Roslyn Fuller

Democracy 1: Why Libya Won’t Be Getting Democracy

This is really quite simple, and incidentally applies to every other nation in the Middle East, and indeed, the world (that’s right – I’m not one for the small issues). The reason no one in Libya will be getting democracy any time soon is that even most people in Western nations have no idea whatsoever what democracy is. Contrary to popular belief, democracy is not the political system in place in nations such as Ireland, Canada, the USA or UK. Neither is it the political system in place in Germany, France or any other European nation.

This is a highly relevant topic as pundits everywhere ask “What next for Libya/Egypt/Tunisia/insert country here”, the insinuation being that the best they could possibly hope for is a system like ours. This is a common tactic that every lawyer knows called “framing the debate”, and is as old as the book. Just as they have succeeded in turning a widespread revolt into a crisis centered narrowly on the two nations who have habitually ticked them off (Syria and Libya), the powers that be (this would be the G-8 governments together with media organizations who prefer to repeat pre-fed lines instead of bothering to do their own research) have also succeeded in turning the entire idea of collective empowerment (which really is what the Arab Spring is all about) into the usual shallow debate about elections. So long as you are walking around with indelibly purple index fingers, so the official wisdom goes, you are living the life and have nothing further to hope for or expect. In fact, you should be grateful. Just think of all the people in the world without purple index fingers.

Rather depressing, isn’t it? But if you’re sitting in Egypt or Tunisia right now, wondering what life has in store for you, beyond the ability to get some serious ink done 12 times in your life (the average number of times a person votes in national elections), or if you are in Ireland or Canada or Germany and have a vague feeling that you are being sold short and really this whole democracy thing isn’t what it is cracked up to be, I’ve got got good news for you.

“Democracy” as we know it is not as good as it gets. This is basically because it isn’t democracy. I know that is a radical claim to make, but bear with me: I spent four years researching this at Ireland’s best university, and I’ve got a bloody high IQ and a Puritan work ethic. It was time well spent. After all, if I were dumber, I would have been satsified enough to write my thesis on something a lot more PC. By the time I’m done with this blog series, I promise you that you’ll wonder how you could have ever believed that you are living in a democracy, and you’ll also see why blindly inducing the newly “liberated” nations of the Middle East to copy the Western system instead of going beyond it would be a lost opportunity.

The political system in place in Western nations is a Republican system, which was explicitly and intentionally modelled on the Roman Republic (anyone doubting this may be interested in reading The Federalist Papers, which are available in paperback form from Penguin, and in which the founding fathers of the USA discuss at length how they will create a system in which the collective people will inter alia be unable to influence politics for such devious ends as debt cancellation). Republicanism is a quite different system than the demokratia in place in ancient Athens. The Founding Fathers made very clear that they did not, under any circumstances, want demokratia. I will say more about demokratia in the future, but for now, let me make a few basic points: democracy was a rather conservative and serious affair, it involved very few elections, it was highly sophisticated (indeed, reading about it may make you feel slightly depressed at the lack of progress humanity has made on some fronts in the past few thousand years), it involved massive levels of active participation from the citizen population, and it depended on a relatively egalitarian form of wealth distribution.

The Republican system of Rome utilized elections at every opportunity, resulted in high levels of active participation for certain sectors of society while the masses were relegated to rubber-stamping decisions, and encouraged the accumulation of enormous wealth disparities which needed to periodically be resolved through debt cancellation mechanisms. I’m sure this sounds familiar.

Personally, I’ve heard enough platitudes. It is time for a real revolution and real change – not the non-events that the Arab Spring and global economic crisis are fast turning into. Athens and democracy offer us a real-life guide as to how this could be achieved, and something that anyone interested in the “what next” question should know about.

(to be continued next week…)

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The Gathering Storm

Robert Jordan and Brandon Sanderson

Orbit Books

(first published in Metro Eireann)

This is the twelfth book of a series and given that the author, Robert Jordan, died after book eleven, it was clear that continuation would be a problem. Fellow author Brandon Sanderson agreed to finish the series based on Jordan’s writings and notes, but he had a lot to live up to.

There are very few fantasy novels I would endorse, but the Wheel of Time series is top of the list, and the main reason for this is that it doesn’t feel like fantasy. There is a reluctant man on a mission (Rand al’Thor) against the Dark One (i.e. the devil); there is magic (recast as “channeling”); there are numerous villians who conveniently come at the hero one at a time. Robert Jordan made this all plausible and fascinating. His enormous cast of characters were likable and not very heroic. They bickered with one another, they had to put up with idiots, with allies who could think of nothing better to do than use the approaching “Last Battle” (Armageddon – Rand’s big day) to further their own ambition. On top of this, Jordan was a master of character development and description.

However, even allowing that Sanderson’s task was not easy, The Gathering Storm fell a bit short. The first 300 pages are a thinly veiled recap of the previous eleven books in the series – incredibly boring if you’ve already read them and, seriously, who starts reading a series at Book Twelve? The characters are less nuanced, the dialogue more hackneyed, the villians more easily defeated. Lame fantasy vocabulary like “quest” starts to surface.

The last 500 pages make up for all of this. The main premise of the series is that Rand needs to die fighting the Dark One to save the world. Not only is this not a whole lot to look forward to, the pressure to live up to expectation and years of dealing with people who see him as little more than a shield to shove between themselves and evil are beginning to wear on him. Rand winning the Last Battle is looking almost as grim as Rand losing the Last Battle. His internal struggle is the best thing about this book, but some well-plotted assassinations of Rand’s arch-enemies and a showdown, three-way battle between factions of Aes Sedai (female channelers) and the Seanchan (foreign invaders – yes, this series is very complicated) rescue it from what halfway through looked like a yawning abyss of mediocrity.

Empty Promises: Bringing the Equality Authority to Heel

Niall Crowley

A&A Farmar

First published in Metro Eireann

Regardless of whether or not you agree with any of the views expressed in this first-hand account of the workings of the Equality Authority by its former CEO, it is still an extremely interesting read and an invaluable resource for anyone interested in this area of law or social science.

Empty Promises is organized into six parts: an overview of equality legislation, theories of equality and the functions and activities of the Authority; a collection of representative case studies which illustrate the Authority’s work in Ireland; equality programmes in various public and private organizations; a chapter on several prominent equality battles waged in the media and and the courts; a bit of a tell-all chapter about the circumstances leading to Crowley’s resignation in late 2008; and finally a “what should be done now” chapter, focusing on socioeconomic status as a grounds for discrimination. Each chapter is well-organized, the writing elegantly straightforward, the content both fact-packed and detailed with only the most occasional of veerings into vapid MBA-speak (“ownership”, “local delivery landscape”, etc.). This book is clear and concise and offers a wonderful insight into the potential workings of a government Authority.

Although it is obvious where Crowley’s sympathies lie, there is little digression or pounding from the pulpit. Where opinions are included (while one may or may not agree with the reasoning) they are well-put, and I felt that some points, such as media pundits attempting to score points against the Authority by a cheap trivialization of equality issues (pg. 69), and the analysis of the systematic nature of discrimination against women in Ireland (pg. 119 et seq), did hit the nail on the head in a most gratifying manner.

While as a jurist I am tempted to wish that the content had been more legally-oriented, I suspect the fact that it isn’t and that there is nary a footnote in sight is a further point in favour for most readers. In fact, while it is rich in detail, Empty Promises can easily be read in an afternoon and serve as an excellent handbook for the non-specialist. I suspect it paints a much different picture of equality issues and the work of the Authority than mass media would have most people in Ireland believe, and as such it tends to swim a little against the current of popular opinion. That alone, I think, makes it worth reading, with excellent structural organization and a total lack of fuzzy-thinking as added bonuses.

Eine Billion Dollar

(One Trillion Dollars)

Andreas Eschbach

Ever ask yourself what you would do with a trillion dollars? That is precisely the dilemma confronting John Fontanelli, former Italian-American pizza delivery boy and all-around loser, and now heir to the mysterious Giacomo Fontanelli, who considerately deposited a nest egg in the Middle Ages with the Vacchi family law firm to be delivered with interest to his youngest living male relation half a millennium later. But this staggering good luck comes with a catch (of course). As the long-awaited heir, John is supposed to use the cash to give the world back its future. In fact, according to Giacomo, it is his destiny to do so. He just doesn’t have a clue how.

As the book progresses, other complications arise: is John even the real heir? He discovers a younger child-genius relation in Italy who died shortly before the date set for inheritance. Surely he and not John would have been the right Fontanelli for the job? For that matter, who was Giacomo? A medieval Italian on a mission from God or just the frontman for something more sinister? And what about his new German journalist girlfriend Ursula, the ascetic, driven helper Michael McCain, John’s former friend in loserdom Marvin, and, of course, the Vacchi family? Everyone has their own advice for John and their own questionable motives for giving it. In addition, our flawed hero is increasingly strained by a set of global expectations he knows he can’t fulfill and the incomprehensible changes that occur in his life as women throw themselves at his feet and the rich and powerful scramble to obey his slightest wish. As his character subtly changes, John embarks on a globe-trotting mission from Mexico to the Philippines to figure out just where things are going wrong with the world and how his trillion dollars can possibly fix it all.

Meticulously well-researched and exhibiting an enviable command of language Eine Billion Dollar should rightfully go down in history as Eschbach’s masterpiece.

The only mild imperfection of the book is a slight falling apart of its political aspect towards the end. How can the future of the world be saved? Turns out Eschbach doesn’t know either, and he falls back on Nelson Mandela, feel-good brotherly love, and a theory of increasingly centralized world government that seems to borrow heavily from contemporary German philosopher Juergen Habermas. However, it’s a credit to the high expectations set by the preceding 800-odd pages that the reader is slightly disappointed when the author fails to pull a brilliant, convincing scheme to end world poverty out of his sleeve.

Despite its very serious subject matter, Eine Billion Dollar is an easy read – young, hip, energetic and worth the cover price just for the fantastic opening chapter. The only drawback is that for some unfathomable reason it hasn’t yet been translated into English. However, if you read German, Turkish, Dutch, Russian or Polish, you’re in luck.

Me sitting for some people trying out “life drawing” for the first time for the Sky Arts Den on Monday at Filmbase.

Felt slightly strange posing for artists with my clothes on for once. There are two more absolutely free classes (this includes feedback from an artist) on Thursday, May 26th at 13:00 and 16:00 respectively, if you’ve ever fancied giving it a go.

Actually, this person, who presumably didn’t even get paid, did a much better job of showing what Dublin looked like during “the Queen visit” and also has some other cool photos:

www.seriousplace.com

Just watching coverage of Queen Lizzie’s visit to Ireland, and have been struck by the absolute on-message habit of every last person on air glossing British-Irish history.

It’s “been troubled”, there “have been mistakes”, it’s “blurry” and “highly complex”. Errrr, not really. The English occupied Ireland for eight hundred years, beat the Irish language out of them (literally), and forced them to adopt their institutions at the point of a whole variety of weapons representing the technological progress made during that very lengthy period of time.

It’s a quite simple history, really.

Yes, Irish people not all good, British people not all bad, but occupation under aegis of imperially-driven colonialism, ruthlessly crushing all opposition? That part is quite clear-cut actually.

I don’t think we should be “getting over” that anymore than African colonies should be “getting over” being brutalized, having their culture destroyed and their resources sucked out from under their feet, or any more than Native Americans and Canadians should be “getting over” being forcibly removed from their families and sent to assimilation schools.

None of these are wishy-washy issues of “troubled history” – they are clear-cut cases of right and wrong. And by refusing to sweep such abuses under the rug, one makes clear that the legacy of colonialism and imperialism should not be the victim’s burden, but the oppressor’s.

However her May 17th-20^th sojourn in the Republic ultimately shakes out for Queen Elizabeth II, this visit is bound to be one of the most stage-managed and carefully spun in history.

The reason for this is that a large proportion of Irish people are not in favour of the visit. This is not because we hate English people – in fact, many English citizens live and work in the Republic of Ireland where they are more than welcome and where they constitute the largest percentage of foreign residents. It’s not even about “the North” – the politically neutral term used on the island to refer to what is elsewhere known as Northern Ireland. The issue of “the North” doesn’t enter the heads of most people down here from the end of one week to the next, hardly surprising as it has been a separate political entity for nearly a century.

It is about the general values on which the State of Ireland was founded. When compared to Rest of World, the Republic of Ireland is distinctly off-message. It is a country that is generally anti-imperialist, deeply republican and somewhat anarchic, a place where – unlike the UK – no one calls you “ma’am” much less “Dr.” and where the last time I arrived at Dublin Airport sans ID, I got told to “remember it next time”. This value system is no coincidence – it is based on a deep-rooted sense of equality and an absolute lack of respect for hierarchical, pointless authority (ie fascism). Republicanism, in this greater sense, was, and is, a lot more than a minor turf war – it was, and is, about equality, freedom and self-determination, and it was/is an inspiration to oppressed people around the world. These values are what has given Ireland its unique position on the world stage: we are a neutral country; we aren’t in NATO; in comparison to other Western nations, the class system and capitalism are weak; we have a singular history vis-à-vis colonialism and our stance on global issues such as Palestine is quite unique in the Western world. We were also the only EU country which was constitutionally required to hold referenda on the various integration treaties, because we are the only nation with such a strong belief in the right of “the people” to make all major decisions.

Queens, on the other hand, are not about equality, freedom and self-determination, and that is why we are not very happy to see Queen Elizabeth here, especially without an apology. We are deadset against colonialism and imperialism, and it is not possible to “move forward” with a visit that does not address those important issues. On the contrary, many of the sites chosen for the visit – Dublin Castle (previous seat of British power in Ireland, where the Queen will give her only address), Croke Park (site of a civilian massacre in 1920), the Garden of Remembrance (dedicated to those who fought for Irish freedom) – as well as the dates (anniversary of the 1974 Dublin and Monaghan bombings, almost universally believed by Irish people to have been carried out by British intelligence), have, however intended, inflammed many people, who are not interested in acting as if the passage of time has magically made everything OK.

Unfortunately, Irish people are not being given a chance to express their views on this point. The official media is presenting a unified pro-visit stance, and Dublin is, at the time of writing, already in a near lockdown state. Most inner city streets are subject to a parking ban and Dublin’s main roads will be closed for the duration of the visit, including the M50, Dublin’s main highway (the equivalent of closing the 407 around Toronto). The police will also be stopping, questioning and possibly searching anyone found in the general vicinity. In addition, the army, navy and air corps have been deployed, as have anti-aircraft guns and seven military planes (representing a sizeable chunk of the entire Irish airforce). The trash bins have been taken off the streets and manhole covers are being sealed. Water cannons have also been brought in from “the North”, making many people feel that the Queen has not only come, but has brought the instruments of oppression with her. Because this 40 million USD security operation is highly unusual for Ireland, where police officers do not carry guns and we essentially do not have crowd control equipment. When people illegally block streets, we phone talk-radio to complain, before conceding that maybe they have a point and hey, it’s only for a few days, anyway.

We also tend not to feel threatened by the IRA (or RIRA, CIRA or other countless variations on the same theme), who generally only harm civilians when they really bungle something, and therefore the perceived need for protection from “terrorists” (notably not referred to as “terrorists” here, but rather as “dissidents”) is rock bottom. We are all well aware that it isn’t us they are after – we’re only worried about being “collateral damage”. Case in point: I traveled by bus through an area of Dublin on Friday where several non-viable explosives had been found the previous day, listening all the way to a middle-aged Irishman gleefully regale some Spanish tourists about said bombs and what a glorious point was being made therewith. But while we are all quite chilled about this sort of thing, few people will be wanting to stand next to Queen Elizabeth while she is here. That is quite a different kettle of fish, and we only question the wisdom of bringing her somewhere where her presence is so clearly undesired. Without this extremely high level of stage-management she would certainly be the target of at least some very hefty protests, and if the world sees a Queen happily visiting a few hand-picked Irish people as part of an imagined apology-free “reconciliation” in the next few days, I can only attest – from my vantage point here on the ground – that it is not seeing the whole picture.

Carthage Must Be Destroyed: The Rise and Fall of an Ancient Civilisation

Richard Miles

Allen Lane

This is one of those books that tells you everything you wanted to know about its subject matter, plus a few things you didn’t. The upshot is that even if you’ve never before heard the word “Carthage”, you’ll have no trouble getting into this non-ficton work which charts this culture from its Middle Eastern roots through its Spanish mining colonies, colossal showdown with Rome and eventual demise at the hands of said indefatigable Romans. Fact-packed and academically weighed, but somehow as easy to digest as a novel, whilst reading you will realize that a few things – albeit things you’ve previously remained blissfully ignorant of – do remain tantalizing shrouded in mystery.  The reason for this is the rather thorough job the Romans did on the destruction front, virtually erasing the Carthaginians from history and vilifying the remnants.

The title takes its cue from a practice of Cato the Elder, who enterprisingly ended every speech with the words “Carthage Must Be Destroyed”, a relentless campaign which finally bore fruit in a monumental genocide coupled with character assassination so complete as to leave traces in modern language: “Baal”, for example, often a demon in Judeo-Christian religion, as well as countless fantasy novels, was simply Punic for “Lord”, a title often granted as a prefix to Punic gods who were, in fact, remarkably similar to Greek and Roman ones; while “Hannibal”, generally associated with horror,  or at least wanton laying waste of the countryside, was really just the only Carthaginian general who ever managed to give the Romans a run for their money (one thing that becomes obvious from reading this book is how embarrassingly indifferent the Carthaginians were in all things martial). It’s this twist – casting events as a somewhat cooked-up, ancient “clash of civilisations” – that sets the book apart, and imbues it with a very pressing modern relevance.

In addition, the author excels at putting one in the mindframe of the people involved, examining their motivations and experiences, and describing battles and political tactics in an engaging, personality-driven manner. As a bit of a bonus, while much misaligned by history, the Carthaginians had their own Dark Side (child sacrifice, routine crucifixion of unsuccessful generals, unceremonious pocketing of Spanish silver), which ups the already considerable drama. If you like history and/or political intrigue, you’ll love this book.

Black Rock

Amanda Smyth

Serpent’s Tail

(first published in Metro Eireann)

In this novel, set not in Blackrock, Ireland, but Black Rock, Tobago, the protagonist Celia grows up with her Aunt Tassi, two younger cousins and her Aunt’s second husband, Roman. She is, of course, both intelligent and beautiful – “You’re a bright girl, Celia. Just because you’re pretty, doesn’t mean you should forget about your studies,” her schoolteacher fawns. But when Roman’s harassment of her finally (and I mean, finally) culminates in rape, Celia runs away to neighbouring Trinidad. Becoming ill on the journey, she is fortunate enough to run into William Shamiel, a young man who helps her find a job as a maid with his employer, a medical doctor named Emmanuel Rodriguez. The womanizing Rodriguez soon begins a not-so-covert affair with an acquiescent Celia, which contributes to his wife’s increasing mental imbalance.

Told from the candid child point of view, Black Rock is a rarity in its interesting depiction of life on a Carribean island, but while the setting is captivating, the plot is largely the same old story. Both juvenile sexual abuse and the husband-philandering-with-the-maid line have been pretty much done to death as literary themes and Black Rock doesn’t offer anything new to justify rehashing them yet again. The answers to such riveting questions as the identity of Celia’s real parents (another theme that’s been wrung dry) can be seen coming a mile off, and, as the icing on the cake, Celia confesses her affair to William while sitting in front of a statue of the Virgin Mary, who apparently has an obligatory cameo in every Irish book ever published whenever the protagonist feels a confessional mood coming on.

But while the storyline is a bit bland (although well-told), the landscape never is. It’s clear that the author knows what she is talking about, and Celia’s island home of the 1950’s comes across both as authentic and asphyxiatingly entrancing. This is where Black Rock really shines, and it’s worth picking up solely for its languid yet vivid description, which instantly transports the reader to another time and place.

This is a book where nothing jars – no one ever drops irritatingly out of character, no gaps surface in the plot to nag at your brain – and this makes for a smooth, entertaining read. The fact that it’s just a little too neat is more than made up for by the exotic and vivid setting which the author conveys with unusual power.