Cold War

Russia Lost the Cold war, but America did not win it

The cold war was an ideological conflict: The Soviet Union worked for a future where all countries would be socialist; the US worked for a future where democracy would win everywhere. Of course, behind the ideology there were also plain geopolitical interests: The Soviet Union wanted a buffer of allies to protect it from further invasions; the US wanted no communism in its own backyard and world access to critical resources, in particular oil. But ideology strongly colored the conflict and forced each side to fit its actions to its declared ideology. Whether this ideology was adhered to sincerely or hypocritically does not matter: it constrained what each side could do. It is worth remembering, for example, that the Soviet Union helped the economies of Eastern Europe communist countries, and helped maintain in most of these countries standards of living that were higher than those in the Soviet Union, rather than exploiting them. Likewise, The US helped Western Europe rebuild with the Marshall Plan, and continued to provide help to many countries.

The Soviet Union lost: There are only a few small countries that adhere to the communist model of a state economy with no free market. But the US did not win: representative democracy, individual freedoms and free markets have taken over most of the ex-communist countries in Eastern Europe, but not Russia, not China, not most of the African countries, not many Central American and South American countries. In fact, democracy is loosing ground in the last few years. While a large majority of countries accept that free markets are more efficient at allocating resources than the state, this has not necessarily led to an acceptance of western style democracy.

We are, in fact, in a peculiar situation: The US is still fighting an ideological war, believing (or professing to believe) it is its duty to promote western-style democracy throughout the world. We protest about the lack of democracy in Myanmar, protest when China imprisons civil rights advocates or tighten censorship, protest against Iran's oppression of the opposition there. To quote our Foreign Secretary:

"This Administration, like others before us, will promote, support, and defend democracy. We will relinquish neither the word nor the idea to those who have used it too narrowly, or to justify unwise policies. We stand for democracy not because we want other countries to be like us, but because we want all people to enjoy the consistent protection of the rights that are naturally theirs, whether they were born in Tallahassee or Tehran. Democracy has proven the best political system for making human rights a human reality over the long term."

Of course, US interests strongly color our foreign policy. But, whether sincere or hypocritical, our ideological mission affects our foreign policy: We do no send troops to reestablish democracy in corners of the world with no oil or other strategic assets, but send them to Iraq. On the other hand, it would be hard for us to send troops in order to replace democratically elected governments by autocrats.

But we have no enemies in this ideological war: Russia or China do not dream of changing the world; they just push old-fashioned geopolitical goals: Having a buffer zone of influence around their borders; having access to mineral resources their economy needs; leveraging their power for economic advantage; etc. This is an asymmetric conflict: We fight for (or are constrained by) principles; they fight for their interests. We want to change the world; they want to strengthen their countries and want no foreigners poking their nose into their house.

Fighting for the "just cause" provided the US and its allies with a significant advantage during the cold war. But this advantage has mostly vanished. Western Europe or other countries do not see us as the "Leader of the Free World", but as a superpower that is not more moral than others -- and perhaps more dangerous. Most Chinese do not clamor for western-style democracy, but are proud of their country, optimistic about its future, and accepting of its political constraints. The same is probably true of the Russian population. Our belief that our values are intrinsically superior is no shared by most of mankind; once the ideological conflict becomes unilateral, it is easier to resent our attempt to impose our values over the world, since we cease being a bulwark against an attempt to impose even more obnoxious values -- namely communism.

I am not sure what is the right course for the future. At one extreme, the US could shed any claim to fight for democracy or human rights -- but just fight for its own narrow interests. A little further, one could see our continued fight for democracy and human rights not as a pursuit of universal principles that is good in itself, but as a way of encouraging the establishment of governments that are likely to be friendlier to the US because of shared values. It is clear that the US must moderate its ambitions to change the world. As the US economy continues growing more slowly than the economies of many developing countries (something that is unavoidable and good on its own) the ability of the US to impose its views on the world decreases. Fighting impotently for the "just cause" is worse than not fighting at all.

I'm shocked, shocked to find an I category at U of I

Movie buffs will remember the scene in "Casablanca" where Captain Renauld pockets his gambling wins, while closing Rick's cafe for illegal gambling: "I'm shocked, shocked to find that gambling is going on in here!" says the captain. It seems that many of us are also shocked, shocked to find that well connected students were given preferential treatment in admissions. Are we hypocrites?

While all the details may have been known by only few, tens of university employees must have known that politically connected applicants were given special treatment. This includes president, chancellor, provost, most if not all deans, associate deans and their administrative assistants, and many employees in the admission office. Hundreds of university employees would have had good reasons to believe that some applicants, in particular, applicants connected to influential donors, received special treatment. This includes development officers and unit heads that are involved in development (I include myself, as former department head). The reaction of faculty when the Chicago Tribune came out with its scoop seems to indicate that few were surprised to find out that politically connected applicants got preferential treatment. Our president told us that this is business as usual that happens on any campus, before becoming shocked, shocked that such things happened here; his early reaction was much more believable than his later one. So the answer is, yes, we are hypocrites. Is this bad?

Some hypocrisy is necessary for the good functioning of any society. Machiavelli, the great father of political sciences, taught us that "every one admits how praiseworthy it is in a prince to keep faith, and to live with integrity and not with craft. Nevertheless our experience has been that those princes who have done great things have held good faith of little account, and have known how to circumvent the intellect of men by craft, and in the end have overcome those who have relied on their word." Even if we reject Machiavelli's precepts as too cynical, we are likely to agree, as most ethicists do, that deception is ethical in some cases. Every US President, every political leader and every top executive will, at times, justly resort to deception and will perform actions they believe are beneficial, but are better kept secret.

There are obvious risks to such a behavior. Machiavelli warns us that "in a well-ordered republic it should never be necessary to resort to extra-constitutional measures; for although they may for the time be beneficial, yet the precedent is pernicious, for if the practice is once established of disregarding the laws for good objects, they will in a little while be disregarded under that pretext for evil purposes."

This risk did not materialize in our case: Nobody accused White or Herman to have personally benefited from the scandal. It seems that the I list was handled carefully, in what people believed was the best interest of the University. However, there is another risk to such covert behavior; namely the risk of being discovered. By this I do not mean the personal risk to the person that disregarded the rules; but the damage done to society when such disregard is found out. Hypocrisy is necessary, because we have to believe in institutions even while knowing, in the back of our mind, that they are not perfect. When the contradiction between principles and reality is exposed, we suffer from a cognitive dissonance; our respect for the institution and our willingness to identify with it are diminished. This holds true in our case. The damage from accepting a hundred or so students that are less qualified is quite minimal, and, arguably, an acceptable price to pay in order ensure continued support to the University from corrupt but influential politicians. But the damage done to the University once this behavior became public is quite significant.

When hypocrisy is exposed, proper order and trust in institutions is restored by finding a scapegoat. In the old days, all the sins of the people of Israel were cast once a year on a scapegoat. The scapegoat was sent to the wilderness, carrying all the sins of the people; the community was thus purified, and life returned to normal. In modern times, a community purifies itself by casting its sins on a leader; the leader takes the blame and go; he resigns for the good of the institution, or is fired if he does not resign. This does not necessarily mean that the leader is guilty and should be punished. Being a leader means taking the blame even if you are not at fault, because taking the blame and leaving will benefit the institution.

I applaud White for his resignation. Not because White did wrong: his actions might have been wrong, but it is hard to judge given the limited available information; but because, once these actions became a public scandal their leadership was weakened; and the institution is weakened until a scapegoat is sent to the wilderness. A resignation may be a personal tragedy for a leader that did his best. But it is a necessity for the intitution.

Privacy and Trust: Google's Achilles' Heel?

I recently attended the Google Summit. The issue of privacy and of Google's policies on privacy came up repeatedly. Here are some thoughts on this topic.

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The increasing intrusion of companies such as Google into our daily life creates fears about privacy: Does Google track my frequent searches on the Internet? Is my Gmail read by Google? Is Big Brother watching me?

This issue is portrayed as one of privacy invasion: My email or my Internet searches are private and Google should not poke its nose in my private information. I would argue, however, that the problem is less one of privacy, and more one of trust.

There is a lot of "private" information that we are willing to trust in foreign hands. My wife knows a lot about my private life. My physician has a lot of intimate information about me. A hurried executive may have her secretary read all her email at work. I trust my cellphone or my laptop to carry a lot of private information.

"Privacy" is a relatively modern concept: Neither the kings of France, woken up by a bevy of people assisting them in their morning toilet, nor his subjects living a dozen to a room had much privacy. But both kings and serfs were sharing their private life with people they knew and trusted. We now share an increasing amount of information without being aware of it, with companies we may not trust. Companies such as Google must create the missing trust, or else they will face increasing obstacles getting to the information they need.

The core issue then, for us and Google, is why do we trust our most significant others, our physician, and our cellphone, but not a Google cloud?

This is a question best answered by anthropologists rather than law or technology experts. Some possible answers come to mind.

1. First rule: Don't break in. We trust our cellphone because it is ours, in our hand. Hence the profound sense of violation when Amazon removes a book from our Kindle: We discovered that Amazon had the keys to our Kindle. Same as the feeling we would have discovering that the person we bought a house from kept the keys to the house. We want to hold (or believe we hold) the keys to our devices.

2. Second rule: Don't spy. We have no problems with people seeing us in a public place, or hearing what we say if we speak loudly in a public place (although courtesy requires they pretend they do not hear us when we do not address them). We have a problem with a hidden camera taking our picture without us being aware of this, or a hidden microphone recording us. A hidden surveillance camera at the entry of a public building violates our privacy; a human-like robot with a camera in place of eyes does not violate our privacy anymore that a guardian at the entrance of that building would.

Access to our information should be obvious and conspicuous. Thus, when I type a search in Google Search, I expect my typed search to be available to Google. When I follow one of the returned links, I do not necessarily expect this information to be available to Google. Logically, I may be aware that Google collects information on followed clicks. Psychologically, I feel that I am now contacting another entity -- I do not need Google to make the introductions.

Having an privacy policy with a lot of fine print is not the answer to this requirement. At any point in time it should be obvious what entity is capturing my information.

3. Third rule: Don't gossip. Each piece of information we receive from a friend in a conversation has implicit sharing rules. If my friend tells me of his marital trouble, this is not to be shared with anybody. If he tells me he is getting married, then this can be shared with all our mutual friends, but not with companies in the wedding industry. If he tells me he is interested in a new job, I may tell potential recruiters, but not his current boss. In other words, we deduce what is the circle of people my friend wants the information to reach and act accordingly, as his agent. When the implication is not obvious, I may ask my friend; or, he may explicitly restrict the "gossip circle" ("Please don't tell xx", "Please keep this confidential"). Leaking information beyond this circle is a breach of trust.

Most companies today are like a gossip that can be always trusted to share information we provide him with all his social circle: Very consistent and reliable, but not a good partner for intimate conversation. We need reliably enforced context and content dependent gossiping rules that are based on a simple principle: When we share information we got from a person, we act as his agent: We should share the information he provided only if this is to his advantage.

4. Fourth rule: Be trustful. I share information with people I trust. The trust may be build on long term relations of reciprocity, such as I have with my spouse and my friends, or a physician I visit regularly. Trust may be build on social, ethical and legal rules: I trust physicians or lawyers, in general, to follow the ethical and legal rules governing their professions. Trust is not a rational attitude, it is a primordial feeling that is essential to social life.

Trust is slowly gained and easily lost. Companies that depend on the trust of their customers (e.g., banks) carefully cultivate their trustworthiness and invest significant efforts to avoid breaches of trust and handle expeditiously any problem that may occur. One way this is done is by having a clear human face that represents the institution and that can convince its customers that he or she cares about them.

While technology can help prevent breaches of trust, trust is not a technical problem. It is a problem of attitude and perception.

The business model of Google is that Google provides to us useful services, and in exchange, we provide Google with access to some private information. Google makes money by aggregating and monetizing information provided by its many customers. The model works because of our collective trust. We know, at some logical level, that Google reads our emails and tracks our web accesses. But this intrusion is sufficiently light-handed for us to be willing to "suspend our disbelief". A few missteps could easily change our attitudes and significantly hurt the business model of Google. I can image people feeling revulsion at the idea that some company reads their email or tracks their clicks -- not trusting anymore the company's handling and use of this information.

Is a geeky company such as Google capable of handing the "touchy-feeling" issue of trust? Can its young, geeky founders be the human face of a trusted company that cares about its customers, not the environment?

Sonia Sotomayor said: "I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would, more often than not, reach a better conclusion than a white male than hasn't lived that life." Is this racism?

If I say "Jews are often better at intellectual pursuits than non-Jews" I may believe that Jews have a genetic advantage in pursuing intellectual activities (a claim some have made), or I may believe that the Jewish culture and Jewish history have encouraged intellectual pursuits, creating an environmental bias toward such pursuits. In either case the statement does not imply that Jews are a race -- while the concept of human races is doubtful and discredited overall, a fortiori it does not apply to Jews or Latinos. It does not imply that race is a primary determinant of human traits. It may or may not be a prejudice, depending to whether it is an objective statement, or a blatantly subjective statement, based on my dislike of non-Jews. It is quite unlikely to be a racist statement.

If I say "The Jewish experience makes Jews more often than not, better at intellectual pursuits then the experience of gentiles" then I clearly do not attribute the possible advantage of Jews in intellectual pursuits to genetic determinism, but to the environment they live in -- their history, their culture, their social environment-- clearly a non-racist statement (albeit possibly prejudiced).

If I say "I would hope that the Jewish experience makes Jews, more often than not, better at intellectual pursuits than gentiles". I do not even express a certitude that Jews have any advantage, just a hope that their experience would provide then with such an advantage. One would need to be singularly prejudiced to see such an expression as racist or to see it as implying racist determinism.

Is there something wrong if a judge's decision is influenced by his or her upbringing, religion, ethnicity, or sex? The Supreme Court judges are smart people. If ruling was merely a matter of a strict, rational interpretation of statutes, then most decisions would be unanimous: rational people will reach the same conclusions from the same premises, if they use logical deduction. Clearly, this is not the case, and clearly, decisions of judges are heavily influenced by their world view. Clearly, this applies to conservative judges no less than to liberal judges. In fact, it is quite incorrect to call the majority on the current supreme court "conservative" as it shows little respect to established precedents and is quite eager to overturn many of those.

It is a pity that the current debate about Sotomayor and about the proper world view for supreme court judges is so superficial and so partisan. There is a problem when major decisions are repeatedly taken with a 5:4 majority. The current debate is unlikely to advance a solution to this problem.

The following is quoted from a review of "LEADERS OF THE PACK: POLLS & CASE STUDIES OF GREAT SUPREME COURT JUSTICES", by William D. Pederson and Norman W. Provizer (eds.). The review is by Joyce A. Baugh.

The final chapter in LEADERS OF THE PACK is a provocative essay by David Schultz titled, "Why No More Giants on the Supreme Court: The Personalities and the Times." Schultz asserts that two characteristics make a justice great: 1) "creat[ing] a new paradigm for him or herself, the Court, or the law," and 2) the ability to "persuade others, on the Court, in government, and in society to adopt a particular perspective on the law" (p.264). He cites John Marshall, Joseph Story, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Louis Brandeis, Benjamin Cardozo, Hugo Black, Earl Warren, and William Brennan, as examples of justices who succeeded in this regard.

Schultz then evaluates the current justices against these two characteristics and concludes that none of them have the potential for greatness. He suggests three primary reasons for this. First, they are serving "at a time when there is a diminished expectation of stated desire for them and the Court to engage in major jurisprudence or legal thinking" (p.270). Second, the post-Bork confirmation process has contributed to the selection of justices who are "confirmable," not because of their intellectual ability. Schultz writes, "This is not to imply that these justices are idiots, but instead to suggest that an important reason for their being on the Court is that they were deemed acceptable and that they would be worthy delegates for the president who nominated them" (p.271). The third factor is that legal education in the post-World War II era is more technically focused than oriented to the liberal arts. Schultz sums up his pessimism about the future in the first paragraph of his conclusion: "There are no giants on the Supreme Court today and the prospect is that for the foreseeable future that will remain true. Many structural and ideological forces are at work that make it difficult for a new giant to emerge, or for any of the current justices to rise to that level" (p.273).

Great Supreme Court judges are judicial activists. The supreme court will not have great judges as long as judicial activism is a pejorative. But the country badly needs great Supreme Court Judges.

I-list at U of Illinois

The I-list -- the sad things about it:

1. The number of special interventions from politicians pushing for the admission of students became so large that the process had to be formalized: a computerized list, a plethora of emails. Small scale traffic of influence can be handled in face-to-face meetings; when it becomes large-scale, it becomes institutionalized. Hypocrisy is essential to the good functioning of any large institution. But hypocrisy requires plausible deniability.

2. As far as I can find in the various publications on the topic, no high executive at U. Illinois has expressed his support and confidence in any other high executive. They all seem much more intent to pass the blame around than to show any solidarity. This is sad and indicative of a dysfunctional leadership. It is also sad seeing senior academics using the "I followed orders" excuse. There is such a thing as academic independence. I can accept "I did not think it is such a big deal" (it is not) but I cannot accept "I thought it is awful, but could not do anything about it".

3. Somebody will need to fall on his sword and be the scapegoat. This will be the person that took most personal responsibility, allowing others to keep their hands clean. This. as usual. will not be the truly guilty party. Fairness is not part of the game.

The Information Society and Economic Instability

We are living in an information society: Most for the value produced by our economy is in intangible goods; most of the investments by firms is in intangible assets, such as IP or branding.

The price of intangible goods or intangible assets is more volatile than the price of tangible goods or assets: The demand for intangible goods can change more abruptly; since the recurring production costs are often negligible, change in demand will affect price, not quantity offered. 

Therefore, it is reasonable to expect an information economy to be less stable than an economy based on tangible assets and goods. The value of IP or of a brand is hard to assess, and can change rapidly. The value of financial assets can change rapidly, since their value is determined by volatile information.

The ability of the state and of financial institutions to dampen financial volatility and avoid positive feedbacks that carry the economy far from the optimum has tremendously improved since the Depression era. But the ability of the economy to change abruptly has also been enhanced. While government is reacting in the right direction and is doing so much faster than in the thirties, it is still possible that the reaction time is too slow, compared to the speed of economic change: Information and intangible assets have little mass, little momentum; small forces can move them very quickly.

Gaza and Morals

I understand the debate about whether Israel followed or broke Geneva Conventions in its fight in Gaza. I do not understand the moral indignation as I do not understand the moral logic of these conventions.

Killing innocent women and children is bad; but why is it worse than killing innocent soldiers? A soldier carries no stronger individual moral responsibility for the evils perpetrated by his country than a civilian. After all, nobody checks what crimes a soldier has committed before  killing him. Noncombatant immunity is one of the accepted principles of a just war, but I do not understand it -- even more so in an environment where the distinction between combatant and non-combatant is fuzzy. Neither the rocket attacks of Hamas on civilian targets in Israel nor the Israel attack on Gaza strike me as immoral -- just terribly wasteful and useless.

Destroying civilian buildings is bad. But, quite often, the target of a war is not the army of the enemy, but the civilian government of the enemy; The goal of the war is to force a government to change its policies. US bombed civilian targets in Serbia, such as bridges or power plants; it bombed civilian targets in Iraq. Russia bombed civilian targets in Georgia.

The target of a war is not the enemy army, but the enemy country. The same holds true of sanctions that are short of an all-out war. Sanctions on Iraq hurt the Iraqi people, not its army of leadership; the sanctions killed many Iraqis. Sanctions on South Africa at the time of the Apartheid did not discriminate between good South Africans and bad South Africans. Sanctions that are proposed on occasion against Israeli organizations do not distinguish between good Israelis and bad Israelis. If such sanctions can be moral than strikes against civilian targets can be moral. It is not a black and white issue, but a debate about the legitimacy of the cause and the proportionality of the means.

Hamas is an organization that wants to destroy the state of Israel. I think is is legitimate for Israel to try to destroy Hamas. With this goal in mind, the Israeli slaughter and destruction is proportional -- indeed it has been too moderate to destroy Hamas.

Closing the circle: Why are soldiers or civilians of a country at war "innocent"? The logic of a war is that it targets a country. a collective, not individuals. Soldiers or citizens suffer in a war because they are part of this collective. The logic is one of collective responsibility, collective guilt and collective punishment. A person that is part of a community bears responsibility for the actions of that community and can suffer consequences. As an American, I can be the target of acts of terrorism against America. I can be killed because I am American, irrespective of my own political opinions. A Gazan can be killed because he is a citizen of a Hamas state, even if he does support Hamas. If we support collective action and solidarity, than we should accept collective responsibility. Targeting civilian targets in Gaza is moral precisely because Hamas won elections and truly represent the population of Gaza.