktales about <a href="https://sites.pitt.edu/%7Edash/type0410.html#perrault">sleeping beauties</a> and <a href="https://www.brooklynmuseum.org/eascfa/dinner_party/heritage_floor/kore">myths of goddesses traversing the underworld</a>. </p>
<p>Today, the trope is often found <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0039545/">in noirish mysteries</a>. These narratives frequently prioritize the development of a male protagonist – a detective who grapples with his own mortality while solving a crime that regularly involves sexual violence.</p>
<p>David Lynch’s “<a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0098936/">Twin Peaks</a>,” which first aired on ABC in 1990, wields this version of the trope. FBI agent Dale Cooper investigates the murder of Laura Palmer, a homecoming queen whose corpse is discovered wrapped in plastic. Though Laura Palmer has been victimized, she isn’t voiceless. She appears in flashbacks and has recorded her feelings and desires in diary entries.</p>
<p>In Showtime’s 2017 reboot, “<a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4093826/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0_tt_8_nm_0_q_twin%2520peaks%2520the%2520return">Twin Peaks: The Return</a>,” the afterlife version of Laura tells Cooper, “I am dead yet I live.” </p>
<p>Ariel and Barbie are their films’ protagonists, and they don’t die via murder. But they nevertheless actualize Laura’s words: Choosing flesh over immortality is to live and die, too.</p>
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<img alt="A bouquet of withering pink flowers." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/546718/original/file-20230906-31-r0qj33.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/546718/original/file-20230906-31-r0qj33.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=449&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/546718/original/file-20230906-31-r0qj33.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=449&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/546718/original/file-20230906-31-r0qj33.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=449&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/546718/original/file-20230906-31-r0qj33.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=565&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/546718/original/file-20230906-31-r0qj33.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=565&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/546718/original/file-20230906-31-r0qj33.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=565&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">Barbie and Ariel choose life – even as they know it will ultimately end in death.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/wilted-flowers-royalty-free-image/685478293?phrase=pink+death&adppopup=true">Jonathan Knowles/Stone via Getty Images</a></span>
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</figure>
<h2>Dreaming death in fish tails and pink</h2>
<p>“Do you guys ever think about death?” asks the character known as “Stereotypical Barbie,” played by Margot Robbie, a few scenes into the film. The irony is that Barbie is already dead, cheerfully doomed to repeat the same pink day, devoid of food, conflict and sex. </p>
<p>Barbie’s dreamworld is home to many iterations of its title character, including Mermaid Barbie. There are also a number of Kens. They are coupled, but they aren’t having sex. As Stereotypical Barbie declares, Barbies don’t have vaginas, and Kens don’t have penises. </p>
<p>Fish tails don’t typically feature vaginas either. The virginal Ariel is stuck in her fin, fathoms below.</p>
<p>Ariel and Barbie don’t get periods and can’t get pregnant. They’ll also never go through menopause.</p>
<p>In their films, the protagonists reject dollified existences and choose human life with its opportunities for sex and unavoidable death. Ariel leaves the ocean’s eternity for the prince’s land-world after she saves him. Barbie sacrifices physical perfection – her own and Ken’s – for the possibility of authentic intimacy and the spontaneity of an aging female body. The latter leads her to visit the gynecologist’s office at the film’s conclusion.</p>
<p>Hollywood films promise happily ever afters, but those weren’t the main draw for audiences of “The Little Mermaid” and “Barbie.” </p>
<p>I think that part of what drove theater attendance this summer was a subconscious attraction to the deathlike repetition of timeless dreamworlds, whether underwater or plastered in pink.</p>
<p>As dead girls, Ariel and Barbie are appealing vessels because, in them, time stops: You can’t be out of time when there is no time to begin with.</p>
<p>A water-bound mermaid and an ageless doll present a “timeout,” especially for girls and women pressured to achieve specific education and other life goals within certain time frames. Fish-tailed mermaids and Barbie dolls are free from ticking biological and career clocks – although they imagine or play at the things determined by those clocks, too. As a doll, Barbie gets to have any and all jobs, trading one for another whenever her player gets bored. She can be a doctor, an astronaut or even president of the United States.</p>
<p>Audiences might go to the movies to escape reality. Yet, Barbie and Ariel choose to enter reality, leaving their respective dreamworlds. Such outcomes make the films relevant to the summer of 2023: The dead girl can’t age, but her perpetual youth signals the future’s promises, even when there is no promise of a future.</p>
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<img alt="The tail of a mermaid covered in sand." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/546716/original/file-20230906-23-2maja2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/546716/original/file-20230906-23-2maja2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/546716/original/file-20230906-23-2maja2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/546716/original/file-20230906-23-2maja2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/546716/original/file-20230906-23-2maja2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/546716/original/file-20230906-23-2maja2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/546716/original/file-20230906-23-2maja2.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">Ariel chooses to leave behind her fish-tailed existence for life on Earth.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/beautiful-pink-mermaids-tail-on-the-beach-mettams-royalty-free-image/954670096?phrase=mermaid+illustration+death&adppopup=true">Robbie Goodall/Moment via Getty Images</a></span>
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</figure>
<h2>‘This sad, vanishing world’</h2>
<p>In her fish-tailed state, Ariel sings about wanting to know about fire and its causes, questions applicable to this summer’s reckoning with global warming. Humans have scorched the planet to fulfill a desire for, among other things, plastic – <a href="https://www.radcliffe.harvard.edu/news-and-ideas/barbie-and-the-american-dream">the very material that made Barbie possible</a>.</p>
<p><a href="https://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/4189155-summer-heat-breaks-records/">The unprecedented heat in the summer of 2023</a> demands that everybody listen to another ticking clock, the one counting down to environmental ruin.</p>
<p>Ariel and Barbie choose to live in the world their audiences inhabit, even though the characters are fully aware that humans are destructive and cause suffering.</p>
<p>“The Little Mermaid” is explicit about how humans hurt the ecosystem, a critique made by Black mermaids <a href="https://theconversation.com/disneys-black-mermaid-is-no-breakthrough-just-look-at-the-literary-subgenre-of-black-mermaid-fiction-194435">in older folk tales and recent literature inspired by them</a>. Ariel and Eric inevitably sail away, leaving her home under the sea and his coastal kingdom. The bittersweet ending suggests they, each equipped with knowledge of the other’s world, will carry insights about environmental harmony to other places.</p>
<p>“The Little Mermaid” and “Barbie,” I believe, reveal a truth found in many sacred stories. If you accept that you are dead already and that time is always passing away, you might gain the freedom to truly embrace the brief life you do have in what the Hindu deity Krishna <a href="https://web.english.upenn.edu/%7Ecavitch/pdf-library/Bhagavad_Gita_chs8-12.pdf">described as</a> “this sad, vanishing world.”</p>
<p>Or <a href="https://poemanalysis.com/william-butler-yeats/nineteen-hundred-and-nineteen/">as W.B. Yeats wrote</a>, “Man is in love and loves what vanishes, / What more is there to say?”</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/210436/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Katie Kapurch 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>People might go to the movies to escape reality. Yet Barbie and Ariel choose to live in the world their audiences inhabit − and, in doing so, decide to die.Katie Kapurch, Associate Professor of English, Texas State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1219482019-11-17T05:30:38Z2019-11-17T05:30:38ZFinancial services need to wake up to fact that treating customers well is good business<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/295600/original/file-20191004-118252-1g90i81.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>South Africa’s regulatory regime for the financial services sector is going through major changes. The question is whether companies can adapt to a principles-based approach. Or will they default back to rules-based compliance during the implementation of the <a href="https://www.moonstone.co.za/cofi-bill-aims-to-strengthen-regulation-customer-treatment-and-general-market-conduct/">Conduct of Financial Institutions Act</a>? The aim of the new law is to improve financial sector conduct and ensure fairer outcomes, particularly for customers.</p>
<p>There are strong arguments that a business that prioritises the values of good <a href="https://group30.org/images/uploads/publications/aaG30_Culture2018.pdf">conduct</a> will be rewarded with loyal <a href="https://customersguide.cgap.org/sites/customersguide.cgap.org/files/resource/2018/07/CGAP%20C-CGuide-FinalLowRes_Web.pdf">customers</a>. They, in turn, have a high degree of trust in the business, and are more likely to source products and services from it. There are also indications that more loyal customers are less concerned about marginal differences in the price of a product or service, when compared to those of <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/306009341_Do_loyal_customers_really_pay_more_for_services">competitors</a>. </p>
<p>In a wider social context, the South African government has made it clear that it expects financial services companies to take seriously the idea of a <a href="https://heinonline.org/HOL/LandingPage?handle=hein.journals/tndl89&div=34&id=&page=">social contract</a>. And that this, is essentially, their licence to operate in the financial industry. </p>
<p>From the industry’s perspective this means that treating customers well and pursuing greater financial inclusion are a <a href="http://www.treasury.gov.za/public%20comments/FSR2014/Treating%20Customers%20Fairly%20in%20the%20Financial%20Sector%20Draft%20MCP%20Framework%20Amended%20Jan2015%20WithAp6.pdf">legal requirement</a>, as well as necessary to mitigate risk.</p>
<p>These developments reflect changed and changing expectations by wider society of the <a href="https://group30.org/images/uploads/publications/aaG30_Culture2018.pdf">role</a> financial service providers should play in contributing to South Africa’s future.</p>
<p>For all these reasons, compliance with new conduct standards should be regarded as an opportunity to embed <a href="https://group30.org/images/uploads/publications/aaG30_Culture2018.pdf">resilience</a>.</p>
<h2>Benefits</h2>
<p>But these kinds of changes are often met with anxiety. Rules-based compliance is straightforward. Principles-based systems are less clear. </p>
<p>In my view anxiety is unnecessary, as compliance with new conduct standards serves a practical purpose. </p>
<p>If done in conjunction with deep reflection, compliance will steer the business towards better conduct. Moreover, a principles-based approach allows for flexibility by eschewing a tick-a-box mentality, which leaves the firm at <a href="https://www.huffpost.com/entry/principlesbased-regulaton_b_7204110">risk</a>. In some entities, good conduct already runs deep in the organisation. What will change, even for them, is the introduction of a more structured framework, more finely targeted, and set against ideational principles, not prescriptive rules.</p>
<p>Put simply, the new conduct regime produces an unexpected additional benefit: through compliance with the principles of good conduct and the assurance of good consumer outcomes, firms may expect to gain greater resilience.</p>
<h2>Achieving authenticity</h2>
<p>In practical terms, compliance that is founded in ethics and integrity brings authenticity. </p>
<p>To achieve this, three issues should be addressed.</p>
<p>The role and perception of compliance: It is important that businesses understand that compliance is not the “business prevention department” but the “business sustainability department”. Put simply, compliance should be regarded as a protector of the business and its place in society. An excellent compliance department, operating in a principles-based regime, is the vector by which the business transmits good outcomes for customers in future. </p>
<p>Implementation: By structuring the business around core principles, the entire organisation is brought along, and helps strengthen the underlying sub-set of narrow compliance. For this process, the compliance department must deploy a framework across the business, under the rubric that it is everyone’s job to act ethically. This envisages leveraging the existing skills, and especially in the case of highly compliant firms, long-standing expertise that is embedded within compliance. </p>
<p>Conduct review: Interrogating the life cycle of a product or service starts with product or service conception. This is more extensive than the customer journey. By spending time with stakeholders – including customers – to help understand why a product or service process works or does not work, these enquiries deliver significant understanding to the firm, and will deliver monetary benefits. Put differently, product performance information intelligible only to a highly educated customer will not be adequate for customers who are low income. Therefore, it would fail to comport with the underlying <a href="http://pmg-assets.s3-website-eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/181211Conduct_of_Financial_Institutions_Bill.pdf">principles</a> of constructing a financial system that is aimed at “protecting financial customers, promotes their fair treatment and protection, and promotes financial inclusion and the transformation of the financial sector”. </p>
<p>Interrogation of those processes would involve chunking conduct standards into a set of qualitative and conceptual (as opposed to analytical) enquiries. By aligning with overall corporate values, these enquiries reinforce the “all together” concept. What is also required is independence in the design of recursive reviews that will make a valuable contribution in mitigating otherwise unavoidable “observer biases”. Evidence of the problems caused by such cognitive biases are to be found in Australia, in the recent review by the Prudential Regulator of Commonwealth Bank and the Westpac self-assessment. Both allude to governance and conduct failures precipitated by a process-driven, as opposed to goal-orientated, myopia.</p>
<h2>Future-focused firms will lead the way</h2>
<p>Forward-thinking firms will be first movers towards stakeholder (as opposed to shareholder) <a href="https://www.apra.gov.au/sites/default/files/CBA-Prudential-Inquiry_Final-Report_30042018.pdf">primacy</a>. </p>
<p>This approach was recently promoted by the Australian Royal Commission as the way forward for Australian banks and insurers. The South African authorities are paying careful attention to the commission’s findings. </p>
<p>In time, therefore, first movers in this space will no longer seem radical, but simply <a href="https://www.westpac.com.au/content/dam/public/wbc/documents/pdf/aw/media/Westpac_Self-Assessment_Report_.pdf">early</a>. Those firms will provide the definition of leadership in the industry. If being values-driven is an end in itself, then first movers will enjoy an advantage. Moreover, credibility in this space affords firms the opportunity to set the standards to which the regulator will hold the rest of the industry.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/121948/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Andrew Schmulow consults to DB & Associates. He receives funding from the Universities of Wollongong and Witwatersrand. He is affiliated with, inter alia, the Australian Institute of Superannuation Trustees and Sungkyunkwan University. </span></em></p>Attitudes to banks are changing. This requires them to be more customer centric, and to take their role in society more seriously.Andrew Schmulow, Senior Lecturer, Faculty of Law, University of WollongongLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/961912018-05-08T13:54:51Z2018-05-08T13:54:51ZExplainer: who will be doing what under South Africa’s new ‘Twin Peaks’ model<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/217932/original/file-20180507-46347-1259vn3.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>South Africa has started implementing a new regulatory regime for the financial sector. Known as Twin Peaks, the approach was first adopted in Australia in 1998. South Africa has become the eighth country <a href="https://theconversation.com/south-africa-joins-the-club-that-regulates-financial-markets-through-twin-peaks-95558">to adopt the model</a>. </p>
<p>Under Twin Peaks two regulators are established. One is charged with maintaining the stability of the financial system – called prudential regulation; the other is responsible for market conduct and consumer protection – what the South African authorities have neatly abbreviated to calling the “<a href="https://www.resbank.co.za/SiteAssets/Lists/Speeches/NewForm/Remarks%20by%20Deputy%20Governor%20Daniel%20Mminele%20at%20the%20ACI%20Market%20Conduct%20Conference%201%20June.pdf">good conduct</a>” peak. </p>
<p>The new approach is designed to address weaknesses in the other models commonly used to regulate banks and the financial services sector. Prior to adopting Twin Peaks South Africa used the sectoral model – that regulated banks separately from other financial firms like insurers. That model’s been replaced because it didn’t address the fact that institutions from different sectors often merge. This is particularly true of banks and insurers (so-called bancassurance). </p>
<p>Twin Peaks ensures that all financial firms – irrespective of whether they are banks or insurers – are covered under the prudential peak, while the other peak monitors good conduct irrespective of the type of entity or the type of product or service offered.</p>
<p>The logic is that by creating two institutions that are independent of one another and that have clear and unambiguous remits and accountability, there’s a much greater chance (but note, not guarantee) of avoiding a financial crisis. And consumers will be protected fairly and efficiently. </p>
<p>There’s an added twist to the model being adopted in South Africa: the South African Reserve Bank, which up until now has regulated the banking sector, will still have a role to play. And the existing National Credit Regulator will also be part of the suite of regulators looking after financial services.</p>
<p>Here’s what each one’s role will be.</p>
<h2>The prudential peak</h2>
<p>The prudential peak has been set up as a subsidiary of the Reserve Bank. One of
the current deputy governors, Kuben Naidoo, who was responsible for banking regulation under the old system, has been appointed as the foundation CEO. His job will be difficult, to say the least. </p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/217933/original/file-20180507-46359-getmob.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/217933/original/file-20180507-46359-getmob.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/217933/original/file-20180507-46359-getmob.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/217933/original/file-20180507-46359-getmob.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/217933/original/file-20180507-46359-getmob.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/217933/original/file-20180507-46359-getmob.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/217933/original/file-20180507-46359-getmob.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&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">South African Reserve Bank deputy governor, Kuben Naidoo, is assuming the new position of heading the Prudential Authority.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Supplied by SARB</span></span>
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<p>Financial crises don’t have consistent causes. This means that Naidoo’s agency will have to develop the ability to ‘<a href="https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2008495">see around corners</a>’ – in other words have sufficient intelligence to anticipate disasters before they happen.</p>
<p>He must also perform an incredibly delicate balancing act: on the one hand, he will need, at times, to be able to stand his ground against the bank. For example, in a crisis the Reserve Bank may want to raise interest rates to shore up the currency. The prudential regulator may oppose that because higher rates will lead to higher defaults, which will affect the solvency of the weakest banks. </p>
<p>On the other hand, he will have to be flexible to make sure that consumer protection isn’t constantly relegated in favour of making sure that financial institutions are sound.</p>
<p>Put differently, the Twin Peaks architecture is most effective if the Reserve Bank doesn’t dominate the prudential regulator, and the prudential regulator doesn’t dominate the good conduct regulator. </p>
<h2>Conduct peak and credit regulator</h2>
<p>The new conduct peak is called the Financial Sector Conduct Authority which has absorbed the country’s old <a href="https://www.fsca.co.za/Pages/Default.aspx">Financial Services Board</a>. The new body will have a much bigger set of responsibilities and a significant array of new tools. This will include the ability to seek damages and penalties far in excess of what was available in the past. </p>
<p>The law that underpins the conduct authority adopts a very different regulatory philosophy because it is principles based as opposed to rules based. The principles based philosophy requires businesses to shift away from just applying rules, to treating customers fairly. The regulator will no longer have to prove a rule was broken before it can intervene. It will only have to show that something has – or is likely to – prejudice consumers, before it takes action. This presents a much bigger target for the regulators, and makes it much easier to intervene. </p>
<p>While the conduct authority will be responsible for protecting consumers, it won’t when it comes to credit. That’s because regulation of credit, and protecting customers against lending abuse, will stay with the country’s 13-year old <a href="http://www.ncr.org.za/">National Credit Regulator</a> which is responsible for enforcing the <a href="https://www.ncr.org.za/documents/pages/ENGLISH.pdf">National Credit Act</a>. </p>
<h2>Set up costs</h2>
<p>From the costings I have seen at Treasury, it’s going to cost about R440 million to set up all the new structures. This is a small amount of money when weighed up against the potential costs of a financial crisis. South Africa has a well developed financial services sector, and needs a regulatory regime that is fit for purpose and can cope with the complexity of its sophisticated financial industry. Better to spend now on Twin Peaks, than spend far more later when (not if) the next financial crisis rolls around.</p>
<p>But the devil will be in the activation and implementation. The best architecture is no panacea for poor implementation. This has been the experience in Australia, where Twin Peaks <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2018/may/06/the-biggest-scandal-ever-campaigner-hopes-for-banking-justice">is in crisis </a>. Australia is reeling after 11 years of uninterrupted scandals involving fraud and dishonesty in its financial industry that has now given rise to a <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-11-27/how-bad-are-our-banks/9194984">Royal Commission of Inquiry</a>. The inquiry is in its fourth month of its 12 month operation, and the evidence uncovered so far indicates that what was known, was the tip of the iceberg. Australia’s regulators have been excoriated for their weak, feckless, timid handling of the country’s biggest financial institutions. </p>
<p>At all costs, South Africa must avoid this by creating strong, determined, well-resourced and fearless regulators.</p>
<p><em>This is part of a series on the implementation of Twin Peaks <a href="https://theconversation.com/south-africa-joins-the-club-that-regulates-financial-markets-through-twin-peaks-95558">in South Africa</a> as well as difficulties the model is facing in Australia.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/96191/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Dr Andy Schmulow consults to Datta Burton and Associates. He is affiliated with Australian Citizens Against Corruption (ACAC), is an Executive Member of the Board of the Australian Law and Economics Association, and a committee member of the Banking and Finance Law and Studies Association (BFSLA) and the American Council on Consumer Interests (ACCI). He provides on-going ad hoc advice to members of the Australian Federal Parliament, principally in the Labor Party. He is currently a member of an expert panel of advisors convened to provide South Africa's National Treasury with advice on the drafting of the Conduct of Financial Institutions Bill, and made a series of submissions during the drafting of the Financial Sector Regulation Act.</span></em></p>South Africa is the eight country in the world to adopt the ‘Twin Peaks’ model of regulating its financial services sector.Andrew Schmulow, Senior Lecturer, Faculty of Law, The University of Western AustraliaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/955582018-04-29T09:00:02Z2018-04-29T09:00:02ZSouth Africa joins the club that regulates financial markets through ‘Twin Peaks’<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/216457/original/file-20180426-175038-1jxpor4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">shutterstock</span> </figcaption></figure><p>South Africa is preparing the ground to migrate to a new way of regulating its banks and <a href="http://www.treasury.gov.za/twinpeaks/Press%20release%20Twin%20Peaks%20implementation%20March2018_FINAL.pdf">financial markets</a>. Known as the Twin Peaks model, the decision has sparked debate, even controversy. </p>
<p>So what is Twin Peaks? And what’s all the fuss about?</p>
<p>The name Twin Peaks was adopted in 1995 by <a href="https://hk.linkedin.com/in/michael-taylor-75682714">Dr Michael Taylor</a>, who at the time was an official with the Bank of England. The name was a riff on the popular US mystery horror television mini-series <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0098936/">created by David Lynch</a>. </p>
<p>In a seminal paper published that year, Taylor set about unpacking the failings of the way banks and the financial markets were regulated in the UK. Regulation was based on a sectoral model – that is on the assumption that banks should be regulated separately from other kinds of financial institutions such as insurers. This model was used in most countries in the world at the time. It was applied in South Africa until 1 April 2018.</p>
<p>Twenty three years ago Taylor argued that the sectoral model was no longer fit for purpose. It was an anachronism. A throw-back to the days when there were clear delineations between different types of firms in the financial sector – banks, insurers, securities issuers. But when those firms began to amalgamate, the new firms that were created presented a problem for regulators whose authority was divided along lines that mirrored the division between banks, insurers and other financial firms. Taylor referred to this as a</p>
<blockquote>
<p>blurring of the boundaries.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>His observations were prescient. Even though his suggestions were rejected at the time, the intervening years – particularly the impact of the financial crisis in 2008 – have underscored the need for a rethink of how financial institutions are regulated. South Africa is in the process of catching up with what has become a growing trend. </p>
<p>Instead of having a separate regulator just for banks, the new system creates two peaks: one is now responsible for regulating to prevent financial crises (the prudential regulation peak), the other to ensure good market conduct and consumer protection (the good conduct peak). </p>
<p>South Africa has gone a few steps further to lay the foundation for a four peak model. This is because it envisages a role for the Reserve Bank in preventing financial crises as well as a role for the National Credit Regulator which already exists to protect consumers of credit. </p>
<h2>The history</h2>
<p>Taylor’s proposal was initially rejected in the UK. Instead the country’s government adopted the mega-regulator model, which brought all firms in the financial services sector under one umbrella. The International Monetary Fund touted this as the superior solution. Then came the global financial crisis in 2008.</p>
<p>The UK’s mega-regulator was abandoned as a disaster in the aftermath of the crisis and the collapse of <a href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/banksandfinance/11032772/The-rise-and-fall-of-Northern-Rock.html%3E%20and%20Halifax%20Bank%20of%20Scotland">Northern Rock</a>. A joint House of Lords, House of Commons <a href="http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/jt201213/jtselect/jtpcbs/144/144.pdf">inquiry</a> identified catastrophic failures by the country’s then regulator, the Financial Services Authority. It painted a picture of a regulator that had poor crisis management, and which had prioritised regulating business conduct over prudential regulation - regulations that are designed to force banks to act prudently, chiefly through making sure they have a minimum capital buffer.</p>
<p>The crisis, and the events it set in motion, led to a much deeper understanding of the tension between trying to enforce prudential regulation on the one hand, and protecting consumers on the other. The two functions are frequently mutually incompatible. And the failings of the mega-regulator showed that one was invariably sacrificed in favour of the other. </p>
<p>More often than not, when faced with a choice between helping several thousand aggrieved consumers, or avoiding a financial crisis, most regulators will choose to avoid a financial crisis - systemic failure in the system. Consumers – especially the most vulnerable consumers – are left unprotected. From a policy perspective, that’s a poor outcome. </p>
<p>But after the global financial crisis, and the sub-prime disaster that initiated it, we understand also that market misconduct and consumer abuse, when practised at scale, can become their own source of financial crisis.</p>
<h2>How Twin Peaks helps</h2>
<p>Twin Peaks is the only model that separates oversight into two independent regulators – market conduct and consumer protection on the one hand, and prudential regulation on the other. It envisions two regulators created as equals, with clear and unambiguous remits: one ensuring a sound and robust financial system, the other ensuring that the financial system is not distorted through market misconduct, while also protecting consumers of financial services and goods. </p>
<p>Twin Peaks was also the first regulatory model to adopt the view that a range of financial institutions – not just banks but also insurers - should be subject to regulations that would ensure they were fit for purpose, and could withstand a crisis. After the near collapse of the large <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB122156561931242905">US insurer AIG</a> in 2008, and its <a href="https://www.thedailybeast.com/remember-the-dollar182-billion-aig-bailout-it-just-wasnt-generous-enough">US$ 182 billion bail-out</a>, we now understand that some insurers are systemically important – that means that their collapse can lead to a domino effect of collapsing firms, and ultimately the market imploding. Prior to AIG’s collapse the assumption had been that only banks carried this level of risk to the system.</p>
<p>In the post-2008 world there is general acceptance that countries need to draw up much more specific terms and conditions for firms in the financial sector. Those terms and conditions are the basis of regulations to protect big firms from financial distress, because if they fail, taxpayers will be forced to step in and save them. In return, taxpayers have a right to impose regulations that will discourage conduct likely to lead to firms failing.</p>
<p>It’s appropriate that South Africa’s highly-advanced and sophisticated financial services sector should be regulated under an architecture that is fit for the present and the future. </p>
<p>Enforcement will be key. Twin Peaks can facilitate better enforcement, but doesn’t guarantee it.</p>
<p><em>This is one article in a series on the implementation of Twin Peaks in South Africa as well as difficulties the model is facing in Australia.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/95558/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Dr Andy Schmulow consults to Datta Burton and Associates. He is affiliated with Australian Citizens Against Corruption (ACAC), is an Executive Member of the Board of the Australian Law and Economics Association, and a committee member of the Banking and Finance Law and Studies Association (BFSLA) and the American Council on Consumer Interests (ACCI). He provides on-going ad hoc advice to members of the Australian Federal Parliament, principally in the Labor Party. He is currently a member of an expert panel of advisors convened to provide South Africa's National Treasury with advice on the drafting of the Conduct of Financial Institutions Bill, and made a series of submissions during the drafting of the Financial Sector Regulation Act.</span></em></p>Instead of having a separate regulator just for banks, the new system creates one to prevent financial crises, the other to ensure good market conduct and consumer protection.Andrew Schmulow, Senior Lecturer, Faculty of Law, The University of Western AustraliaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/784542017-05-31T03:25:33Z2017-05-31T03:25:33ZIt’s happening again … our love affair with TV reboots<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/171289/original/file-20170529-25219-19s31lv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Kyle MacLachlan in the new season of Twin Peaks: has the Internet helped fuel nostalgia for TV shows from decades past?</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Rancho Rosa Partnership, Showtime Networks</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>May 22 saw the <a href="http://variety.com/2017/tv/reviews/tv-review-twin-peaks-the-return-showtime-1202439500/">long-awaited return</a> of David Lynch’s 90s TV series Twin Peaks. Cancelled in 1991 after only two seasons, the show had ended on a cliff-hanger, with the fate of its characters left unknown.</p>
<p>Twin Peaks came out the year I was born (1990), so I didn’t watch it until about 2013. By then, it had already developed a strong cult status, with original fans still singing its praises. The return of Twin Peaks was celebrated in various ways. In Sydney, Newtown’s Gelato Messina <a href="https://www.pedestrian.tv/news/entertainment/1000s-of-sydneysiders-sussed-our-epic-twin-peaks-p/58c49526-4af4-42da-8908-f3aa031d462c.htm">refurbished their shop</a> to resemble the show’s infamous Double R diner. Missing Persons posters of the main character, Laura Palmer, <a href="http://welcometotwinpeaks.com/news/missing-laura-palmer-posters-australia/">were</a> plastered on city streets.</p>
<p>Co-creator Mark Frost <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/tv-and-radio/twin-peaks-cocreator-mark-frost-reboot-not-an-exercise-in-nostalgia-20161128-gsz5nv.html">claimed the reboot</a> wasn’t merely an exercise in nostalgia. Instead, he said, it was an exercise in “engaging with one of the most powerful themes in all of art” - the ruthless passage of time.</p>
<p>The new series will reportedly both tie up loose ends and <a href="https://www.gizmodo.com.au/2017/05/we-have-so-many-questions-about-what-the-hell-is-happening-in-twin-peaks-the-return/">provoke more questions</a> about its characters. On the evidence so far, the reboot is big on strangeness. Classic <a href="http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Creator/DavidLynch">Lynchian tropes</a> from the original series - bizarre and cryptic dialogue, odd plot points with seemingly no resolution - are back.</p>
<p>One major plot point that has resurfaced is the fate of Special Agent Dale Cooper (Kyle MacLachlan) who was left trapped while his doppelganger took over his body. Yet while the new series taps into a strong sense of nostalgia, it invariably lacks the intimate atmosphere of the original one. <a href="http://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2017/05/twin-peaks-review-the-return-season-3-episode-1-2-recap">Others have also questioned</a> whether the show can live up to the hype of its impressive marketing campaign. </p>
<p>Still, nineties nostalgia is <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/08/opinion/sunday/the-best-decade-ever-the-1990s-obviously.html?_r=0">all the rage</a>; shows and films that have been - or soon will be - rebooted include <a href="http://www.gq.com/story/x-files-revival-2016">The X-Files</a>, <a href="http://variety.com/2015/digital/features/nostalgia-retro-tv-reboots-internet-full-house-1201572809/">Full House</a>, <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/tv-and-radio/netflix-set-to-continue-reviving-the-gilmore-girls-revival-20170306-gus512.html">Gilmore Girls</a>, <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/bensin/2016/07/13/every-time-nintendo-falls-it-bounces-back-with-a-vengeance/#16f49ea53da3">Pokémon</a>,<a href="http://www.newnownext.com/will-and-grace-revival-trailer/05/2017/"> Will and Grace</a> and even <a href="http://www.firstpost.com/entertainment/the-baywatch-revival-is-bringing-pamela-anderson-back-but-is-it-as-cj-parker-2865134.html">Baywatch</a>. Other films from different eras have also just been remade as TV shows, including <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt6038954/?ref_=nv_sr_2">Picnic at Hanging Rock</a> and <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt4834206/?ref_=nv_sr_1">Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events</a>. But what are the reasons behind this remake boom? Was TV really so much better back then? </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/171290/original/file-20170529-25247-1bgjde0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/171290/original/file-20170529-25247-1bgjde0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/171290/original/file-20170529-25247-1bgjde0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/171290/original/file-20170529-25247-1bgjde0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/171290/original/file-20170529-25247-1bgjde0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/171290/original/file-20170529-25247-1bgjde0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/171290/original/file-20170529-25247-1bgjde0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/171290/original/file-20170529-25247-1bgjde0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Lauren Graham in Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life (2016)</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Warner Bros. Television</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Pangs for the past</h2>
<p>Nostalgia is, of course, nothing new. Johannes Hofer – a Swiss physician – <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2013/08/when-nostalgia-was-a-disease/278648/">coined the term</a> in 1688, when it was considered a disease. It comes from the Greek words <em>nóstos</em> (to return home) and <em>álgos</em> (a painful longing).</p>
<p>Since then, a more endearing narrative has emerged around the condition of nostalgia. It has become less a disease, and more of a natural reaction to growing up. As Simon Reynolds says in his 2010 book <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/9854239-retromania">Retromania: Pop Culture’s Addiction to its Own Past</a>, nostalgia is </p>
<blockquote>
<p>thoroughly entwined with the consumer-entertainment complex: we feel pangs for the products of yesteryear, the novelties and distractions that filled up our youth.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Every generation obviously has an extended moment of fond remembrance for the pop culture it grew up with. Is it now just the turn of the 90s, recently dubbed by <a href="http://channel.nationalgeographic.com/the-90s-the-last-great-decade/">National Geographic</a> the “last great decade”? It was, writes Patrick J. Kiger, a decade filled with “incongruous motifs without a theme to tie them coherently together”. These include events such as the Gulf War, the Y2K scare, the Dotcom bubble, Princess Diana’s death, the OJ Simpson case, and Seinfeld. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/yQJM963be_I?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>This fascination is widespread. <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2013/07/think-the-us-is-having-a-90s-nostalgia-craze-take-a-look-at-japan/277356/">In Japan</a>, 90s memorabilia such as the Neon Genesis Evangelion films, and TV shows Dragonball Z and Sailor Moon, have made a comeback, with the 2013 film Dragonball Z: Battle of the Gods a box-office smash.</p>
<h2>The net and nostalgia</h2>
<p>Some theorists have other ideas as to why the 90s is proving compelling today. They argue the internet has largely facilitated this reboot craze, as it offers a more convenient method of archiving recent histories. As Variety magazine editor Pat Saperstein <a href="http://variety.com/2015/digital/features/nostalgia-retro-tv-reboots-internet-full-house-1201572809/">notes</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Fuelled by social media, this interest in the pop-culture trappings of the past, particularly the 90s, has become a fertile area for TV programmers.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Not only are there <a href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/6-websites-bring-90s/">websites dedicated to celebrating 90s nostalgia</a>, but search engines enable easier access to the past. As Guardian writer Charlie Lyne puts it: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>Our pop-cultural past is now just a Google search away, and the immediacy has turned nostalgia into the dominant cultural force.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Some writers are less enthusiastic about the internet’s role in propelling 90s nostalgia. While Eve Peyser <a href="https://www.dailydot.com/upstream/stop-rebooting-every-tv-show/">calls the internet</a> a “cesspool of nostalgia”, James Wolcott <a href="http://www.vanityfair.com/culture/2014/08/90s-culture-nostalgia">describes it as</a> an “inexhaustible suction pump that indiscriminately dredges up the dreck along with the sunken pearls”.</p>
<p>The internet has made it easier to reflect on the past, with websites such as Buzzfeed and Youtube operating as galleries of nostalgia. But the internet can’t be used to explain everything. As Wolcott points out, this “anxious, ravenous speedup of nostalgia” is “more than a reflection of the overall acceleration of digital culture”. For many who grew up in the 90s, the decade was indeed a kind of nouveau golden age. It was an age of innocence and optimism before the internet, 9/11, the endless “war on terror” and the growth of extremist groups such as Daesh.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/171295/original/file-20170529-25261-11rbhdd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/171295/original/file-20170529-25261-11rbhdd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/171295/original/file-20170529-25261-11rbhdd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=391&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/171295/original/file-20170529-25261-11rbhdd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=391&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/171295/original/file-20170529-25261-11rbhdd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=391&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/171295/original/file-20170529-25261-11rbhdd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=491&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/171295/original/file-20170529-25261-11rbhdd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=491&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/171295/original/file-20170529-25261-11rbhdd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=491&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Firefighters fight fires that sprouted up from within the rubble of the World Trade Center on September 19, 2001: is the 90s seen as a more innocent time?</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Reuters</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Still, nostalgia is a tricky phenomenon. Theorist Arjun Appadurai has talked of <a href="https://www.upress.umn.edu/book-division/books/modernity-at-large">what he calls</a> “imagined nostalgia”. Put simply, this refers to a nostalgia for a particular time period that one has not even lived through. Some critics argue that this is driven by consumer culture playing on our feelings on longing. Nostalgia is thus turned into an act of consumerism. </p>
<p>Indeed, the funny thing about nostalgia in the age of the internet is that people can vicariously partake in it. Many who eagerly awaited the return of Twin Peaks were either too young to be fans or not even alive for the original airing (myself included). So their experience of the show was only enabled through technologies such as video cassettes, DVDs, or streaming. This might be described as a kind of “estranged nostalgia”.</p>
<h2>The Future of Revivals</h2>
<p>The late Svetlana Boym, in her 2001 book <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/75902.The_Future_of_Nostalgia">The Future of Nostalgia</a>, distinguishes between “restorative” nostalgia and “reflective” nostalgia. The former relates to the “nóstos” aspect of returning home, while the latter relates to the “algos” – or the sense of pain and loss.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/QO22Cd672XE?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>The past is comfortable terrain. With the aid of hindsight, it appears more attractive than it may have been when it was our present. Still, the 90s was indeed a thrilling ride when it came to quality TV. Classic shows included Seinfeld, The Sopranos, The Simpsons, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and, of course, Twin Peaks.</p>
<p>It’s worth remembering though that reboots made now won’t be the same as their original source material. Situated in a different time and place, they’ll speak of contemporary fears and concerns, rather than actively taking us back to that comfortable, pleasantly eerie world we once knew.</p>
<p>The new Twin Peaks season, for instance, is set in a different cultural landscape; ironically it sees old characters grappling with the internet and iphone technology. The original series, however, exuded a 50s-era innocence. </p>
<p>Reboots must therefore be seen for what they are – a somewhat disconnected extension of an original. While revivals are all the rage, they can never truly revive a specific moment in time. And nor should they.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/78454/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Siobhan Lyons 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>Twin Peaks has just hit our streaming services, again, alongside reboots of the X-Files, Gilmore Girls, and more. But, despite our nostalgia, they’ll never revive the specific time they were born in.Siobhan Lyons, Scholar in Media and Cultural Studies, Macquarie UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/775002017-05-22T10:21:27Z2017-05-22T10:21:27ZThe fashion of Twin Peaks: why David Lynch’s TV show is back in style<p>Twin Peaks, David Lynch’s iconic TV series, is returning to our screens after it went missing for almost three decades. First broadcast in 1990, the show became a cult classic and is celebrated by fans and TV scholars alike. One of the reasons for this is its extraordinary use of costume. The original series’ strikingly distinctive style anticipated the way we dress now, making its revival especially timely. </p>
<p>The show’s original costume designer was Patricia Norris, who won an Emmy for her work on the pilot episode. Sara Markowitz took over for the series’ two-season run and adapted Norris’s ideas in new directions. Norris and Markowitz combined classic Americana (1950s-style leather jackets, plaid workwear, cheerleader uniforms) with the often tonally jarring looks of the late 1980s (oversized, patterned knits and scrunchies). The look they created was simultaneously timeless, indicating the universality of American small-town life, and highly specific, conveying the distinctiveness of David Lynch’s vision. Twin Peaks’ style is both very recognisable and intensely strange, mapping on to coordinates of what we think we know, yet at the same time upsetting them. </p>
<h2>Clues are everywhere</h2>
<p>Part of the cult appeal of Twin Peaks is in the way it encourages its viewers to look for clues and to participate in the detective process, which gives rise to endless speculation. It is the original watercooler television. Clothes are no exception to this process. Why does the character of Audrey Horne change from sensible black and white saddle shoes to red kitten heels when she gets to school? The obvious answer is out of adolescent rebellion. However, the repeated close-ups on the shoes throughout the pilot episode draw attention to them and encourage the viewer to speculate on their meaning. </p>
<p>Their black, white and red colour scheme prefigures the zigzag floors and red curtains of the infamous red room sequence, in which detective Dale Cooper dreams that the murdered Laura Palmer tells him the name of her killer. Later in the series, a one-armed shoe salesman plays a significant role, while Bobby and Shelly find a tape of Laura’s therapy sessions hidden in Shelly’s husband Leo’s shoe. In Twin Peaks, material objects take on inflated significance. Everything and nothing is a clue. </p>
<p>The costumes in Twin Peaks have clear roles in American popular culture: the rebel, the cheerleader, the prom queen, the FBI agent or the eccentric hippy. Many of the characters overtly wear uniform, from police and waitress uniforms to school sportswear. But in a sense all the characters wear uniform: they all have a recognisable “look” that helps to define their role within the community. Even the nondescript plaid fishing gear worn by Pete Martell signifies his lack of an identifiable role. </p>
<p>There is often something slightly off about the costumes. Nadine Hurley accessorises her cheerleader uniform with an eye-patch. Recognisable archetypes should reassure us – the biker, the trucker, the waitress – but they ultimately disconcert. And the costumes that have been most influential on contemporary fashion are the more odd, such as the mysterious Log Lady, whose frumpy layered tweeds and oversized glasses are pure Prada. </p>
<p>Since the show’s original broadcast, fans have continued to obsess over the looks of their favourite characters, with Audrey Horne a particular favourite for her stylish sweater-skirt combos. Online magazine The Cut published <a href="http://nymag.com/thecut/2014/10/ranking-of-all-117-sweaters-seen-on-twin-peaks.html">a slideshow</a> ranking 118 sweaters that appeared in the show, with Audrey inevitably taking the number one spot. Audrey’s style was instantly iconic, with actor Sherilyn Fenn becoming the stand-out star. But where it once seemed classic, it now looks fashionable, embodying the vintage trend of the 2000s. </p>
<p>Other characters whose looks appeared frumpy and even comic at the time, such as girl-next-door Donna or receptionist Lucy, now look spectacularly on trend. The chunky patterned knits worn by Lucy, Sheriff Truman and many other characters on the show anticipate the fad for “hygge”, the Danish term meaning a sense of cosiness and well being. Similarly, Donna’s calf-length skirts and cardigans anticipate the recent revival of the “midi-skirt”. </p>
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<p>It is no surprise, then, that designers and advertisers have repeatedly mined Twin Peaks for inspiration. <a href="https://vimeo.com/76825432">H&M’s 2012 advertising campaign</a> featuring Lana del Rey in a variety of Lynchian scenarios was particularly notable. Elle magazine has twice published Twin Peaks themed fashion shoots, in its <a href="http://welcometotwinpeaks.com/inspiration/elle-magazine-twin-peaks/">August 2012 American edition</a> and <a href="https://models.com/work/elle-sweden-twin-peaks/192273">September 2013 Swedish edition</a>. Meanwhile the grunge revival of 2013 resulted in some distinctly Twin Peaks-inspired collections, such as Hedi Slimane’s <a href="http://www.vogue.co.uk/shows/autumn-winter-2013-ready-to-wear/saint-laurent/collection/">A/W show for St Laurent</a>, which featured plaid shirts, cardigans and black lace cocktail dresses. </p>
<p>We have grown into the world of Twin Peaks, it seems, and its style now suits us. “That gum you like is going to come back in style”, the Man From Another Place tells Agent Cooper in the Red Room – the line that Lynch used on <a href="https://twitter.com/david__lynch/status/518060411690569730?lang=en">Twitter</a> to announce the show’s return. Sure enough, Twin Peaks has come round again, with a fresh range of costumes to inspire us, although probably leaving us little closer to solving one of television’s most enduring and unsettling mysteries.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/77500/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Catherine Spooner is the co-editor with Jeffrey Weinstock of Return to Twin Peaks: New Approaches to Materiality, Thoery and Genre on Television, published by Palgrave.</span></em></p>The fashion of Twin Peaks looked to the past and predicted the future.Catherine Spooner, Reader in Literature and Culture, Lancaster UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/326242014-10-09T19:06:05Z2014-10-09T19:06:05ZI’ll see you again in 25 years: the return to Twin Peaks<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/61241/original/9b6bfr8p-1412830456.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">How will the new Twin Peaks stack up against its stylish and nightmarish cable brethren?</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/mc1984/292500164/in/photolist-rR97h-9VRiWG-q86w1-c2GngS-dx9VME-dx4sV6-dx4sXK-c2GmxW-c2Gn1U-c2Gna5-c3mHgE-c3Ycg1-c3mHHY-c2GqmQ-aMhS7T-c2Gm3G-c3mKdy-bZp5Lm-c2GqfC-4bKhts-8MyCpu-c4uccd-56tcBr-c4udWf-c4udpW-c4udE3-c4udvs-c4udAE-c3YcW5-c4uecA-c4ucSd-dx9Vef-c4ue1f-dx4sg4-dx4t26-dx9Vgq-c3mGSW-c3Ydm1-dx4tXP-c4uffw-c4ueU7-9rgETZ-8MyAQ9-8MvzoX-8MALEM-8MvyGa-8MvwGZ-c2Hcp1-c3YbF1-c3mJcQ">☠mc 1984☠ GENGHIS KHAN LAURA2</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/">CC BY-NC-SA</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>In the penultimate episode of <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0098936/">Twin Peaks</a> (1990-1991), “I’ll see you again in 25 years” were the words <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BL57-9171pk">spoken backwards</a> by Laura Palmer (Sheryl Lee) to FBI Special Agent Dale Cooper (Kyle MacLachlan), the detective who had spent more than a season investigating her death. </p>
<p>Following Laura’s promise to Cooper she assumes the frozen pose of a statue before disappearing entirely from view. For those who had watched Twin Peaks during its initial run, this was nothing new. Unexplained actions, surreal figures and constant non-sequiturs had appeared throughout but they remained no less eerily transfixing.</p>
<p>Laura’s promise, within the context of the show, occurs inside the Black Lodge. This is a liminal zone that exists between the small town that the series is named after, its surrounding Douglas fir forests and that which lies “beyond”, a metaphysical crossing-point between life and death, good and evil. </p>
<p>It is visualised as a room of zigzagged floors, black couches, white statues and gently swaying red curtained walls wherein time is fluid and speech is spoken backwards. Long before Rust Cohle (played by Matthew McConaughey) intoned about time being a flat circle in <a href="https://theconversation.com/true-detective-lassos-the-yellow-king-in-hollywood-south-24113">True Detective</a> (2014), Twin Peaks abounded in existential enigmas. </p>
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<p>In the Black Lodge, bodies appear and disappear; time loops; lights flicker and wrenching screams fill the air. Like the experience of watching Twin Peaks in general, the Black Lodge scenes are so aesthetically singular, so highly stylised, and at times so frankly terrifying that it is hard to imagine how David Lynch and Mark Frost’s co-creation was greenlit by and aired on prime time US network television. </p>
<p>At a time in which network rather than cable TV programming held clout, Twin Peaks was, initially at least, commercially and critically successful, garnering 14 Emmys and some of the highest ratings that ABC had netted in years.</p>
<p>Looking back, Twin Peaks had no shortage of ardent supporters and fans.</p>
<p>Its riddling, quixotic sensibility spread out far beyond the textual confines of the show and into a range of concurrent popular culture forms. In The Simpsons, for instance, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w0_eTYwKoBE">Homer is seen</a> laughingly watching a mock Twin Peaks episode before exclaiming: “I have absolutely no idea what is going on.” </p>
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<p>There was a Saturday Night Live parody, cross-media spin-offs (<a href="http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/119427.The_Secret_Diary_of_Laura_Palmer">The Secret Diary of Laura Palmer</a>, penned by Lynch’s daughter Jennifer Lynch, or <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/495822.The_Autobiography_of_F_B_I_Special_Agent_Dale_Cooper">The Autobiography of F.B.I. Special Agent Dale Cooper: My Life, My Tapes</a>), coffee ads as well as endless magazine covers with the cast. </p>
<p>Furthermore, as media fandom scholars such as Henry Jenkins <a href="http://books.google.com.au/books?hl=en&lr=&id=m6mjuWXrqb8C&oi=fnd&pg=PA51&dq=Henry+Jenkins,+%27%22Do+You+Enjoy+Making+the+Rest+of+Us+Feel+Stupid%22:1995&ots=0HAtJQNajk&sig=zFMYL0_TQEId3fNNMHBcGtwZRxM#v=onepage&q=Henry%20Jenkins%2C%20'%22Do%20You%20Enjoy%20Making%20the%20Rest%20of%20Us%20Feel%20Stupid%22%3A1995&f=false">have observed</a>, Twin Peaks was one of the first shows to launch nascent forms of TV/internet fandom. Its first audiences took to online bulletin boards and forums, together with VCR recordings and fanzines to collectively try and make sense of a deliberately obtuse show. </p>
<p>When the network placed the show on hiatus after the first season, the fans passionately rallied around the show imploring the network to “Give Peaks A Chance”.</p>
<p>What went wrong? Arguably, the downfall of Twin Peaks actually had very little to do with the quality of the show or with Lynch/Frost. Sure, there were plot lines we could all have lived without. For myself, that involved anything to do with the town mill or the seemingly endless and ill-fated Windom Earle storyline that dominated the end of season 2.</p>
<p>The real “problem” with Twin Peaks was that it simply did not cohere with the conventions, demands and audience expectations of network TV during the early 90s. When audiences dropped off because the question of who killed Laura Palmer still had not been answered, ABC responded by changing programming days and times and then cancelling the show. </p>
<p>Lynch himself (unlike the more TV-schooled Frost) has made no secret of the fact he never wanted to reveal who killed Laura. He would have preferred, instead, to leave that question unanswered so that it might generate still further enigmas. When network pressures forced the show to reveal Laura’s killer, Twin Peaks provided an answer while defiantly opening up other existential questions. The Black Lodge, aliens, doppelgängers. <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killer_BOB">Killer BOB</a>. </p>
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<p>The real legacy of Twin Peaks is not who killed Laura or any of the other narrative mysteries that followed. It is how this show managed to be (and still is, upon reviewing) so powerfully and affectively mysterious. From the oneiric opening credits on, you felt like its seemingly innocuous, small town, beige carpeted reality could, at any moment, give way to an entirely different, unnerving world. </p>
<p>The click of a record player, BOB steadily crawling over the lounge room couch, the movement of the ceiling fan, the sway of a traffic light or that low humming drone that resonated throughout. The use of images and sounds in Twin Peaks become the stuff and substance of nightmares. </p>
<p>To date, I can only think of one TV show that even comes close to achieving that kind of surrealist atmospherics whereby one reality subtly and seamlessly enfolds into another – <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2243973/">Hannibal</a> (2013-).</p>
<p>This week it was <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nNHsA4WIFvc">announced</a> that Twin Peaks is set to return for a third season on Showtime in 2016 – 25 years after Laura promised she would see Cooper again. Purported to be a direct continuation of where the last season left off only set in the present day, there has already been much anticipation, speculation and hesitation. </p>
<p>Social media is rife with different generations of Twin Peaks fans trading those old but familiar quotes (“it’s happening again”; “that gum you like is going to come back in style”), demanding to be the new Log Lady, and wondering whether or not we will know Cooper’s fate. </p>
<p>With Lynch/Frost at the helm once more and Lynch set to direct all of the nine slated episodes, questions abound. How will the new Twin Peaks stack up against its slick, stylish and nightmarish cable brethren? Will it be as disturbing, as hilariously funny and as wildly multi-generic as the original? There is some time yet before any of those questions can be answered. </p>
<p>Let us hope that the contemporary age of “quality TV” and “narrative complexity”, particularly on cable, will finally give Lynch/Frost room enough to play.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/32624/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Saige 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>In the penultimate episode of Twin Peaks (1990-1991), “I’ll see you again in 25 years” were the words spoken backwards by Laura Palmer (Sheryl Lee) to FBI Special Agent Dale Cooper (Kyle MacLachlan), the…Saige Walton, Lecturer in Screen Studies, University of South AustraliaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/327022014-10-09T05:06:24Z2014-10-09T05:06:24ZTwin Peaks was a hit because it was so of its time – but the return is welcome<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/61189/original/pp2t9jyp-1412786162.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Welcome back.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Showtime</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>So the <a href="http://uproxx.com/tv/2014/10/is-twin-peaks-coming-back/">cryptic teasers posted on Twitter</a> by Mark Frost and David Lynch have substance: Twin Peaks will be returning to television screens 25 years after its cancellation. The new series will be a nine-episode run on US premium cable network Showtime. Again Lynch and Frost are to be united as key creative personnel.</p>
<p>For those unaware of Twin Peaks, it became a cultural phenomenon in the US (and beyond) in the early 90s. The series narrative initially revolved around the investigation of the murder of the seemingly idyllic prom queen, Laura Palmer (Sheryl Lee), by FBI special agent Dale Cooper (Kyle Maclachlan). It was set in the equally idyllic Pacific North West town that gave the series its name. But as the narrative progressed and surfaces were scratched, the town and its surrounding areas revealed many dark secrets. Even the owls were not what they seemed. </p>
<p>Twin Peaks was axed after just 30 episodes, ending on an unresolved cliff-hanger where agent Cooper had become possessed by the evil spirit BOB after escaping from <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q1CuX0Ix33I">the Black Lodge</a> (a sequence that remains one of the most abstract, inventive and disturbing sequences ever seen on television). Similar denials of closure are characteristic of programmes that attract enduring fan communities (<a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/cult/classic/prisoner/">The Prisoner</a> and <a href="http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/tv/tubetalk/a377479/blakes-7-tube-talk-gold.html#%7EoS7a090JFhNiqa">Blake’s 7</a> immediately spring to mind) and Twin Peaks is no exception. Deferring resolution allows fans the space to speculate about what happened after and to draw their own conclusions. </p>
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<p>Such activities assist in maintaining a series’ visibility and, in the years since its untimely cancellation, Twin Peaks remains extraordinarily well known. The programme still has a healthy fan community through <a href="http://www.twinpeaksukfestival.com/">yearly conventions and events</a> and, although news of the programme’s return has generated some <a href="http://grantland.com/hollywood-prospectus/on-the-massive-betrayal-of-showtimes-twin-peaks-revival/">mildly-dissenting voices</a>, the <a href="https://twitter.com/TwinPeaksArchve/status/519182417815273472">announcement</a> has generally received high levels of enthusiasm. Twin Peaks’ reputation has also endured as <a href="http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=Ad-3S51t6XIC">a reference point for multiple television series</a> as diverse as The Simpsons and AMC’s remake of The Killing, though, demonstrating its wider legacy within popular culture. </p>
<h2>Industry shifts</h2>
<p>Twin Peaks caught the attention of future directors and fans because of its originality; because it was such a product of its time. It was commissioned by ABC in response to declining audiences that were the result of multiple shifts that were affecting the TV industry throughout the 1980s when there was suddenly much greater choice. It was the slick visual style and Hollywood associations of the show that helped distinguish it from its peers. Twin Peaks was addressed primarily towards affluent, “quality” viewers who wouldn’t regularly watch television. </p>
<p>Such appeals were even encoded into the series itself in the form of a spoof soap opera called <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ulSVBkaboK0">Invitation to Love</a> that enthrals (primarily female) characters. Such features required the show’s audience to get the joke, and reflect on the excesses of equivalent prime-time soaps such as Dallas and Dynasty. This makes Twin Peaks not only of its time but also something of a historical artefact. </p>
<p>But it hasn’t lost its relevance, and it can still be considered timeless. Such jokes and tropes continue to echo if you watch the series now, 20 years after those specific cultural references resonated. And this is particularly down to that same idea that originated with Twin Peaks: TV that “isn’t TV”. This idea mirrors contemporary discourses of “quality” television. Retrospective reflections from former cast and crew members regularly imply that the series remains unique in comparison to its peers in the same way that HBO series such as The Sopranos, Sex and the City and, more recently, Game of Thrones are marketed as “not TV”. <a href="http://www.salon.com/2014/06/22/how_twin_peaks_shaped_the_entire_golden_age_of_tv/">A recent article for Salon</a> stressed such parallels by arguing that without Twin Peaks there would have been no Breaking Bad or Mad Men. Twin Peaks appears timeless because it erodes distinctions between TV production trends then – and now.</p>
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<h2>Perfect timing</h2>
<p>Twin Peaks’ return is also perfectly timed. This is because similar shifts in audience behaviour are happening again. Rather than VCRs, satellite and cable, streaming and on-demand services such as Netflix are reconfiguring how people watch TV. While it remains to be seen whether Twin Peaks’ return will spoof these trends (Invitation to Stream, perhaps?), TV drama is responding to these changes by providing more edgy content that targets specific niche audiences. Just look at Hannibal, True Detective or the aforementioned Game of Thrones. Twin Peaks certainly fits the bill here. The current climate may be well suited to the series’ at times complex and abstract exploration of philosophical issues such as the concepts of good and evil, or the individual psyche. </p>
<p>And anniversaries are more popular than ever, a by-product of the difficulty in holding down audiences among an avalanche of content. This spring saw publicity events take place in LA to mark the <a href="http://www.radiotimes.com/news/2014-09-22/the-cast-of-lost-where-are-they-now">tenth anniversary of Lost’s debut</a> on US television while the UK (and beyond) also recently saw year-long celebrations to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Doctor Who. Commemorating Twin Peaks’ 25th anniversary with a new series in 2016 (which coincides with its cancellation) is part of this trend.</p>
<p>Those composing <a href="http://tvline.com/gallery/twin-peaks-showtime-cast-returning-season-3-kyle-maclachlan/#!1/tp14/">lists</a> and dreaming about which original characters will or must return may be disappointed – the new series will have to attract and sustain a new audience alongside entertaining its established fans. Let’s wait and see if the furore of the early 90s will happen again. Time, as always, will tell.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/32702/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ross Garner 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>So the cryptic teasers posted on Twitter by Mark Frost and David Lynch have substance: Twin Peaks will be returning to television screens 25 years after its cancellation. The new series will be a nine-episode…Ross Garner, Lecturer in Media and Cultural Studies, Cardiff UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.