From shuddha at sarai.net Tue Jan 1 16:34:18 2002 From: shuddha at sarai.net (Shuddhabrata Sengupta) Date: Tue, 1 Jan 2002 16:34:18 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Welcome 2002 Message-ID: <02010116341800.01106@sweety.sarai.kit> Dear all on the Reader List Firstly, a very happy new year to all. Our list will soon be a year old (the first posting, a test message, went out on the 10th of March last year) and since then, the list has faithfully reflected the events of this turbulent year. 9/11 was obviously a big issue, as were the growing climate of authoritarianism in South Asia, in India, Pakistan and Bangladesh. The list also reflected a lot on software related issues, and the social and cultural implications of software. Another important concern was the global forms of resistance to the WTO. As the year turns, the list has begun to reflect on the growing threat of War in South Asia. We have also had a number of very informative postings on the situation in Kashmir. It is only natural that a list such as this will reflect what happens in the world around us. Let us hope that this year, the world can get a respite from war and violence, and that the list can have conversations that are more than reactive, that we can initiate the debates on city spaces, and the images and transmissions that emanate from our spaces. Sometimes, the list has acted as that space where one could vent ones rage at what was happening, sometimes a space where one could quietly let loose a discreet provocation. All of this has been important to me, and I am hoping that it has been so for others as well. I have enjoyed listening in on the debates that we have had, and have been grateful for the space that the list has created to share what I think and feel. I wish everyone on the list peace and happiness in the new year. Last night, going home just after midnight I witnessed a city full of revellers, and watching the revellers were armed policemen behind sandbags, in improvised checkposts. The nervous edges of joy and fear intersected when the revellers stopped at checkpsosts. Bomb scares and celebrations mingled in a way that I suppose we must now count on as being routine. At a friends' house, someone said, "lets look at the news", and then someone else said, don't bother, "they won't declare war on new years eve". Lets hope that war does not come knocking on our doors, even once the new year has begun to acquire the tarnish of a few days. For those of you who are in Delhi, you can see a fragment of the list archives have an offline life today at the SAHMAT commemoration at Safdar Hashmi Marg, off Mandi House Circle. Two computer terminals have been loaded with a selection of the forwards and original postings (33 postings) on the aftermath of September 11 that were made on this list between September and December of the last year. One of these computers is connected to a printer, and anyone can take printouts of the postings that have been archived. And so, our List has taken a small step out on to the streets of Delhi. Cheers, from a troubled city in a troubled time Shuddha From dulallie at yahoo.com Tue Jan 1 20:07:30 2002 From: dulallie at yahoo.com (Alice Albinia) Date: Tue, 1 Jan 2002 06:37:30 -0800 (PST) Subject: [Reader-list] Out of Sync In-Reply-To: <02010116341800.01106@sweety.sarai.kit> Message-ID: <20020101143730.66607.qmail@web12503.mail.yahoo.com> Yesterday afternoon I tried to order a delivery of the Asian Age from the local newsagent. Who is Sri Lankan. �Asian what?� he said, handing a New Yorker over my head to the liberally-scented woman with a poodle in the queue behind. I am living, now, alongside London�s genteel Chalk Farm, where the houses are big, and, like their residents, white. I think he thought I was taking the piss. At present, Indian news sometimes makes page two of The Guardian. One mostly finds it somewhere in the middle, in black and white only, below Afghanistan, Russia and Peru. But what you lose in sleep by flying feet first into Greenwich Mean Time, you gain in peculiar new perspective. This is where I live then: India on page ten. Having abandoned two alarm clocks in New Delhi, functioning as I do five and half waking hours ahead of Great Britain, old time (lost time) takes on altered meaning. Thus I spent New Year with a crowd of polite partyers on Primrose Hill, looking at London through a draggle of fireworks, and listening to the dislocated Mexican wave of cheering that greeted their various approximations of midnight. 31st December is as arbitrary a marker of time as any other (after a culmination of Diwali, solstice and Christmas it sort of loses its charm) but the TV channels love it for its recycling-of-old-footage soft touch and various state drudges (the Prime Minister, the Queen) make summary speeches. The better bit is the morning after, when we the new citizens get to see the 30-year old state papers, on hot release from the Public Record Office. I was born in 1976. 1971, monotonously, was a year of public gaffes from Britain�s Royal family, of the Education Secretary Mrs Thatcher�s crackdown on �extreme left-wing activities� of student unions, and tough new immigration laws, heckled through by Enoch Powell, to let in the �old� Commonwealth (the white ones, of �British stock�) � but keep out the Asians. Memories are short: 1971�s legislation reviewed Labour�s 1945 law, for Powell and cronies feared being �swamped� by an Indian �explosion�. Well, thirty years on, the papers are swamped by Lloyd-Webber�s rising star Preeya Kalidas, reviews of Nithin Sawhney�s latest, and reports that if 2001 saw Lagaan get to the Top Ten in British Box Office Charts, 2002 will be the year of Bollywood-Britasian. Ironic that. (But in Chalk Farm, I still await my era of Asian Age.) This, I am ashamed to say, is my first posting. Sorry I�m late. And if it has some meaning, Happy 2002. __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Send your FREE holiday greetings online! http://greetings.yahoo.com From ravis at sarai.net Wed Jan 2 11:50:48 2002 From: ravis at sarai.net (Ravi Sundaram) Date: Wed, 02 Jan 2002 11:50:48 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Long distance servies withdrawn in Kashmir Message-ID: <5.0.2.1.2.20020102114621.00ad4450@pop3.norton.antivirus> This is a news report on the withdrawal of long distance services from Kashmir. Given the near-hysterical war fever that has been the flavour in the government and the media in Delhi..the restrictions on independent access and independent media in the Valley are part of the package. Web sites blocked, Internet access limited in "security areas", more to come? Ravi STD, ISD, Internet services withdrawn in Kashmir SRINAGAR: STD and ISD services were withdrawn from all private public call offices (PCOs) and cybercafes in the Kashmir Valley on Tuesday following reports of misuse of the facilities by militants which came to light, especially after the December 13 attack on Parliament. While crippling the STD and ISD facilities in the valley, Bharat Sanchar Nagam Ltd (BSNL) officials, however, said that the facilities to individuals, firms and offices would remain intact. The decision to withdraw the services for an "indefinite period" owing to security reasons was reportedly taken after the first meeting of the Cabinet Committee on Security, which met after the audacious attack on Parliament. The move, according to informed sources, was taken after it was found that Mohammed, leader of the suicide squad attack on Parliament, had extensively used the Internet and e-mail facilities while planning the December 13 operations. It may be mentioned that security personnel had seized a laptop from Mohammed Afzal, pointman of Jaish-e-Mohammed, and during its scrutiny it was found that Mohammed had finalised the plan through e-mails to Pakistan and Dubai. The sources said that anti-national elements, mainly militants, were using the STD, ISD and Internet facilities for "taking instructions from their mentors across the border." Meanwhile, the fresh move may also put into jeopardy the prestigious project of the Jammu and Kashmir government of setting up a software park in the valley. ( PTI ) From rehanhasanansari at yahoo.com Wed Jan 2 22:21:11 2002 From: rehanhasanansari at yahoo.com (rehan ansari) Date: Wed, 2 Jan 2002 08:51:11 -0800 (PST) Subject: [Reader-list] Just Causes Message-ID: <20020102165111.54833.qmail@web12902.mail.yahoo.com> Early this year in Qasbah Colony, Karachi, I saw a poster that proclaimed, �Shahadat Conference.� Its central image was of a masked man holding a machine gun, the background red, as in the afterglow of an explosion. Along the margins of the poster were photographs of martyrs, all the faces were young, some ridiculously so. The poster also had a date for the conference and promised a �telephonic� address from Syed Ali Geelani. It was placed on the outside wall of a house that served as a school. I was standing in a narrow lane of houses when I saw this poster. The lane was on a hill. As I looked further up the lane, over the rooftops following the phone lines, towards the hillside, I saw a sign that commanded the community � it said �Jaish-e-Muhammad�. Qasbah Colony is adjacent to the SITE area where the heavy industries of Karachi are located. It is one of the colonies that houses the industrial workforce. I had gotten there along broken roads, open sewers and open-air trash burnings. In the entire township I saw only one building that said it was a government-run educational institution. I wonder if any of the $1 billion that Washington promised Islamabad for the defanging of the madarsas, will make it to Qasbah Colony. I wonder if the most obvious signs of violence will be removed. For once I would like Barkha Dutt and her Star TV crew to cover Kashmir from Qasbah Colony, Karachi. --------------------------------- Do You Yahoo!? Send your FREE holiday greetings online at Yahoo! Greetings. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20020102/56f1488e/attachment.html From aiindex at mnet.fr Thu Jan 3 03:47:01 2002 From: aiindex at mnet.fr (Harsh Kapoor) Date: Wed, 2 Jan 2002 23:17:01 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] Running Naked by Anwar Iqbal Message-ID: South Asia Citizens Wire - Dispatch #2 | 2 January 2002 http://www.mnet.fr/aiindex #1. Running Naked by Anwar Iqbal "Two or three years after the partition, it occurred to the governments of India and Pakistan that lunatics, like prisoners, should also be exchanged -- Muslim lunatics should be sent to Pakistan, and Hindus and Sikhs be transferred to India," writes Urdu short story writer Saadat Hasan Manto. Published in the early 1950s, it is considered so far the best story on the human tragedy that accompanied the partition of the Subcontinent in 1947. Parts of the story, still read and enacted in schools and colleges on both sides of the dividing line, aptly describe the madness that has plagued both the nations during the last 53 years. Three wars and countless skirmishes have failed to resolve their disputes. Equally useless have been dozens of meetings and conferences arranged by the international community to let the two neighbors resolve their differences. They are still at each other's throats. At least once in a decade, their madness gets out of control and they dash at each other with whatever weapons they can lay their hands on. Exhausted, they pause and wait another decade to build up enough hatred to dash at each other again. The Muslim majority Himalayan valley of Kashmir is the main dispute that caused two of the three wars India and Pakistan have fought. But any issue, even a friendly cricket match, can turn ugly and stir their madness. Kashmir also is in the center of the current crisis stirred by an attack on the Indian parliament by a group of armed men last week. India says the attackers were Pakistan-backed Kashmiri fighters. Islamabad denies the charge and says they could have been Indian agents who attacked the parliament to justify an armed Indian incursion against Pakistan. "One inmate had got so badly caught up in this India-Pakistan-India rigmarole that one day, while sweeping the floor, he dropped everything, climbed the nearest tree and installed himself on a branch. From this vantage point, he spoke for two hours on the delicate problem of India and Pakistan. The guards asked him to get down; instead he went a branch higher, and when threatened with punishment, declared: 'I wish to live neither in India nor in Pakistan, I wish to live in this tree,'" writes Manto. Unfortunately, unlike Manto's lunatics, today's Indians and Pakistanis do not have this option. They have no tree to climb. They have to live through this insanity and suffer. And now that their leaders have nuclear toys to play with, their sense of insecurity has increased. The theory of nuclear deterrence that Indian and Pakistani leaders invoked to justify their nuclear tests in 1998 does not make them feel better. "There are enough crazy people on both sides of the border. Besides, the chance of an accidental nuclear war is greater here than it was between the United States and the former Soviet Union, who coined the theory of nuclear deterrence," says Pervez Hoodbhoy, a Pakistani scientist. Hoodbhoy, a Ph.D. in nuclear physics from MIT, is an anti-nuclear lobbyist and a campaigner for peace between India and Pakistan. "We share a long border, and it will take a nuclear-tipped missile less than a minute to hit its target on either side of the border. There's no room for correcting an error as it was between the United States and the Soviet Union," said Hoodbhoy. Rulers on both sides of the border, however, assure that their insanity will not lead to a nuclear war. "We are talking about precise attacks on terrorist targets, not an all-out war against Pakistan," India's minister of state for foreign affairs, Omar Abdullah, told journalists in New Delhi on Tuesday. He, however, did not say what will prevent Pakistan from going for an all-out war if attacked. Similarly, Pakistani rulers have long defended their open and hidden support to Kashmiri militants as a reminder to India, and the rest of the world, that the Kashmir dispute needs to be resolved. They also fail to explain why should India continue to suffer these hit-and-run attacks by Kashmiri militants without engaging Pakistan in a war. "We are sitting on a powder keg which can explode any moment," says N.H. Nayyar, another anti-nuclear lobbyist in Islamabad, Pakistan. Authorities on both sides of the border describe such people as alarmists, arguing that "both India and Pakistan are mature enough to understand the repercussions of a war between two nuclear neighbors," as a spokesman for the Foreign Ministry in Islamabad said. "They do not want to commit suicide." But to ordinary observers it seems that suicide is what the two governments want to commit. "People who understand what a nuclear weapon can do, live under great stress," says Nayyar. "Peace campaigners and anti-nuclear lobbyists are too weak to affect decision making in India or Pakistan. All we can do is to sit and pray," said Rashid Khalid, another anti-nuclear lobbyist who teaches defense and strategic studies at Islamabad's Quaid-i-Azam University. In Manto's story, characters at the Lahore asylum, where lunatics were being divided on the basis of their religion, reacted differently to the stress of the partition. "A Muslim radio engineer ... who never mixed with anyone ... was so affected by the current debate that one day he took all his clothes off, gave the bundle to one of the guards and ran into the garden stark naked." Maybe this is what peace lovers in India and Pakistan ought to do: Run stark naked in the streets to force their leaders to give peace a chance. --- About the author: A Washington-based journalist working for an international news agency. This article appeared in Chowk.com From patrice at xs4all.nl Thu Jan 3 10:19:05 2002 From: patrice at xs4all.nl (Patrice Riemens) Date: Thu, 3 Jan 2002 05:49:05 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] Pinguin take-over in Goa class-rooms (fwd) Message-ID: <20020103054905.E25269@xs4all.nl> (From the GoaNet mailing list) ---- Forwarded message from Frederick Noronha ----- Date: Wed, 2 Jan 2002 12:17:39 +0530 (IST) Subject: [goanews] NEWS: The penguin goes to school, Linux for Goa classrooms... THE PENGUIN GOES TO SCHOOL: LINUX TO DEBUT IN GOA CLASSROOMS By Frederick Noronha, Indo-Asian News Service PANAJI (Goa), Dec 27 -- After struggling for years to get access to non-pirated software to run their computer labs, schools in the western coastal state of Goa have hit a bonanza that seems too good to be true. Red Hat India, part of a prominent global corporation dealing in 'open source' or 'free' software, has come up with an innovative plan, which was promptly seized by volunteers pushing for the speedy computerisation of schools here. Under this, schools will get access not just all the software they need, but also to free training for teachers and volunteers. What makes this project innovatively different is that it's based on Linux, or GNU/Linux, an operating system (OS) which seeks to make the software industry 'open'. 'Free software' means it is freely distributable and free of restrictions on seeing, using, copying, modifying and re-distributing the original source code or software based on it. This, in turn, makes the software moderately or affordably priced, even in countries like India, and legally copyable. In a few weeks time, volunteers are to get training in a project that could sustainably meet schools' software needs. Young Linux enthusiasts and volunteers -- including some engineering college students -- will be trained in installing the software. Later, Red Hat and their training partners are to train teachers in using this decade-old operating system which is now making a dent across the globe. Red Hat Indian training manager Shankar Iyer told this correspondent that his firm would provide Linux as a standard operating system (OS) for schools in Goa. "In this process, Red Hat and an NGO (Goa Computers in Schools Project) have come together for a social cause," said Iyer. The Goa Computers in Schools Project is a coalition of educationists, concerned citizens and expat Goans who feel the need to speeding up the pace of computer education in this small state. It was launched in the mid-nineties, and has been both inspiring and helping schools to get computer infrastructure faster. It has also raised funds among expat communities towards this goal. By this understanding, the Goa Computers in Schools Project will work to implement the project here, while Red Hat India will provide training to teachers and volunteers at its own cost. Red Hat's approach is to 'catch them young', and agrees that introducing students to 'free' computer operating systems like its own at the school level itself could help build an edge over proprietorial software like Windows which currently dominates the desktop segment worldwide. Currently, a project of this type is unique for India, where schools have been struggling with un-affordable software prices. "Red Hat is willing to extend it across the country (without any financial implications for the schools)," said Iyer. "The concept of open source and its advantages of having the source code in hand, will be of great advantage for children. Schools and parents will not be burdened with high investments, on regular intervals. School also need not keep spending on upgrading its machines on a regular basis," Red Hat's Iyer contended. Daryl Martyris, a US-based expat management consultant with PriceWaterHouseCoopers and key GCSP campaigner, told this correspondent: "We have been trying very hard over the last two years to persuade Microsoft to donate OS software and MS Office or sell it at concessional rates." But this didn't work. "Since the (once-used US) computers we ship are "wiped" of their OS by the donors for liability reasons, and do not want to encourage piracy of MS products, we have started to ship Linux OS installation kits with the computers," said Martyris. So, the Red Hat India offer to provide free training came as a bonanza. "Training for our volunteers and support to the schools is very tempting, since it complements our efforts in this direction," said Martyris. Red Hat India told this correspondent that it has drawn up a complete schedule to train the volunteers, starting from January 2002. The cost of the training would be estimated to about Rs 150,000, according to Red Hat India's Shankar Iyer. But this figure hides another reality -- non-pirated proprietorial software needed to run on just the 360 computers that are being shipped into Goa would cost millions. "This is a very good initiative," commented Dr Gurunandan Bhat, till recently head of Goa University's computer science department. "The spread of (useful open source technologies like) Linux depends on how quickly we take it across to schools," he added. But Bhat cautioned that the effort's project would hinge on building up a "stable group of volunteers" and this is where NGOs could play an important role in making things possible. ~ Red Hat India suggested that if this project took off well in Goa, it could be replicated in other places across India, considered by some as a software-superpower in the making, but which ironically often can't afford prices of 'legal' proprietary software for its schools. But implementing this project is not going to be easy. Larger, more ambitious, attempts have faced glitches. For instance, in 1998, the Mexican government embarked on an ambitious attempt to equip its vast and under-funded school system with computers running the free operating system GNU/Linux. It expected to save up to $124 million in software licenses, and part of this could go to buy computer hardware for some 126,000 public schools. Mexico's RedEscolar project inspired Brazil and Argentina, but "fewer than 20" out of 4500 schools could run GNU/Linux machines, primarily due to a lack of support, both technical and political. Besides a chronic scarcity of personnel familiar with GNU/Linux, a lack of compatible hardware also caused roadblocks in plans. Goa-based GCSP representative Anit Saxena admits that the job ahead poses some daunting tasks, but says efforts are on to make it work. "Getting things done in Goa can take time," he says. One other problem that the proponents of 'free software' would face is the Goa Board syllabus, which currently lays down that particular Microsoft products have to be taught to students. But efforts are on to make the syllabus 'brand-neutral', so that concepts can be taught to students, instead of focussing on familiarity with particular software products. Linux proponents point out that all tasks needed to be undertaken by computer users and software programmers can be easily done using 'free' and 'open' software tools too. GNU/Linux software has won praise from techies across the globe. It is particularly apt for running 'server' computers. Of late, major Linux packages (called 'distributions') have become more user friendly, even for desktop-computer users. But compatibility with some printers, scanners, fax machines and sound-cards has been an issue with some distributions of Linux. Installation is somewhat more difficult than a Windows OS, though experts say once everything everything is running, day-to-day use of Linux and open source applications is not much different from using Windows. In some schools in Goa -- like the elite Sharada Mandir outside Panaji -- piracy-free Linux software has already been installed in the school lab. "We are keen to employ Linux solutions too," says Ashwin D.Naik, a UK-educated engineer and management expert, whose family-run trust runs the Adarsh Vidyalaya School in the South Goa town of Margao. Meanwhile, the Goa Computers in Schools Project has announced that the duty waiver for the import of once-used computers has come through. Some 360 computers are expected to be shipped in, to reach schools across the state. (ENDS) ************************************************************************** Interested in volunteering? Contact Daryl Martyris ************************************************************************** ----- End forwarded message ----- From oneworld at del3.vsnl.net.in Thu Jan 3 10:09:36 2002 From: oneworld at del3.vsnl.net.in (Kanti Kumar) Date: Thu, 3 Jan 2002 10:09:36 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] FW: CSE Chairperson Mr. Anil Agarwal passes away Message-ID: -----Original Message----- From: webadmin at cseindia.org [mailto:webadmin at cseindia.org] Sent: Thursday, January 03, 2002 8:28 AM To: CSE-LIST2 at listserv.cseindia.org Subject: CSE Chairperson Mr. Anil Agarwal passes away ENVIRONMENTALIST ANIL AGARWAL PASSES AWAY NEW DELHI, JANUARY 2: Anil Agarwal, 54, Chairperson of the New Delhi based Centre for Science and Environment, passed away in Dehradun today after a prolonged illness. He was undergoing treatment for cancer and asthma, and is survived by his wife and two daughters. The cremation will take place at the Lodhi Road Crematorium at 3 pm today, January 3, 2002 Agarwal, a mechanical engineer trained at IIT Kanpur, began his journalistic career as a science correspondent for the Hindustan Times in 1973. He was the Editor of Down To Earth, India's premier science and environment magazine. He has written for several international publications including the London-based journals Earthscan and New Scientist. He has written and edited more than 20 books on science and environment in India. In 1980, Agarwal founded CSE, one of the world's most dynamic NGOs. >From 1983 to 1987, Agarwal chaired the world's largest network of environmental NGOs, the Nairobi-based Environment Liasion Centre. In 1987, the United Nations Environment Programme elected him to its Global 500 Honor Roll for his work in the national and international arena. The Indian Government has also honored him with Padma Shri and Padma Bushan for his work in environment and development **************************************************************** CENTRE FOR SCIENCE AND ENVIRONMENT ( CSE ) 41, TUGHLAKABAD INSTITUTIONAL AREA, NEW DELHI- 110 062 TELE: 608 1110, 608 1124 608 3394, 608 6399 FAX : 91-11-608 5879 VISIT US AT: http://www.cseindia.org Email: webadmin at cseindia.org **************************************************************** Kanti Kumar Editor, Digital Opportunity Channel OneWorld South Asia New Delhi, India From aiindex at mnet.fr Thu Jan 3 15:52:27 2002 From: aiindex at mnet.fr (Harsh Kapoor) Date: Thu, 3 Jan 2002 11:22:27 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] PC apparently used by al-Qaida leaders reveals details of four years of terrorism Message-ID: PC apparently used by al-Qaida leaders reveals details of four years of terrorism By Alan Cullison and Andrew Higgins THE WALL STREET JOURNAL KABUL, Afghanistan, Dec. 31 — Last May, someone sat down at an IBM desktop here and typed out a polite letter to a bitter foe of al-Qaida, the anti-Taliban leader Ahmed Shah Massoud. The writer tapped at the computer for 97 minutes, according to its internal record, then printed out the fruit of his labor: a request for an interview with Massoud, to be conducted by "one of our best journalists, Mr. Karim Touzani." ON SEPT. 9, two men posing as journalists, one carrying a passport in the name of Karim Touzani, detonated a hidden bomb as they interviewed Massoud. The legendary Afghan commander was mortally wounded. Two days later came the suicide attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon. Now, as al-Qaida, the group blamed for all of those lethal attacks, is uprooted from its Afghan sanctuaries, it is leaving behind cyber-fingerprints. The letter to Massoud is one of hundreds of text documents and video files in a computer evidently used for four years by al-Qaida chieftains in Kabul. Its hard drive is a repository for correspondence with militant Muslims around the world, portraying al-Qaida bosses struggling to administer, inspire and discipline the sprawling global organization. Dating from early 1997 through this fall, the files paint a picture of both ghoulish ambitions and quotidian frustrations within an organization that, despite its medieval zealotry, sometimes mimicked a multinational corporation. Memos refer to al-Qaida as "the company" and its leadership as "the general management." [...] From abirbazaz at rediffmail.com Fri Jan 4 22:13:40 2002 From: abirbazaz at rediffmail.com (abir bazaz) Date: 4 Jan 2002 16:43:40 -0000 Subject: [Reader-list] Kamila Shamsie on India,Pakistan and Lies Message-ID: <20020104164340.26734.qmail@mailweb11.rediffmail.com> Kamila Shamsie Thursday January 3, 2002 The Guardian A decade ago, more than 50 of my 96 classmates and I left Karachi to attend university in the US and UK. We didn't give much thought to the fact thatmany of us would be meeting Indians for the first time in our lives. It's hard now to find anyone among those 50-odd Pakistanis who didn't make at least one Indian friend. But what we all discovered was this: we might agree with our friends from across the border on everything else - our embarrassed attachment to 80s music; our despair at the floundering fortunes of the West Indian cricket team; our inability to eat Uncle Ben's rice without thinking weepily of basmati; our positions on capital punishment, gay rights,abortion, and gun control - but we could not agree, not one whit, on the twointerrelated wounds of Indo-Pak relations: partition and Kashmir. There are worse things, I suppose, than discovering at 18 that, no matter how many books you read and analytical skills you acquire, your truths will never be objective. It would be nice to say that, after a decade of talk, those Indo-Pak friendships have resulted in a shifting of positions which can serve as an example to the politicians of our two countries. Perhaps this is true in one or two cases. But, largely, we just learned to stop talking about certain things to each other, and accepted that we had grown up with two different narratives about the same events. If the "two nations, two narratives" issue only centred on the creation of Pakistan 55 years ago, I expect we could learn to live with our differences.But as long as the situation in Kashmir remains unresolved we will continue to see border tensions and doomsday predictions and radically differing interpretations arising from a basic set of facts. The basic set of facts we are faced with is this: on December 13 there was a failed attack on the Indian parliament, and the attackers were killed along with several Indian security personnel. One narrative surrounding these ba ed how easy it is to milk the "no distinction between terrorists and those who harbour them" line, gunmen miraculously got through security checks, in a time of heightened alerts, and attempted to destroy the Indian parliament. In a further miracle, none of the ministerswere hurt and the terrorists were killed. The Indian government refused to show the faces of the terrorists to reporters, insisted that the terrorists were part of two groups fighting for the liberation of Kashmir (though that is not quite how the Indians phrased it), and that the attack was planned in training camps in Pakistan and involved the collusion of Pakistan's intelligence agency, the ISI. Pakistan offered a joint inquiry into the affair, and India refused. The other narrative, in which I'm not as well-versed, follows these lines: Pakistan decided to take advantage of its newly warmed friendship with the world's superpower by launching yet another in a long series of attacks on India. Pakistan-sponsored terrorist groups attempted to bring the Indian government to its knees by blowing up the Indian parliament. The plan was foiled and the terrorists were killed. If the war against terrorism is to be a global war then surely India must have the right to attack Pakistan. But the US cautioned restraint, and Pakistan, in a brazenly cheeky move, insisted that it be part of the investigation into the attack. Or, here is the condensed version of the two narratives, which can stand in for the two narratives during any conflict between India and Pakistan. Narrative one: India always lies. Narrative two: Pakistan always lies. But there is an important third narrative. In the first days after President Musharraf came to power in Pakistan more than two years ago, he repeatedly expressed his admiration for the aggressively secular Kemal Ataturk. Andthen, abruptly, he went silent. It was widely believed that Musharraf was warned against the perils of taking on the hardline religious groups. But in a post-September 11 Pakistan the extr up significant support for their anti-government rallies, and the president has been speaking openly about the need to combat those who have been holding hostage a nation which is essentially moderate. Pakistan's best chance to move against the extremists is now. But it's one thing for Musharraf to root out terrorists; it's quite another for him to appear to do so at the behest of India. In government circles, it is being said that Musharraf is furious about the attacks on the parliament building,and - more importantly - that India's belligerent demands that he arrest militants are actually slowing down the crackdown on extremists. Perhaps this is the narrative to which more Indians should be paying attention. For a moment I thought I could end this column on that previous line. But to do so would be to leave out the most important narrative here: that of the 70,000 and more (every week, more) who have died since 1990 in the struggle for Kashmir's future. When Indo-Pak narratives clash, the fallout is almost always in Kashmir. India insists there is no genuine struggle for self-determination and that the uprising in Kashmir is Pakistan-sponsored.Pakistan insists it offers only moral support to the Kashmiri struggle. India lies. Pakistan lies. But here is a truth we can all agree on: a solution to the Kashmir dispute must be found so that the phrase "threat of nuclear war" can be consigned to the history books and the next generation of Pakistanis and Indians does not become so accustomed to such a phrase that, in the midst of the massive build-up of troops along the border, it continues to live its life as though nothing out of the ordinary is going on. (I don't know about the major cities of India, but in Karachi New Year was a wildly celebratory affair, and not just among groups who are associated with fiddling during fires.) And here is another, no less important truth: a solution must be found for the sake of the Kashmiris who have waited far too long already to approve a joint narrative Bloomsbury, £6.99) From soenke.zehle at web.de Sat Jan 5 01:51:45 2002 From: soenke.zehle at web.de (Soenke Zehle) Date: Fri, 04 Jan 2002 21:21:45 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] Unocal Oil Company adviser named US envoy to Afghanistan In-Reply-To: Message-ID: Oil company adviser named US representative to Afghanistan By Patrick Martin 3 January 2002 http://www.wsws.org/articles/2002/jan2002/oil-j03.shtml President Bush has appointed a former aide to the American oil company Unocal, Afghan-born Zalmay Khalilzad, as special envoy to Afghanistan. The nomination was announced December 31, nine days after the US-backed interim government of Hamid Karzai took office in Kabul. The nomination underscores the real economic and financial interests at stake in the US military intervention in Central Asia. Khalilzad is intimately involved in the long-running US efforts to obtain direct access to the oil and gas resources of the region, largely unexploited but believed to be the second largest in the world after the Persian Gulf. As an adviser for Unocal, Khalilzad drew up a risk analysis of a proposed gas pipeline from the former Soviet republic of Turkmenistan across Afghanistan and Pakistan to the Indian Ocean. He participated in talks between the oil company and Taliban officials in 1997, which were aimed at implementing a 1995 agreement to build the pipeline across western Afghanistan. Unocal was the lead company in the formation of the Centgas consortium, whose purpose was to bring to market natural gas from the Dauletabad Field in southeastern Turkmenistan, one of the world's largest. The $2 billion project involved a 48-inch diameter pipeline from the Afghanistan-Turkmenistan border, passing near the cities of Herat and Kandahar, crossing into Pakistan near Quetta and linking with existing pipelines at Multan. An additional $600 million extension to India was also under consideration. Khalilzad also lobbied publicly for a more sympathetic US government policy towards the Taliban. Four years ago, in an op-ed article in the Washington Post, he defended the Taliban regime against accusations that it was a sponsor of terrorism, writing, "The Taliban does not practice the anti-U.S. style of fundamentalism practiced by Iran." "We should ... be willing to offer recognition and humanitarian assistance and to promote international economic reconstruction," he declared. "It is time for the United States to reengage" the Afghan regime. This "reengagement" would, of course, have been enormously profitable to Unocal, which was otherwise unable to bring gas and oil to market from landlocked Turkmenistan. Khalilzad only shifted his position on the Taliban after the Clinton administration fired cruise missiles at targets in Afghanistan in August 1998, claiming that terrorists under the direction of Afghan-based Osama bin Laden were responsible for bombing US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. One day after the attack, Unocal put Centgas on hold. Two months later it abandoned all plans for a trans-Afghan pipeline. The oil interests began to look towards a post-Taliban Afghanistan, and so did their representatives in the US national security establishment. Liasion to Islamic guerrillas Born in Mazar-e Sharif in 1951, Khalilzad hails from the old ruling elite of Afghanistan. His father was an aide to King Zahir Shah, who ruled the country until 1973. Khalilzad was a graduate student at the University of Chicago, an intellectual center for the American right-wing, when the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan in 1979. Khalilzad became an American citizen, while serving as a key link between US imperialism and the Islamic fundamentalist mujahedin fighting the Soviet-backed regime in Kabul-the milieu out of which both the Taliban and bin Laden's Al Qaeda group arose. He was a special adviser to the State Department during the Reagan administration, lobbying successfully for accelerated US military aid to the mujahedin, including hand-held Stinger anti-aircraft missiles which played a key role in the war. He later became undersecretary of defense in the administration of Bush's father, during the US war against Iraq, then went to the Rand Corporation, a top US military think tank. After Bush was installed as president by a 5-4 vote of the US Supreme Court, Khalilzad headed the Bush-Cheney transition team for the Defense Department and advised incoming Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. Significantly, however, he was not named to a subcabinet position, which would have required Senate confirmation and might have provoked uncomfortable questions about his role as an oil company adviser in Central Asia and intermediary with the Taliban. Instead, he was named to the National Security Council, where no confirmation vote was needed. At the NSC Khalilzad reports to Condoleeza Rice, the national security adviser, who also served as an oil company consultant on Central Asia. After serving in the first Bush administration from 1989 to 1992, Rice was placed on the board of directors of Chevron Corporation and served as its principal expert on Kazakhstan, where Chevron holds the largest concession of any of the international oil companies. The oil industry connections of Bush and Cheney are well known, but little has been said in the media about the prominent role being played in Afghan policy by officials who advised the oil industry on Central Asia. One of the few commentaries in the America media about this aspect of the US military campaign appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle last September 26. Staff writer Frank Viviano observed: "The hidden stakes in the war against terrorism can be summed up in a single word: oil. The map of terrorist sanctuaries and targets in the Middle East and Central Asia is also, to an extraordinary degree, a map of the world's principal energy sources in the 21st century.... It is inevitable that the war against terrorism will be seen by many as a war on behalf of America's Chevron, Exxon, and Arco; France's TotalFinaElf; British Petroleum; Royal Dutch Shell and other multinational giants, which have hundreds of billions of dollars of investment in the region." Silence in the media This reality is well understood in official Washington, but the most important corporate-controlled media outlets-the television networks and major national daily newspapers-have maintained silence that amounts to deliberate, politically motivated self-censorship. The sole recent exception is an article which appeared December 15 in the New York Times business section, headlined, "As the War Shifts Alliances, Oil Deals Follow." The Times reported, "The State Department is exploring the potential for post-Taliban energy projects in the region, which has more than 6 percent of the world's proven oil reserves and almost 40 percent of its gas reserves." The Times noted that during a visit in early December to Kazakhstan, "Secretary of State Colin L. Powell said he was 'particularly impressed' with the money that American oil companies were investing there. He estimated that $200 billion could flow into Kazakhstan during the next 5 to 10 years." Secretary of Energy Spencer Abraham also pushed US oil investments in the region during a November visit to Russia, on which he was accompanied by David J. O'Reilly, chairman of ChevronTexaco. Defense Secretary Rumsfeld has also played a role in the ongoing oil pipeline maneuvers. During a December 14 visit to Baku, capital of Azerbaijan, he assured officials of the oil-rich Caspian state that the administration would lift sanctions imposed in 1992 in the wake of the conflict with Armenia over the enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh. Both Azerbaijan and Armenia have aligned themselves with the US military thrust into Central Asia, offering the Pentagon transit rights and use of airfields. Rumsfeld's visit and his conciliatory remarks were the reward. Rumsfeld told President Haydar Aliyev that the administration had reached agreement with congressional leaders to waive the sanctions. On November 28 the White House released a statement hailing the official opening of the first new pipeline by the Caspian Pipeline Consortium, a joint venture of Russia, Kazakhstan, Oman, ChevronTexaco, ExxonMobil and several other oil companies. The pipeline connects the huge Tengiz oilfield in northwestern Kazakhstan to the Russian Black Sea port of Novorossiysk, where tankers are loaded for the world market. US companies put up $1 billion of the $2.65 billion construction cost. The Bush statement declared, "The CPC project also advances my Administration's National Energy Policy by developing a network of multiple Caspian pipelines that also includes the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan, Baku-Supsa, and Baku-Novorossiysk oil pipelines and the Baku-Tbilisi-Erzurum gas pipeline." There was little US press coverage of this announcement. Nor did the media refer to the fact that the pipeline consortium involved in the Baku-Ceyhan plan, led by the British oil company BP, is represented by the law firm of Baker & Botts. The principal attorney at this firm is James Baker III, secretary of state under Bush's father and chief spokesman for the 2000 Bush campaign during its successful effort to shut down the Florida vote recount. From aiindex at mnet.fr Sat Jan 5 04:42:30 2002 From: aiindex at mnet.fr (Harsh Kapoor) Date: Sat, 5 Jan 2002 00:12:30 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] SACW #1 (05 January. 02) Message-ID: South Asia Citizens Wire - Dispatch #1 | 5 January 2002 http://www.mnet.fr/aiindex ------------------------------------------ #1. The foolishness of war (Khushwant Singh) #2. Blocking the road to peace (Beena Sarwar) #3. Peace, progress and the private armies (Naeem Sadiq) #4. Pakistan: Peace walk condemns violence against Wagah rally #5. They Changed My God (Anwar Iqbal) #6. URGENT! Help Stop Indo-Pak War: Peace Letter seeks NGO Signatures ________________________ #1. The Hindustan Times Saturday, January 5, 2002 http://www.hindustantimes.com/nonfram/050102/detpla01.asp The foolishness of war Khushwant Singh There are millions of my countrymen who agree with me that we must never ever go to war against Pakistan again - or for that matter, against any nation. Sabre-rattling is not patriotism; it is a foolish person's show of bravado. Persons who have not seen the havoc modern-day weaponry can cause to both, those on battlefields and civilians, who have not seen once-flourishing cities in Poland and Germany reduced to rubble and the ruins of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, have little idea of what war is. I have. The vast majority of those who perished in World War II were not soldiers but civilians - men, women and children. I never want to see that happen in India, Pakistan or any other country. Are our responses to the attack on our Parliament the best we could do to fight terrorism? I do not think so. Pakistan condemned it as soon as it occurred, as it did after the attack on the Kashmir assembly. Accusing President Musharraf and his government of being behind these attacks is unwarranted. So is recalling our high commissioner from Islamabad. Al-Qaeda, Lashkar-e-Tayyeba, Jaish-e-Moha-mmed and the Taliban are not creations of Musharraf's regime. They were created by his predecessors and came to him as unwanted inheritance. They have strong presence in Pakistan's armed forces and have gained popularity among the common people of Pakistan. Musharraf has an unenviable task of getting rid of them. He did a right about-turn by disowning the Taliban in Afghanistan under American pressure. Under the same pressure, he is doing his best to disown other Islamic militant organisations. It is not in our interests to add to his troubles but to help him in the task he has been compelled to undertake. His hold on Pakistan is very tenuous. There are many in Pakistan's defence services who would like to see him out of power. They will be more extremist and anti-Indian than Musharraf. Would helping subvert Musharraf's regime at this juncture be in India's interest? Our government seems to think so. I think it is a grave error. Stopping train and bus services to Lahore is also a retrograde step. The need of the hour is more people-to-people contact between Indians and Pakistanis, not making it almost impossible. To say that these buses and trains are conduits for terrorists is a canard no one should believe. Agha Shahid Ali The telephone rang late in the evening of Saturday, December 8. Few people ring me up at that hour. I had a premonition that it might not be good news. The voice at the other end betrayed no emotion. "This is Yaseen Malik speaking," he said. I knew he had been in the United States for medical treatment. "Where from?" I asked. "America or Tihar Jail?" He was not amused. "No, I am speaking from Srinagar. I have some sad news to convey to you." I interrupted him, "No doubt our telephone is being tapped." "I don't care," he replied. "I just wanted to tell you that Agha Shahid Ali died a few hours ago in New York. I believe you know his parents and have written about him." I was numbed. Yes, I knew his parents and had reviewed a couple of his collections of poems and translations of Faiz Ahmed Faiz. I also knew that he had brain surgery and survived the ordeal. But dying at the age of 52 and taking so much of his yet-to-be exposed talent to the grave seemed tragically unfair. I spent much of the night re-reading his The Country Without a Post Office (Ravi Dayal) and his translations. Death was there with Agha Shahid throughout his adolescent years. He brooded over it while doing his doctorate in Penn State University and teaching creative writing in Massachusetts. Melancholy filtered through his mind to his pen and whatever he wrote had the refrain: "When you leave home in the morning, you never know if you'll return." It reflects the turbulent times the people of Kashmir have been living through for the last many years. Some lines are poignant: "Don't tell my father I have died," he says and I follow him through blood on the road and hundreds of pairs of shoes the mourners left behind, as they ran from the funeral, victims of the firing. From windows we hear grieving mothers, and snow begins to fall on us, like ash. Black on edges of flames, it cannot extinguish the neighbourhoods, the homes set ablaze by midnight soldiers. Kashmir is burning: By that dazzling light We see men removing statues from temples. We beg them, "Who will protect us if you leave?" They don't answer, they just disappear On the road to the plains, clutching the gods. Two lines from the Koran in the beginning of his last collection of poems sums up Agha Shahid's emotions: "The Hour draws nigh and the moon is rent asunder." _____ #2. The News on Sunday Jan 06 2002 Blocking the road to peace Beena Sarwar It is unfortunate that road, rail and air links between India and Pakistan have been suspended. The decision will most hurt ordinary people who are in any case worst affected by tensions between our two countries, which divert attention and resources away from the real issues of poverty, hunger and illiteracy, and the rising tide of religious extremism that feeds on this tension. The suspension particularly impacts the hundreds of thousands of divided families who were linked by the idealistically named Samjhota Express and the Dosti Bus. The heart-wrenching scenes at the train and bus depots on both sides recently are eloquent testimony to their pain. Now, even letters between those who cannot afford telephone and email will not be possible until the links are restored. The suspension serves the purpose of no one, except war mongers and religious zealots. The burning desire for contact between ordinary Indians and Pakistanis is expressed in their willingness to brave the hazards of making this contact; this was evident even during the Kargil crisis when the air, bus and rail services between the two generally ran packed. Besides the tensions and the risk of harassment by intelligence sleuths, difficulties include applying for visas in Islamabad or Delhi, where the only two consulates are located. Then there are the inconveniences of the journey itself, harassment by border guards, customs and immigration officials, and mandatory police reporting within twenty-four hours of arrival and departure. Visas are not granted for the country, but for a maximum of three cities. Other restrictions include a prohibition on Indians and Pakistanis crossing the border by foot (other 'foreigners' are allowed), and on visas for armed forces personnel (serving and retired), or to those who are not visiting relatives. And this was when we were in a state of 'no-war' - there never has been any genuine peace, since each side has been engaged in a covert war for years, with varying levels of intensity. But the 'no-war' situation was better than nothing. Restrictions were sometimes lifted, if at times grudgingly, to facilitate people-to-people contacts. 'Track two' diplomacy cannot replace the real thing, but both governments allowed it, because it provided them an escape route from their own implacable positions. The process thus fulfilled an important function. On another level, it contributed to the public discourse, thus creating a platform and a pressure for peace. A significant part of such alternative meetings has been the discussion about the rise of religious extremism on either side of the border. The 'jihadis' and the 'sangh parivar' are more similar than they'd like to believe, and the people have more to gain from eliminating this mindset than suits either government. Closing borders only strengthens extremist views. And it serves no purpose in terms of 'countering terrorism'. After all, 'terrorists' don't cross over with valid visas. The present crackdown on their activities in Pakistan is only pushing them underground - and according to the Jaish's own statement, across the line of divide, into the Indian side of Kashmir. Another important issue discussed in Track Two meetings has been Kashmir, and the need to acknowledge it not just as a territorial dispute but as a matter of the aspirations of the Kashmiri people. Indians had begun to realise that they cannot hold on to Kashmir by force, and Pakistanis had begun to realise that they cannot take Kashmir by force. Significantly, those involved in such dialogues include senior armed forces personnel - retired, of course, since during active service army discipline forbids such dissent. This process was underway right up until airspace was banned for Indian and Pakistani aircraft. A two day workshop on conflict resolution (Dec 22-23) organised by the Program on Peace Studies and Conflict Resolution (Department of International Relations, Karachi University) was conducted in collaboration with Brig. (rtd) A.R. Siddiqui's Regional Institute of Peace and Security Studies, Karachi. The Program itself is funded by the Colombo-based Regional Centre for Stragic Studies -- headed by a retired Indian general, Dipankar Banerjee. Participants came away inspired and hopeful of the chances for peace, even though the tension was building up. But just a few days later, the situation prevented a high level three-member delegation of another people's initiative, the India Pakistan Soldiers Initiative for Peace, from keeping their appointment with Gen. Musharraf. They had visas, but the Indian authorities refused to allow them to cross the Atari-Wagah border on foot as they had planned, for safety reasons. "By the time we changed our plans to fly, the only flight we could have taken to make our appointment with the President of Pakistan on time was leaving Delhi within the next three hours," writes Admiral (rtd) Ramu Ramdas. Unable to get seats, despite the personal efforts of Pakistan's Deputy High Commissioner, the delegation had to postpone their visit. "You can imagine how disappointed and helpless we felt. Both Lt. Gen. Dar and I had flown to Delhi from Mumbai and Pune respectively to keep this date but alas, the 'Ooper Walah' willed otherwise!" Besides the personal disappointments caused by this meeting, it could have played an important role in conveying the views of India's peace activists to the President of Pakistan, who possibly does not fully appreciate what this movement is up against. If we in Pakistan are up against the 'jihadis', our friends across the border face the hawks of the Sangh Parivar - each feeds on and reflects the other. Meanwhile, the suspension of links between the two countries has interrupted an exciting development -- cross-border visits by school and college students, privately initiated, with no official or NGO involvement or sanction. Students who made such visits, despite warnings from friends and relatives, returned to their respective countries amazed at the warmth and hospitality they received across the border - stereotypes shattered. "They are people just like us," is a common response. "We didn't find the Pakistan we were looking for," wrote a Ramjas College history student after visiting Pakistan. The Habib Public School students from Karachi who visited 15 educational institutes in India this past summer had similar experiences. A peace camp was planned for young Indians and Pakistanis in South India this coming summer. Whether this will be able take place is now doubtful. Peace activists in India have been vocal against the prevailing war hysteria, as have those here in Pakistan. But these voices are barely reflected in the mainstream media. In any case, they alone cannot pull the two countries back from the brink. The governments have to be involved and willing. New Delhi's knee-jerk response to the attack on its parliament, its plagiarism of Washington's rhetoric and attempts to take full political advantage of the prevailing climate against 'terrorism', should not stop Islamabad from taking the steps it urgently needs to take for Pakistan's own survival. In this, it will be supported by the majority of the people, who are increasingly aware of the cost to the country's own social fabric, of allowing militant religious groups to flourish and develop. Islamabad's 'Afghan policy' lies ripped apart; that relating to Kashmir needs to be urgently reviewed. Steps in the right direction are being taken - and so they should. We have paid a heavy price for our support, covert and overt, to religiously motivated ideologues, in the form of sectarian violence and killings in our own country. We need to curtail the 'jehadi' groups not under Indian or even US pressure, but for our own sakes. And our friends in India need to realise that for Pakistan to achieve this, we need support rather to be dragged into a confrontation that will only strengthen the extremists on both sides. Only if we can live in peace can the people of this region emerge from the problems that plague us, and play a positive role in an increasingly interconnected world. (ends) _____ #3. Date: Fri, 4 Jan 2002 17:17:24 +0500 Peace, progress and the private armies In October 2001, Sufi Mohammad after taking over parts of Swat, Dir and Korakoram Highway, led his 5000 strong army of Tehrik Nifaz Shariat-I-Mohammadi to attack the US forces operating in Afghanistan, with weapons ranging from world war 1 antiques to mortars used by modern day armies. The fact that most of these illiterate and misguided soldiers lost their lives to unfriendly daisy cutters, and Sufi, who had himself never seen either an American or an aeroplane, deserted the battle field, ran for his life, and ended up in a Pakistani jail, with a cosmetic three year sentence, perhaps for not possessing valid travel documents. In December 2000, Maulana Akram Awan marching with his private army of ten thousand misguided zealots, camped at Chakwal, and threatened to capture Islamabad, the capital of Islamic Republic of Pakistan, if the laws considered Islamic in the medieval mind of Maulana were not promulgated throughout the country. The government was so unnerved that it sent a delegation consisting of the Home Secretary, Inspector General Police and the minister for religious affairs to please, pamper and compensate the Maulana and convince him to return with his army to where ever he came from. Having never met an official beyond the rank of SHO, the Moulana was so moved at the top officials of the nuclear state obsequiously falling to his feet, that he withdrew without a battle, and declared to come back next year to implement his promised mission. For ten long years the JUI Madrassahs of Balochistan retained the dubious distinction of operating as the world's largest nursery for producing teenage soldiers who had only two missions in life. To secure an entry into paradise by their rhythmic pendulum like reproduction of memorised portions from the Holy Book, and to participate in a global jihad with ignorance and Klashnikovs as their only two assets. In the last ten years any thing between 10 to 20 thousand of these innocent children were killed as fodder in the proxy war that ultimately reduced Afghanistan to rubble, and Pakistan to an embarrassing but much needed voltafaccia. Those responsible for this mass genocide however still wear royal robes and go around freely to restart if possible, from where they last left. Till a few days back travelling between Lahore and Peshawar by road, one could see dozens of sign boards offering short cuts to paradise to those who sought recruitment in one of the many private armies operating under names such as Jaish-e- Mohammad, Lashkar-e- Tayuba or Harkat ul Majahideen. The proliferating religious fervour of these private armies has resulted in creation of downstream sectarian militant organisations whose strong sense of loyalty to their own brand of ideology requires killing of every one else who does not subscribe to their point of view. The ignorant Mullah has often joined this chorus of madness by condoning this barbarism from his unchallenged pulpit, and even suggesting that such acts could in fact guarantee the reservation of suitable seats in paradise. Karachi alone bore the sorrow and pain of hundreds of its outstanding citizens mercilessly killed by these sectarian fanatics. The brother of the interior minister is shot to death two days after the minister articulates his much belated intention of curbing the religious extremists. The private armies thus freely rule and till recently even collected "bhatta" (compulsory donations) in the land of the pure, making a mockery of the writ of the state. This phenomenon often generically referred to as "Talibanisation" of society remained unchecked till recently when its excessive export drew an angry response from the world at large as well as the already fed up neighbours. Pakistan's primary think tanks remain pathologically addicted to a frozen world view based on a dogmatic and bigoted understanding of religion, emphasis on rituals instead of spirit, hatred instead of tolerance, ideological slogans instead of service to people, state agencies instead of participative institutions, abhorrence to science and technology, deep disinclination to reason and rationality, obsession with female behaviour and dress, and the megalomaniac self image as the flag bearer and champion of the cause of Ummah, (not one of the Ummah countries offered even lip service of support at the time of India Pakistan stand off.) It is around this irrelevancy that the state has coined its signature for the past fifty years. While the large majority of Pakistanis are as moderate, tenacious, vibrant and enterprising as people of any other country, their rightful place amongst the developed and civilised nations of the world has been a hostage to the tribal traditions, private armies and religious fanatics who forcibly dictate the social order of the country. Only a week back the Orakzai tribes got together to declare photography as an offence punishable by demolition of the offenders' house and a fine of one million rupees. The events of nine-eleven in many ways provide a miraculous opportunity and impetus for Pakistan to re-evaluate its direction and make a conscious decision to make a departure from the past. It can choose to follow the path that has enabled other nations to pursue progress, prosperity and enlightenment. Alternately it can remain glued to its ancient and obsolete mindset, and gradually acquire the status of an irrelevant and failed state. Many would argue that it has already reached that point. A more factual assessment would be that while Pakistan does have the necessary capacity and desire to enter the 21st century, it is restrained by its own medieval mindset that is frozen in an imaginary past and not open to the reality and ideas of the modern times. Any nation must first address issues that are vital to itself and its own citizens. For Pakistan these are issues of creating a just and civil governance mechanism, education, industry, addressing poverty, and providing host of basic amenities and services to its burgeoning population. For too long the voluntarily adopted culture of obscurantism has come in direct conflict with the scientific and rational methods that could be applied towards solving these issues. The bigoted clergy, the Lashkars, the Sipahs , the Jaishes the agencies and the increasingly bureaucratic and incompetent state machinery are either completely reluctant to change for better or desire a change in the reverse direction only. The first step is to realise that there can possibly be no sanity, peace or progress in Pakistan, as long as it retains a multitude of fully loaded private armies, each in pursuit of its own brand of intolerance and bigotry. It is time for Pakistan to realise that the private armies representing the feudal and tribal thinking of the medieval times are simply not compatible with how the progressive modern nations pursue their interests and conduct their business in the 21st century. There can be no serious investment or development interest by any outsider (for that matter even insiders) in a writ-less state ruled by private armies eternally at war within and without. The first step towards peace and progress must therefore begin by firmly disbanding and disarming all militant religious, political and tribal organisations in Pakistan. This needs to be done as a national challenge and not like the lame, half hearted, incompetently managed and half way aborted earlier de-weaponisation campaign. It is also time to extend the rule law to areas and tribes that hitherto made their own laws. The days of private armies and the wild west must come to an end if a new beginning is to be contemplated. While this may also be a high profile international demand, it is essentially for its own good that Pakistan needs to clean up its militant backyard. It is only through creating a law abiding, pluralistic and tolerant society that Pakistan can hope for peace, progress and dignity in the years to come. Naeem Sadiq _____ #4. DAWN 04 January 2002 Peace walk condemns violence against Wagah rally Bureau Report HYDERABAD, Jan 3: A large number of human rights and political activists and representatives of NGOs staged a peace walk under the banner of Joint Peace Action Forum Sindh against the war hysteria in India and Pakistan and violence by law enforcement agencies against the participants of the peace walk at Wagah border, Lahore. The walk started from local press club and after marching on main city roads it culminated at the club. The participants released pigeons as symbol of peace and carried white flags inscribed with slogans of "we want peace not war" and "dialogue not tension". They raised slogans against Maj Faisal Ghori of rangers who had subjected Asma Jehangir to violence. Speaking to the participants of the peace walk, the coordinator, HRCP Sindh core groups, Akhtar Baloch, said that the participation of such a large number of people belonging to different schools of thought in the peace march had proved that the people of the country wanted peace not war. He said that history was witness to the fact that the wars had created disasters and given only corpses. He said that the violence committed on the participants of the peace walk at Wagah border was aimed at sabotaging attempt for peace. He demanded a judicial inquiry by a High Court judge into the incident. Prominent among those who attended the peace march were HRCP coordinators, Nasreen Shakeel Pathan and Aftab Ahmed, PPP leaders, Comrade Jam Saqi and Nuzhat Pathan, president Sindh Hari Committee, Azhar Jatoi, Prof Khalid Wahab, Prof Eijaz Qureshi, Parveen Magsi, M. Parkash advocate, Akbar Clinton and others. OCCUPATION: The residents of Goth Yar Mohammad Nandwani near Kapri Mori, taluka Matli, district Badin, have accused the an influential person of illegally occupying the village land with the connivance of police and harassing the villagers. Speaking at a news conference at the Hyderabad press club here on Thursday, they said that one Jameel and his accomplices had occupied a portion of the vacant land in the village on the pretext that they had taken the land on lease. They added that when the villagers asked Jameel to show the relevant papers, they were threatened with dire consequences. They said that they made inquires from the Mukhtiarkar (estate) Hyderabad who informed them that the village land had never been allotted to any body. They said that on Dec 3 last year, they approached the EDO (revenue) Badin and requested him to get the occupied village land vacated. They said that the EDO issued necessary instructions to the Mukhtiarkar Matli who held inquiries on Dec 22 which rejected Jamil's claim and fixed the next date of hearing for Jan 5 2002. They said they again approached the Mukhtiarkar (estate) Hyderabad and obtained the relevant form which disclosed that the opponent party had been allotted some other land and they had nothing to do with Nandwani Goth. They, however, said that the Mukhtiarkar declined to give anything in writing as he was under tremendous pressure. They alleged that on last Thursday night, police in half a dozen mobiles raided the village, harassed the residents including women and children and arrested an elder of the village, Mohammad Saleh Nandwani, Habibullah and Maqbool. They added that later the police chaargesheeted five villagers who were released on bail. They said that the police had established a check post at the village and no one was allowed to enter it. They appealed the authorities and human rights organizations to take notice of the plight of the villagers and restore justice. Those who spoke at the news conference included Yar Mohammad Nandwani, Shahid Khaskheli, Hashim Nandwani, Mohammad Hussain Nandwani, Mohammad Yaqoob Khaskheli and others. Earlier, about 40 villagers staged a protest demonstration outside the Hyderabad press club and SSP office against the alleged high handedness of police. _____ #5. [Recieved from Zaheer Kidwai, Karachi] They Changed My God by Anwar Iqbal I do not know how God is related to me Is it love and respect that links me to Him? Or fear that forces me to seek his refuge? Is He a loving friend or a cruel ruler? Is He like a cloud that protects us from the scorching sun? Or is he the fire that burns us? I still love Him, even after so many years I cannot forget the time I spent with Him That's when we were friends - me and my God We roamed around together, holding hands Collecting feathers of colorful birds Exotic flowers, ran after butterflies And spent hours in friendly chats But they came and took my God away from me And changed him When they came, me and my God were Having an important talk in a garden near our house He was explaining to me why Butterflies stain our hands And fireflies do not burn them They were all big men, Some bearded, some not Some had guns, some did not Some were armed with swords and spears And others had big sticks They came and shouted: We cannot let God waste his time We are here to save him from kids and butterflies He has more important things to do Give him to us They lifted God on their shoulders and Walked out of my garden, chanting slogans And they took him away >From me and my house >From my village and my city Since then nobody has seen my God Nobody knows where they have kept Him He does not communicate with children anymore He does not communicate at all They bring all his orders to us and say This is what God says. Do it Those who do not Are kicked, beaten up, flogged and even killed All in the name of my God He has changed so much since they took him away That I do not recognize Him anymore He is not the God I loved He is their God He does not speak the language of Butterflies and fireflies anymore His orders are not that of a loving friend He talks like the worldly rulers I still miss Him a lot I want the God of butterflies and flowers back I want to say to Him O God how much I want you to come down >From your heavenly abode and play with me I want to be a little child again I want to hold your hand and run with you Deep into the jungle And when the jungle scares me I want to hide in your arms I want you to stay there, wait for me Don't go away like others You are more kind than a mother And more caring than a father I want you to leave all your work aside For one day, just one day Yes, I know it is important I know it is You who bring Clouds from the sea And makes them rain on the thirsty earth So that we could smell the fragrance and The raindrops stir in the dry soil It is You who bring the monsoon Holding the reins of the sun, the moon, the stars And the planets in your hands And thus cause the seasons to change It is you who prevent people >From killing each other in madness You enable us to live under the loving care of our friends It is you who feed insects hiding under the stone And give warmth to the poor sitting around the fire You also fetch a glass of water For the beggar woman You fill our dreams with color and light And bring sleep to our burning eyes You protect the travelers And save us from our own madness Yes You have so many important things to do But you have always been doing this and more Only You know how old this universe is And how unending your daily chores But you also know that my stay here is short My age is not numbered in solar years Then do this for me, O God Give a day, just one day >From your busy schedule To me I want to hold your hand and walk In the cruel crowd Holding my head high So that everybody could see You have dodged your bearded guards And returned to children and butterflies You once again love the flowers And their fragrance We will walk together for miles And when we are both tired (Don't you ever get tired?) We will sit somewhere along the beach And watch the people walking past us Dismissing the child and his God In their ignorance I want to watch them and smile at them And you, my Provider I don't want much from you Just buy me a plate of chic peas Some oranges and some mangoes (They do not grow in the same season but You get them both for me!) I also want you to fetch a glass of cold sherbet With crushed ice And then I want to put my head on your shoulders (Don't be upset with me, this is how children behave) And sleep, a long, long sleep And when I do, you quietly close my eyes And take me to the journey that awaits us all If you are with me, why should I be afraid of Any journey? Note: Anwar Iqbal was threatened with death by an unidentified group after reciting the Urdu original of this poem in Islamabad in late July 2000. _____ #6. Date: Fri, 4 Jan 2002 17:53:41 +1000 From: FoE Sydney - Nuclear Campaign Subject: URGENT! Help Stop Indo-Pak War: Peace Letter seeks NGO Signatures Dear NGO, Do you think that your organisation could endorse this? It is to be sent urgently to the governments of India and Pakistan. This letter to the governments of India and Pakistan is now soliciting signatures from organisations, parliamentarians, and prominent persons most urgently, and in view of the situation, needs to be sent as soon as possible. Do you think you might be able to sign it and/or pass it on to others who would endorse it? (To sign/endorse just email me back with details of your name, name of organisation, position, and location including country) John Hallam PRIME MINISTER OF INDIA A.B. VAJPAYEE, SOUTH BLOCK, NEW DELHI, 110-004 +91-11-301-6857 +91-11-301-9545, 91-11-972-2-664-838 MINISTER OF EXTERNAL AFFAIRS INDIA +91-11-301-0700 UN MISSION Fax. + 1 212 490 9656 Aust. High Commission - 6273-1308, 6273-3328 PRESIDENT MUSHARRAF OF PAKISTAN, 0011-92-51-920-3938, 0011-92-51-920-1968 0011-92-51-811390 FOREIGN MINISTER OF PAKISTAN +92-51-920-7217 +92-51-920 0420 or 820-420 UN Mission Fax. + 1 212 744 7348 Aust. High Commission - 6290-1073 UNITED NATIONS SECRETARY - GENERAL KOFI ANNAN Dear Presidents, Prime Ministers, Secretary-General, and Foreign Ministers of India and Pakistan, The undersigned groups and parliamentarians, representing people and organizations worldwide write to you to express our extreme concern over the possibility of conflict between your two countries. A military conflict could all too easily become a devastating nuclear exchange, which could destroy both countries as functioning entities, with casulties in the millions. Some projections suggest that up to 150 million people might die, depending on the exact scenario. Military action, or a threat of military action, could all too easily lead to an outcome that is not in anyone's interest. Military solutions to the Kashmir problem should therefore be ruled out. It is therefore urgent to initiate a dialogue on Kashmir in whatever is the most effective manner, leading to a real solution to the Kashmir problem. We do not seek to prescribe in detail any particular solution to the Kashmir issue. Rather we point out that the losses that would be incurred equally by both nations in a nuclear exchange are so vast, and so incomprehensible, that no political, security, or other goal whatsoever could possibly justify taking the risk of those losses. Eliminating the risk of a nuclear exchange between India and Pakistan is a goal which must take precedence over all other possible political and security goals as it concerns the continued physical survival of both nations. The religious traditions of both Islam and Hinduism place a high value on peace. Whoever provides a peaceful and just way out of this crisis will have the gratititude of both Indians, Pakistanis, and the world as a whole. We therefore urge India and Pakistan: --To move their troops, especially 'strategic units', but also all military formations, back from the border. --To instruct their troops not to return fire if fired upon --To immediately enter discussions both at SAARC and elsewhere which will stabilize the situation. --To immediately restore road and rail links --To enter discussions as to the most appropriate way in which to pursue terrorist organisations. and in the longer term: --To enter a dialogue aimed at providing a mutually acceptable solution to the Kashmiri problem. --To enter discussions aimed at eliminating the risk of a nuclear exchange between the two countries, under any cicumstances. --To work towards lasting solutions toward peace and stability in the region. Finally, we urge that both nations take seriously the goal of eliminating nuclear weapons to which other nations have agreed, and eliminate the risk of the annihilation of both parties by dismantling their nuclear arsenals. We trust that through these and other representations, a peaceful solution to the current crisis will be found. Signed [Organizations and Parliamentarians Signatures] John Loretz, International Physicians for the prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW) John Hallam, Friends of the Earth Australia, Irene Gale AM, Australian Peace Committee, Jo Vallentine, People for Nuclear Disarmament W.A., Martin Butcher, Physicians for Social Responsibility (PSR) Washington, USA, Marylia Kelly, Tri-Valley CARES, Livermore, US, Carol Wolman, Nuclear Peace Action Group of Mendocino, CA. Alice Slater, Global Resource and Action Centre for the Environment, (GRACE) NY, USA, Jenny Maxwell, West Midlands CND, UK, Harsh Kapoor, South Asians Against Nukes, Sukla Sen EKTA (Committee for Communal Amity) Mumbai (Bombay) _/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/ SACW is an informal, independent & non-profit citizens wire service run by South Asia Citizens Web (http://www.mnet.fr/aiindex) since 1996. To subscribe send a blank message to: / To unsubscribe send a blank message to: ________________________________________ DISCLAIMER: Opinions expressed in materials carried in the posts do not necessarily reflect the views of SACW compilers. From electricshadows at vsnl.com Sat Jan 5 22:00:46 2002 From: electricshadows at vsnl.com (electricshadows at vsnl.com) Date: 05 Jan 2002 21:30:46 +0500 Subject: [Reader-list] fw: fw: CERC for Ban on Corporate Gifts in Schools Message-ID: <20020105155945.AF4A5A76F@md4.vsnl.net.in> > ** Original Subject: fw: CERC for Ban on Corporate Gifts in Schools > ** Original Sender: Chaterji > ** Original Date: 03 Jan 2002 22:05:29 +0500 > ** Original Message follows... >To: reader-list at sarai.net CC: BCC: From: Chaterji Subject: fw: CERC for Ban on Corporate Gifts in Schools Date: 03 Jan 2002 22:05:29 +0500 {\rtf1\ansi\deff0\deftab720{\fonttbl{\f0\fswiss MS Sans Serif;}{\f1\froman\fcharset2 Symbol;}{\f2\froman Kuenst480 BT;}} {\colortbl\red0\green0\blue0;} \deflang1033\pard\plain\f2\fs24\cf0\b \par \par \par > ** Original Subject: CERC for Ban on Corporate Gifts in Schools \par > ** Original Sender: "cerc" \par > ** Original Date: Thu, 3 Jan 2002 16:35:10 +0530 (IST) \par \par > ** Original Message follows... \par \par >PRESS RELEASE \par ------------- \par Ref: E&R/PS/Class.01/AH/2002 \par \par CERC for Ban on Corporate Gifts in Schools \par \par Consumer Education and Research Centre (CERC), Ahmedabad, has \par urged both the Union Government and the Government of Gujarat to \par ban the advertising campaigns, sales, distribution and promotion \par of fast-moving consumer goods, dietary supplements, free gifts, \par etc. in schools, resorted to by manufacturing companies and other \par organisations of commercial interest. \par \par In a letter to Dr Murli Manohar Joshi, the Union Minister for \par Human Resource Development, and Mrs Anandiben Patel, the Gujarat \par Minister for Education, CERC has pointed out that schools should \par in fact inculcate in children the ability to resist sales \par pressures by educating them about the nature of commercial \par messages, analysing advertisements, `demagnifying products and \par clarifying alternatives in the marketplace. Such education should \par begin at the elementary grade itself, the letter has added. \par \par CERC has also called for a ban on quizzes and competitions \par sponsored by industry where children are forced to buy a \par company's product to participate in a competition or where \par promotional campaigns are carried out in the form of free gifts. \par Even schools themselves should not conduct such quizzes, \par competitions, etc. that may encourage children to watch \par advertisements. Display of names of products and manufacturers \par in any form in school should also be banned. \par \par Citing certain recent instances of violation of advertising and \par promotion norms, CERC said that kindergarten children were \par reportedly offered an energy drink along with milk and in another \par case, noodles. Samples of toothpastes were also known to have \par been distributed to children in school. "The latest and most \par unpardonable entrant" to join this rush for luring children into \par the fold is a drug company, which offered kids of primary \par classes a 15-tablet calcium supplement along with an eraser, a \par ruler and a pencil. Worse, the company's representative was \par allowed to deliver a sales talk to the kids on calcium deficiency \par and their need for daily calcium intake. (CERC has also written \par to the Drug Controller General of India to take action against \par the pharmaceutical company concerned.) \par \par In another campaign, children were required to buy a box of \par crayons, obtain a coupon, and attach it to their drawing or model \par to be eligible for a competition. CERC also cited a widely \par reported recent incident in an Ahmedabad school where children \par had fallen sick after consuming chocolates of a reputed brand and \par \par company. The chocolates had been distributed free as part of a \par promotional campaign in the school. "If the District Education \par Office has issued a show-cause notice to the school concerned to \par explain why a private company was allowed to hold a quiz \par competition in the school premises, it is equally important to \par stop manufacturers from entering school premises at all -- with \par or without competitions," the CERC letter argued. \par \par It added that by allowing commercial interests free entry into \par classrooms, schools have become silent partners in advertising to \par children, contributing to commercial pressures on children and \par implying endorsement of the products promoted. In fact, schools \par should have taught children how to deal with commercial pressures \par and not to succumb to them. \par \par The vulnerability and natural credulity of children could not be \par exploited for narrow commercial gains, CERC said, adding, "This \par is against all norms of national and international advertising \par codes of conduct". \par \par The Advertising Standards Council of India Rules state that \par "Advertisements addressed to minors shall not contain anything, \par whether in illustration or otherwise, which might result in their \par physical, mental or moral harm or which exploits their \par vulnerability." The International Code as well as the British \par Code of Advertising too specifies similar, if not more stringent, \par safeguards against children's exposure to advertisements, the \par CERC letter added. \par \par Date : 2-1-2002 Ms. Lalita Meduri \par Place: Ahmedabad Consumer Relations Officer \par ----------------------------------------------------------------- \par Opinions, test results and research findings issued through this \par Press Release cannot be used in any form directly or indirectly \par for advertising, promotional or commercial purpose. \par \par CONSUMER EDUCATION AND RESEARCH CENTRE \par "Suraksha Sankool", Thaltej, Ahmedabad-Gandhinagar Highway, \par Ahmedabad- 380 054 (INDIA) Phone: 079-7489945-46, Fax: 079- \par 7489947, E-mail: cerc at wilnetonline.net \par ----------------------------------------------------------------- \par \par \par \par >** --------- End Original Message ----------- ** \par \par > \par } {RTFBGCOLOR}=16777215 File Attached: C:\Program Files\NeoPlanet\data\_TEMPE\at the elementary grade itself, the letter has added. >** --------- End Original Message ----------- ** > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20020105/288e73e5/attachment.html From aiindex at mnet.fr Sat Jan 5 22:34:51 2002 From: aiindex at mnet.fr (Harsh Kapoor) Date: Sat, 5 Jan 2002 18:04:51 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] Rise of Internet 'Borders' Prompts Fears for Web's Future Message-ID: Washington Post Friday, January 4, 2002; Page E01 Rise of Internet 'Borders' Prompts Fears for Web's Future By Ariana Eunjung Cha Washington Post Staff Writer It is the modern-day equivalent of a border sentry. When visitors try to enter UKBetting.com, a computer program checks their identification to determine where they're dialing in from. Most people are waved on through. Those from the United States, China, Italy and other countries where gambling laws are muddy, however, are flashed a sign in red letters that says "ACCESS DENIED" and are locked out of the Web site. For much of its life, the Internet has been seen as a great democratizing force, a place where nobody needs know who or where you are. But that notion has begun to shift in recent months, as governments and private businesses increasingly try to draw boundaries around what used to be a borderless Internet to deal with legal, commercial and terrorism concerns. "It used to be that a person sitting in one place could get or send information anywhere in the world," said Jack Goldsmith, a professor of international law at the University of Chicago. "But now the Internet is starting to act more like real space with all its limitations." These new barriers take many forms. One method is to simply restrict who has access to computers and gateways to the Internet. Another is to make all communications pass through filters that seek to weed out objectionable content, such as pornography or information deemed to endanger national security. Growing in popularity is software that attempts to match a computer's unique Internet address with a general geographic location, a technology that is becoming more precise every day. The debate is no longer about if we can create these barriers, but rather whether we should. Even those who support the idea in theory disagree on who should erect and maintain the electronic fences, whether it should be done by nation-states or by the Web site operators. The new borders provide what some call a neat solution to the vexing problem of how to resolve the often-conflicting policies of the roughly 200 independent states of the world on matters such as gambling, commerce, copyright and speech. But critics fear that the barriers will create an Internet that's balkanized. And civil rights groups warn that freedom of speech will suffer, that the technology will make it easier for oppressive governments to stifle nonconformist viewpoints, and that people's privacy will be eroded, especially because some technologies can pinpoint one's location. "It's likely that the Internet of tomorrow will look radically different from different parts of the world," said Lee Tien, a lawyer with the Electronic Frontier Foundation in San Francisco. Already legislatures and court systems around the world have been attempting to assert their country's authority over the World Wide Web. Hong Kong's government, for instance, has been debating whether to pass a law that would make it a crime for any overseas gambling site to offer services to its residents. A court in Genoa, Italy, recently found the operator of a Web site in another country guilty of libel. A French judge has ordered Yahoo to stop selling Nazi paraphernalia because a law there bans such practices. Without an international treaty or mediation organization, such rulings have so far been largely unenforceable on parties residing outside a country's borders. But that has not stopped countries from drafting rules for what is and is not permissible online. At least 59 nations limit freedom of expression, according to Leonard R. Sussman, author of "Censor.gov." Singapore, for instance, works with Internet access providers to block any material that undermines public security, national defense, racial and religious harmony, and morals. That includes pornography and hate speech. Some analysts say the barriers could grow with the development of "geolocation" technology, which attempts to match a person's location based on a computer's Internet address. Silicon Valley's Quova Inc., one of the leading providers of this technology, claims it can correctly identify a computer user's home country 98 percent of the time and the city about 85 percent of the time, but only if it's a large city. Independent studies have pegged the accuracy rate of such programs, which also are sold by companies such as InfoSplit, Digital Envoy, Netgeo and Akami, at 70 to 90 percent. The system is not foolproof; people can easily get past by using special software programs to cloak their identities. But experts such as Goldsmith, the Chicago law professor, say the technology need not work perfectly to have an impact. These barriers act like checkpoints on a nation's physical border: They can be evaded, but most people probably won't want to go to all the trouble. Gambling sites were among the first to roll out the technology, last year. When users from countries where online gambling is not allowed try to get on, they are either not given the option to place bets or they are kicked out when they try to register for an account. "There are a number of sites out there that just don't care about the laws. They are perfectly happy to let U.S. gamblers in even though they know it's illegal," said Jeremy Thompson-Hill, an account manager for OrbisUK, which provides the sentry technology used by Sports.com, Ladbrokes.com and other betting sites. "But most reputable companies want to be able to say to the United States, 'We're taking every reasonable precaution to prevent the use of our gambling software in your country.' " The technology also is being embraced by Web broadcasters, whose nascent industry had been growing slowly because of concerns about copyright. JumpTV is betting its future on this technology. The Montreal-based venture retransmits television broadcasts from around the world and is trying to avoid being sued by broadcasters who claim it violates their broadcasting licenses. In early 2000, a U.S. judge effectively shut down another Canadian company called iCraveTV by prohibiting it from broadcasting its signals into the United States for 90 days. Farrel Miller, JumpTV's chief executive, said the company hopes to begin retransmitting ABC, CBS and NBC only to Canadian viewers early next year but was much more modest about his company's aspirations than some heads of other webcasting companies during the dot-com boom. "We don't see the Internet as a revolutionary medium that will change the TV business," Miller said. "It'll be just another alternative vehicle for disseminating channels." The difficulty in recognizing nation-state borders on the Internet became such a concern during the 2000 Sydney Games that the International Olympic Committee effectively banned most Web video of the events. Television stations had paid enormous fees for the rights to broadcast the games on a country-by-country basis -- NBC, for instance, shelled out $3.5 billion for the United States -- and they were worried that piracy or even legitimate online transmissions that were accessible to anyone, anywhere might devalue the worth of those contracts. The IOC and many of the owners of broadcast rights say the accuracy rate for geolocation technology is still not good enough and they won't allow any webcasts for the Salt Lake City games this February. "The technology just doesn't pass muster yet. There's no way to guarantee that your broadcast would be confined to your territory and would not run in to someone else's," said Kevin Monaghan, a vice president for NBC Sports. Even if geolocation technology worked perfectly, some legal experts said it would not be feasible because it would require Web site operators to know the applicable laws in every country. "Geographical location technology is a red herring," said Alan Davidson, a lawyer with the Center for Technology and Democracy, a Washington think tank. "It would be incredibly burdensome to tailor content to meet all of the different laws in all of the different countries everywhere the world." That's the heart of the question being addressed by a court case that pits Yahoo Inc. against France. Last year, two French groups -- League Against Racism and Anti-Semitism and the Union of Jewish Students -- sued Yahoo for allowing Nazi collectibles to be sold on its auction pages. The sale of such hate material is illegal in France. Almost 1,000 such items were on the block at the time, including Adolf Hitler's "Mein Kampf," stamps and coins, as well as hate paraphernalia. Jean-Jacques Gomez, a judge in Paris, ordered Yahoo to prevent French users from seeing the material by using the geolocation technology. Yahoo declined on principle and sued in U.S. District Court in San Jose to make the order unenforceable because a foreign judge could not impose such conditions on a U.S.-based company. U.S. Judge Jeremy Fogel ruled Nov. 7 that the First Amendment trumps overseas laws when they pertain to content produced by U.S. companies. An appeals court upheld the decision but the French groups have appealed again and have vowed to take the case to the U.S. Supreme Court if necessary. The attorney for the French groups, Ronald Katz, argues that the issue is not about free speech but about national sovereignty. "Yahoo wants to use the court decision as a sort of megaphone to say the U.S. controls the Internet," he said. Indeed, the U.S. dominance of the Internet is one major thing that observers say will change with the new electronic borders, slowing the dissemination of ideologies and culture across countries. "Is geographical tracking a panacea that solves international jurisdiction issues? Probably not. But is it a technology that's significantly changing the social, economic and political aspects of how we communicate on the Internet?" Davidson said. "Absolutely." From aiindex at mnet.fr Sun Jan 6 02:18:52 2002 From: aiindex at mnet.fr (Harsh Kapoor) Date: Sat, 5 Jan 2002 21:48:52 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] Obit: Anil Agarwal Message-ID: The Hindustan Times Sunday, January 6, 2002 A down-to-earth dreamer Darryl D' Monte ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Everyone thought that Anil Agarwal would defy death, in much the same way that he challenged anyone whom he thought was guilty of destroying the environment or who was opposing those that were doing their bit to save it. He had come close to it several times over the past eight years and had written about his illness, converting the personal into the political as only he could have done. He gave his cancers the toughest of fights, and carried on working right till the very end. I first encountered Anil in the early seventies, when I was editing the Sunday magazine of The Times of India in Mumbai. He had just returned from a stint in Holland, after completing his studies at IIT, Kanpur, which was his home town. If my memory serves me correctly, this stranger wrote, offering me a 20-part series of interviews with eminent European scientists he had met during his Dutch sojourn. I wondered who this presumptuous person was and suggested one or two instead. He took his series to the Hindustan Times, which promptly published them and hired him too. He later worked in The Indian Express before he joined Earthscan, the media organisation which was affiliated to the International Institute of Environment and Development in London. It was at an Earthscan workshop for journalists from the South that I met Anil again. It was the beginning of a long friendship. The period at Earthscan - the entire environment and development paradigm was first enunciated by organizations like this - helped Anil form his ideas on the many facets of the environmental crisis. In retrospect, it is somewhat ironical that he made a mark with an Earthscan pamphlet on drugs in what was then called the Third World: he later contracted such a rare form of cancer that he obtained free treatment as a test case at the National Cancer Institute in the US with new medicines, failing which he would have passed away some years ago. He was restless in London and yearned to get back. He returned soon after and started the Centre for Science & Environment. It first made a mark with the inaugural "State of India's Environment 1982 - A Citizens' Report". It took a synoptic view of every aspect of the deterioration of the natural resource base of the country but relied - unlike the annual reports of the Environment Ministry and countless other official and non-official organizations - on the first-hand reports of people in the field. These were then edited by professional journalists and well- displayed with boxes and pictures, which made the book very reader-friendly and became an instant success. The second report followed two years later and was much more ambitious, taking a more analytical view. Many government and private institutions and individuals came to Anil's help, buying copies in advance and helping the CSE defray the publishing expenses. It was very well received and one of the most revealing comments was from a reader in the West who said that it was a model for researchers in the North to emulate. Anil was insistent on getting both reports published in Hindi, and attempted to translate them into other languages as well. Incidentally, he is widely credited for being the first journalist to bring the Chipko movement to the notice of the English press in the seventies. Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi obtained a copy of the second Citizens' Report and was most impressed by it. He ordered an unprecedented joint meeting of both houses of parliament to be briefed by Anil and his CSE team, which included Sunita Narain, who has recently taken over as Director and for years co-authored a fortnightly column with him. There was a huge number of MPs and Anil was understandably, though perhaps mistakenly, excited at the prospect of converting MPs into green warriors in their constituencies. There was a second meeting, this time when Mr Gandhi was not present himself and the MPs had dwindled to less than a score. Environmentalists criticised Anil for making the fatal mistake of aligning himself with the government. Before the Earth Summit at Rio in 1992, Anil investigated the claim by the World Resources Institute (WRI) in Washington that China and India were the fourth and fifth biggest net emitters of greenhouse gases respectively. He found that the WRI, whose findings are considered "objective" science emanating from the world's most powerful capital, was taking the total emissions of each country but deducting the "sinks" - forests and oceans which absorb these harmful gases - in the same proportion as their emissions. Anil said that an if alternative yardstick was used - per capita emissions - India and China would figure right at the bottom of the list and added that both sets of calculations constituted politics rather than science. The CSE's findings were criticized initially - by this writer too - but eventually his formulation has come to be accepted by most environmental organisations. It was this baptism in the politics of climate change that steered Anil and Sunita into looking at various environmental treaties after Rio, including that concerning biodiversity and the Montreal Protocol. The CSE has brought out well-argued critiques of these agreements in a tome called Green Politics and this has provided a perspective from the South to such global negotiations. The CSE's staff has tracked these deliberations minutely and the organization has countered the propaganda generated by many multilateral bodies about the benefits of these treaties. It had always been Anil's dream to bring out a magazine of his own, which was eventually realized with the fortnightly, Down To Earth. It has served to provide information and analyse environmental problems within the country and globally. The magazine does not have a large circulation but remains one of the best environmental journals in the world. It is seldom that one can make such a claim about any publication from this country. The CSE's books on water harvesting techniques throughout the country are a resource book for activists and researchers alike. When the Supreme Court appointed him on a committee to advise it on ridding New Delhi of its obnoxious air pollutants, it could hardly have foreseen what it was taking on. Anil attacked the diesel industry in particular for polluting the atmosphere and the Tatas, who manufacture diesel vehicles, had on one occasion threatened the CSE with a law suit. Characteristically, Sunita held a press conference welcoming such a move, and the Tatas withdrew. Anil crossed swords with other researchers on this highly controversial issue, including the Tata Energy Research Institute and Prof Dinesh Mohan of IIT Delhi a reputed transport expert. But if Delhi has anyone to thank for ridding its air of contaminants, it is Anil. He has set very high standards for all of us to follow and the best tribute that we can pay to him is to try and emulate some of them. Sunita Narain and her fellow researchers at the CSE deserve the support of all of us who care for the environment. His family too needs our sympathy, particularly because he was always immersed in his work. (Darryl D'Monte is the Chairperson of the Forum of Environmental Journalists of India and President of the International Federation of Environmental Journalists. He was previously a CSE Fellow.) -- From aiindex at mnet.fr Sun Jan 6 06:35:00 2002 From: aiindex at mnet.fr (Harsh Kapoor) Date: Sun, 6 Jan 2002 02:05:00 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] The drive to license academic research for profit is stifling the spread of software that could be of universal benefit. Message-ID: Salon.com Public money, private code The drive to license academic research for profit is stifling the spread of software that could be of universal benefit. By Jeffrey Benner Jan. 4, 2002 | Would the creation of the Internet be allowed to happen today? The networked society we live in is in large part a gift from the University of California to the world. In the 1980s, computer scientists at Berkeley working under contract for the Defense Department created an improved version of the Unix operating system, complete with a networking protocol called the TCP/IP stack. Available for a nominal fee, the operating system and network protocol grew popular with universities and became the standard for the military's Arpanet computer network. In 1992, Berkeley released its version of Unix and TCP/IP to the public as open-source code, and the combination quickly became the backbone of a network so vast that people started to call it, simply, "the Internet." Many would regard giving the Internet to the world as a benevolent act fitting for one of the world's great public universities. But Bill Hoskins, who is currently in charge of protecting the intellectual property produced at U.C. Berkeley, thinks it must have been a mistake. "Whoever released the code for the Internet probably didn't understand what they were doing," he says. Had his predecessors understood how huge the Internet would turn out to be, Hoskins figures, they would surely have licensed the protocols, sold the rights to a corporation and collected a royalty for the U.C. Regents on Internet usage years into the future. It is the kind of deal his department, the Office of Technology Licensing, cuts all the time. Hoskins' "privatize it" attitude has become the norm among administrators at many universities and federal labs across the country. As a result, computer-science professors and researchers who want to release their work to the public as open-source software often face an uphill battle. Some familiar with the situation say the problem is that universities and federal research labs have become more interested in making money than serving the public interest. Larry Smarr, a professor of computer science at U.C. San Diego and one of the country's top experts on supercomputing, is one of them. As former director of the National Center for Supercomputing Applications at the University of Illinois, where the original Mosaic Web browser was created, he's quite familiar with both sides of the debate. "Some universities are dead set against giving [software code] away," says Smarr. "But I don't think universities should be in the moneymaking business. They ought to be in the changing-the-world business, and open source is a great vehicle for changing the world." Open-source software describes program code that is made publicly available for anyone to copy, change or even sell. The best-known open-source programs, such as Linux and Apache, are the product of a collaborative process of software development that takes advantage of the contributions of thousands of programmers all over the world. It's not only a cheap way to produce software; with so many eyes looking at the code, the theory is, bugs are found and fixed more quickly than with proprietary software. Over the past several years, open-source software development has won high-profile adherents in the business world -- including the likes of IBM and Sun Microsystems. But it has always had its strongest fans in the academic world, where open-source software is seen as a natural extension of the idea that the fruits of academic research should be shared with everyone. But now some academic programmers on the cutting edge have found that the licensing office is proving a more formidable obstacle to progress than the limits of their imagination and skill. Pete Beckman, formerly a senior computer scientist at the federal laboratory in Los Alamos, N.M., is a pioneer in creating clusters of servers that rival the power of mainframe supercomputers. He had to fight with lab lawyers for months before receiving permission to open-source his department's work on the clusters. Part of the lab's reticence was concern about letting computer technology fall into the hands of America's enemies, according to Beckman. "But the lab's other motive for keeping technology private is the misguided belief they can license it and make money on the lab system," he says. "They have whole departments dedicated to extracting intellectual property from the labbies." Before Beckman led the fight at Los Alamos to establish a protocol for making lab software public, "the only way to get your code released [open source] was to declare it worthless," he says. Beckman won his fight back in 1999, but the old standard still applies at other federal labs. "Some federal labs can release code, others can't," Beckman says. "There are whole departments that create valuable new technology, and they can't get it out to the world because [the lab] is trying to make money off it." Software for modeling global climate change, the behavior of viral epidemics and traffic patterns are among the programs researchers can't get released, he says. In a white paper Beckman authored on the problem, he wrote, "Seeking to control computer-science research by putting intellectual property concerns before the goal of good science has destroyed countless projects." Just how many is hard to say. Most researchers are reluctant to criticize their administrators. It is rare that universities flat out refuse a request to release software, but the hassle of getting permission can discourage those who might otherwise release their work. "It's tricky to find examples," says Rebecca Eisenberg, a law professor at the University of Michigan who specializes in intellectual property policy. "Because most technology fails, it's hard to say something would have succeeded" if only it had been put in the public domain. Nevertheless, Eisenberg is convinced that university interest in licensing intellectual property for profit is often at odds with the advancement of science. "You can make a clear case that research is being slowed by intellectual property claims," she says. "Universities aren't distinguishing between times when it's important to have a patent in place to get something disseminated and times when it's not," Eisenberg says. "They're just looking to see if they can make money. It retards innovation and taxes development." It took Chris Johnson, a computer-science professor at the University of Utah, several years of negotiation with his technology transfer office to get permission to make public a program his team had worked on for years. Called SCIRun (pronounced "ski run"), the program is a software platform for modeling and solving all sorts of complicated scientific problems. One of its most promising applications is as a tool for designing new medical devices. Because it is a foundation upon which other programs can be built, Johnson felt that making it an open-source-code project was fundamental to its value. "The hope is people will take this and put in their own applications and share those back with the community," Johnson says. But to do that, they have to be able to see and use the code without having to pay for it or get permission. "A lot of smart people out there can show you new and better ways for you, if they can see under the hood," Johnson says. But when he tried to explain to the university administration that the best way to maximize the value of SCIRun was to give it away, he ran into a roadblock. "We wanted to open-source it," Johnson says. "But they said that would undermine its commercial value." The negotiations began, a clash of differing cultures and interests. "No one really knew what we were doing at the beginning," Johnson says. "We didn't really understand intellectual property law, and they didn't really understand open source. The university just didn't want to let commercial value go. We're academics who wanted to push the envelope." After two years of haggling, they reached a compromise. In March, the software was released under a license that allows academics free access to the code but reserves the right to royalties if the code makes its way into a commercial software product. It hasn't always been this way. In the eighties, UC Berkeley was a pioneer in giving away software for the betterment of society. The rapid dissemination of "BSD Unix" allowed Internet-connected computers to speak the same language, helping to make our networked world possible. But now the University of California is often mentioned as one of the institutions that have taken the craze for exclusive patents and licenses too far. "It changed in the late eighties and early nineties," says Susan Graham, a professor of computer science at Berkeley. She didn't remember there even being an Office of Technology Licensing back when the department gave away Unix and the Internet protocols. If those innovations were discovered today, Graham worries they would end up in corporate hands. "I don't know whether they would let us release software like TCP/IP today," she says. "If they thought it had monetary value, they would want a revenue stream. There would be companies who could pay for it. I'm not sure we would have the same outcome [as in the past], and that's what concerns me." The trend at universities toward trying to profit from intellectual property began with the passage of the Bayh-Dole Act in 1980. Bayh-Dole allows institutions doing research for the federal government -- mostly universities -- to own the intellectual property they produce, and sell the rights to private companies. Because most cutting-edge research at both public and private universities involves some federal funding, Bayh-Dole allows universities to lay claim to many of their faculty's inventions. The same rights were later extended to the federal research labs. The philosophy behind Bayh-Dole is economic stimulation through privatization. When the law passed, the federal government held roughly 28,000 patents, but fewer than 5 percent of these were licensed to industry for development of commercial products, according to the Council on Government Relations, a lobbying group for research universities. By giving contractors a chance to sell the rights to technology developed in the course of publicly funded research, Congress hoped to spark an economic boom with taxpayer-funded technology. Overall, the model has been a dramatic success. The transfer of technology from university labs into offices, factories and stores was fundamental to the growth of Silicon Valley and the success of the new economy. Since 1980, university inventions licensed to the private sector under Bayh-Dole have spawned over 2,200 new companies that generate about $30 billion in economic activity every year, according to the Association of University Technology Managers. Statistics like these explain the enduring enthusiasm among most policy experts for privatizing the public's intellectual property. But a few eloquent dissenters have begun to argue that taking privatization of the nation's intellectual property too far could stifle innovation and suffocate economic growth. The champion of this broad thesis is Stanford law professor Larry Lessig, who has just outlined this argument in a new book, "The Future of Ideas." Lessig worries that the proper balance between private intellectual property (Microsoft) and the public good (the Internet) has been lost, and our society is blindly moving toward too much private control over intellectual property. "The shift is not occurring with the idea of balance in mind," he wrote; "instead, the shift proceeds as if control were the only value." The most powerful examples that privatizing technology does not always equal progress are public code like the Internet's and open-source software. They are cases of technology that derive their value from being public and free; fences kill them. "The open-source movement is an endorsement of the value of the public domain," Eisenberg says. "It's a striking counter-example to the bias of public policy: that the public domain dooms technology to obscurity." The systemic bias toward privatization, which Bayh-Dole codified into law, has the scientists working on improved versions of the Internet worried. "For the last 20 years, public money has backed proprietary systems software," says Rick Stevens, who is working on "grid computing" software at Argonne National Lab. "We're saying, stop putting public money there." Ian Foster, another computer scientist working at Argonne, agrees. "I believe that in almost all cases, the interests of science and society alike are best served by free distribution of software produced in research labs and universities. Unfortunately, there are still institutions that place significant obstacles in the way of researchers who wish to follow this path. Agencies funding research could help things by making strong statements in favor of open source, so that this is the norm rather than the exception." Some government agencies are starting to get the message. Open-source development for grid software and other supercomputing applications is getting some government funding. The Department of Energy, which runs Argonne, has been supporting open-source projects for years. In April, the National Security Agency announced it would help to make a version of the Linux-based operating system secure enough for the Defense Department to use. Universities are starting to rediscover the value of open-sourcing software, too. Stanford, the institution at the hub of Silicon Valley, lets its faculty release software under a public license. "We pretty much go with what our faculty members want to do," says Kathy Ku, who heads the licensing office there. "We care about the academic mission more that the money." Elsewhere, the struggle goes on. "It's trying to find a balance between the academic mission and commercialization," Johnson, the Utah professor, says. "This is a hot topic in universities right now, and everyone is really struggling with it. Some universities have really gone overboard. It's not going to be an easy thing to resolve." From electricshadows at vsnl.com Sun Jan 6 14:02:16 2002 From: electricshadows at vsnl.com (electricshadows at vsnl.com) Date: 06 Jan 2002 13:32:16 +0500 Subject: [Reader-list] (no subject) Message-ID: <200201060755.IAA29234@zelda.intra.waag.org> The Guardian Weekly December 13 � 19 : Features Born to do battle against the odds Letter from India Dhritiman Chaterji Chennai, which was formerly known as Madras, is southern India's premier city. Take the spanking new East Coast Road going south and you whiz along to the historic temple town of Mahabalipuram, a must-see for tourists. Farmhouses, resorts and entertainment centres pop up on both sides of the highway, growing at the rate of about two a week. The southern coastal region is fast becoming the playground of the city's affluent middleclass. Barely a kilometre to the east of the highway, the coastline is dotted with fishing villages. There is electricity but no running water and few toilets. There is alcoholism among the men and a reluctance to go to school among the children. Balan came to the village of Injambakkam with his family about 3 years ago from his hometown of Kumbakonam. He is a mason, an expert roof layer, but even with the spate of construction going on all around, he cannot get regular work. He finds it difficult to put together the initial capital of $100 or so to, as he says, 'launch himself'. $100 is rather less than the average family from the city spends on a weekend bash at one of the nearby resorts. Balan is taciturn, dignified and is in a way exceptional for he does not drink and does not indulge in the nightly ritual of wife beating. Balan's wife Sulochana looks much older than her 40 odd years. She usually wears an oddly blank expression, as if her mind has caved in under her load of worries. The older son drives a trishaw and considers himself the main provider. This gives him the right to beat his mother, since his father won't. Somebody has to keep the women in their place. The younger son's eyes are bright with intelligence but all efforts to send him to school have failed. He is Balan's apprentice and a television addict. Illiteracy has already defined his future. The older daughter, together with her mentally retarded child, has been deserted by her husband. She has come back to live with her parents. She is 'family' and it would be unthinkable to ask her to fend for herself. In any case, fending for herself could only mean working as domestic help, with probably a little bit of prostitution, brewing illicit liquor or drug dealing on the side. The younger daughter, Nagu, is just into her 20-s and unmarried. The apple of the family's eye is Goutam, Nagu's 6-month old son. Getting Nagu's pregnancy confirmed was difficult enough � being made to run from pillar to post at Government hospitals, having to borrow money for the tests and so on. The family was aghast and the truth had to be beaten out of Nagu, quite literally. Another daughter had been married to Govindan, who had children by her. Then she died. The family believes that she was killed by Govindan and his family for dowry she could not bring. It did not even occur to them to go to the police, for they knew they did not have the money to buy justice. Govindan had been demanding that Nagu now be given to him to bring up the children. The family had refused but Govindan hung around. And then one day, claims Nagu, he had waylaid her by the community toilet, tied her down and had sex with her. Abortion was out of the question, especially as far as Sulochana was concerned. A grandchild was coming and had to be welcomed, regardless of marriage or social approval. And so here's Goutam, a strong, happy infant, ready to break out into a smile at the slightest excuse. Everybody in the family adores him. The neighbours have accepted him as just another kid who will grow up in Injambakkam along with a swarm of others. In time, he will find his place in the almost inevitable cycle of poverty, lack of education, lack of self-esteem, struggling to find work, struggling to raise a family, struggling with alcoholism� struggle, struggle and yet more mind-deadening struggle. The families that drive down to the beach in their shiny new Korean model cars (Chennai is being billed as the Detroit of India) would not approve of this state of affairs. They would see no courage, no compassion, no dignity in the decision the family took. "This is the way all these poor people behave", they would say. "And besides, the child is illegitimate." Quite right. He is illegitimate not only because his mother is not married but because the resurgent new India has no place for him. As his inquisitive little head jerks from side to side, the blue of the ocean in his backyard shines in his bright little eyes. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20020106/1a64feeb/attachment.html From abirbazaz at rediffmail.com Sun Jan 6 20:50:35 2002 From: abirbazaz at rediffmail.com (abir bazaz) Date: 6 Jan 2002 15:20:35 -0000 Subject: [Reader-list] On Deleuze Message-ID: <20020106152035.31533.qmail@mailFA6.rediffmail.com> PIERRE GUYOTAT on Deleuze-Guattari list... Too much to say, and I don't have the heart for it today. There is too much to say about what has happened to us here, about what has also happened to me, with the death of Gilles Deleuze, with a death we no doubt feared(knowing him to be so ill), but still, with this death here (cette mort-ci), this unimaginable image, in the event,would deepen still further, if that were possible, the infinite sorrow of another event. Deleuze the thinker is, above all, the thinker of the event and always of this event here (cet evenement-ci). He remained the thinker of the event from beginning to end. I reread what he said of the event, already in 1969, in one of his most celebrated books,The Logic of Sense. He cites Joe Bousquet ("To my inclination for death," said Bousquet, "which was a failure of the will"), then continues: "From this inclination to this longing there is, in a certain respect, no change except a change of the will, a sort of leaping in place (saut sur place) of the whole body which exchanges its organic will for a spiritual will. It wills now not exactly what occurs, but something inthat which occurs, something yet to come which would be consistent with what occurs, in accordance with the laws of an obscure, humorous conformity: the Event. It is in this sense that the Amor fati is one with the struggle of free men" (One would have to quote interminably). There is too much to say, yes, about the time I was given, along with so many others of my "generation," to share with Deleuze; about the good fortune I had of thinking thanks to him, by thinking of him. Since the beginning, all of his books (but first of all Nietzsche, Difference and Repetition, The Logic of Sense) have been for me not only, of course, vocations to think, but, each time, the unsettling, very unsettling experience - so unsettling - of a proximity or a near total affinity in the "theses" - if one may say this - through too evident distances in what I woul ing better, "gesture," "strategy," "manner": of writing, of speaking, perhaps of reading. As regards the "theses" (but the word doesn't fit) and particularly the thesis concer From abirbazaz at rediffmail.com Sun Jan 6 20:50:41 2002 From: abirbazaz at rediffmail.com (abir bazaz) Date: 6 Jan 2002 15:20:41 -0000 Subject: [Reader-list] On Deleuze Message-ID: <20020106152041.31598.qmail@mailFA6.rediffmail.com> PIERRE GUYOTAT on Deleuze-Guattari list... Too much to say, and I don't have the heart for it today. There is too much to say about what has happened to us here, about what has also happened to me, with the death of Gilles Deleuze, with a death we no doubt feared(knowing him to be so ill), but still, with this death here (cette mort-ci), this unimaginable image, in the event,would deepen still further, if that were possible, the infinite sorrow of another event. Deleuze the thinker is, above all, the thinker of the event and always of this event here (cet evenement-ci). He remained the thinker of the event from beginning to end. I reread what he said of the event, already in 1969, in one of his most celebrated books,The Logic of Sense. He cites Joe Bousquet ("To my inclination for death," said Bousquet, "which was a failure of the will"), then continues: "From this inclination to this longing there is, in a certain respect, no change except a change of the will, a sort of leaping in place (saut sur place) of the whole body which exchanges its organic will for a spiritual will. It wills now not exactly what occurs, but something inthat which occurs, something yet to come which would be consistent with what occurs, in accordance with the laws of an obscure, humorous conformity: the Event. It is in this sense that the Amor fati is one with the struggle of free men" (One would have to quote interminably). There is too much to say, yes, about the time I was given, along with so many others of my "generation," to share with Deleuze; about the good fortune I had of thinking thanks to him, by thinking of him. Since the beginning, all of his books (but first of all Nietzsche, Difference and Repetition, The Logic of Sense) have been for me not only, of course, vocations to think, but, each time, the unsettling, very unsettling experience - so unsettling - of a proximity or a near total affinity in the "theses" - if one may say this - through too evident distances in what I woul ing better, "gesture," "strategy," "manner": of writing, of speaking, perhaps of reading. As regards the "theses" (but the word doesn't fit) and particularly the thesis concerning a difference that is not reducible to dialectical opposition, a difference "more profound" than a contradiction (Difference and Repetition), a difference in the joyfully repeated affirmation ("yes, yes"), the taking into account of the simulacrum, Deleuze remains no doubt, despite so many similarities, the one to whom I have always considered myself closest among all of this "generation." I never felt the slightest "objection" arise in me, not even a virtual one,against any of his discourse, even if I did on occasion happen to grumble against this or that proposition in Anti-Oedipus(I told him about it one day when we were coming back together by car from Nanterre University,after a thesis defense on Spinoza) or perhaps against the idea that philosophy consists in "creating" concepts. One day, I would like to explain how such an agreement on philosophical "content" never excludes all these differences that still today I don't know how to name or situate. (Deleuze had accepted the idea of publishing, one day, a long improvised conversation between us on this subject and then we had to wait, to wait too long.) I only know that these differences left room for nothing but friendship between us. To my knowledge, no shadow, no sign has ever indicated the contrary. Such a thing is so rare in the milieu that was ours that I wish to make note of it here at this moment. This friendship did not stem solely from the (otherwise telling) fact that we have the same enemies. We saw each other little, it is true, especially in the last years. But I can still hear the laugh of his voice, a little hoarse, tell me so many things that I love to remember down to the letter: "My best wishes, all my best wishes," he whispered to me with a friendly irony the summer of 1955 in the courtyard of the Sorbonne when I w exam. Or else, with the same solicitude of the elder: "It pains me to see you spending so much time on that institution (le College International de Philosophie). I would rather you wrote..." And then, I recall the memorable ten days of the Nietzsche colloquium at Cerisy, in 1972, and then so many,many other moments that make me, no doubt along with Jean-Francois Lyotard (who was also there), feel quite alone, surviving and melancholy today in what is called with that terrible and somewhat false word, a "generation." Each death is unique, of course, and therefore unusual, but what can one say about the unusual when,from Barthes to Althusser, from Foucault to Deleuze, it multiplies in this way in the same "generation," as in a series -and Deleuze was also the philosopher of serial singuarity - all these uncommon endings? Yes, we will all have loved philosophy. Who can deny it? But, it's true, (he said it), Deleuze was, of all those in his "generation," the one who did/made" (faisait) it the most gaily, the most innocently. He would not have liked, I think, the word "thinker" that I used above. He would have preferred "philosopher." In this respect, he claimed to be "the most innocent (the most devoid of guilt) of making/doing philosophy" (Negotiations). This was no doubt the condition for his having left a profound mark on the philosophy of this century, the mark that will remain his own, incomparable. The mark of a great philosopher and a great professor. The historian of philosophy who proceeded with a sort of configurational election of his own genealogy (the Stoics, Lucretius, Spinoza, Hume,Kant, Nietzsche, Bergson, etc.) was also an inventor of philosophy who never shut himself up in some philosophical "realm" (he wrote on painting, the cinema, and literature, Bacon, Lewis Carroll, Proust, Kafka,Melville, etc.). And then, and then I want to say precisely here that I loved and admired his way -- always faultless -- of negotiating with the image, the newspapers, televis mations that it has undergone over the course of the past ten years. Economy and vigilant retreat. I felt solidarity with what he was doing and saying in this respect, for example in an interview in Liberationat the time of the publication of A Thousand Plateaus(in the vein of his 1977 pamphlet). He said: "One should know what is currently happening in the realm of books. For several years now, we've been living in a period of reaction in every domain. There is no reason to think that books are to be spared from this reaction. People are in the process of fabricating for us a literary space, as well as judicial, economic, and political spaces, which are completely reactionary, prefabricated,and overwhelming/crushing. There is here, I believe, a systematic enterprise that Liberation should have analyzed." This is "much worse than a censorship," he added, but this dry spell will not necessarily last." Perhaps, perhaps.Like Nietzsche and Artaud, like Blanchot and other shared admirations, Deleuze never lost sight of this alliance between necessity and the aleatory, between chaos and the untimely. When I was writing on Marx at the worst moment, three years ago, I took heart when I learned that he was planning to do so as well. And I reread tonight what he said in 1990 on this subject: "...Felix Guattari and I have always remained Marxists, in two different manners perhaps, but both of us. It's that we don't believe in a political philosophy that would not be centered around the analysis of capitalism and its developments. What interests us the most is the analysis of capitalism as an immanent system that constantly pushes back its proper limits, and that always finds them again on a larger scale, because the limit is Capital itself." I will continue to begin again to read Gilles Deleuze in order to learn, and I'll have to wander all alone in this long conversation that we were supposed to have together. My first question, I think, would have concerned Artaud,his interpretation of manence" on which he always insisted, in order to make him or let him say something that no doubt still remains secret to us. And I would have tried to tell him why his thought has never left me, for nearly forty years. How could it do so from now on? Translated by David Kammerman From aiindex at mnet.fr Mon Jan 7 14:57:31 2002 From: aiindex at mnet.fr (Harsh Kapoor) Date: Mon, 7 Jan 2002 10:27:31 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] The Telecom 'Revolution' - All for the elite's sake? Message-ID: The Praful Bidwai Column for the week beginning Jan 7 The Telecom 'Revolution' All for the elite's sake? By Praful Bidwai It's nothing short of a "revolution", we were told when long-distance telephone rates in India were cut by unprecedented margins last month. First, the private cellular operators' alliance, IndiaOne, announced it was going to reduce mobile-to-mobile national long-distance (NLD) tariffs by 50 percent. The mobile handset, a trade-mark of the upwardly mobile Indian, was proclaimed to have become "downwardly mobile" as the "poor man's telephone". For a lot of people, who were wonder-struck by the five- to ten-fold decrease in the prices of fancy cellular handsets over the past four years, the prediction rang true. Private mobile telephony, it was said, would wrench India out of the cesspool of global telephone laggards, with an abysmally low telecom density of four lines per hundred people. India would soon join the league of the middle-level developing countries. Just days later, on December 28, the giant public sector Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd (BSNL) hit back with a whopping 60 percent-plus cut in its static telephone tariffs. A peak-time Mumbai-Delhi call will now cost only Rs 9 per minute, in place of Rs 24. A Delhi-Chandigarh or Hyderabad-Madras call will cost 59 percent less. This too was ecstatically welcomed as the greatest-ever "bonanza" for telephone subscribers. The pendulum had now swung from wireless telephony to terra firma--the good old land-based line. Nevertheless, "the consumer is king", proclaimed free-market enthusiasts, euphorically forecasting a 70 percent increase in long-distance dialling and hence NLD revenues, and eventually India's telephone connectivity. They predict the private sector will now be lured to invest in a big way not just in the mobile business, but even in basic telephony. Never mind that the "Information Technology Revolution" has lost some of its steam. Telephony will give it a boost; it could even provide another shortcut to rapid growth. The time has come to pour some wintry-cold water over the "telecom revolution" euphoria. The tariff cuts will of course be a bonanza for the top one-seventh of India's telecom consumers. But the cuts will slow down, not accelerate, overall telephone development. It is not hard to understand this apparent paradox. India's primary telephone system, comprising 35.4 million DoT (department of telecommunications) subscribers, relies on a system of cross-subsidies. It costs about Rs 25,000 to install a new telephone line, but you can buy one outright for a mere Rs 8,000 to 15,000, or rent one by depositing Rs 1,000-3,000 in the cities (Rs 500 in remote villages) and then paying a low monthly rent (varying from Rs 50 to a maximum Rs 250). DoT doesn't make up this difference through grants from the government--it pays handsome dividends to it--but generates it out of its NLD profits. NLD revenues account for about half the total revenue of Rs 25,000 crores earned by DoT subsidiaries, BSNL and MTNL (which is confined to Mumbai and Delhi). This is socially desirable and progressive, because it allows DoT to lay new lines in small towns and villages, and keep local call rates low. A good 40 percent of all DoT subscribers have "zero-calls" bills--i.e. are covered by the free calls allowance, because they use the telephone frugally. At the other end of the spectrum are high-use customers such as corporations, governments and rich individuals, totalling five million. These form only 15 percent of all subscribers, but yield three-fourths of DoT's revenue. Being relatively well-off or entitled to organised sector perquisites, they can afford to make frequent long-distance calls. It is only rational that they should subsidise the poorer subscribers in the short run. In the long run, they themselves benefit through increased connectivity, lower tariffs and improved service. This is a desirable subsidy. It is this mechanism that has allowed DoT to add 4.5 to 5 million new lines to the national network each year. At our present stage of telecom development, there is simply no substitute for a mechanism like this. Only five percent of all Indian homes are telephonically connected. This proportion is abysmally low. It represents an avoidable waste of social time and resources, including energy. Telecommunications growth entails real cost-saving through avoided physical movement. Growth of telephony is an essential component of contemporary economic development. To enable ordinary people to communicate via telephone lines, or through devices (like computers) linked to them, is to empower them. This was one rational major goal of the 1994 National Telecom Policy. The government has itself undermined the goal by allowing private operators to prey upon public networks, and by lowering long-distance tariffs. (For details, see this Column on Oct 20, 2000) It wrote off Rs 7,000 crores in fees payable by private companies. It has unfairly deprived DoT of Rs 3,000 crores. Making mobile phones cheaper solves little. Mobiles rarely represent a net addition to the network. Most of their owners are existing DoT subscribers. The beneficiaries of all these policies are less than 10 million individuals--in a country of 1,000 million. Private companies have provided just 4.2 lakh new lines (compared to DoT's 35 million). They indulge in cherry-picking: concentrating on super-rich clients who want value-added services, wholly ignoring the majority. Their rural connections total an appalling 300! They evade our already lax and scarcely-enforced service quality regulations. They are now illegally digging up roads and pavements to lay cables. Some have announced grandiose schemes. (The Tatas have a Rs. 3,500 crore investment plan for four circles, and Reliance and Bharti Telecom are getting into "broad-band" services, including "convergence"). But it is doubtful if these will see the light of day. In the past, private operators had grossly overestimated the likely rise in telecom demand and made bids for a ludicrously high Rs 160,000 crores. They won't be able to compete with DoT's low rates, but will nevertheless drive down its surplus from Rs 9,000 crores to Rs 3,000 crores. Rural telecom expansion will slow down. Equity will take a big hit. Equity has been one of the biggest losers from many of our recent economic policies and social practices. The elite, comprising less than five percent of the population, has been the biggest gainer. This class increasingly preys upon national resources, and returns little to the common pool. It has been the main beneficiary of the past decade's tax breaks and reduced imposts on consumer durables ranging from cars to air-conditioners. Its income has more than doubled in the past five years or so (for instance, thanks to the Fifth Pay Commission) although poverty has deepened in much of the country. The elite has developed a positive stake in the prevalence of low wages, child labour and economic serfdom. Having established its dominance at the macro level, this class is now aggressively taking over the public or common sphere--quite literally. All of our urban spaces are being reshaped to brazenly favour the property-owning elite. Thousands of crores are being spent on flyovers. Mumbai has 55 of these under construction, Delhi has 30, and Chennai has 18. These are tilted against public transport. The "beautification" drives launched in many cities further discriminate against the majority and pamper the elite. As if these were not enough, rich car-owners now monopolise whole pavements. Go to the average Delhi "colony", from Mayur Vihar to Punjabi Bagh, and see for yourself how every square yard of pavement space has become someone's private parking place. Disputes over "ownership" can lead to murder. City centres and public squares are being demolished to build shopping arcades and amusement parks from which the majority is excluded. Even green public spaces are "reserved" in many cities for those who can pay. Meanwhile, private clubs and golf courses are being built on public land. So are posh schools and hospitals. Our elite has fattened itself on entrenched hierarchies and discrimination, as well as subsidised education. But roughly 60,000 of our brightest students go abroad each year even for non-specialist degrees that can be easily earned in India. It is hard to find a joint secretary to the government whose children are not studying abroad, or planning to. This would be bad enough even if it didn't represent a drain of resources. But it involves that too. The Reserve Bank turns a blind eye to this. And no one asks how an officer earning Rs 18,000 a month can finance his son/daughter's $30,000-a-year fees in America. This dualism is utterly repugnant--morally, socially and politically. It is corroding our democracy, and breeding a culture of arrogance and apathy among the privileged, and resentment among the majority. This is evident in our cities, with their lack of safety, growing crime, and widespread squalor. Stress in school and at home, aggression in the street, and insecurity in the workplace, have become common features of our daily lives. Not even the wealthiest are free from these. Ultimately, gaping inequalities and unaddressed injustices will catch up with everyone unless we radically change our policies. Or else, we may be doomed under the present Right-wing juggernaut to go the Argentinian way--towards economic collapse and social chaos.--end-- From rustam at cseindia.org Mon Jan 7 16:50:54 2002 From: rustam at cseindia.org (rustam) Date: Mon, 7 Jan 2002 16:50:54 +530 Subject: [Reader-list] Water as a weapon of war In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <7EBE17392@cseindia.org> being forwarded FYI: "Not one child deserves to die because of a dispute - real that it may be - between Washington and Baghdad, or the International Coalition led by the US against 10, 000 al Qaeda operatives backed by a despotic regime. Someone needs to show leadership, and sadly it is not coming from the current administration or the American public who unquestioningly follow. No, Mr. President, you have given us a false choice. I am neither for terrorism nor for your war. Rather, I am merely trying to give a child a clean glass of water. And if the child drinks the water and lives, then maybe, just maybe, she will remember us fondly." --------------------------------------------------------------------- This is an article written by Edward D. Breslin, an employee of WaterAid working in Lichinga, Moçambique. These are Edward's personal views rather than him acting on behalf of WaterAid in anyway. If anyone would like to contact Edward about this article his email address is wateraid-mz at teledata.mz --------------------------------------------------------------------- Water as a Weapon of War Water - so basic and so necessary for life. We all know this of course, but many in the West understandably take their water supply for granted. Water is readily available, cheap in the USA at least, in abundant supply, and always flows when we turn on our taps. Water is not taken for granted in most parts of the world however. It is generally accepted that over 1 billion people do not have access to clean water in the world, and the health, economic and developmental consequences of this reality are dire. Women and children spend hours collecting dirty water each day and lose valuable time, energy and calories (which are in short supply anyway) in the process. A family can not prosper if it spends hours each day fetching water, and the bite is twice as painful because that water is so often contaminated that the family has to spend what little it has looking for a cure. All that effort for something that inevitably undermines your health - it is cruel. Diarrhoea, typhoid, cholera and other water-related diseases haunt poor communities throughout the world but are the price families pay for a glass of water. The World Health Organisation (WHO) argues that over 2 million people die each year from diarrhoeal disease linked to inadequate water supply. Most are children, most under 5 years old.And they suffer before they die. A child suffering from acute diarrhoea is listless, can not produce saliva, can barely speak, can not sit up, and can barely swallow. The body shrivels, as the last remnants of moisture within are sucked dry by a parched body. Cholera is worse of course, as is typhoid. The child's death is gruesome to behold - all for a glass of water. Few hear their cries, even if the child could muster a tear. These deaths are sadly silent deaths, far from the cameras and the news, because it picks off children one at a time. Perhaps today a child will die down the road from where I sit in Moçambique. Tomorrow the death will occur across town. The following day there may be a respite - no deaths today, but tomorrow... Hardly gripping but no less tragic than the famine camp footage that periodically galvanises the world. Development workers focused on water supply struggle and are often frustrated. Despite all our efforts, the number of people without water continues to climb - despite claims from some in the sector to the contrary. There are many debates as to why this is happening, and the reasons are complex. But the truth is that many water projects fail throughout the world every day. Projects fail because of inappropriate technologies, poor operation and maintenance systems, or a lack of finances on the part of governments and communities to keep their systems operational. Projects fail to improve health because many countries do not have the finances to purchase chlorine and other chemicals necessary to treat water - to make it safe to drink. Too often, these basics are out of reach. And the sector races against time as each day without clean water will mean more death, more anguish, more suffering - all for a drink of water. But water rarely stops flowing out of malice or hate or punishment. No,even the cruellest dictators in the world would not use water as a weapon of war. The consequences are too much, the suffering too profound. Even the coldest dictators, who have shown scant regard for the welfare of people under their control, would not go that far. Surely water is off limits. Surely... Many Americans worry about water as a weapon of war, particularly since September 11th. Americans are right to worry. Terrorists could conceivably contaminate US water supplies. The impact would be cataclysmic - Americans fighting against Americans over the last supplies of bottled water at the convenience store. That baby I describe dying of diarrhoea could be a child down the street from us in Maryland, or Wisconsin, or California. Tomorrow it could be my child.... Sadly, water is being used as a weapon of war, and America is the culprit.And the international water sector needs to think clearly about how we respond to this affront. America needs to look at itself as well. It needs to ask hard questions.It needs to look into the eyes of hate and stare it down, and sadly those eyes are our own. And it needs to ask hard questions of the administrations of Presidents Bush I, Clinton and Bush II. But where is the evidence? Well, it has been known for some time that the US has enforced sanctions on Iraq that include equipment and chemicals necessary for water supply. These include spares necessary to maintain water systems, and chemicals needed to treat contaminated water. These sanctions have been in place since the end of the Gulf War. Many have criticised the inclusion on these items of sanctions lists, but the US has consistently and strenuously defended tight sanctions on water treatment chemicals and equipment on the grounds that Iraq could divert these items to the military. Weapons of mass destruction could be made with this equipment and these chemicals, so they must be banned. Yet Thomas J. Nagy of George Washington University has unearthed documents from the US Defence Intelligence Agency (DIA), an Agency within the US Department of Defence, that most clearly show the US' concerns about the diversion of water treatment equipment and chemicals is disingenuous. The documents conclusively prove that the US has knowingly understood the human consequences of denying vital water treatment chemicals to Iraq as part of UN Sanctions. They suggest that the US has denied these critical water treatment chemicals with the knowledge and intent of reeking havoc on Iraq's water supply system (The Progressive, September 2001). Nagy's research brings the whole strategy behind the sanctions debate to light, and it is evil.The DIA documents are frighteningly cold but meticulously researched and argued documents. DIA produced a report in January 1991 that was circulated widely within the Bush Sr. Administration that highlighted Iraq's water treatment vulnerabilities. The report argues that, "failing to secure supplies will result in a shortage of pure drinking water for much of the(Iraqi) population". The report predicted that Iraq's water treatment capacity would take six months to "fully degrade" (June 1991) after which widespread disease, "if not epidemics" would ensue. Most importantly, DIA argues the following: "unless water treatment supplies are exempted from the UN sanctions for humanitarian reasons, no adequate solution exists for Iraq's water purification dilemma, since no suitable alternatives, including looting supplies from Kuwait, sufficiently meets Iraqi needs. Subsequent DIA reports document what is known about civilian casualties through the inclusion of water purifying chemicals and equipment on the Iraqi population. They show that Iraq's water supplies are running at 5 percent capacity. The administrations of Presidents Bush Sr., Clinton and George W. Bush have all vigorously enforced the inclusion of water treatment chemicals (like chlorine), water extraction technologies and basic water supply equipment on UN sanctions lists, often over the objections of other Security Council members wishes. UNICEF, the World Health Organisation and other concerned development institutions and human rights groups have all questioned the US stance, correctly arguing that the humanitarian consequences of the inclusion of these goods on UN sanctions lists has no military or securitylogic. As reported on CNN on November 29 2001, "One of the biggest problems with sanctions now is that a huge range of equipment needed for water, sanitation and the oil industry, is routinely blocked at the sanctions committee by the U.S. and Britain because of fears that they could be used for military purposes. These are items as basic as water pumps... International humanitarian workers say the biggest problem in Iraq right now is not a lack of food or even medicine -- it is a lack of clean water, and that is because the infrastructure is not being repaired. And it can't be fully repaired without major imports of equipment. UNICEF says the biggest single reason that children are still dying at an abnormally high rate here appears to be that many communities do not have access to clean water." The result of UN sanctions against Iraq has not, as hoped, been the toppling of Saddam Hussein but rather the death of 5,000 children every month. That is 60,000 children a year. That is 500,000 children - dead children - since the Gulf War ended. When asked on national television in 1996, former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright stated that the large numbers of dying children in Iraq created "a very hard choice" for the United States but "we think the price is worth it." And so sanctions continue, and vital water purifying equipment is denied to Iraq because they have a leader who is viewed as a threat to the world by handful of the most powerful nations in the world. And the casualties in this stand-off are children. And the US knows. And the US will not be swayed. And the US does not care who dies in the process as long as this one man is dethroned. The US drones on about Iraqi culpability, and claims that all would be resolved if Hussein simply let inspectors into Iraq. Yet the US continues to be the biggest purchaser of Iraqi oil in the world, and does not have the courage to ask hard questions about our appetite for oil in light of child deaths. So we help the Iraqi regime by purchasing oil, but we do not have the compassion, vision or leadership to have this fight with Saddam Hussein in a way that spares children. If only children were as valuable to Americans as the liquid that fuels our SUVs. Surely it's the wrong target, and surely I am allowed to ask these questions even in an environment where "criticism" is shamelessly linked to the evil of al Qaeda. Surely we can look into the eyes of children and see their innocence. Hopefully, we can look into our children's eyes and see other children, maybe even an Iraqi child. And surely what we will see will transcend meaningless debates about an individual dictator, or a strategy to oust him. Children, who have no choice over what happens in the world of geo-politics, are the casualties here - all for a glass of water. Sadly, we are culpable, particularly given the fact that the US argues that Saddam Hussein does not care about his people. Wouldn't it be an amazing revelation to the world if we actually showed Iraqi children that we in fact did care for them, that we in fact could see beyond the politics to the people, to the children? And it raises a sharp image for me - when we think of chemical laboratories where schemes are hatched to construct weapons of mass destruction, we think of mad scientists who have lost their grip on reality. We think of government psychopaths urging them on with a glint in their eye. And we imagine their names are Middle Eastern and largely unpronounceable.The faces I am now confronted with are from within the US Government, within the US Defence Intelligence Agency of the US Department of Defence, within Presidential Administrations, with names like George, Dan, George Jr., Dick,Al and Bill. They are not the faces of some "other" but of us. The tragedy of September 11th is so clear to us, so real, and so powerful.Not one person deserved to die in New York, Washington or on a plane thatcrashed in Pennsylvania. Likewise, not one Afghani deserves to die, or one child who had the misfortune to be borne into a county that the United States does not like. America will never be great until it argues and defends the rights of all innocent people in the world, especially in times of war. We have not done this, despite token efforts with food aid from the sky. The real proof of our weakness is in our callous response to suffering elsewhere, and our utter lack of compassion. Collateral damage is thrown around as if they were car parts. Sadly, they are children. Not one child deserves to die because of a dispute - real that it may be - between Washington and Baghdad, or the International Coalition led by the US against 10, 000 al Qaeda operatives backed by a despotic regime. Someone needs to show leadership, and sadly it is not coming from the current administration or the American public who unquestioningly follow.No, Mr. President, you have given us a false choice. I am neither for terrorism nor for your war. Rather, I am merely trying to give a child a clean glass of water. And if the child drinks the water and lives, then maybe, just maybe, she will remember us fondly. Edward D. Breslin Lichinga, Moçambique 20 December 2001 **************************************************************** * NOTE CHANGE IN OUR EMAIL ADDRESS: PLEASE NOTE IT AS FOLLOWS * **************************************************************** CENTRE FOR SCIENCE AND ENVIRONMENT ( CSE ) 41, TUGHLAKABAD INSTITUTIONAL AREA, NEW DELHI- 110 062 TELE: 608 1110, 608 1124 608 3394, 608 6399 FAX : 91-11-608 5879 VISIT US AT: http://www.cseindia.org Email: rustam at cseindia.org **************************************************************** From aiindex at mnet.fr Mon Jan 7 19:30:59 2002 From: aiindex at mnet.fr (Harsh Kapoor) Date: Mon, 7 Jan 2002 15:00:59 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] 3 recent (mainstream) IT stories on India Message-ID: The Wall Street Journal Jan. 7, 2002 Boom Town Column By Kara Swisher U.S. Tech Town Rises in India --- Silicon Valley Veteran Starts Self-Contained Community To Make Bargain Software PHOTO: Swain Porter and the all-purpose domes of New Oroville, India, where the water buffaloes have given way to programmers By Kara Swisher E-mail: kara.swisher at wsj.com WITH ALL THE WHINING in Silicon Valley about how tough it is to keep a start-up going in these difficult times, it might be a good idea to consider what Swain Porter has been going through over the past year. While he has had to deal with the normal litany of challenges faced by any tech entrepreneur -- constantly looking for solid funding, new clients and crack programmers -- there were other less ordinary problems, such as the recent matter of the water buffalo that got stuck in the trench where his new company's fiber-optic lines were about to be laid. Eventually, it took more than a dozen people to pull what had become a very heavy and very dead mud-covered beast out of the muck. But even that incident pales in comparison with other issues: a variety of cobras, a $26,000 goat shed, constant power outages and the twin seasonal dangers of torrential rains and 107-degree temperatures. It's all been part of an unusual venture to build a self-sustaining software-making community in the desolate hills of southern India. That's where Catalytic Software, a small U.S. company founded in 1999 by a group of former Microsoft executives led by Mr. Porter, has been scratching its way into existence. The grand vision: creating high-quality, just-in-time software for bargain prices by combining cheaper Indian programming talent with stricter U.S. standards. Amazingly, with little funding and lots of obstacles, it is actually starting to work. Mr. Porter, who is 36 years old, was back in Silicon Valley last week firming up new funding, hires and several promising outsourcing contracts with U.S. software firms -- and hoping for good times ahead. Unlike the feel-sorry-for-me faces of many techies here, Mr. Porter is not only still plugging away, but also headed to profitability. And he is still beaming about the project that he has dedicated his life and fortune to in pursuit of an ambitious and adventurous dream. You might call it: Indiana Jones and the Temple of Geeks. "I am still really excited because we've weathered the downturn and are building a real business that has real roots," he says. "I think this was never something that was easy, so I think that's why we're still going." The soft-spoken former research scientist and Microsoft contractor relocated to India 18 months ago, settling not far from the up and coming tech city of Hyderabad, in the southern state of Andhra Pradesh. Back then, as he drove his battered Toyota SUV over the scrubby landscape, he regaled a dubious visitor with his dreams of a city that would eventually rise there called New Oroville, named after his hometown in Washington state. Since India has notoriously uneven services -- from roads to power to telephones -- a gated community would be needed to control all variables. Over to the left would be neat lines of ultramodern geodesic domes where hundreds of enthusiastic Indian software programmers would live and work. Over to the right would be the pool, recreation center, ice rink (yes, ice rink) where workers and their families would relax and enjoy themselves. And just up the road would be the state-of-the-art electric-recycling communications grid that would effortlessly power up this humming new city of tomorrow -- a vibrant community created from scratch. >From the beginning, there were obstacles -- such as the water buffaloes. This being India, these lumbering objects of holy veneration plopped down anywhere they liked -- and the spot they seemed to favor most was the dead center of what was to be New Oroville's Main Street. Today, Mr. Porter thinks he has finally solved that problem by stringing up a barbed-wire fence around the 500-acre site. "You have to be really careful with water buffaloes, since they can get really angry and come at you," Mr. Swain says. "That's not something you learn at Microsoft, of course." Of course. But Microsoft, at least Microsoft-generated money, has helped a lot, with principal funding for the project coming from Eric Engstrom. The former executive there has put up more than $1 million for New Oroville, and his other U.S.-based software ventures have given Catalytic its first business. Mr. Engstrom's main aim was to use what he had considered excellent Indian programming talent to make "Made in India" a coveted label. In fact, over the years, India has developed into a major source of cheaper outsourced information technology services for U.S. companies and more growth there is predicted. Recent studies have estimated that IT services from India will rise drastically in the years to come from about $1 billion last year. Pushing a higher-quality offering, Catalytic hopes eventually to grab a more than $100 million slice of that pie -- if it gets a planned 4,000 domes built at New Oroville, with thousands of employees. Now, there are 35 workers at the company and about a dozen nearly complete domes on the site, along with new electrical, water and communications systems. Each dome, costing about $4,000, is made of concrete and recycled magazines and can be expanded to three floors, about 32 feet in diameter and 26 feet tall. Some will be used for homes and others offices and community facilities. Mr. Porter hopes 60 domes will be operational by the end of the year, with 200 workers. Resumes, especially since the tech downturn has started, are pouring in, he says. While the venture is still a small affair, growth will require well beyond the $2 million spent so far. Catalytic is about to close a small ($2 million) round of funding and recently bolstered its reserves with a $2.3 million loan from the Export-Import Bank and a $2.1 million loan from the State Bank of India. It is still a trifling amount given the progress made, especially compared with the huge sums spent by now-defunct dot-coms in the U.S. over the past several years. Mr. Porter's biggest regret: having to pay $26,000 to buy out a goat herder's building and a few borehole wells on the land. Catalytic now has to attract new programming contracts from companies not affiliated with its investors. Mr. Porter notes that the key to that is completing quality work at low cost, so word-of-mouth will build. Catalytic has already garnered several of these, and he is now aiming to hire a small Silicon Valley-based staff to focus solely on attracting that business. Thinking about it all rising from bare soil in India, as he sits amid the skyscrapers of downtown San Francisco, is a bit of a disconnect, Mr. Porter admits. But he is eager to return to get down to business. "We are looking pretty strong coming out of this downturn, and I think we will have a good lead now that the domes are on the ground," says Mr. Porter, who recently became engaged to be married to an Australian woman whom he met in India. "Hardship is what has made us great." That, of course, includes water buffaloes. What do you think about what it's like to be an entrepreneur in today's downturn? Write me at kara.swisher at wsj.com and come see the debate Friday at WSJ.com/BoomTown. o o o o o Reuters Sunday, December 30, 2001 http://biz.yahoo.com/rf/011230/bom248116_1.html India seeks to become world's back-office By Rosemary Arackaparambil BOMBAY, Dec 31 - The chattering youngsters, many dressed in Western-style casual clothes, alighting at a train station in a northern Bombay surburb appear headed for a college campus. But it is late at night, and they are making their way to a nearby plush office complex. There, in a huge brightly painted ``shopfloor'' whose walls and pillars are adorned with colourful posters, they settle down behind computers, pull on headphones and spend several hours speaking English with an American accent. These 18 to 26-year-olds working for eFunds Corp unit E-Funds International (India) handle direct tele-marketing calls from customers halfway around the globe for U.S.-based call centre operator West TeleServices. They are part of an emerging workforce for India's latest export offering -- IT-enabled services. These include tele-marketing, helpdesk support, medical transcription, back-office accounting, payroll management, maintaining legal databases, insurance claim and credit card processing, animation, and higher-end engineering design -- all of which can be delivered by phones, computers and the Internet. India is aiming to become ``the world's back-office''. A McKinsey study has estimated e-enabled services could be worth over half a trillion U.S. dollars globally by 2008. ``I think there is no better or more promising area for India. It plays to India's sweet spot,'' Pramod Bhasin, president of GE Capital Services India, which runs the country's largest such enterprise, said at a recent venture capital seminar in Bombay. GE Capital's 10,000 strong manpower offers accounting, claims processing and credit evaluation services to 80 branches of General Electric Co around the world. India seeks to become world's back-office Countries like Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, Canada and the Philippines have long provided call centre services but India, with its cheaper, skilled, English-speaking and IT-savvy workforce is fast becoming attractive. The National Association of Software and Services Companies (NASSCOM) has forecast India's revenues from IT-enabled services to rise more than 20 times to 810 billion rupees ($16.94 billion) by 2008 from 40 billion rupees last year. Industry officials say Indian companies can offer these services 30-40 percent cheaper than their competitors. CALLING MORE Some 208 IT-enabled service companies are currently registered with NASSCOM, but there are many more. ``The biggest opportunity in IT-enabled services in India is call centres,'' said Johnathan Everett, managing director of venture capital firm The VIEW Group, which manages $40 million. ``India is currently barely scratching the surface.'' Call centre services can extend to emotional help, as Bangalore IT-firm Phoenix Global Solutions plans to do. It has hired 50 people for a pilot project to counsel troubled American people. NASSCOM estimates that about 68,000 people are employed in the Indian IT-enabled services industry but forecasts this could rise to 1.1 million by 2008. With starting monthly salaries of 8,000-10,000 rupees, the opportunities are good for many of India's job-seeking graduates. Several foreign firms like HSBC, Standard Chartered Bank, American Express and British Airways are setting up back-office processing centres in India. Indian IT firms like Wipro, HCL Technologies, Mphasis BFL and private telecoms group Bharti Enterprises are among a few that have announced plans to expand their services offerings to the IT-enabled business. ``The main reason we decided to do this is because it is a different set of services for the same set of customers,'' said Ramesh Enami, chief technology officer of Wipro Technologies. INVESTMENT IN STAFF But Indian companies need to build marketing skills, strong infrastructure, and tackle cultural issues to grab more business. Call centres usually hire Indians with neutral accents. Most are located near big cities such as New Delhi, Bombay and Bangalore. The firms focusing on U.S. customers train their operators in American culture and linguistics. Some give the impression that they are located in the United States and agents adopt American names to make callers feel comfortable. But despite the relative novelty of the business, Indian firms face attrition rates of 20-25 percent, partly because most agents are young and keen to move on. Besides investments in telecoms, computers and power back-up, call centres need to invest in agent interest and training. Telecoms and software firm GTL Ltd's 1,000-seat centre near Bombay houses a gymnasium, prayer room, baby-sitters and recreation room to pamper and retain agents. Experts say that while retaining staff was important, companies also need to join hands with foreign partners to lower the cost of customer acquisition and expand business. ($1 equals 48.3 Indian rupees) o o o o o BusinessWeek Dec. 26, 2001 http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/dec2001/tc20011226_2002.htm SECURITY FOCUS The Littlest Security Pro A teenaged computer prodigy in India becomes the youngest CISSP in the certification's twelve-year history By Kevin Poulsen At a time when teenagers are more likely to be noted for cracking networks than defending them, a computer prodigy in South Bombay, India shattered some stereotypes this month when he became the youngest person ever to be credentialed as a "Certified Information Systems Security Professional", or "CISSP," after acing the lengthy certification exam and clearing a special investigation triggered by his young age. Namit Merchant was sixteen when he sat for the six-hour, 250-question CISSP test in Mumbai in November -- he turned seventeen later that month. While there's no official minimum age for obtaining the certification -- which is widely recognized in the industry -- aspirants are required to have at least three years of full-time professional computer security experience under their belt when they take the test. Perhaps understandably, the CISSP test proctor became skeptical of Merchant's qualifications when the teenager checked in for the exam using his high school I.D. card. "He saw my birth date on there, and he asked me how old I was," says Merchant. "I told him I was sixteen, and that was why I didn't have a driver's license." The proctor needn't have worried. The son of a software engineer, Mechant grew up with computers in the home, and took to them naturally. According to his resume, he landed his first IT job when he was 13, architecting security controls into payroll and accounting software for Bombay-based Compuware, then later went on to perform security work at several more Indian technology companies. Today he works for consulting firm Network Intelligence India, while finishing up his senior year in high school. "Security is the most challenging part of computers," says Merchant. "That's why I got into it." In December, the ethics board of the International Information Systems Security Certification Consortium -- the not-for-profit corporation that created the certification program in 1989 -- verified Merchant's three years of pubescent work experience, and granted him the CISSP credential. A frankly flabbergasted review board member told Merchant in an email that the investigation had been prompted by the organization's desire to "maintain the stature of the certification." "I don't have the statistics handy, but I suspect the median age of CISSPs is over 30," wrote Bill Cambell in the email. "The certification was never conceived as something within reach of teenagers!" "Obviously he's very extraordinary, and he seems to be very sincere about his interest in information security and going somewhere in the industry," says consortium spokesman Mike Kilroy. "We really congratulate him on his achievement." In addition to the $450 test fee, the young security pro will now be responsible for annual dues, and is bound to the earnest CISSP code of ethics -- a kind of Ten Commandments of computer security work that includes such injunctions as "protect society," "act honestly" and "advance and protect the profession." Merchant, who plans to attend a university when he graduates high school, will also have to renew his CISSP certification in three years, and retake the exam -- which he describes as challenging but "too theoretical." "There should be more practical knowledge," says Merchant. By then, he'll be nineteen years old, and may even have a driver's license to show at the door. From abirbazaz at rediffmail.com Mon Jan 7 20:36:23 2002 From: abirbazaz at rediffmail.com (abir bazaz) Date: 7 Jan 2002 15:06:23 -0000 Subject: [Reader-list] More controversy on Kandahar Message-ID: <20020107150623.911.qmail@mailFA11.rediffmail.com> International Herald Tribune Saturday,January 5,2002 An actor in the movie "Kandahar" is also an assassin who killed an Iranian dissident in suburban Washington in 1980 and then fled to Iran, an American prosecutor says. Hassan Tantai, who plays a black American doctor in the film, is actually the 51-year-old Daoud Salahuddin, born David Belfield, said Douglas Gansler, state's attorney for Montgomery County, Maryland. "We are very confident that they are one in the same," Gansler said. "He's a terrorist, he's a fugitive and he's a confessed assassin." "Kandahar," a suddenly timely story of the Taliban's rule in Afghanistan, has been shown worldwide and has won several film festival awards. Directed by the Iranian filmmaker Mohsen Makhmalbaf and filmed in Iran near the Afghan border, "Kandahar" is the story of an Afghan journalist living in Canada who travels to Afghanistan to find her sister. Along the way she meets Tantai, playing the role of an American-born doctor treating Afghan women. Gansler said he had "conclusive" information that proves Tantai is Salahuddin, but would not comment further because the case is still technically open. There is no statute of limitations on first-degree murder, he said. Prosecutors say Salahuddin, who converted to Islam as a young man, killed the former Iranian diplomat Ali Akbar Tabatabai in July 1980, then escaped to Iran and shelter under the regime of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. Tabatabai, the former press attaché for the Iranian Embassy in Washington, had been an opponent of Khomeini. In a 1995 interview with The Washington Post and ABC News in Turkey, he said he was contacted by Iranian agents shortly after Khomeini's Islamic revolution toppled the shah in 1979 and asked whether he would kill Tabatabai. He agreed in return for $4,000 and a promise that he would be sent to China for medical training. Makhmalbaf said he chose his actors from "crowded streets and barren deserts"' and did not know whether Salahuddin and Tantai were the same person. "I never ask those wh before, nor do I follow what they do after I finish shooting my film. 'Kandahar' is no exception," he said in a statement. From parvati at sarai.net Mon Jan 7 21:10:45 2002 From: parvati at sarai.net (parvati at sarai.net) Date: Mon, 7 Jan 2002 15:40:45 -0000 Subject: [Reader-list] the 5-6 in the philippines Message-ID: <200201071540.QAA13940@zelda.intra.waag.org> The Indian diaspora gets a lot of attention. Its efforts at preserving culture, creating identity and communicating, down its generations, the need for a sense of nationhood that relies on building outside in order to, at some indefinite point in the future, rebuild inside, are scrutinised, lauded, mocked, turned into alternatively moving and mocking fictions. In the host country, they are typecast fairly quickly into roles they may protest but cannot entirely transform. Hardworking, unprotesting, quiet, enclosed in ghettos marked by the smell of spices, they are doctors, lawyers, businessmen, engineers, IT professionals, taxi drivers, family men and women. In the Philippines, they are the 5-6. Arriving, for entirely unexplained reasons, from either Sind or the district of Jallandhar, there are approximately 30,000 Indians in these 7000 islands. The Sindhis are traditional businessmen: they make a lot of money selling Chinese goods, live in big houses and visit the Indian Embassy with their complaints. The Sikhs from Jallandhar bribe their way to a visa, cut their hair, pack away their turbans, force themselves to acquire a working taste for seafood and become moneylenders. They lend at the rate of 5:6. In a sense, they are the economy�s rural credit. Equipped with some capital and a motorbike, a 5-6 will lend, in Saeed Naqvi�s description, 100 pesos to a shopkeeper. Then, for the next month, he will collect 4 pesos a day [http://www.indian-express.com/columnists/saee/20010420.html]. Without collateral or written record, frequently robbed on their way home, engaged in work that is not only illegal but has nothing to do with their own trade or community, rarely granted permanent citizenship or even long-term visas, only infrequently recognised officially, they are each others� only family. Robert Frost said that �Home is where when you go, they have to let you in�. The 5- 6, living his entire life on credit, has to force his way wherever he goes. Vigan, in the province of Illocus Sur, is among UNESCO�s World Heritage Sites because represents a �unique fusion of Asian building design� with European colonial architecture� and is an �exceptionally well-preserved example of a European trading town in� South East Asia�. It also has cobbled streets and dhabas where you can drink beer sitting on rickety benches in the sun. And the ubiquitous McDonalds and Dunkin Donuts. The two Indian �families� in Vigan are not on talking terms. The first consists of Sikhs from Jallandhar led by a Sindhi married to a Phillipina. The other is a purely Sindhi family with one son and three daughters. They are all brought out for an Ambassadorial dinner. The Sikhs occupy one end of the table. The Sindhis an adjacent corner. Dinner consists of shrimp, fish, pork, rice and wine. The 5-6 watch their leader eat salad. The province�s flamboyant Governor encourages them to eat while making sardonic comments on their profession. �They are illegal, of course. But we let them stay, the 5-6!� he remarks to the Ambassador. While the 5-6 resist this invitation to shrimp, the Ambassador plays the interesting diplomatic game of making a point with a dulled pencil. �Governor, this is an intriguing point: none of them do this sort of work at home. Just ask them what they did before they came here!� �Student.� �Tailor.� �Electician.� �Shop keeper.� �Mechanic.� �Well then�, the Governor retorts, �We will be more than happy to give them jobs that suit their training here. With us!� The 5-6 look up in alarm. �You know why they won�t work for us? Because of the 5-6! It�s too good business.� �Maybe. But you must admit, their work is essential to the economy. And, I don�t know if you are aware of this, but at least one Indian dies every month � is murdered. The business may be good, but it is dangerous.� Deuce. Diplomatic questioning and Governorial interjections reveal that this is a silent, secret community. Because of their illegal status, they cannot buy land, build a house, settle down. They live in rented houses, work every day of the week, learn as much Tagalog as is necessary for their work and cook their own food at home. The spectre of a lost turban hangs over each head at table, the long, sharp noses, broad jaws, hooded eyes recall it as a symbol of lost professions, dignity, home. Without it, they seem to have little to contribute to any social occasion. When encouraged to introduce Philippinos to tandoori chicken and bhangra, they smile shyly. Sunita Lajvani�s white salvar suit makes a statement of shyness belied almost instantly by her conversation. �I have my own business: a shop.� �Your father�s shop?� �No, no. I started it. My father was 5-6.� �Really? You started the shop alone?� �Yes. After my MBA. Now I�ll do a Doctorate in Business.� She visited her village, near Amritsar, recently, to find a boy. �Any luck?� �No! Eight months I spent there � froze my fingers and no boy!� �You didn�t like the cold?� �Not at all! I spent the whole winter indoors. Tried to warm my hands by the angithi, but they said �Your hands will get black�, so I pulled them away.� There were other problems too. �They don�t let you wear your clothes. I tried to go out in pants: they were cut a little high you know � up till here � and as I was going out my Dadi caught me. She said, �Wait one minute, I�ll just sew that slit in your pants. It�ll take no time.� What could I say? I said, �Take it Dadi, I�ll wear a skirt.� So she sewed them up, I put them away, along with all the other clothes. What can you say?� Why not look for Philippino boys then? �They�re no good. Look very sweet and all, but they�re very happy go lucky. No stability.� She eats a specially made vegetarian meal. �You don�t eat any meat? Not even seafood?� �See, I thought of it like this: if my husband asks me to eat meat, no problem. But supposing I start eating, then I get married to a vegetarian and he tells me not to, I�ll say �What the hell?� So better like this.� Half an hour later, back to the question of Philippino boys. �My parents also you know. I�ve had boys ask me and all, but my parents don�t, obviously�� I have read this conversation in books, seen it on film, heard it before even. The white salvar suit ironed by the mother for an occasion, hastily substituted for jeans, the sweet Indian girl smile, the search for a husband. Even after every cynical impulse is ruthlessly buried, it seems impossible not to know what it all conceals. If Sunita eats meat, drinks beer and has Philippino boyfriends it will surprise nobody, perhaps not even her Dadi. Just as it surprises nobody, when maybe it should, that the 5-6 ride motorbikes sitting bolt upright with their arms stretched out, wear helmets brought from home and cannot speak Tagalog in turbans. From zfa at comsats.net.pk Mon Jan 7 19:12:21 2002 From: zfa at comsats.net.pk (Zubair Faisal Abbasi) Date: Mon, 7 Jan 2002 18:42:21 +0500 Subject: [Reader-list] The Telecom 'Revolution' - All for the elite's sake? References: Message-ID: <006c01c19781$4362ac40$8c0938d2@f8o6u4> Almost similar is the case with Pakistan and I am experiencing the arrogance and torture of 'rich-man's business'. They are not even willing to think of using IT for support of 'poor-man's business'. A very controversial (in the moral sense) argument of making markets work for the poor and expanding the consumer-base is thrown on the ground. The most torturous for me is the sad demise of idealism or romanticism in our youths' outlook towards life. People might have not been, in the past, interested in the advice and practices of Gandhi and Sages, but they did not threw them in dust bin with arrogance and abhorrence. The youngsters of my age are doing it feverishly and may be unknowingly as well. The Telecom Revolution and IT Revolution for that matter is, in its present form, a persistent travel towards greed and nauseating hatred towards the poor and the weak; I fear Nietzschean spirit jostling through the apparently well-dressed and wealthy tycoon of IT business persons. The harm, I see, is the madness which took Professor Nietzsche ---- may take the social architecture of societies in its fold. 'Corrupt Sciences' ----- ! Zubair Faisal Abbasi Islamabad, Pakistan ----- Original Message ----- From: "Harsh Kapoor" To: Sent: Monday, January 07, 2002 2:27 PM Subject: [Reader-list] The Telecom 'Revolution' - All for the elite's sake? > > The Praful Bidwai Column for the week beginning Jan 7 > > The Telecom 'Revolution' > > All for the elite's sake? > > By Praful Bidwai > > It's nothing short of a "revolution", we were told when long-distance > telephone rates in India were cut by unprecedented margins last > month. First, the private cellular operators' alliance, IndiaOne, > announced it was going to reduce mobile-to-mobile national > long-distance (NLD) tariffs by 50 percent. The mobile handset, a > trade-mark of the upwardly mobile Indian, was proclaimed to have > become "downwardly mobile" as the "poor man's telephone". For a lot > of people, who were wonder-struck by the five- to ten-fold decrease > in the prices of fancy cellular handsets over the past four years, > the prediction rang true. > > Private mobile telephony, it was said, would wrench India out of the > cesspool of global telephone laggards, with an abysmally low telecom > density of four lines per hundred people. India would soon join the > league of the middle-level developing countries. > > Just days later, on December 28, the giant public sector Bharat > Sanchar Nigam Ltd (BSNL) hit back with a whopping 60 percent-plus cut > in its static telephone tariffs. A peak-time Mumbai-Delhi call will > now cost only Rs 9 per minute, in place of Rs 24. A Delhi-Chandigarh > or Hyderabad-Madras call will cost 59 percent less. This too was > ecstatically welcomed as the greatest-ever "bonanza" for telephone > subscribers. The pendulum had now swung from wireless telephony to > terra firma--the good old land-based line. > > Nevertheless, "the consumer is king", proclaimed free-market > enthusiasts, euphorically forecasting a 70 percent increase in > long-distance dialling and hence NLD revenues, and eventually India's > telephone connectivity. They predict the private sector will now be > lured to invest in a big way not just in the mobile business, but > even in basic telephony. Never mind that the "Information Technology > Revolution" has lost some of its steam. Telephony will give it a > boost; it could even provide another shortcut to rapid growth. > > The time has come to pour some wintry-cold water over the "telecom > revolution" euphoria. The tariff cuts will of course be a bonanza for > the top one-seventh of India's telecom consumers. But the cuts will > slow down, not accelerate, overall telephone development. It is not > hard to understand this apparent paradox. India's primary telephone > system, comprising 35.4 million DoT (department of > telecommunications) subscribers, relies on a system of > cross-subsidies. It costs about Rs 25,000 to install a new telephone > line, but you can buy one outright for a mere Rs 8,000 to 15,000, or > rent one by depositing Rs 1,000-3,000 in the cities (Rs 500 in remote > villages) and then paying a low monthly rent (varying from Rs 50 to a > maximum Rs 250). > > DoT doesn't make up this difference through grants from the > government--it pays handsome dividends to it--but generates it out of > its NLD profits. NLD revenues account for about half the total > revenue of Rs 25,000 crores earned by DoT subsidiaries, BSNL and MTNL > (which is confined to Mumbai and Delhi). This is socially desirable > and progressive, because it allows DoT to lay new lines in small > towns and villages, and keep local call rates low. A good 40 percent > of all DoT subscribers have "zero-calls" bills--i.e. are covered by > the free calls allowance, because they use the telephone frugally. > > At the other end of the spectrum are high-use customers such as > corporations, governments and rich individuals, totalling five > million. These form only 15 percent of all subscribers, but yield > three-fourths of DoT's revenue. Being relatively well-off or entitled > to organised sector perquisites, they can afford to make frequent > long-distance calls. It is only rational that they should subsidise > the poorer subscribers in the short run. In the long run, they > themselves benefit through increased connectivity, lower tariffs and > improved service. This is a desirable subsidy. It is this mechanism > that has allowed DoT to add 4.5 to 5 million new lines to the > national network each year. > > At our present stage of telecom development, there is simply no > substitute for a mechanism like this. Only five percent of all Indian > homes are telephonically connected. This proportion is abysmally low. > It represents an avoidable waste of social time and resources, > including energy. Telecommunications growth entails real cost-saving > through avoided physical movement. Growth of telephony is an > essential component of contemporary economic development. To enable > ordinary people to communicate via telephone lines, or through > devices (like computers) linked to them, is to empower them. This was > one rational major goal of the 1994 National Telecom Policy. > > The government has itself undermined the goal by allowing private > operators to prey upon public networks, and by lowering long-distance > tariffs. (For details, see this Column on Oct 20, 2000) It wrote off > Rs 7,000 crores in fees payable by private companies. It has unfairly > deprived DoT of Rs 3,000 crores. Making mobile phones cheaper solves > little. Mobiles rarely represent a net addition to the network. Most > of their owners are existing DoT subscribers. > > The beneficiaries of all these policies are less than 10 million > individuals--in a country of 1,000 million. Private companies have > provided just 4.2 lakh new lines (compared to DoT's 35 million). They > indulge in cherry-picking: concentrating on super-rich clients who > want value-added services, wholly ignoring the majority. Their rural > connections total an appalling 300! They evade our already lax and > scarcely-enforced service quality regulations. They are now illegally > digging up roads and pavements to lay cables. Some have announced > grandiose schemes. (The Tatas have a Rs. 3,500 crore investment plan > for four circles, and Reliance and Bharti Telecom are getting into > "broad-band" services, including "convergence"). But it is doubtful > if these will see the light of day. > > In the past, private operators had grossly overestimated the likely > rise in telecom demand and made bids for a ludicrously high Rs > 160,000 crores. They won't be able to compete with DoT's low rates, > but will nevertheless drive down its surplus from Rs 9,000 crores to > Rs 3,000 crores. Rural telecom expansion will slow down. Equity will > take a big hit. > > Equity has been one of the biggest losers from many of our recent > economic policies and social practices. The elite, comprising less > than five percent of the population, has been the biggest gainer. > This class increasingly preys upon national resources, and returns > little to the common pool. It has been the main beneficiary of the > past decade's tax breaks and reduced imposts on consumer durables > ranging from cars to air-conditioners. Its income has more than > doubled in the past five years or so (for instance, thanks to the > Fifth Pay Commission) although poverty has deepened in much of the > country. The elite has developed a positive stake in the prevalence > of low wages, child labour and economic serfdom. > > Having established its dominance at the macro level, this class is > now aggressively taking over the public or common sphere--quite > literally. All of our urban spaces are being reshaped to brazenly > favour the property-owning elite. Thousands of crores are being spent > on flyovers. Mumbai has 55 of these under construction, Delhi has 30, > and Chennai has 18. These are tilted against public transport. The > "beautification" drives launched in many cities further discriminate > against the majority and pamper the elite. As if these were not > enough, rich car-owners now monopolise whole pavements. > > Go to the average Delhi "colony", from Mayur Vihar to Punjabi Bagh, > and see for yourself how every square yard of pavement space has > become someone's private parking place. Disputes over "ownership" can > lead to murder. City centres and public squares are being demolished > to build shopping arcades and amusement parks from which the majority > is excluded. Even green public spaces are "reserved" in many cities > for those who can pay. Meanwhile, private clubs and golf courses are > being built on public land. So are posh schools and hospitals. > > Our elite has fattened itself on entrenched hierarchies and > discrimination, as well as subsidised education. But roughly 60,000 > of our brightest students go abroad each year even for non-specialist > degrees that can be easily earned in India. It is hard to find a > joint secretary to the government whose children are not studying > abroad, or planning to. This would be bad enough even if it didn't > represent a drain of resources. But it involves that too. The Reserve > Bank turns a blind eye to this. And no one asks how an officer > earning Rs 18,000 a month can finance his son/daughter's > $30,000-a-year fees in America. > > This dualism is utterly repugnant--morally, socially and politically. > It is corroding our democracy, and breeding a culture of arrogance > and apathy among the privileged, and resentment among the majority. > This is evident in our cities, with their lack of safety, growing > crime, and widespread squalor. Stress in school and at home, > aggression in the street, and insecurity in the workplace, have > become common features of our daily lives. Not even the wealthiest > are free from these. Ultimately, gaping inequalities and unaddressed > injustices will catch up with everyone unless we radically change our > policies. Or else, we may be doomed under the present Right-wing > juggernaut to go the Argentinian way--towards economic collapse and > social chaos.--end-- > > _______________________________________________ > Reader-list mailing list > Reader-list at sarai.net > http://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/reader-list > From chaiyah at hardynet.com Tue Jan 8 01:05:48 2002 From: chaiyah at hardynet.com (Emily Cragg) Date: Mon, 07 Jan 2002 11:35:48 -0800 Subject: [Reader-list] What has the US been UP TO, over the lasts fifty years? Message-ID: <001301c197b2$9d2e13a0$8a955c3f@chaiyah> With the Freedom of Information Act, information is being leaked about America's involvement in a lot of scurrulous activities. The four links below should give you some clues that you never saw before, how LOW some people will stoop, to retain power over other people. See http://communities.msn.com/WorldCitizensConcerns and look at the Pictures. See http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/ and http://www.boydgraves.com/press/071701.html and http://us.altnews.com.au/nexus/mycoplasma.html. We are only now scratching the surface of written evidence and testimonials. May God guide us to the Truth, and may our nation, the United States of America, return to the Constitutional ideals under which our nation was established, 200 years ago. Amen. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20020107/b2eb6fbe/attachment.html From announcements-request at sarai.net Tue Jan 8 11:15:17 2002 From: announcements-request at sarai.net (announcements-request at sarai.net) Date: Tue, 8 Jan 2002 06:45:17 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] Announcements digest, Vol 1 #10 - 1 msg Message-ID: <200201080545.GAA25347@zelda.intra.waag.org> Send Announcements mailing list submissions to announcements at sarai.net To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to announcements-request at sarai.net You can reach the person managing the list at announcements-admin at sarai.net When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific than "Re: Contents of Announcements digest..." Today's Topics: 1. 12.1.2002: Manufacturing Space (Mumbai Study Group) --__--__-- Message: 1 Date: Sun, 6 Jan 2002 09:16:53 -0500 To: Recipient List Suppressed:; From: Mumbai Study Group Subject: [Announcements] 12.1.2002: Manufacturing Space 12.1.2002: Manufacturing Space
Dear Friends:
In our next session, we welcome HARINI NARAYANAN, urban geographer and journalist, who will speak on "MANUFACTURING SPACE: TEXTILE POLICY and the POLITICS of INDUSTRIAL LOCATION in MUMBAI". Her current research and field-work focusses on the manner in which government policy related to land use in Mumbai is negotiated and formulated, viewed from the perspective of those who are most affected by it. Her core research site and study period is the textile mill districts of Central Bombay in the 1990s, situated in a wider historical frame that goes back to the beginnings of the cotton textile mill industry in the mid-nineteenth century. Parallel to this, she is conducting research into the housing market, the Urban Land Ceiling Act, and its effects on the urban economy.

Harini Narayanan is currently completing her Ph.D. in Urban Geography from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, U.S.A. She is an Associate with PUKAR (Partners for Urban Knowledge Action and Research), Mumbai. She completed her B.A. in English from Women's Christian College, Madras, and her M.S. in Journalism, from the University of Illinois, U.S.A. She worked for ten years as a journalist at the Times of India, Mumbai, The Bombay Magazine, and the Economic Times. She has presented papers at conferences in the U.S. and in India on the legal and policy aspects of the industrial and spatial restructuring of Mumbai. 

This session will be on SATURDAY 12 JANUARY 2002, at 10.00 A.M., on the SECOND FLOOR, Rachna Sansad, 278, Shankar Ghanekar Marg, Prabhadevi, Mumbai, next to Ravindra Natya Mandir. Phone: 4301024, 4310807, 4229969; Station: Elphinstone Road (Western Railway); BEST Bus: 35, 88, 151, 161, 162, 171, 355, 357, 363, to Ravindra Natya Mandir, 91 Ltd, 305 Ltd, A1 and A4 to Prabhadevi.


MUMBAI STUDY GROUP SESSIONS

26 JANUARY 2002
"Food Security in Mumbai and Thane: A Study of the Rationing Kruti Samiti"
by Mayank Bhatt, Journalist and Research Associate, Institute of Development Studies, University of Sussex, Brighton, U.K.

9 FEBRUARY 2002
"Party Politics in Mumbai: A Panel Discussion on the Eve of the Civic Elections"
Participants to be Announced

23 FEBRUARY 2002
"Mumbai Modern"
by Dr Carol Breckenridge, University of Chicago Dept of History, Chicago, U.S.A.

9 MARCH 2002
Film Screening of "Jari-Mari: Of Cloth and Other Stories"
Discussion with Surabhi Sharma, Producer and Director

23 MARCH 2002
"Girangaon: The Past, Present and Future of Mumbai's Textile Mills and Mill Workers"
Participants to be Announced

13 APRIL 2002
"Gender and Space in Mumbai"
by Shilpa Phadke, Visiting Lecturer in Sociology, Nirmala Niketan School of Social Work, Mumbai
and Neera Adarkar, Architect, Adarkar Associates, Mumbai

ABOUT the MUMBAI STUDY GROUP

The MUMBAI STUDY GROUP meets on the second and fourth Saturdays of every month, at the Rachana Sansad, Prabhadevi, Mumbai, at 10.00 A.M. Our conversations continue through the support extended by Shri Pradip Amberkar, Principal of the Academy of Architecture, and Prof S.H. Wandrekar, Trustee of the Rachana Sansad.

Conceived as an inclusive and non-partisan forum to foster dialogue on urban issues, we have since September 2000 held conversations about various historical, political, cultural, social and spatial aspects of the Mumbai Metropolitan Region. Our discussions are open and public, no previous membership or affiliation is required. We encourage the participation of urban researchers and practitioners, experts and non-experts, researchers and students, and all individuals, groups and associations in Mumbai to join our conversations about the the city.The format we have evolved is to host individual presentations or panel discussions in various fields of urban theory and practice, and have a moderated and focussed discussion from our many practical and professional perspectives: whether as architects or planners, lawyers or journalists, artists or film-makers, academics or activists.Through such a forum, we hope to foster an open community of urban citizens, which clearly situates Mumbai in the theories and practices of urbanism globally.

Previous sessions have hosted presentations by the following individuals:

Kalpana Sharma, Associate Editor of The Hindu; Kedar Ghorpade, Senior Planner at the Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority; Dr Marina Pinto, Professor of Public Administration, retired from Mumbai University; Dr K. Sita, Professor of Geography, retired from Mumbai University, and former Garware Chair Professor at the Tata Institute of Social Sciences; Dr Arjun Appadurai, Professor of Anthropology at the University of Chicago, Director of Partners for Urban Knowledge Action & Research (PUKAR), Mumbai; Rahul Srivastava, Lecturer in Sociology at Wilson College; Sandeep Yeole, General Secretary of the All-India Pheriwala Vikas Mahasangh; Dr Anjali Monteiro, Professor and Head, and  K.P. Jayashankar, Reader, from the Tata Institute of Social Sciences Unit for Media and Communications; Dr Sujata Patel, Professor and Head, Department of Sociology, University of Pune; Dr Mariam Dossal, Head, Department of History, Mumbai University; Sucheta Dalal, business journalist and Consulting Editor, Financial Express; Dr Arvind Rajagopal, Associate Professor of  Culture and Communications at New York University; Dr Gyan Prakash, Professor of History at Princeton University, and member of the Subaltern Studies Editorial Collective; Dr Sudha Deshpande, Reader in Demography, retired from the Department of Economics, Mumbai University and former consultant for the World Bank, International Labour Organisation, and Bombay Municipal Corporation; Sulakshana Mahajan, doctoral candidate at the Taubman College of Architecture and Urban Planning, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, U.S.A., and former Lecturer, Academy of Architecture, Rachana Sansad; Dr Rohini Hensman, of the Union Research Group, Mumbai; Mrs Jyoti Mhapsekar, Head Librarian, Rachana Sansad and Member, Stree Mukti Sanghatana.

Previous panel discussions have comprised of the following individuals:

S.S. Tinaikar, former Municipal Commissioner of Bombay, Sheela Patel, Director of the Society for Promotion of Area Resource Centres (SPARC), and Bhanu Desai of the Citizens' Forum for the Protection of Public Spaces (Citispace) on urban policy making and housing; Shirish Patel, civil engineer and urban planner, Pramod Sahasrabuddhe and Abhay Godbole, structural engineers on earthquakes and the built form of the city; B. Rajaram, Managing Director of Konkan Railway Corporation, and Dr P.G. Patankar, from Tata Consultancy Services, and former Chairman of the Bombay Electric Supply & Transport Undertaking (BEST) on mass public transport alternatives; Ved Segan, Vikas Dilawari, and Pankaj Joshi, conservation architects, on the social relevance of heritage and conservation architecture; Debi Goenka, of the Bombay Environmental Action Group, Professor Sudha Srivastava, Dr Geeta Kewalramani, and Dr Dipti Mukherji, of the University of Mumbai Department of Geography, on the politics of land use, the city's salt pan lands, and the Coastal Regulation Zone (CRZ) Act; Nikhil Rao, of the University of Chicago Dept of History, Anirudh Paul and Prasad Shetty of  the Kamala Raheja Vidyanidhi Insitute of Architecture, and members of the various residents associations and citizens groups of the Dadar-Matunga, on the history, architecture, and formation of middle-class communities in these historic neighbourhoods, the first suburbs of Bombay.


CONTACT US
We invite all urban researchers, practitioners, students, and other interested individuals to join us in our fortnightly conversations, and suggest topics for presentation and discussion. For any more information, kindly contact one of the Joint Convenors of the Mumbai Study Group: ARVIND ADARKAR, Architect, Researcher and Lecturer, Academy of Architecture, Phone 2051834, <adarkars at vsnl.com>; DARRYL D'MONTE, Journalist and Writer, 6427088 <darryl at vsnl.com>; SHEKHAR KRISHNAN, Coordinator-Associate, Partners for Urban Knowledge Action & Research (PUKAR), 4142843, <kshekhar at bol.net.in>; PANKAJ JOSHI, Conservation Architect, Lecturer, Academy of Architecture, and PUKAR Associate, 8230625, <pjarch at vsnl.com>.
--__--__-- _______________________________________________ Announcements mailing list Announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements End of Announcements Digest From abirbazaz at rediffmail.com Tue Jan 8 21:40:50 2002 From: abirbazaz at rediffmail.com (abir bazaz) Date: 8 Jan 2002 16:10:50 -0000 Subject: [Reader-list] Tariq Ali on the India, Pakistan and China Message-ID: <20020108161050.22638.qmail@mailweb34.rediffmail.com> Do We Have to Wait for a War to Bring These Politicians to Their Senses? Tariq Ali The Independent January 4, 2002 'On one level, it would suit both sides to have a small war. But who could guarantee a small war?' Despite pleas of the new pro-Western regime, Afghanistan is still being bombed. Innocent people die every day. Osama bin Laden is still at large, but attention has already shifted to Pakistan. The destabilising effects of the war in Afghanistan were always likely to be felt here first. The reasons are obvious. The Pashtun population in Pakistan's North-Western Frontier Province shares linguistic and ethnic ties with the region that formed the principal base of the Taliban in Afghanistan. The same brand of Deobandi Islam is strong on both sides of the border. It is worth stressing that there was less actual fighting on the ground in the last three months than there has been over the last quarter century. The bearded ones chose not to fight. A sizeable section of the Taliban forces simply came back home to Pakistan. Some of them are undoubtedly demoralised and happy to be alive, but there is probably a large minority that is angered by Islamabad's betrayal and is eager to link up with the armed fundamentalist groups already in the country. The leaders of the most virulent jihadi sects have been arrested, but who will disarm their militants? Until late last year some of the Islamist leaders were boasting that they had chosen 20 cities on which Islamic laws would be imposed. The unstated threat was clear. If any authority attempted to interfere, they would unleash a civil war. When the latest Afghan war began, Washington made no secret of its fear that a massive Western intervention in Afghanistan that overtly used Pakistan as a launching-pad might trigger major unrest or even a coup against a collaborationist regime. The US did everything to maintain decorous appearances for General Musharraf, Pakistan's ruler, while making sure of the practical compliance of Islamabad. In return nry began to flow into Pakistan once again. But now that the Taliban have been defeated, can anyone be sure that the various fig-leaves will really insulate Pakistan from the indignation of the faithful? Everything depends on the unity of the officer corps. To some degree, if one difficult to gauge, Sunni fundamentalism has also penetrated the ranks of the armed forces. Across the country, radical Islamism of one kind or another is a vocal, if minority, force. General Musharraf's military regime itself is, moreover, a very recent and none-too-strong creation, with little positive civilian support. The abandonment of its own creation in Afghanistan will be a bitter pill for many in the army, especially at junior levels of command, where religious influence is strongest. However, even more secular-minded officers are not pleased at the outcome. The Taliban takeover in Kabul was the Pakistan army's only victory. Privately the ruling elite - officers, bureaucrats and politicians - congratulated each other for having gained a new province. It almost made up for the 1971 defection of Bangladesh. As if to rub salt into the wounds, the Northern Alliance and its Washington-selected Prime Minister, Hamid Karzai, have just declared their intention of forging close relations with India, as was the case from 1947-89. This has further weakened the position of the general ruling Pakistan. It is true that, at more senior levels, the American crusade against the Taliban has been seen as a godsend. For at a stroke it has allowed the Pakistani generals to recover their traditional regional priority for Washington, assured them of credits they desperately need and lifted opposition to their nuclear arsenal. Unlike its Arab counterparts, the Pakistani army has never seen a coup mounted by captains, majors or colonels - when it has seized power, as so often, it has always done so without splits, at the initiative and under the control of its generals (a tradition of discipline inherited from the Raj). At all events, short long-established pattern, it seems unlikely that the top-brass of the Pakistani regime will suffer much from the pieces of silver with which they have been showered. However, the scale of the Pakistani defeat is such that, once the flow of money and weapons ceases, General Musharraf might well be toppled from within. Power-hungry generals have never been a rare commodity in Pakistan. This is what makes the tension with India potentially dangerous. The irony is that Pakistan is led by a secular general and India by a fundamentalist Hindu politician: an ideal combination to make peace. Yet on one level it would suit both sides to have a small war. General Musharraf could prove that he was not a total pawn. And Atal Bihari Vajpayee, India's Prime Minster, could win an election. The Kashmiris would continue to suffer. But who could guarantee a small war? The fact is that Pakistan's infiltration of jihadi groups, such as the Lashkar-e-Tayyiba and the Jaish-e-Mohammed, into Indian-occupied Kashmir has created an alternative military apparatus that Islamabad funds and supplies but can't fully control - just like the Taliban. It's obvious that the attack on the Indian Parliament was carried out by one of these groups to provoke a more serious conflict. Some of the jihadis don't much care for Pakistan as an entity. Their aim is to restore Muslim rule in India. Crazy? Yes, but armed and capable of wreaking havoc in both countries. If General Musharraf won't deal with the menace, Mr Vajpayee will. If Washington can wage its "war on terrorism", why can't Delhi? Just because it can't get retrospective sanction from the UN? But as any Second World politician will tell you, for UN read US. The threat of an Indo-Pak war has concentrated minds in Washington: how to give the Indians their pound of flesh without destabilising Pakistan? Perhaps the time is coming when General Musharraf can be sacrificed in the name of a return to democracy in Pakistan. The problem is that no civilian politician in Pakistan is strong enough has ruled the country longer than any political party. The real solution lies in Kashmir, the cause of a dispute that could lead to nuclear conflict. Kashmiris have suffered long enough. The brutality of the Indian occupation made many of them turn to Pakistan, but the behaviour of the jihadi infiltrators has shocked most Kashmiris. The very thought of Talibanisation has led many educated professionals, male and female, to flee. They would like to be rid of both sides. An autonomous Kashmir, which shares sovereignty with both India and Pakistan, and even China, could become a haven of peace in the region. Sooner or later the situation will require some such solution, but do we have to wait for a war to bring politicians to their senses? From aiindex at mnet.fr Tue Jan 8 22:17:36 2002 From: aiindex at mnet.fr (Harsh Kapoor) Date: Tue, 8 Jan 2002 17:47:36 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] The Activists Guide to the Internet Message-ID: Fiona Osler & Paul Hollis (2001), 'The Activists Guide to the Internet'. London, New York, Toronto, Sydney, Tokyo, Singapore, Madrid, Mexico City, Munich, Paris: Prentice Hall (An Imprint of Pearson Education) £9.99 www.informit.uk.com Foreward by Hilary Wainwright, Editor of Red Pepper Contents Part One: Spiders in the web: Online Activism 1. Reclaiming Technology 2. Red, Green and Radical Politics 3. Towards a Global Labour Net 4. Non-profits and Charities 5. Activism 6. The Developing World and the Internet 7. Hacking, Censorship and Liberty Online 8. Women Online 9. Alternative Media Part Two: Building Your Web: How to Get Online and Use the Internet 10. Using Email for Activism 11. How to Create a Website From boud_roukema at camk.edu.pl Wed Jan 9 04:37:00 2002 From: boud_roukema at camk.edu.pl (Boud) Date: Wed, 9 Jan 2002 00:07:00 +0100 (CET) Subject: [Reader-list] UK video activists Delhi 25 Jan Message-ID: http://india.indymedia.org/front.php3?article_id=521 > Video activists to visit India > by undercurrents 10:46am Tue Jan 8 '02 > phone: 44 1865 203661 paulo at joymail.com > > Video activists from Britain want to meet Media activists in Dehli > > Undercurrents is an organisation of Video activists in Britain. Two of > our crew will be in Dehli on January 25 and would like to meet similar > groups. Drop us an email and we can link up > > all best > Paul and Martin > > http://www.undercurrents.org Please contact them directly if interested. I'm just cross-posting! From shohini at giasdl01.vsnl.net.in Wed Jan 9 08:44:27 2002 From: shohini at giasdl01.vsnl.net.in (shohini) Date: Wed, 9 Jan 2002 08:44:27 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] UCLA Professor Fights Islamic `Puritans' Message-ID: <000701c198bf$79cae4c0$ec74c8cb@shohini> Los Angeles Times January 2, 2002 COLUMN ONE Battling Islamic 'Puritans' [UCLA professor, once a fanatic himself, is now a leading scholarly voice against intolerance among Muslims. Death threats don't deter him] By TERESA WATANABE, TIMES RELIGION WRITER The most incendiary Muslim in American academia knows a thing or two about Islamic fanatics. He says he used to be one as a seventh-grader in his native Kuwait. UCLA law professor Khaled Abou El Fadl remembers beating up other kids, condemning his parents as unbelievers and destroying his sister's Rod Stewart tape, "Da Ya Think I'm Sexy?" "I found it remarkably empowering to spew my hatred with the banner of God in my hand," he says. But challenged by his father to take up true religious scholarship, Abou El Fadl began a journey of Islamic learning that would transform him into a nemesis of the extremists he once endorsed. Today, at 38, he is a leading warrior in the intellectual struggle that exploded into America's consciousness Sept. 11: Who speaks for Islam? Who defines it? With breathtaking bluntness, Abou El Fadl attacks Muslims who promote a strict, literalist trend in Islam, most prominently the creed of Wahhabism in Saudi Arabia. In his writings and through the electronic media, he accuses them of an "intolerant puritanism" that values ritual over morality. He blames them for oppressing millions of women, creating hostility toward non-Muslims and giving the likes of Osama bin Laden their theological justification for terrorism. He issues scathing critiques of Saudi legal rulings that permit everything from the mistreatment of dogs to the beating of women. For tackling the puritans in high-profile forums, Abou El Fadl has received so many death threats that new security systems are going up around his office and home. His books are banned in Saudi Arabia and his visa applications denied in Egypt. Before Sept. 11, his daily battles would have been dismissed by outsiders as esoteric doctrinal debates. Today they are better understood as critical insights into the fierce ideological tensions raging within Islam between the forces of puritanism and moderation. They shed light on how Islam can produce such chilling extremists as Bin Laden, who exults in the carnage of Sept. 11 as "blessed strikes." By devoting himself to a modern interpretation of the Koran, Abou El Fadl is perhaps the most articulate enemy of the Wahhabi creed that shaped Bin Laden's brand of Islam. "The supremacist creed of the puritan groups is distinctive and uniquely dangerous," the scholar recently wrote in the influential Boston Review. "They do not merely seek self-empowerment, but aggressively seek to disempower, dominate or destroy others." To many muftis, ayatollahs, sheiks and their followers throughout the world, Abou El Fadl has become "America's most dangerous corrupter of Islam," as one foe put it. One international network of students claims credit for successfully working to blacklist him from most Islamic conferences and publications under the banner of protecting "the one and only true Islam." Wahhabism's founder, 18th century evangelist Muhammad ibn 'Abd al-Wahhab, was alarmed by what he viewed as corruptions to the faith. He advocated a strict, back-to-basics approach to keep Islam as pure as the day it was revealed to the Prophet Muhammad and practiced by his early companions nearly 1,400 years ago. Wahhabism had long been a marginal force in Islam. Abou El Fadl asserts that it has risen in prominence in the last three decades because of the collapse of Islamic institutions after colonialism, creating a vacuum of authority that puritans, backed by Saudi petrodollars, rushed to fill. Today's puritans advocate strict gender roles and perpetual guarding against what they view as heretical innovations--be they new interpretations of the faith by scholars such as Abou El Fadl or other expressions of Islam, such as mystical Sufism or the Shiite branch of the faith. Many followers of Wahhab describe their approach benevolently, merely as "monotheism without the frills," as one member of the Saudi-financed King Fahd Mosque in Culver City put it. Abou El Fadl, however, says extremists have used Wahhabism to justify sometimes violent intolerance--massacres of Sufis and Shiite, for instance--or hostility to non-Muslim "infidels" that has bred terrorist acts. Many Muslims see an even more pervasive impact of puritanism--robbing Islam of its richness and flexibility. Howard University professor Sulayman Nyang calls it "the mummification, ossification and fossilization of Islam." "Most of these groups we call fundamentalists have a rigid idea that everything is sealed in concrete and there is no elasticity in reinterpretation," says Nyang, an African-born professor of African and Islamic studies. "We need to inject life back into Islam and open it up in light of new realities." In that pursuit, Nyang says, Abou El Fadl "is blazing a new trail." Other Muslim intellectuals trying to reclaim their faith's rich legacy of tolerance and compassion have also suffered for it. Abdulaziz Sachedina at the University of Virginia says his liberal views on women and pluralism provoked a 1998 fatwa, or religious edict, from an Iraqi ayatollah that resulted in some Islamic centers in the United States banning his appearances. Ebrahim Moosa, an associate professor of Islamic studies at Duke University, says his South African home was bombed by puritans in 1998 because of his activism promoting religious, racial and gender equality. But it is Abou El Fadl who appears to pose the greatest threat to the puritanical view of Islam because he promotes his competing vision with an erudition and persuasive prose that even his foes grudgingly acknowledge. Fajrul Din, a student in Saudi Arabia who belongs to the international student group that opposes Abou El Fadl, ticks off the scholar's sins: defending infidels against Muslims in court; befriending Shiite, Jews and Bahais; embracing music; owning devilish black dogs; and sheltering wives fleeing from the "discipline" of husbands. What makes Abou El Fadl such a master of pandering to Western liberal sensitivities, Din wrote in an e-mail, is that "with each of these heretical views, he weaves sweet words like a serpent, and misleads the naive and simple. His sin is greater than any other. He studied and saw the light, but chose to turn away from it. We will not dirty our hands by touching him, but let him perish like a dog among the heathens he loves so much." Dogs and Books as Symbols of His Effort The man at the center of this ideological furor is physically unimposing, with a short, stocky frame, light brown eyes and olive skin. His home is dominated by two elements that symbolize much about Islam's ideological tensions today: dogs and books. Abou El Fadl loves to use dogs to illustrate what he regards as the puritans' willful ignorance of Islamic tradition and an oppressive emphasis on law over morality. In much of the Muslim world, dogs are decidedly not man's best friend. Abou El Fadl says he was taught that they were impure and that black dogs in particular were evil. Religious traditions hold that if a dog--or woman--passes in front of you as you prepare to pray, it pollutes your purity and negates your prayer. Dogs are permissible as watchdogs or for other utilitarian purposes, but not simply for companionship. Abou El Fadl says this zealous adherence to doctrine led one religious authority to advise a Muslim that his pet dog was evil and should be driven away by cutting off its food and water. Many Muslims say this caution toward dogs is fundamentally a matter of hygiene. Many devout Muslims follow such rules without question, for submission to God is Islam's highest call whether the reasons for divine law are apparent or not, according to Sheik Tajuddin B. Shuaib of the King Fahd Mosque. But Abou El Fadl prides himself on questioning just about everything. He could not fathom a God who would condemn such loving, loyal creatures. So about five years ago he set out to investigate. After a lengthy process of textual research and prayer for divine guidance, he concluded that reports against dogs were passed on through questionable chains of transmissions, or contradicted by more favorable reports--for instance, one story of Muhammad praying with his dogs playing nearby. Some reports against dogs bear uncanny similarities to Arab folklore, Abou El Fadl says, leading him to suspect that someone took the tales and attributed them to the prophet. As Abou El Fadl speaks, Honey snoozes near his side. The yellow cocker spaniel mix was abandoned by its owners and was cowering in the corner of an animal shelter, dirty and racked by seizures, when the scholar and his wife rescued him. They also rescued Baby, a black shepherd a day away from being killed, and Calbee, an abused dog who smelled of garbage for a year and still feels secure only when curled up inside a plastic laundry basket. "Dogs represent my rebellion against ignorance about the basis of actual historical law," Abou El Fadl says. "They are a symbol of the irrationality of our tradition, the privileging of law over humaneness." How, he asks, pointing to Honey, who constantly follows him and nestles at his side, does God "create animals with these natural tendencies and then condemn them as thoroughly reprehensible?" A Male Feminist Who Cites Tradition In the same audacious manner, he is a leading Muslim feminist, challenging puritanical positions that women must be fully veiled and obey their husbands without question or submit to beatings for disobedience. He even urges his wife, Grace, to lead him in prayer, challenging prevailing Muslim practice of all-male religious leadership. Most troubling to his ideological enemies, Abou El Fadl cannot be written off as a Westernized "Uncle Tom," a term puritans use to dismiss American Muslims with similar open views. His work is painstakingly grounded in classical Islamic sources, they acknowledge, giving him the ability to defend his modern interpretations with a dizzying command of ancient traditions. For example, in a book published this year challenging Saudi legal rulings on women--barring them from freely wearing bras or high heels, for instance--Abou El Fadl read 350 sources, some of them ancient Islamic texts that are virtually impenetrable to the untrained Muslim. His book, "Speaking in God's Name," has outraged puritans, prompting Din's international student group to declare that it will organize demonstrations against the work in London and elsewhere. But to fans such as Asma Gull Hasan, author of "American Muslims: The New Generation," Abou El Fadl gives feminists like her the courage and intellectual firepower to resist what she calls the growing influence of puritans in mosques and on college campuses. "They are making Islam a religion of shame, guilt and oppression," says Hasan, 25, bemoaning puritan exhortations to avoid non-Muslims, MTV and, for women, uncovered heads. "Without someone of Khaled's caliber to speak out against them, many more Muslims would feel we have to accept their positions, and we might turn away from the religion." Abou El Fadl has also worked with international human rights groups, blowing the whistle on such practices as the widespread rape of Southeast Asian maids in Muslim countries throughout the Persian Gulf. He has helped document abuses in Sudan, Iraq, Kuwait, Syria, Israel, Algeria, Turkey, Egypt and Saudi Arabia. As a result, he says, he can no longer travel to Egypt, even as his relatives are aging and asking to see him to say a last goodbye. As a lawyer in the United States, he has taken on highly sensitive cases, such as a suit against an American Muslim leader's son for leaving a woman pregnant and in debt in apparent violation of an oral marriage contract. And he frequently serves as an expert witness to help victims of religious persecution obtain political asylum here. On a recent afternoon, he took the witness stand in the Los Angeles courtroom of federal immigration-law Judge Richard D. Walton. Wagih Wadie, an Egyptian bank teller and member of the Coptic Christian church, was seeking political asylum, telling the judge he was tortured by Egyptian security police on trumped-up charges of defaming Islam and causing fitna, or national disunity, last year. His only crime, Wadie asserted, was offending an influential Muslim by refusing to cash his check. When Abou El Fadl took the stand, he testified about the Egyptian government's record of torture and the plausibility of the petitioner's fears of persecution. Walton granted asylum. "I don't know any other Muslim who sticks his neck out like he does," says Wadie's attorney, Roni Deutsch. He says Abou El Fadl's testimony is so authoritative that it nearly always clinches court victories, yet comes either free or at just a fraction of the $500 hourly going rate. "I don't know anybody who does what he does in any religion. He doesn't have an agenda. He does this because he believes it is right." Abou El Fadl says he does this, in part, because he has been on the other side. He says he was persecuted by security forces in the Mideast in the 1980s after writing pro-democracy articles and poems. (He asks that the name of the country not be printed for fear of retribution against relatives.) Advised to flee, he stood in line at the U.S. Embassy praying for a student visa. "I made a promise to God that if you allow me to be where I can speak without fear, I will never shut up," he says. "Now it's been 20 years, and I've kept my bargain." A Cocky Boy Learns to Overcome Arrogance Abou El Fadl is physically frail, popping 36 pills a day for maladies ranging from osteoporosis to asthma. He speaks in a soft voice and sometimes avoids direct eye contact. He can boyishly haul his family to video arcades to shoot down zombies in "House of the Dead." He is the quintessential absent-minded professor who doesn't drive, can't remember his address, took two years to learn his phone number and once wore his son's pint-sized tie to class, vaguely wondering why students kept grinning. All this belies an extravagant overachiever. He memorized the Koran at age 12, but says his real learning began after his rebellion against his parents as a seventh-grader. His father, a lawyer from a family with a long tradition of Islamic learning, challenged his cocky son to test his expertise in a religion class at a local mosque. The class was on shariah, Islamic law, taught Socratic-style, and Abou El Fadl says the other students--both girls and boys--demolished him. Crushed, he ran home, dived under his bed and cried. "Is the solution for you to cry? Or learn?" his father admonished him. "If anyone can learn it is you. Your only stupidity is your arrogance." For the next decade, Abou El Fadl spent four hours each day after school, all weekend and every summer in Egypt learning the Islamic classics at the feet of such celebrated sheiks as Muhammad Al-Ghazali, a world-renowned proponent of moderate Islamic revivalism. He spoke broken English when he arrived at Yale in 1982. Four years later, he graduated magna cum laude and won the prestigious Scholar of the House award for exceptionally gifted students. Next was a law degree in 1989 from the University of Pennsylvania and a first-place award in the national Jessup Moot Court Competition. He clerked for the Arizona Supreme Court and worked in commercial and immigration law. He became a naturalized American citizen. In 1998, he completed his doctorate in Islamic law at Princeton, where he earned a perfect grade point average, nabbed a prestigious writing award and won Best Dissertation for a paper on "Rebellion and Violence in Islamic Law." Abou El Fadl was teaching at the University of Texas in Austin when Irene Bierman of UCLA's Center for Near Eastern Studies went to scout him out in 1998 for a new chair in Islamic law. Bierman says his chief attraction was his rare combination of a doctorate and a law degree, Western and Islamic training, legal experience and prolific academic scholarship. To Muslim philanthropists Omar and Esmeralda Alfi, who have pledged a $1-million endowment to finance the chair, Abou El Fadl presented the perfect candidate. "People say there is a conflict between modernity and tradition, but Khaled is able to get the most liberal thoughts from a very old tradition because of his deep knowledge and the awesome amount of reading he does," Esmeralda Alfi says. Library Illustrates Vast Traditions Abou El Fadl's most important weapon is books. They line the walls of his home, fill an entire room on the second floor and spill out into another detached room outside. His annual book budget is more than $60,000. His entire collection surpasses 40,000 volumes on law, theology, sociology, philosophy, history, literature. His mother, Afaf El Nimr, says her eldest son was drawn to the written word from the time he was 3, every day spreading out the newspaper and studying it in deep concentration. By the time he was 9, he had begun reading his father's tomes on Winston Churchill, Franklin Roosevelt and Indian nationalist leader Jawaharlal Nehru. Young Khaled would sell off his underwear to raise money for more books, according to his mother. The 10,000 volumes in his Islamic law library illustrate the vastness of the faith's traditions--and some of its problems. The collection, some of its items eight centuries old, includes writings from every school of thought in the majority Sunni and minority Shiite traditions, some extinct. They run the gamut from works by Muslims whom Abou El Fadl reveres, such as the 11th century Baghdad jurist Ibn 'Aqil, to those by writers he abhors, such as Omar Abdel Rahman, the blind sheik serving a life sentence in connection with the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. "Imagine how many intellects are deposited in here," he says, "how many glimpses of perception." He agonizes over a rising tide of censorship. He blames it directly on the 1970s rise in oil prices that gave Saudi Arabia the financial resources to control the Islamic book market and propagate the nation's puritan creed. During a recent trip to an Arabic bookstore in Anaheim, he pointed out numerous books banned in the Mideast, including such classics as "1001 Nights" and other books on theories of human rights, homosexuality and Islam, and a treatise on Sufism. Abou El Fadl's own books--he published four in just the last year--are banned in Saudi Arabia, although Din of the opposition student group says bootleg translations are making the rounds in Medina and scandalizing devout Muslims there. Recently, Abou El Fadl says, puritan Muslims have even begun cleansing the sacred texts of passages they deem offensive. He exposes the practice in an essay, "Corrupting God's Book," citing as one example a popular English translation of the Koran, widely distributed in the United States, that he says skews the Arabic text to claim women must cover their entire body except for one or both eyes. "The agony of the Muslim plight in the modern world cannot be expressed either in words or tears," Abou El Fadl writes in the piece, published this year in a collection of critical essays titled "Conference of the Books." "What can one say about those people who, in their utter ignorance and maniacal arrogance, subjugate even the word of God to ugliness and deformities?" Some Muslims are offended by such searing self-criticism, believing that it only aids enemies of Islam. Others, such as University of Michigan Islamic studies professor S. Abdal-Hakim Jackson, say Abou El Fadl's boldness is needed, but they worry that it alienates the very audience the scholar is trying to reform. Still others embrace the candor as a sign of the Muslim community's maturity. "You have to be confident in your place in society to begin airing your dirty laundry," says Rick St. John, a Muslim convert and Los Angeles attorney who believes that Abou El Fadl is "trying to improve the religion and return it to something better and beautiful." On his good days, such comments encourage Abou El Fadl to believe that he is making a difference. On his bad days, when he encounters death threats, back-stabbing, censorship or indifference from his fellow Muslims, he is plaintive in his pain. "I am so lonely," he blurted out one night. "God gave me this affliction of law. I learned all of it, and there is nothing I can do with it, and if I don't preserve it, it will die." He needs to pray. It is 1:25 a.m. In the darkened silence, for more than an hour, he offers supplication to his creator, moving his lips in silent worship. Then he rises. He kisses the Koran, touches it to his forehead and lets out a soft whisper. "And everything looks beautiful again." (BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC) ISLAMIC TERMS Sunni Muslim: A follower of the main branch of Islam, which accepts the legitimacy of the four "rightly guided" caliphs who were the companions and immediate successors of the Prophet Muhammad: Abu Bakr, Umar ibn al-Khattab, Uthman ibn Affan and Ali ibn Abi Talib. Shiite Muslim: Historically, a follower of those who called for the rulership of Ali ibn Abi Talib, the prophet's cousin, after the prophet's death. Today, the Shiites constitutes the second-largest branch of Islam after the Sunnis. Sufi Muslim: Those who seek to achieve higher degrees of spiritual excellence or pursue Islamic mysticism. Wahhabi: A follower of the strict teachings of Ibn Abd al-Wahhab. Adherents, who object to the terms Wahhabism and Wahhabi, say they observe the "one true Islam." They are hostile to the intercession of saints, visiting tombs of saints, Sufism, Shiite Muslims and rational methods of deducing law. The creed dominates in Saudi Arabia. * -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20020109/b361ea2a/attachment.html From rehanhasanansari at yahoo.com Thu Jan 10 23:13:27 2002 From: rehanhasanansari at yahoo.com (rehan ansari) Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2002 09:43:27 -0800 (PST) Subject: [Reader-list] Heartbreak as Craft Message-ID: <20020110174327.31141.qmail@web12905.mail.yahoo.com> SHAHID, Harsha and myself were there with a beautiful Karachi boy that Harsha was enamoured with. It was a boys� night out during Desh Pardesh in Toronto, a week long festival that celebrated achievement in the arts and in Left political activism among South Asians living in the west. Desh was what had brought us together. We were spending the evening, guests of Harsha, on the balcony of a luscious bed and breakfast in a wonderful tree lined neighbourhood in the Annex in Toronto. In the �90s Desh was the annual festival where I first saw writers like Michael Ondaatje, Rohinton Mistry, Shyam Selvadurai, Amitav Ghosh and Agha Shahid Ali up close. Shahid was up close and personal unlike any of the stars that had ever come through Desh. He was the only star writer I remember from years of attending Desh, who came from out of town and, besides giving a reading, was interested in meeting aspiring poets in a separate session. I attended that session and was struck by the passion that Shahid brought to the classroom (he used to teach creative writing at University of Massachusetts at Amherst). He argued for rhyme and metre in English poetry, as opposed to blank verse, giving examples from advertising jingles and a Duran Duran song. The most preposterous thing I heard that morning was his argument for writing ghazals in English. At his reading on Desh opening nite I heard a brilliant adaptation he did of Faiz�s poem Mujh Si Pehli Si Mohabbat Mere Mehboob Na Mang. In his English poem Shahid�s rhyme schemes sparkled, putting his poem far ahead of any mere translation or creative translation of Faiz I had ever heard or read. But that morning of the seminar Shahid�s encouragement to write ghazals in English seemed an outlandish assertion. This was a year before Shahid�s book, The Country Without a Post Office came out. At that Desh in �96 the brown satchel he was carrying had the proofs of the book. His book bag carried shaeri like this: Where are you now? Who lies beneath your spell tonight before you agonise him in farewell tonight? Pale hands that once loved me beside the Shalimar: Whom else from rapture�s road will you expel tonight? Those Fabrics of Cashmere � �to make Me beautiful �� �Trinket� � to gem � �Me to adorn � How � tell�� tonight? Over time, in encounters with Shahid, mostly through his poetry, I have realised the truth to his audaciousness. I wish that a Shahid was in the English department of all campuses in the world that have an English Department. It should be a human right, at least for young desis. He would also say anything anytime. On the taxi-ride with all of us headed over to the b&b in the Annex when he found out Harsha taught at Berkeley, he asked after Bharati Mukherjee who is in the English Department there. Without waiting for an answer from Harsha, skipping no beats, he added: the writer without a brain. When we were sitting in the balcony at the height of the tree trunks, Harsha had lit candles, recited by heart a poem in Russian by Joseph Brodsky, his Karachi friend was looking marvellous and Harsha asked Shahid about Kashmir and what would become of it. Shahid said he hoped India and Pakistan would leave it alone. That it become a Switzerland in the future. That was my first introduction from Shahid to the vexed issue of Kashmir. I have never been to Kashmir and only know Kashmir from the rhetoric of Islamabad. Islamabad, whether it�s the politicians, the bureaucrats or the army I know is not interested in the self determination of anybody. Not East Pakistan, not Baluchistan, not Sind, not Karachi. When has anyone in Islamabad shown heartfelt concern about anybody�s rights, human or otherwise? So to somebody with such a closed heart to a closed rhetorical question Shahid�s poems should have been a challenge. Here is a part of a poem in which a dead young Kashmiri speaks to the poet: �Don�t tell my father I have died,� he says, and I follow him through blood on the road and hundreds of pairs of shoes the mourners left behind, as they ran from the funeral, victims of the firing. From windows we hear grieving mothers, and snow begins to fall on us, like ash. Black on edges of flames, it cannot extinguish the neighbourhoods, the homes set ablaze by midnight soldiers. Kashmir is burning: By that dazzling light we see men removing statues from temples. We beg them, �Who will protect us if you leave?� They don�t answer, they just disappear on the road to the plains, clutching the gods. --------------------------------- Do You Yahoo!? Send FREE video emails in Yahoo! Mail. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20020110/951e719c/attachment.html From aiindex at mnet.fr Fri Jan 11 09:14:50 2002 From: aiindex at mnet.fr (Harsh Kapoor) Date: Fri, 11 Jan 2002 04:44:50 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] Pakistan bans Internet in border areas Message-ID: The Nation (Pakistan) 11 January 2002 Internet in border areas banned By Munawar Hasan LAHORE-Pakistan has banned internet access in certain areas including border belt with neighbouring India as a security measure in the wake of war threats emanating from India, it is reliably learnt here on Thursday. As a result of unannounced ban on internet access, subscribers of Internet Service Providers (ISPs) have not been able to connect the ISPs through telephone lines. "Every time I try to connect to ISP, the message 'the line is busy, please try again later' emerged," said an internet subscriber. "We lodged many a complaints with our respective ISPs but no sufficient answers were being provided in order to resolve the problem," said a net user. Due to the ban, internet cafes situated in the border area, including Batapur, have been closed. Similarly, the use of prepaid calling cards for international dialing have also been banned in the border areas. Pakistan's long-standing differences with India escalated last month after India blamed an attack on the Indian parliament by the Kashmiri separatist groups, allegedly backed by Pakistan. A military build-up has been accompanied by travel bans and sanctions unilaterally imposed by India. Meanwhile, an official of a leading ISP told The Nation that many of its customers were facing problems in connecting Universal Internet Number (UIN) from their located exchanges, to the exchange of the ISP. He said that the telephone exchanges of Mominpura, Garden Town, Baghbanpura, Mustafa Town and Kahna Nau were the most affected areas where hundreds of web-surfers are unable to use this facility. When contacted, highly placed officials of Pakistan Telecommunication Company Ltd (PTCL) did not confirm or negate the development. They said: "We are looking into the matter". It may be noted that India already shut down local Internet access in the Kashmir and was policing Internet cafes in an effort to check communications. The ban was instituted on December 18. The clampdown also extended to intelligence agencies patrolling Internet cafes for Kashmiri Muslims communicating outside India. India has also imposed a ban on long distance calls from Kashmir for an indefinite period. From shohini at giasdl01.vsnl.net.in Fri Jan 11 08:38:59 2002 From: shohini at giasdl01.vsnl.net.in (shohini) Date: Fri, 11 Jan 2002 08:38:59 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Left Orphaned by War: The City and Its Children Message-ID: <000701c19a4d$93728600$bf74c8cb@shohini> The New York Times January 10, 2002 SRINAGAR JOURNAL Left Orphaned by War: The City and Its Children By SOMINI SENGUPTA Somini Sengupta/The New York Times Aijaz Ahmed Ganai, the 12-year-old son of a slain Kashmiri militant, lives in an orphanage in the heart of Srinagar, a city that has been devastated by the fight for territory between India and Pakistan. SRINAGAR, Kashmir, Jan. 9 - Pressed hard against a cliff at the dead end of a twisting road in the old city here, a cluster of squat red buildings houses the lingering misery of Kashmir. It is an orphanage for boys, a great many of whom were left fatherless and destitute by the bloody 12-year guerrilla war in this Himalayan valley. Some of them are sons of dead militants. Some of them don't know how their fathers were killed. Not many remember their fathers at all. They know only that one day their mothers packed their clothes, told them to tend to their studies and had them ferried from their villages to the orphanage here. For all the gloom that has descended over this city, it is a cruel twist that its name in the ancient Indian language Sanskrit means city of the sun. Srinagar, the summer capital of Kashmir, is at the heart of the disputed territory between India and Pakistan, the spoil for which they are poised to fight their fourth war. No other place has been as pulverized by the rivalry between the nations. And today, with the soldiers of India and Pakistan lined up along their 1,800-mile border, no other place likely will. "In both the nations, the governments are thriving on Kashmir," observed Abdur Rasheed, a retired government official here who helps support dozens of women and children who have lost their men to the conflict. "This is the battleground. We are the sufferers. Who else?" The dispute over Kashmir, which has gone on for more than 50 years, has spawned a violent insurgency, pitting guerrilla fighters against Indian soldiers and paramilitary outfits. India accuses Pakistan of fomenting the insurrection in Kashmir, India's only Muslim-majority state. Pakistan, as well as many Kashmiris, accuse India of hindering their right to self-determination. The conflict has left a terrible human toll here - the orphans are but one of many examples. That toll is visible on virtually every street corner in this city. Paramilitary forces stand bunkered behind stacks of sandbags on every other block. Abandoned apartment houses have been taken over by security forces. The sports stadium has suffered the same fate. Of the dozen or so movie theaters that once operated in the city, only two remain open. The rest have been abandoned or serve as bunkers for India's Border Security Force. The streets are empty by dark. People think twice about making dinner appointments. The restaurants close by sundown, anyway. The latest indignity heaped upon the people of the valley is a severing of their connections to the world beyond. Kashmiris awoke on New Year's Day to discover that their Internet connections had been snapped. The long distance telephone shops that the vast majority of people use to talk to friends and family outside the state have had their long distance connections suspended, too. There is no word on when service will be restored. Indian officials contend that such steps were needed to stop terrorists operating in the valley from communicating with one another. For the same reason, mobile phone service is not available here either. So for over a week now, a car dealer hasn't been able to call Chandigarh, some 400 miles to the south by road, to speak to his factory dealer. An exporter of Kashmiri woolens hasn't been allowed to send an e-mail to his American distributor in Utah. The purveyor of a sweet shop has been unable to call New Delhi, to request what were his daily rations of curd and cream. The shopkeeper, Bashir A. Butt, shrugged off the inconveniences as a fact of Kashmiri life. Things could be worse. They have been before. "Maybe the government will say, `There's a curfew, close up your shop,' " he said. "We can expect anything. People here, they are used to these things." Even today, the severed phone service mattered little anyway, at least to the store owners. As is routine here, a one-day strike shuttered the city's shops, in protest of the death of a young Kashmiri man in police custody in New Delhi, the Indian capital. For most Kashmiris, however, the lack of phone service meant that New Year's greetings to friends and family elsewhere had to be put off. "They say Kashmiris are an integral part of India," Prince Ahmed, 24, said, biding the time at the long distance telephone shop of his brother Muzzafir, "but don't let them talk to the rest of the country." On the streets of Srinagar, blood and guns have been such constant features that the prospect of war hardly meets with outrage or panic. Bashir Ahmed Dabla, a sociology professor at the University of Kashmir, recounted the words of a student at one of his seminars recently. The young man said he would be relieved if war broke out. " `Let both countries kill us and the Kashmir problem will go away automatically,' " Professor Dabla recalled hearing him say. "This sentiment got the approval of most of the audience." Few have felt the crunch of the conflict here as acutely as Aijaz Ahmed Ganai, a 12-year-old boy who appeared to be drowning inside one of the flowing woolen overcoats that Kashmiris wear in winter. His father was a commander with a militant group called Al Jahad when he was pulled off his scooter and gunned down by security forces. The boy was 2 at the time, and he was called Irfan. He got a new name after his father died - Aijaz, his father's alias. But he lost his home. Four years ago, an uncle brought him here to the orphanage, the Yateem Trust hostel, one of the largest and oldest in the city. They rode the bus from their village, in the center of the valley, here to the old city. It was the boy's first time in Srinagar. Aijaz learned of his father's fate from a newspaper clipping his mother kept. Aijaz is a shy boy, with big eyes and a beauty mark under his bottom lip that gives him a slightly coquettish look. He sees his mother during Eid, the annual Muslim feast. He wants to be an engineer, he said, not a mujahedeen, and buried his face, giggling, in his overcoat. _____ -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20020111/8a10b3fc/attachment.html From hansathap1 at hotmail.com Sun Jan 13 13:43:01 2002 From: hansathap1 at hotmail.com (hansa thapliyal) Date: Sun, 13 Jan 2002 13:43:01 Subject: [Reader-list] Fwd: [minstrels] Poem #982: Rachel Rose Message-ID: something i read in a ;ist that sends in a poem every day- reminded me again that an attempt at this form of ' topographical' expression can bring in the direct the economical and manage to say just what you were getting at. hansa Guest poem sent in by Laura Simeon > >'What We Heard About the Japanese' > > We heard they would jump from buildings > at the slightest provocation: low marks > > On an exam, a lovers' spat > or an excess of shame. > > We heard they were incited by shame, > not guilt. That they > > Loved all things American. > Mistrusted anything foreign. > > We heard their men liked to buy > schoolgirls' underwear > > And their women > did not experience menopause or other > > Western hysterias. We heard > they still preferred to breastfeed, > > Carry handkerchiefs, ride bicycles > and dress their young like Victorian > > Pupils. We heard that theirs > was a feminine culture. We heard > > That theirs was an example of extreme > patriarchy. That rape > > Didn't exist on these islands. We heard > their marriages were arranged, that > > They didn't believe in love. We heard > they were experts in this art above all others. > > That frequent earthquakes inspired insecurity > and lack of faith. That they had no sense of irony. > > We heard even faith was an American invention. > We heard they were just like us under the skin. > > -- Rachel Rose > >Today's poem is actually one of a pair, and I think they really work best >read together.... > > 'What the Japanese Perhaps Heard' > > Perhaps they heard we don't understand them > very well. Perhaps this made them > > Pleased. Perhaps they heard we shoot > Japanese students who ring the wrong > > Bell at Hallowe'en. That we shoot > at the slightest provocation: a low mark > > On an exam, a lovers' spat, an excess > of guilt. Perhaps they wondered > > If it was guilt we felt at the sight of that student > bleeding out among our lawn flamingos, > > Or something recognizable to them, > something like grief. Perhaps > > They heard that our culture > has its roots in desperate immigration > > And lone men. Perhaps they observed > our skill at raising serial killers, > > That we value good teeth above > good minds and have no festivals > > To remember the dead. Perhaps they heard > that our grey lakes are deep enough to swallow cities, > > That our landscape is vast wheat and loneliness. > Perhaps they ask themselves if, when grief > > Wraps its wet arms around Montana, we would not prefer > the community of archipelagos > > Upon which persimmons are harvested > and black fingers of rock uncurl their digits > > In the mist. Perhaps their abacus echoes > the shape that grief takes, > > One island > bleeding into the next, > > And for us grief is an endless cornfield, > silken and ripe with poison. > > -- Rachel Rose > >Rachel Rose is a young Canadian/American poet whose work has been published >in a volume of the Hugh MacLennan Poetry Series (_Giving My Body to >Science_, McGill-Queen's University Press, 1999, >http://www.mqup.mcgill.ca/99/rose.htm), as well as appearing in _The Best >American Poetry 2001_. > >When I first read these poems, they resonated strongly with me on several >levels. Being half Japanese, I have heard it all: both extreme negative >stereotypes and the almost unbelievable idealizing of Japanese culture that >some Westerners indulge in. Either approach reduces the Japanese to >something not quite like us, whether it's less-than-human or super-human. >Rachel Rose captures these absurdity of these contradictions economically >and strikingly in just a few lines. > >Secondly, as an American with many friends from Japan, I'm often in the >position of trying to explain things about US culture that I can barely >grasp myself. Things like guns and individualism and attitudes towards the >elderly. Rose's second poem crystallizes all of this into a few vivid and >colorful images, showing us how strange and inscrutable we can appear when >viewed from the outside. > >And finally, the timing of when I read poems felt significant. Much of what >I've been hearing lately about Muslims reminds me painfully of what was >said >about the Japanese and Japanese Americans during World War II. They were >seen as people with no respect for life or regard for self-preservation, no >sense of morality that we could understand, showing fanatical loyalty to an >evil empire, and threatening our culture with their alien customs. I.e. not >"good Christians." Sound familiar? Life for Muslims in America today must >be >much like it was for Japanese during World War II. It makes me ache, but I >do have hope that we can learn from past mistakes. > >Laura Simeon >Laura.Simeon at alumnae.brynmawr.edu > _________________________________________________________________ Chat with friends online, try MSN Messenger: http://messenger.msn.com From zamrooda at sarai.net Mon Jan 14 18:27:28 2002 From: zamrooda at sarai.net (zamrooda) Date: Mon, 14 Jan 2002 18:27:28 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Authors special rights Message-ID: <02011418272800.07251@legal.sarai.kit> The Indian Copyright Act 1957, Section 57 Authors special rights : Apart from the right to Copyright the author of a work has the right to claim authorship of the work;and to restrain or claim damages for any distortion, mutilation,modification or other work in relation to the said work done before the expiration of the copyright term and or if it is prejudicial to his honor or reputation. Are software companies obliged to give credit to all its employees or contractors who have worked on a product or project, however small it may be? Can programmers who develop software for MNCs demand that they be named as co-authors of the programme when the product or project is finally delivered? The answer to these questions can throw the whole software industry into chaos with programmers demanding their 'rights'. Legal experts assert that the Indian Copyright Act (Amended) confers Special Rights (Section 57 of the Indian Copyright Act) on software programmers to demand that they be named as co-authors of a 'work' even though they were involved in merely writing a small module of a large programme. "A programmer has a legal right to get the company name him in the copyright. He or she also has the right to stop mutilation of source code-," says Mr Mustafa Safiyuddin solicitor, M&M Legal Ventures, Mumbai and a specialist in intellectual property rights in the infotech industry. Since software programme is listed under the literary work, the copyright comes into existence the minute the programme is written. The rights may be shared or rest .in one individual as is the circumstance. However, at no time does a software code or even a 'flow-chart' for that' matter lies unprotected. In some of the developed countries, these rights are termed as Moral Right and Integrity Right. In fact, Japan has made it mandatory for companies to name programmers as co-authors of a 'work' and extend royalty to them. However, the special rights under the Indian Copyright Act does not provide for any monetary benefit. Mr Safiyuddin says the special rights applies not only to employers of a company but also the outside contractors. This brings the attention on what will happen when all the employees start asserting their rights. Mr Safiyuddin says the only way out is to get the employee or the contractor waive his/her special right. rights applies not only to employees of a company but also the outside contractors who are developing part of the work. Mr N.L. Mitra of the National Law School of India University, says as per the General Agreement on Trade and Tariffs (GATT), India can change its Copyright Act to accommodate the Moral Rights and provide greater protection to Under the definition of the law, special rights cannot be assigned to authors. He reveals that India is considering defining Moral Rights. Today, moral rights are conferred on the 'author' (in this case, programmer) by the Special Rights. Another but can only be waived. "Even before a company embarks upon a project, it should get its employees to waive their rights if it does not wish to name them as co-authors," Mr Safiyuddin advises software development companies. This is just the tip of the iceberg. As India moves closer to the deadline to fulfill the GATT guidelines, fuller implications of copyright act with respect to the software industry is becoming manifest. AP-PTI Legal experts recommend a rigorous IPR management by corporates. "Right from day one, companies should document what it considers is of importance and confidential nature," says Mr Safiyuddin. Today, companies are struggling to find ways to stop its employees from misusing confidential information after leaving the company. The problem is holding information is ruled out as companies need to reveal information crucial to their business to aid the employees in executing the assignments. This has created a catch-22 situation in the industry. With attrition rate being as high as 40 per cent in the software industry, this issues has attained scary proportions. One solution is to organise their information more deftly. Know what is confidential and what is public, and then go about documenting the confidential information to bring it under the copyright protection law. Develop a system where employees are educated about their rights and their obligations in copyright protection. While joining work or during the taking up of assignments, the company should ensure that all its copyright requirements are met such as getting employees sign the Non-Disclosure Agreement document, and waiver of moral rights. Indian software industry is highly lax in copyright issues. Neither do companies realise its full rights nor are the employees aware of their rights. This has apparently led to a severe IPR erosion. Analysts point out that copyright has not got as much mindshare and exposure as patents even though the latter is seldom extended to software programmes in India. Legal experts say since copyright is universally recognised, Indian companies will have to secure their IPRs before looking at acquiring patents. ------------------------------------------------------- From sam at myspinach.org Tue Jan 15 16:44:58 2002 From: sam at myspinach.org (s|a|m) Date: Tue, 15 Jan 2002 22:14:58 +1100 Subject: [Reader-list] Article Request - India + Pakistan - from The Paper In-Reply-To: <200201150541.GAA00841@zelda.intra.waag.org> Message-ID: <5.0.2.1.0.20020115220209.029e29a0@myspinach.org> Hi, Is there any writers or journalist-types who may be interested in contributing a 600 - 800 word article about the situation between India and Pakistan for The Paper (www.thepaper.org.au). Maybe an angle that is not being covered by the mainstream. Guidelines for articles are available on our website. Also, we are really interested in connecting with people interested in writing about issues in your part of the world. We are interested in exposing more of these issues to audiences here in Australia and internationally through The Paper website. Thanks, look forward to hearing from you, Best wishes, Sam de Silva. ---- About the Paper The Paper aims to be a forum for critical thought where content and presentation of ideas remain unaffected by corporate/governmental influence. While it strives to be non-partisan, it does attempt to give space to issues that are under or mis-represented by other, more commercial media outlets. The people behind The Paper are passionate about independent media, and believe that information and education are the key to understanding diversity and reducing ignorance. Currently, The Paper has 8 pages and is printed on tabloid size newsprint. It has a fortnightly run of 4,000. It is distributed throughout Australia and is available online at www.thepaper.org.au The Paper is produced by a volunteer team. From aiindex at mnet.fr Wed Jan 16 00:02:07 2002 From: aiindex at mnet.fr (Harsh Kapoor) Date: Tue, 15 Jan 2002 19:32:07 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] Technology: '.name' Web suffix for individuals kicks off Message-ID: Technology: '.name' Web suffix for individuals kicks off Copyright © 2002 AP Online By ANICK JESDANUN, Associated Press NEW YORK (January 14, 2002 4:09 p.m. EST) - Joining the familiar ".com" and ".org" domain names, the first Internet address suffixes created exclusively for individuals - ".name" - debuted Tuesday. Currently, Internet users with personal Web sites tend to use ".org," which is commonly associated with nonprofits. Operators of ".name" are hoping individuals will be lured by e-mail and Web addresses featuring their own names. The London-based Global Name Registry, which in 2000 proposed and won rights to administer the suffix, is also exploring expanding ".name" to mobile phones and other personal devices later this year. "We think the personal space is in its infancy," said Andrew Tsai, the registry's chief executive. The ".name" suffix was one of seven approved in November 2000 by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, an Internet oversight body. They are the first major additions to the domain name system since its creation in the mid-1980s. The new names were approved to help relieve domain name overcrowding. Registration of ".com," ".net" and ".org" names more than tripled in 2000, ending the year at 28.2 million. But tackling the details of actually creating the new suffixes took much longer than expected. In the meantime, the Internet economy slid, and names lost much of their speculative value. Total domain name registrations increased only slightly in 2001, a 13.5 percent jump to 32 million as of September. Ross Stevens of New York got ".name" addresses for himself, his wife and a 6-month-old daughter. He plans to set up a Web page with baby pictures and to use ".name" for lifetime e-mail addresses. The service costs about $30 a year for both e-mail and Web addresses. The fee is for the name only; the user still would have to set up an e-mail account or buy Web space from an Internet service provider. Two other suffixes, ".biz" for businesses and ".info" for informational sites, debuted last fall, with more than 1.2 million names registered combined. In addition, ".museum" began operating in November on a provisional basis, meaning assigned names may still change, and ".coop" for business cooperatives became active Jan. 9. A few thousand names have been requested under each. Debuting later this year are ".aero" for aviation and ".pro" for professionals. The Global Name Registry began allowing pre-registrations in earnest last month for ".name" suffixes. For duplicate names requested as of Dec. 17, one was selected at random. The first batch of 60,000 names was to be activated Tuesday. Additional rounds will be activated every two weeks or less until "live" registration begins in mid-May. Tsai said the slow rollout should help the ".name" registry avoid some of the troubles that ".biz" and ".info" faced. The ".info" registry failed to block some bogus trademark claims, while the ".biz" operators were hit with a lawsuit charging that their procedures amounted to an illegal lottery. Both ".info" and ".biz" changed their procedures to address the concerns. The seven new domain names: ".info" - For informational sites. Became operational Sept. 23, with more than 700,000 registered so far. Early problems with speculators jumping ahead of queue by claiming bogus trademark ownership. To rectify, operators of ".info" plan to refer as many as 10,000 registrations this week to arbitrators at the World Intellectual Property Organization. ".biz" - For businesses only. Became operational Oct. 1. Lawsuit challenged registration process, calling it illegal lottery. To address concerns, operators changed procedures for handling names for which more than one application was received. More than 500,000 names registered through mid-December. ".name" - Individuals can register a name in form of "firstname.lastname.name" for Web sites and "firstname(at)lastname.name" for e-mail addresses. About 60,000 names were to be activated Tuesday. ".museum" - Names for some museums were approved provisionally in November. Some names work now, but the suffix becomes formally operational in March. Names subdivided by location as in "sanfrancisco.museum" and type of museum as in "maritime.museum." Index available at http://index.museum. ".aero" - For aviation industry. Registration begins in March. ".coop" - For business cooperatives, such as credit unions and electric coops. Some preregistered names became active earlier this month. Regular registration begins Jan. 30. ".pro" - For professionals, initially doctors, lawyers and accountants. Individuals and companies requesting names must show proof. Details still being negotiated. Copyright © 2002 Nando Media From aiindex at mnet.fr Wed Jan 16 04:44:18 2002 From: aiindex at mnet.fr (Harsh Kapoor) Date: Wed, 16 Jan 2002 00:14:18 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] The Internet's Invisible Hand Message-ID: The New York Times January 10, 2002 The Internet's Invisible Hand By KATIE HAFNER NO one owns it. And no one in particular actually runs it. Yet more than half a billion people rely on it as they do a light switch. The Internet is a network whose many incarnations - as obscure academic playpen, information superhighway, vast marketplace, sci- fi-inspired matrix - have seen it through more than three decades of ceaseless evolution. In the mid-1990's, a handful of doomsayers predicted that the Internet would melt down under the strain of increased volume. They proved to be false prophets, yet now, as it enters its 33rd year, the Net faces other challenges. The demands and dangers - sudden, news- driven traffic, security holes, and a clamor for high-speed access to homes - are concerns that bear no resemblance to those that preoccupied the Internet's creators. For all their genius, they failed to see what the Net would become once it left the confines of the university and entered the free market. Those perils are inextricably linked to what experts consider the Internet's big promise: evolving into an information utility as ubiquitous and accessible as electricity. That, too, was not foreseen by most of the engineers and computer scientists who built the Net in the 1960's and 70's. Ten years ago, at the end of 1991, the same year that the World Wide Web was put in place but a good two or three years before the term Web browser became part of everyday speech, the Net was home to some 727,000 hosts, or computers with unique Internet Protocol, or I.P., addresses. By the end of 2001, that number had soared to 175 million, according to estimates by Matrix Net Systems, a network measurement business in Austin, Tex. For all that growth, the Net operates with surprisingly few hiccups, 24 hours a day - and with few visible signs of who is responsible for keeping it that way. There are no vans with Internet Inc. logos at the roadside, no workers in Cyberspace hard hats hovering over manholes. Such is yet another of the Internet's glorious mysteries. No one really owns the Net, which, as most people know by now, is actually a sprawling collection of networks owned by various telecommunications carriers. The largest, known as backbone providers, include WorldCom (news/quote), Verizon, Sprint and Cable & Wireless (news/quote) USA. What, then, is the future of this vital public utility? Who determines it? And who is charged with carrying it out? For the Internet's first 25 years, the United States government ran parts of it, financed network research and in some cases paid companies to build custom equipment to run the network. But in the mid-1990's the Net became a commercial enterprise, and its operation was transferred to private carriers. In the process, most of the government's control evaporated. Now the network depends on the cooperation and mutual interests of the telecommunications companies. Those so-called backbone providers adhere to what are known as peering arrangements, which are essentially agreements to exchange traffic at no charge. "Peering fits right in with the overly loose way the Internet is provided," said Scott Bradner, a senior technical consultant at Harvard University, "which is unrelated commercial interests doing their own thing." Mr. Bradner, co-director of the Internet Engineering Task Force, an international self-organized group of network designers, operators and researchers who have set technical standards for the Internet since the late 1980's, said that peering remains a remarkably robust mechanism. And for now, capacity is not a particularly pressing problem because the backbone providers have been laying high-speed lines at prodigious rates over the last few years. "We've got a lot of long-distance fiber in the ground, a lot of which isn't being used, but it's available," said Craig Partridge, a chief scientist at BBN Technologies, an engineering company that oversaw the building of the first network switches in the late 1960's and is now owned by Verizon. Still, the fear that the Net is not up to its unforeseen role still gnaws at prognosticators. Consider the gigalapse prediction. In December 1995, Robert Metcalfe, who invented the office network technology known as Ethernet, wrote in his column in the industry weekly Infoworld that the Internet was in danger of a vast meltdown. More specifically, Dr. Metcalfe predicted what he called a gigalapse, or one billion lost user hours resulting from a severed link - for instance, a ruptured connection between a service provider and the rest of the Internet, a backhoe's cutting a cable by mistake or the failure of a router. The disaster would come by the end of 1996, he said, or he would eat his words. The gigalapse did not occur, and while delivering the keynote address at an industry conference in 1997, Dr. Metcalfe literally ate his column. "I reached under the podium and pulled out a blender, poured a glass of water, and blended it with the column, poured it into a bowl and ate it with a spoon," he recalled recently. The failure of Dr. Metcalfe's prediction apparently stemmed from the success of the Net's basic architecture. It was designed as a distributed network rather than a centralized one, with data taking any number of different paths to its destination. That deceptively simple principle has, time and again, saved the network from failure. When a communications line important to the network's operation goes down, as one did last summer when a freight-train fire in Baltimore damaged a fiber-optic loop, data works its way around the trouble. It took a far greater crisis to make the Internet's vulnerabilities clearer. On Sept. 11, within minutes of the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center, the question was not whether the Internet could handle the sudden wave of traffic, but whether the servers - the computers that deliver content to anyone who requests it by clicking on a Web link - were up to the task. Executives at CNN.com were among the first to notice the Internet's true Achilles' heel: the communications link to individual sites that become deluged with traffic. CNN.com fixed the problem within a few hours by adding server capacity and moving some of its content to servers operated by Akamai, a company providing distributed network service. Mr. Bradner said that most large companies have active mirror sites to allow quick downloading of the information on their servers. And as with so many things about the Net, responsibility lies with the service provider. "Whether it's CNN.com or nytimes.com or anyone offering services, they have to design their service to be reliable," he said. "This can never be centralized." Guidelines can help. Mr. Bradner belongs to a Federal Communications Commission advisory group called the Network Reliability and Operability Council, which just published a set of recommended practices for service providers, including advice on redundant servers, backup generators and reliable power. "Still, there are no requirements," Mr. Bradner said. If the government is not running things, exactly, at least it is taking a close look. Dr. Partridge of BBN Technologies recently served on a National Research Council committee that published a report on the Internet. One of the group's main concerns was supplying households with high-speed Internet service, known as broadband. Some 10.7 million of the nation's households now have such access, or about 16 percent of all households online, according to the Yankee Group, a research firm. Only when full high-speed access is established nationwide, Mr. Partridge and others say, will the Internet and its multimedia component, the Web, enter the next phase of their evolution. "We need to make it a normal thing that everyone has high-speed bandwidth," said Brian Carpenter, an engineer at I.B.M. (news/quote) and chairman of the Internet Society, a nonprofit group that coordinates Internet-related projects around the world. Yet there is no central coordination of broadband deployment. Where, when and how much access is available is up to the individual provider - typically, the phone or cable company. As a result, availability varies widely. Control falls to the marketplace. And in light of recent bankruptcies and mergers among providers, like Excite at Home's failure and AT&T (news/quote) Broadband's sale to Comcast (news/quote) late last year, universal broadband deployment may be moving further into the future. The one prominent element of centralized management in Internet operations - the assignment of addresses and top domain names, like .com or .edu - reflects the tricky politics of what is essentially a libertarian arena. That is the task of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, or Icann, which operates under the auspices of the Commerce Department. Its efforts to establish an open decision-making process became mired in disputes over who the Internet's stakeholders actually were. And even as Icann and its authorized registrars take over administration of the Internet's naming system, a different problem nags at computer scientists: the finite number of underlying I.P. addresses. In the current version of Internet Protocol, the software for the routers that direct Internet traffic, there is a theoretical limit of four billion addresses. Some 25 percent are already spoken for. The solution, Mr. Carpenter said, is bigger addresses. "This means rolling out a whole new version of I.P.," he said. Although the assignment of I.P. addresses falls to Icann, inventing a new protocol is essentially a research problem that falls to the Internet Engineering Task Force. As the Internet continues to grow and sprawl, security is also a nagging concern. The Internet was not built to be secure in the first place: its openness is its core strength and its most conspicuous weakness. "Security is hard - not only for the designers, to make sure a system is secure, but for users, because it gets in the way of making things easy," Mr. Bradner said. There is no centralized or even far-flung security management for the Internet. The Computer Emergency Response Team at Carnegie Mellon University is mainly a voluntary clearinghouse for information about security problems in Internet software. The lack of a central security mechanism "is a mixed bag," Mr. Bradner said. A centralized system that could authenticate the origin of all traffic would be useful in tracing the source of an attack, he said. That is where a delicate balance must be struck: between the ability to trace traffic and the desire to protect an individual's privacy or a corporation's data. "It's not at all clear that there's a centralizable role, or that there's a role government could play without posing a severe threat to individuals," Mr. Bradner said. Past plans for identity verification have failed because of the complexity of making them work on a global scale, he said. Such are the challenges that face the Internet as it continues its march. "The really interesting question to ask is whether we can build a next generation of applications," Mr. Carpenter said. "Can we move from what we have now, which is an information source, to a network that's really an information utility, used for entertainment, education and commercial activities? There's tremendous potential here, but we've got a lot of work to do." As that work progresses, another question centers on what role the government should play. Many carriers who bear the cost of expanding the infrastructure favor federal incentives for carriers to invest in new broadband technology. The Federal Communications Commission is also mulling policy changes, soliciting suggestions from the communications industry for making broadband access more widely available. Dr. Metcalfe predicts that the next big step is what he calls the video Internet. "We're done with just voice and text," he said. "No one is quite sure what the killer app will be, but we want to see stuff move, and we want it to be better than television." Despite his joke about eating his words, Dr. Metcalfe said he was unrepentant about his forecast of a gigalapse. "There's a gigalapse in our future," he said. "The Net's getting bigger all the time and there are basic fragilities." Since there is no formal tracking mechanism for connection failures, he argues, his gigalapse may very well have happened already without anyone noticing. "I'm sure there are outages every day, but because of the Internet's robust nature they are generally not noticed," he said. "We do control-alt-delete and chant, and eventually the connection comes back." Indeed it does. -- From zamrooda at sarai.net Wed Jan 16 15:31:46 2002 From: zamrooda at sarai.net (zamrooda) Date: Wed, 16 Jan 2002 15:31:46 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] video piracy case Message-ID: <02011615314600.01942@legal.sarai.kit> The Indian Copyright Act : A video film cannot be published until the following particulars are displayed on the video cassette or other container thereof: 1 if the work is a cinematographic film required to be certified for exhibition under the provisions of the Cinematograph Act, 1952, a copy of the certificate granted by the Board of Film Certification under section 5A of the Act in respect of such work. 2 The name and address of the person who has made the video film and a declaration by him that he has obtained the necessary license or consent from the owner of the copyright in such work for making such video film and the name and address of the owner of the copyright in such work. The Supreme Court in a significant judgement on "infringement of copyright' in a "video piracy case" convicted and sentenced an owner of a video library in Tenali (Andhra Pradesh) to pay a fine of Rs. 1 0,000 for offence under Section 68 A of the Copyright Act read with Section 52 A of the Act. According to the findings of the courts below (namely, the "trial court' and the District and Sessions Court, Guntur) ? N. Venkataramanan (respondent-owner of the video library), was exhibiting the cinematograph films in his "Video City" for hire or sale of the cassettes to the public which did not contain the particulars envisaged under Section 32 A of the Act, the Bench noted. Section 52A deals with particulars like, a copy of the certificate granted by the Board of Film Certification under section 5A of the Cinematograph Act in the case of a 'cinematograph film" (including a "video tape"). the name and address of the person who has made the video film and a "declaration" that he had obtained necessary licence or consent from the owner of the copyright in such work for making such video film etc and the name and address of the owner of the copyright of such work ? to be included in "sound recordings" and 'video films". Section 68A provides penalty for contravention of Section 52A of the Act. The Bench consisting of Mr. justice K. Ramaswamy and Mr. Justice G B Pattanaik, set aside a judgement of the Andhra Pradesh High Court acquitting the respondent. The High Court held that unless the owner (of a video film or video cassette etc) was identified and gave evidence that he had a copyright of the video films concerned, there was no offence made out under relevant provisions of the Copyright Act. The apex court, on an analysis of the provisions and scheme of the Copyright Act, as amended, in 1954, noted that the amending provisions were introduced in the Act "to prevent piracy which became a global problem due to rapid advances in technology and to punish the pirates" in the interest of protecting copyrights. The Bench, in allowing an appeal from the State against the judgement of the High Court observed that on the facts and circumstances of the case "it would be unnecessary for the prosecution to track on and trace out the owner of the copyright to come and adduce evidence of infringement of copyright." The absence thereof does not constitute lack of essential element of infringement of copyright and "if the particulars on video films etc as mandated under Section 52A do not find place, it would be infringement of copyright," the Bench pointed out. The Court in imposing a sentence of fine of Rs. 10,000 on the respondent, modified a sentence of imprisonment of six months and imposition of fine of Rs 3000 as awarded first, by the trial court and later, by the District and Sessions Court (first appellate court), In default (of payment of sentence of fine of Rs, 10,000), the respondent should undergo rigorous imprisonment for three months, the Bench directed and ordered that "even if he does not pay the fine and undergoes the sentence, the State is at liberty to recover the fine from the respondent." From zamrooda at sarai.net Wed Jan 16 15:42:23 2002 From: zamrooda at sarai.net (zamrooda) Date: Wed, 16 Jan 2002 15:42:23 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] sound recording Message-ID: <02011615422301.01942@legal.sarai.kit> The Indian Copyright Act,1957 A sound recording cannot be published unless and until the following particulars are displayed on the sound recording and on any container thereof: 1 the name and address of the person who has made the sound recording, 2 the name and address of the owner of the copyright of that work and 3 the year of its publication. Which are the acts that will not be deemed to be Infringement of Copyright? 1 Making of sound recording of any literary,dramatic or musical work with the licence or consent of the owner of the right in the work. 2 Where the person making the sound recording has given a notice of his intentions, has provided the copies of all the covers and labels with which the sound recording is to be sold. The royalties have been paid in conformation to the rates fixed by the Copyright Board. 3 Provided that no alterations are made that have not been made previously or with the consent of the owner of the rights. 4 Sound recording cannot be packed or labeled in a fashion as to mislead or confuse the public of their identity. 5 Copies of sound recording cannot be made till the expiration of two calendar years after the end of the year in which the recording was first made. 6 The person making the copy of the recording has to allow the owner or a duly appointed agent to inspect all records and books of accounting relating to such sound recording. 7 Playing of recordings in an enclosed area or hall meant for residents as part of the amenities provided. Or as part of a club or similar organisation which is not established or conducting it for profit. 8 When performance is given to non paying audience, or for the benefit of a religious institution. Internet effects XI: Napster and beyond One of the most talked about cases on the subject of ASP liability is the one Rodney D. Ryder * Rodney D. Ryder * that pitted the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) against Napster. Napster delivers an Internet service that enables users to create their own private libraries of sound recordings. These libraries are then made available to other users for instantaneous distribution and copying. In March 2000, the RIAA, which represents music labels, filed a complaint against Napster, alleging that Napster's wilful conduct constitutes contributory and vicarious copyright infringement. Napster moved for summary judgement. In May, the judge denied the motion, holding that Napster was not an ISP because Napster did not "transmit, route or provide connections for allegedly infringing material through its system". (It actually provides the computer software application by which the allegedly infringing activity can occur.) In June, the association asked the judge to grant an injunction to prevent Napster, while the case was pending, from "facilitating or assisting others in the copying, downloading, uploading, transmission or distribution of copyrighted musical works". After a two-hour hearing on July 26, a federal judge granted a temporary injunction, barring "digital music upstart" Napster from trading music online, pending a trial. Napster immediately filed an appeal. On July 28 an appellate court granted an emergency stay, ruling that Napster had "raised substantial questions of first impression going to both the merits and the form of the injunction". On October 2, both parties had the opportunity to address the arguments for and against the injunction to the appeals court. Napster - the Indian position Under Indian law, the activities of Napster would not, on the face of it, amount to direct copyright infringement as they are not: reproducing the copyrighted works or storing them; selling or hiring copyright works; issuing copies of the works to the public; performing the works in public or communicating them to the public; making any translations or adaptations of the works. In the Garware Plastic & Polyester versus Telelink case, which pertained to the showing of video films over a cable network, the Indian Supreme Court held that such an action amounted to broadcasting or communicating material to a section of the public. The court also held that such broadcasting of the programme directly affected the earnings of the author and violated his intellectual property rights, and stated that assisting in infringement would amount to infringement of copyright. On the basis of this case, it may be possible for some to argue that Napster facilitates unauthorised copying and, hence, should be liable for contributory and vicarious infringement of copyright. But the Garware case is different from the Napster affair since Napster is not 'broadcasting' the music to any of its subscribers; it is merely providing software that may be used to locate songs for copying over the net. The legal position in India is as yet unclear and much would depend on the facts and interpretation of these facts by the adjudicating judge. Indian law has a provision similar to the 'personal, non-commercial' fair use exception set out in the US Home Recording Act, 1992. This is explained in Section 52 of the Indian Copyright Act 1957, which holds that use of a work will not amount to infringement of copyright if it is private use; for criticising or reviewing the musical work; for making back-up copies; or reporting the work in a newspaper or for judicial or legislative proceedings. Therefore, it may be possible for Napster to run the argument of non-infringement, since its subscribers are using the music only for private use. But Napster would not be able to claim immunity under the 'network service provider' provision of the Indian Information Technology Act 2000. The provision stipulates that a network service provider can claim immunity against 'third party information' only if it proves that the contravention (in this case, copyright violation by the Napster subscribers) was committed without its knowledge, or that it had exercised due diligence to prevent any such offence or contravention. Napster is not only aware of such contravention, but is facilitating it by actively supplying the software and service that makes such contravention possible. The outcome of this case could change the application of traditional copyright laws. If the court finds that Napster's use of the copyrighted material was a fair use, traditional protection of copyright law will be worthless. Furthermore, a fair use decision may have an effect on one of the major purposes behind copyright law, which is to allow artists to restrict reproduction of the works they create. This protection gives artists an incentive to create works. A decision allowing copyrighted works to be easily downloaded from the Internet may cause artists to refrain from creating works. Additionally, the RIAA complains that it will lose revenue from CD sales. By the time the time research for this article was concluded, the infamous Napster judgement became well known. The ruling against Napster is a tremendous blow to lovers of the "freedom of the Internet", but it is vital for the safeguarding of intellectual property worldwide. Even if Napster is shut down, many more will emerge to take its place. This is a "menace" that's virtually impossible to contain. In 1957, cinematographic films got separate copyrights of their own, quite apart from their components, such as music and story. Fresh amendments followed, though the issue of piracy, a raging issue today, was not adequately addressed until 1984. The Amending Act 65 of 1984 acknowledged piracy as a "global problem" thanks to the rapid advances in technology. The legislature finally woke up to realise the fact that it was not just the copyright owners who suffered losses in the form of royalties, but also the national exchequer by way of tax evasions. Here's how the Act justified the amendment: "Recorded music and video cassettes of films and TV programmes are reproduced, distributed and sold on a massive scale in many parts of the world without any remuneration to the authors, artistes, publishers and producers concerned. The emergence of new techniques of recordings, fixation and reproduction of audio program, combined with the advent of video technology have greatly helped the pirates. It is estimated that the losses to the film producers and other owners of copyright amount to several crores of rupees. The loss to Government in terms of tax evasion also amounts to crores of rupees. In addition, because of the recent video boom in the country, there are reports that uncertified video films are being exhibited on a large scale. A large number of video parlours have also sprung up all over the country and they exhibit such films recorded on video tapes by charging admission fees from their clients. In view of these circumstances, it is proposed to amend the Copyright Act, 1957, suitably to combat effectively the piracy that is prevalent in the country." To add teeth to the legislation, punishment for copyright infringement was enhanced to a maximum of three years and a minimum of six months, and a fine up to Rs 2 lakh, and a minimum of Rs 50,000.The provisions now specifically also addressed video films and computer programmes. Producers of records and video films were now statutorily obliged to display information such as the name of the copyright owner and year of first publication etc. The law protects cinematographic films as a distinct work, giving the producer of the film exclusive rights to make a copy of the film, including a photograph of any image forming part thereof; and to sell or give on hire, or offer for sale or hire, any copy of the film regardless of whether such copy has been sold or given on hire on earlier occasions; to communicate the film to the public. India is a member of the two major global copyright conventions, Berne Convention and the Universal Copyright Convention. Hence, Indian works are accorded copyright protection in all leading countries of the world. Likewise, foreign works and works of foreign authors are accorded the same protection in India as Indian works. From zamrooda at sarai.net Wed Jan 16 16:04:39 2002 From: zamrooda at sarai.net (zamrooda) Date: Wed, 16 Jan 2002 16:04:39 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Notes from the court-1 Message-ID: <02011616043902.01942@legal.sarai.kit> Dear friends, This is the begining of a series of writtings on the daily events of the court and the life around it. We would love to recieve any inputs or ideas or any similar writtings. Enjoy. As I pulled into the parking lot I could not but notice the stillness in the air. The day was lined with the grimness of the grey colour of the sky. I sat in the car in the anticipation of something to happen. Traffic whizzed passed me on the Purana Quila Road. I was catching the attention of the few people around the premises. I wonder what is on their minds. How they are taking to my presence in the parking lot so early in the morning. The stillness of that moment is uncanny as I know that in the next hour one will not be able to relate to this emptiness to this very space. Sweepers are moving around with their large brooms raising early morning dust. The place resembles a fair ground from which the circus has moved on. Gives one an idea of the number of people visiting the premises each day. People strolled into the building entering into the stillness of the morning. One or two mummers, a loud shout, opening of the small tea stall. Car honking for the barricade to be raised. People peering into my car,questions written on their faces. Cars, two Wheeler's, auto's and cycles steadily increasing in number. The parking attendants trying to maintain some order in the parking lot and miraculously able to do so. Hoarding displaying names of advocates are visible in the parking. Advocate Kanta Ram, chamber 25; Advocate Divender Nath, chamber 82; and so on. Not so surprisingly women advocates do not figure out in these hoarding. But the eye catches the words: BEWARE OF TOUTS CONTACT YOUR ADVOCATE DIRECTLY a warning which today has become a part of all government offices. Whether it is the this notice or something else but surely when I walked into the building I was not hounded by the middle men as I had expected. Moving slowly into the building my attention was drawn to a group of women gathered together in the park. As I approached them I was taken aback by what I saw. This was a group of beggars getting ready for their days work. The deity was cleaned and garlanded to attract the devotees visiting the court. A woman was applying mud on the face of her pretty child to make her look vulnerable. Clothes were being adjusted to suit the mood. A look around the place had a similar story to tell. Tea vendors were busy brewing the morning tea. Young boys adjusting cups in the baskets. What if few months back the same courts had passed the verdict that Right to Education is a Fundamental Right. People have to survive and for survival work is imperative. The seven to eight food stalls cleaning their individual premises for the day. The water machines being rescued from their corners for the days work. Change in season brings in new vendors. Mungfali walas are busy weighing their goodies to fit into the small paper bags. Security men are swarming the premises performing their morning rounds before the court sets in for the day. People are gathered in groups all over, workers of the court to clients each one busy discussing the days proceedings. As you float around you will get to hear snippets of different cases, and the different events that are likely to happen during the day. Lawyers have the privilege of parking their vehicles inside the premises and one witnesses the most fascinating site in this parking lot. Invariable you will catch lawyers struggling with their attire. The most common site is the struggle with the collar. Similar to a man's struggle with his tie. Wonder if collars have something to do with the term white collar job. The coat the collar wonder why we never gave up the British dress code for the court. If I am not wrong their was a talk some time back. Guess with so much happening in the court no one has the time for this little irritant. There definitely is a change in the scenario where the old and the young generation lawyers are concerned. Over the years the belief that a well dressed lawyer signifies an incompetent lawyer is slowly fading. Its almost a breath of fresh air to see the younger generation lawyers with cheerful faces and good attire. In the morbidity of black and white resembling a cemetery this new look makes the place approachable which is a lot for a place that one dreads to step in unless forced to do so.... The court authorities have tried their best to organise the place. From parking slots to vendors to chambers of the Lawyers all have their allotted corners. There are sighs directing vehicles in the parking lot only one has forgotten to co-ordinate the directions. Its a miracle that there is not a chaos. Or maybe people park oblivious to the sighs. For if one followed the sighs one will never be able to leave the premise. One noticeable thing is the listing of the Advocates practicing in the court. Gives some meaning to the notice asking people to beware of touts. Notices do not end with legal information, no you can enjoy the privilege of shopping through the notice board of the court....which is nothing other than the back wall of the building. I was amazingly surprised by a list of items with their prices pasted up on the wall. The notice caught my attention as I imagined it to be a legal notice. Was I underestimating the usage of notices ? Here was a classical example..... It was time for me to leave and as I was moving out I could not but notice the chaos outside.......A police patrol car parked on the opposite side of the road added to the building confusion on the road. Traffic was swelling in numbers and the car became a hindrance to the free flowing traffic. Not a word was said but irritation was visible on peoples faces. In this building confusion, chaos was added by people in quest of self importance not willing to descend from their big expensive cars anywhere else but at the front gate. Traffic comes to a stand still as by this time there are cars parked on both sides of the road leaving little space for vehicles to maneuver around. By nine forty five in the morning Purana Quila road is a road to avoid unless one has work in Patiala House Court! ------------------------------------------------------- From bhrigu at sarai.net Sat Jan 19 06:03:32 2002 From: bhrigu at sarai.net (Bhrigu) Date: Sat, 19 Jan 2002 06:03:32 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Robert Fisk Article Message-ID: <02011906033200.01614@janta7.sarai.kit> When journalists refuse to tell the truth about Israel Robert Fisk. 'Fear of being slandered as "anti-Semites" means we are abetting terrible deeds in the Middle East' 17 April 2001: What if we had supported the apartheid regime of South Africa against the majority black population? What if we had lauded the South African white leadership as "hard-line warriors" rather than racists? What if we had explained the shooting of 56 black protesters at Sharpeville as an understandable "security crackdown" by the South African police. And described black children shot by the police as an act of "child sacrifice" by their parents? What if we had called upon the "terrorist" ANC leadership to "control their own people". Almost every day that is exactly the way we are playing the Israeli-Palestinian war. No matter how many youths are shot dead by the Israelis, no matter how many murders by either side and no matter how bloody the reputation of the Israeli Prime Minister, we are reporting this terrible conflict as if we supported the South African whites against the blacks. No, Israel is not South Africa (though it happily supported the apartheid regime) and no, the Palestinians are not the blacks of the shanty towns. But there's not much difference between Gaza and the black slums of Johannesburg; and there's not much difference between the tactics of the Israeli army in the occupied territories and that of the South African police. The apartheid regime had death squads, just as Israel has today. Yet even they did not use helicopter gunships and missiles. Rarely since the Second World War has a people been so vilified as the Palestinians. And rarely has a people been so frequently excused and placated as the Israelis. Israeli embassies are now buttonholing editors around the world, saying that it's not fair to call Israel's Prime Minister "hard-line". And the reporters are falling into line. Sharon, we are told, may turn into a pragmatist, another De Gaulle; in truth he's more like the French putschist generals in Algeria. They also used torture and massacred their Arab opponents. It needed an Israeli writer Nehemia Strasler, in Ha'aretz to point out that Sharon's career spells anything but peace. He voted against the peace treaty with Egypt in 1979. He voted against a withdrawal from southern Lebanon in 1985. He opposed Israel's participation in the Madrid peace conference in 1991. He opposed the Knesset plenum vote on the Oslo agreement in 1993. He abstained on a vote for peace with Jordan in 1994. He voted against the Hebron agreement in 1997. He condemned the manner of Israel's retreat from Lebanon in 2000. He is now building Jewish settlements on occupied Arab land in total violation of international law ­ at a faster rate than his predecessor. Yet we are to believe that it is the corrupt, Parkinson's-haunted Yasser Arafat who is to blame for the war. He will not "control" his people. He is chastised by George Bush while his people are bestialised by the Israeli leadership. Rafael Eytan, the former Israeli chief of staff, used to talk of the Palestinians as "cockroaches in a glass jar". Menachem Begin called them "two-legged beasts". Rabbi Ovdia Yousef, the spiritual head of the Shas party, called them "serpents". In August last year, Ehud Barak called them "crocodiles". Last month, the Israeli tourism minister, Rehavem Zeevi, called Arafat a "scorpion". Even the South African regime never called the blacks by such vile names. And woe betide the diplomat or journalist who points this out. Earlier this year, the Simon Wiesenthal Centre, in Paris, accused the Swedish president of the European Union of "encouraging anti-Jewish violence". To condemn Israel for "eliminating terrorists", the centre wrote in a letter to the Swedish prime minister, "recalls the allied argument during the Second World War, according to which bombing the railways leading to Auschwitz would encourage anti-Semitism among the Germans". Sweden was making "a unilateral attack against the state of the survivors of the Holocaust". And the Swedish president's crime? She had dared to say that "the practice of eliminations constitutes an obstacle to peace and could provoke new violence". She did not even refer to death squads. In February Newsweek propagated a virtual fraud on its cover by showing under the headline "Terror Goes Global Exclusive: Bin Laden's International Network" a frightening photograph of a man (head and shoulders), his face covered in an Arab scarf, holding a rifle in his right hand. The reader would imagine this to be a member of Osama bin Laden's network of "global terror". But I traced the Finnish photographer who took this picture. He snapped it at a funeral on the West Bank. The man was an armed member of the Palestinian Tanzim militia -- and had nothing to do with Bin Laden. The Tanzim are violent enough. But the cover generically smeared the entire Palestinian people by associating them with the man supposedly responsible for bombing US embassies in Africa. As that brave American writer Charley Reese said in his regular US column, the Israelis "have created their own unconquerable enemy". They have made the Palestinians so crushed, so desperate, so humiliated that they have nothing to lose. We, too, have done this. Our gutlessness, our refusal to tell the truth, our fear of being slandered as "anti-Semites" the most loathsome of libels against any journalist means that we are aiding and abetting terrible deeds in the Middle East. Maybe we should look up those cuttings of the apartheid era and remember when men were not without honour. From bhrigu at sarai.net Sat Jan 19 06:21:35 2002 From: bhrigu at sarai.net (Bhrigu) Date: Sat, 19 Jan 2002 06:21:35 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Emerging Alternatives in Palestine Message-ID: <02011906213501.01614@janta7.sarai.kit> Emerging alternatives in Palestine by Edward Said Since it began 15 months ago the Palestinian Intifada has had little to show for itself politically, despite the remarkable fortitude of a militarily occupied, unarmed, poorly led, and still dispossessed people that has defied the pitiless ravages of Israel's war machine. In the United States, the government and, with a handful of exceptions, the "independent" media have echoed each other in harping on Palestinian violence and terror, with no attention at all paid to the 35-year Israeli military occupation, the longest in modern history: as a result, American official condemnations of Yasser Arafat's Authority after 11 September as harbouring and even sponsoring terrorism have coldly reinforced the Sharon government's preposterous claim that Israel is the victim, the Palestinians the aggressors in the four- decade war that the Israeli army has waged against civilians, property and institutions without mercy or discrimination. The result today is that the Palestinians are locked up in 220 ghettos controlled by the army; American-supplied Apache helicopters, Merkava tanks, and F-16s mow down people, houses, olive groves and fields on a daily basis; schools and universities as well as businesses and civil institutions are totally disrupted; hundreds of innocent civilians have been killed and tens of thousands injured; Israel's assassinations of Palestinian leaders continue; unemployment and poverty stand at about 50 per cent -- and all this while General Anthony Zinni drones on about Palestinian "violence" to the wretched Arafat, who can't even leave his office in Ramallah because he is imprisoned there by Israeli tanks, while his several tattered security forces scamper about trying to survive the destruction of their offices and barracks. To make matters worse, the Palestinian Islamists have played into Israel's relentless propaganda mills and its ever-ready military by occasional bursts of wantonly barbaric suicide bombings that finally forced Arafat in mid-December to turn his crippled security forces against Hamas and Islamic Jihad, arresting militants, closing offices, occasionally firing at and killing demonstrators. Every demand that Sharon makes, Arafat hastens to fulfil, even as Sharon makes still another one, provokes an incident, or simply says -- with US backing -- that he is unsatisfied, and that Arafat remains an "irrelevant" terrorist (whom he sadistically forbade from attending Christmas services in Bethlehem) whose main purpose in life is to kill Jews. To this logic-defying congeries of brutal assaults on the Palestinians, on the man who for better or worse is their leader, and on their already humiliated national existence, Arafat's baffling response has been to keep asking for a return to negotiations, as if Sharon's transparent campaign against even the possibility of negotiations wasn't actually happening, and as if the whole idea of the Oslo peace process hadn't already evaporated. What surprises me is that, except for a small number of Israelis (most recently David Grossman), no one comes out and says openly that Palestinians are being persecuted by Israel as its natives. A closer look at the Palestinian reality tells a somewhat more encouraging story. Recent polls have shown that between them, Arafat and his Islamist opponents (who refer to themselves unjustly as "the resistance") get somewhere between 40 and 45 per cent popular approval. This means that a silent majority of Palestinians is neither for the Authority's misplaced trust in Oslo (or for its lawless regime of corruption and repression) nor for Hamas's violence. Ever the resourceful tactician, Arafat has countered by delegating Dr Sari Nusseibeh, a Jerusalem notable, president of Al-Quds University, and Fatah stalwart, to make trial balloon speeches suggesting that if Israel were to be just a little nicer, the Palestinians might give up their right of return. In addition, a slew of Palestinian personalities close to the Authority (or, more accurately, whose activities have never been independent of the Authority) have signed statements and gone on tour with Israeli peace activists who are either out of power or otherwise seem ineffective as well as discredited. These dispiriting exercises are supposed to show the world that Palestinians are willing to make peace at any price, even to accommodate the military occupation. Arafat is still undefeated so far as his relentless eagerness to stay in power is concerned. Yet at some distance from all this, a new secular nationalist current is slowly emerging. It's too soon to call this a party or a bloc, but it is now a visible group with true independence and popular status. It counts Dr Haidar Abdel-Shafi and Dr Mustafa Barghouthi (not to be confused with his distant relative, Tanzim activist Marwan Barghouthi) among its ranks, along with Ibrahim Dakkak, Ziad Abu Amr, Ahmad Harb, Ali Jarbawi, Fouad Moghrabi, Legislative Council members Rawiya Al-Shawa and Kamal Shirafi, writers Hassan Khadr and Mahmoud Darwish, Raja Shehadeh, Rima Tarazi, Ghassan Al-Khatib, Nassir Aruri, Eliya Zureik and myself. In mid-December, a collective statement was issued that was well-covered in the Arab and European media (it went unmentioned in the US) calling for Palestinian unity and resistance and the unconditional end of Israeli military occupation, while keeping deliberately silent about returning to Oslo. We believe that negotiating an improvement in the occupation is tantamount to prolonging it. Peace can only come after the occupation ends. The declaration's boldest sections focus on the need to improve the internal Palestinian situation, above all to strengthen democracy; "rectify" the decision-making process (which is totally controlled by Arafat and his men); assert the need to restore the law's sovereignty and an independent judiciary; prevent the further misuse of public funds; and consolidate the functions of public institutions so as to give every citizen confidence in those that are expressly designed for public service. The final and most decisive demand calls for new parliamentary elections. However else this declaration may have been read, the fact that so many prominent independents with, for the most part, functioning health, educational, professional and labour organisations as their base have said these things was lost neither on other Palestinians (who saw it as the most trenchant critique yet of the Arafat regime) nor on the Israeli military. In addition, just as the Authority jumped to obey Sharon and Bush by rounding up the usual Islamist suspects, a non- violent International Solidarity Movement was launched by Dr Barghouthi that comprised about 550 European observers (several of them European parliament members) who flew in at their own expense. With them was a well-disciplined band of young Palestinians who, while disrupting Israeli troop and settler movement along with the Europeans, prevented rock-throwing or firing from the Palestinian side. This effectively froze out the Authority and the Islamists, and set the agenda for making Israel's occupation itself the focus of attention. All this occurred while the US was vetoing a Security Council resolution mandating an international group of unarmed observers to interpose themselves between the Israeli army and defenceless Palestinian civilians. The first result of this was that on 3 January, after Barghouthi held a press conference with about 20 Europeans in East Jerusalem, the Israelis arrested, detained and interrogated him twice, breaking his knee with rifle butts and injuring his head, on the pretext that he was disturbing the peace and had illegally entered Jerusalem (even though he was born in it and has a medical permit to enter it). None of this of course has deterred him or his supporters from continuing the non-violent struggle, which, I think, is certain to take control of the already too militarised Intifada, centre it nationally on ending occupation and settlements, and steer Palestinians toward statehood and peace. Israel has more to fear from someone like Barghouthi, who is a self-possessed, rational and respected Palestinian, than from the bearded Islamic radicals that Sharon loves to misrepresent as Israel's quintessential terrorist threat. All they do is to arrest him, which is typical of Sharon's bankrupt policy. So where is the Israeli and American left that is quick to condemn "violence" while saying not a word about the disgraceful and criminal occupation itself? I would seriously suggest that they should join brave activists like Jeff Halper and Louisa Morgantini at the barricades (literal and figurative), stand side by side with this major new secular Palestinian initiative, and start protesting the Israeli military methods that are directly subsidised by tax-payers and their dearly bought silence. Having for a year wrung their collective hands and complained about the absence of a Palestinian peace movement (since when does a militarily occupied people have responsibility for a peace movement?), the alleged peaceniks who can actually influence Israel's military have a clear political duty to organise against the occupation right now, unconditionally and without unseemly demands on the already laden Palestinians. Some of them have. Several hundred Israeli reservists have refused military duty in the occupied territories, and a whole spectrum of journalists, activists, academics and writers (including Amira Hass, Gideon Levy, David Grossman, Ilan Pappe, Dani Rabinowitz, and Uri Avnery) have kept up a steady attack on the criminal futility of Sharon's campaign against the Palestinian people. Ideally, there should be a similar chorus in the United States where, except for a tiny number of Jewish voices making public their outrage at Israel's military occupation, there is far too much complicity and drum-beating. The Israeli lobby has been temporarily successful in identifying the war against Bin Laden with Sharon's single-minded, collective assault on Arafat and his people. Unfortunately, the Arab American community is both too small and beleaguered as it tries to fend off the ever-expanding Ashcroft dragnet, racial profiling and curtailment of civil liberties here. Most urgently needed, therefore, is coordination between the various secular groups who support Palestinians, a people against whose mere presence, geographical dispersion (even more than Israeli depredations) is the major obstacle. To end the occupation and all that has gone with it is a clear enough imperative. Now let us do it. And Arab intellectuals needn't feel shy about actually joining in. From netwurker at hotkey.net.au Fri Jan 18 09:28:12 2002 From: netwurker at hotkey.net.au (][mez][) Date: Fri, 18 Jan 2002 14:58:12 +1100 Subject: [Reader-list] Announcing The Net.Wurk Series::_][ad][Dressed in a Skin C.ode_ Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20020118145807.03087720@pop.hotkey.net.au> The Net.Wurk Series:: _][ad][Dressed in a Skin C.ode_ http://www.cddc.vt.edu/host/netwurker/ ..is now available for viewing.........please pro.ceed 2 the first available life-browser::.... ...... [or alternatively, scan this pr][o.logue][ess release first::]...... >>_][ad][Dressed in a Skin Code_ holistically documents select phases of the mezangelle language system and its ][r][evolution [1995-2001]. the texts presented @ http://www.cddc.vt.edu/host/netwurker/ act as residual traces from net.wurk practices that thrive, react and shift according to fluctuations in the online environment in which they ][initially][ gestated. >>You have the option of viewing these net.wurks as singular _texts_ or selected _n.hanced_ packages. the _n.hanced_ wurks contain various interactive elements that require you [the user] to x.plore & x.tract meaning via mouseovers, clickable regions, audio fragments & x.tended "click-&-hold" areas. please be rigorous & patient during yr x.plorations. >>the_n.hanced_ net.wurks use javascript [please make sure it's enabled in your +4 browser] & Flash [please ensure you have the plugin] :: sound is [more than] relevant so please use your volume dial accordingly. if you can avoid using netscape 6 - 6.2 to view the wurks, do so - however, x.pect only slightly reduced functionality if viewing with netscape 6 - 6.2. >>Thanks to The Center for Digital Discourse and Culture for hosting _][ad][Dressed In a Skin C.ode_. This project has been funded by Connelly Temple & the Studio Residency Program @ Wollongong City Gallery, as well as being assisted by the Commonwealth Government through the Australia Council, its arts funding and advisory body. . . .... ..... net.wurker][mez][ .][E][mot][E][ion capt][l][ure.goes.here. xXXx ./. www.hotkey.net.au/~netwurker .... . .??? ....... -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20020118/5b5ad1cd/attachment.html From bhrigu at sarai.net Sun Jan 20 02:48:23 2002 From: bhrigu at sarai.net (Bhrigu) Date: Sun, 20 Jan 2002 02:48:23 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Politics and Democracy in Pakistan Message-ID: <02012002482301.01750@janta7.sarai.kit> Himal (South Asian) January 2002 Issue Pakistan OUR ENDANGERED SPECIES BY AQIL SHAH Noam Chomsky says humans are an “endangered species” and given the nature of their institutions, they are likely to destroy themselves in a fairly short time. When Chomsky was in Pakistan in late November 2001 to deliver the Distinguished Eqbal Ahmed Annual Lecture, I asked him about the survival prospects of civilian institutions and society in Pakistan, a ‘species’ endangered by the institutional hegemony of a pathologically powerful military establishment. With a curiosity unique to his razor sharp mind, Chomsky threw the ball right back at me: “Do you see any glimmer of hope?” In response, I inadvertently found myself playing the proverbial prophet of doom. At the turn of the new millennium, when most countries around the world have more or less accepted democracy as the best possible form of government, Pakistan is still grappling with unending praetorianism. After eleven years of electoral democracy in which power alternated between the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) and the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) often at the behest of the military, the generals seized direct control in October 1999. How did Pakistan get here? The roots of praetorianism date back to the early years of Independence when a host of external and internal factors combined to tilt the civil-military institutional equation in favour of the military. For one, a migrant political leadership lacking in a domestic political constituency continually resorted to extra-constitutional tactics to hold on to power. At the same time, the fledgling state prioritised national defence over critical development needs as it faced a hostile neighbourhood. Moreover, weak civilian administrations routinely fell back on the well-organised military to undertake even day-to-day civilian tasks. This reliance on the military gradually eroded respect for civilian authority among the men in khaki, spurring them to ‘save Pakistan’ at the slightest sign of political instability. The military ultimately emerged as a domineering vested interest in state and society. This superimposition of the military on vital aspects of civil and political life over the decades has stripped civilian authority of even its basic functions. Be it federal or provincial administrations, universities, examination boards, public utility corporations, state research institutions, the military has gradually ‘taken over’ in the name of promoting accountability and reducing corruption. Militarisation is not just limited to the public sector. Name a vital sector of the economy (logistics, public works, fertiliser, cement, sugar production) and the military runs it tax free, clearly undermining any chances of fair competition, besides crowding out scarce investment resources required for private sector development. Finance Ministry insiders also whisper of the financial rot within the military which, subject to little external scrutiny, claims a lion’s share of the government’s budget. The military’s unquestioned dominance of state affairs coupled with its holy cow public image allows it to act the untainted angel while holding its civilian counterparts accountable for their actions. For instance, under the current military regime’s much touted accountability process, civil officials and anti-military politicians are hauled up in the name of ‘fair account- ability’ while military officers are excluded under the convenient pretext of existing stringent internal accountability mechanisms. Desperate optimism The long-term effect of the military’s consolidation of civil and political affairs has been disastrous in other ways. Military rule has wrought pervasive deintellectualisation and depoliticisation on Pakistani society. The various factors have coalesced to tranquilise the society so that it is unable to tackle its internal contradictions, nor be aware of its due place in governing the country, or its inalienable right to challenge the state’s unlawful coercion. Thus far, the ‘attentive public’ has remained confined to the fringes of politics. “Politics is just not our business,” is the ingenuous reaction of most middle-class Pakistanis to all matters political, willing as they are to give the military the benefit of the doubt till an imaginary “leader with vision” shows up on the horizon. The public has been confused by the constant harping on the failures of elected governments by democracy’s influential detractors, liberal and otherwise. In the opinion of these detractors, eleven years of what General Pervez Musharraf calls “sham democracy” had worsened corruption in government, failed to ensure the rule of law, fanned ethnic and sectarian politics, undermined key state institutions, politicised the civil service and failed in implementing much-needed structural reforms. Hence, military intervention had become a necessary evil. Given Islamabad’s external threat perceptions, this acquiescence to the military’s political involvement is even understandable. But in this desperate optimism, Pakistanis have failed to realise that with each foray into politics the military develops its own political ambitions and usurps civilian poles of power. Military rulers, seeking political legitimacy, invariably play off ethnic, religious or other pro-military groups against mainstream political forces, thus creating a peculiar set of distortions in society. And in all fairness, the insecure elected governments have had little room to maneuver in the face of overwhelming policy constraints imposed by scarce government revenues, large debt and defence burdens, externally im posed harsh economic conditionalities, the needs of political give and take, and-- on top of it all— a military establishment with an exclusive control over crucial national defence, security and nuclear policies. Ironically, after two years in power the military remains as clueless about managing Pakistan’s complex governance crisis as were the “corrupt” politicians it replaced to “reconstruct real democracy”. Despite his self-important rhetoric of providing good governance, General Musharraf has set about the business of government by nakedly perverting the civilian share of the state, centralising power within a close-knit cohort of trusted senior military commanders, manipulating the political process in favour of pliant pro-military politicians, while brutally suppressing legitimate political opposition. The events of 11 September 2001 and the changed geo-political alignments have turned out to be a blessing in disguise for the general. The immediate needs of the war on terror have made a secure and stable dictatorship in Pakistan indispensable for the Americans. As expected, the international community’s calls for restoration of civilian rule have been pushed to the back burner. This outright international support gives the general-president complete control over the chessboard of Pakistani politics— in essence allowing him to create another period of ‘guided democracy’ in which the military determines who is fit to rule Pakistan. The million-rupee question is this: where does the country go from here? Given the almost universal failure of military experiments in Pakistan, it seems safe to argue that the country’s salvation rests on an uninterrupted political process. Political democracy, despite numerous imperfections, makes citizens sovereign. Their allegiance to the state is contingent on their willful agreement to the exercise of its legal and political imperatives. At least in theory, the state is not allowed to exercise these imperatives for its own sake, or for granting preferential advantage to dominant groups or classes. Representative and judicial institutions keep a check on the state’s arbitrariness. Democratic political processes, however, evolve slowly. Institutional checks and balances, that may take a long time to evolve, ensure that no leader takes the public for a ride and gets away with it. As a critical first step, the ‘attentive public’ of Pakistan must partake in politics. Indeed, the power of the state is so colossal that individual attempts to engage or challenge will be like crying in the wilderness. To be effective, societal political endeavours require the integrated support of a broad coalition of interests, and aggressive lobbying of the news media, political parties and Parliament too is critical. But all this can be done only if Pakistanis at home and abroad recognise that non-democratic experiments, whether military or civilian, are disastrous for the polity in the long run. Towards the end of our meeting, Chomsky was curious about the state of the Pakistani intelligentsia. “What role are they playing?” he asked, “Have they been able to reach out to the larger public?” Exiled, co-opted, harassed, or marginalized, I replied, intellectuals too are an “endangered species” in Pakistan. From hoomair at yahoo.com Sat Jan 19 01:49:02 2002 From: hoomair at yahoo.com (=?iso-8859-1?q?Omair=20Faizullah?=) Date: Fri, 18 Jan 2002 20:19:02 +0000 (GMT) Subject: [Reader-list] talkhiyaan In-Reply-To: <20011220165156.21248.qmail@mailweb10.rediffmail.com> Message-ID: <20020118201902.30203.qmail@web20709.mail.yahoo.com> Ah poverty --- my childhood nightmare and fear when in the coldest nights of December My cat was my hot water bottle and the moon was a bread. Coconut flower looked so delicious and edible----and God was nowhere to be found. And India where vultures are well fed and human corpses are undernourished. Where cow is worshiped and human are sacrificed Where human are carnivorous and animal are vegetarian. And Pakistan where confusion is reigned and wisdom is chained. Where religion rules and believers are fools Where people eyes are pecked everytime they want to see. Poets are hanging upside down looking at the world. Humans are fighting over land, which does not even belong to them. I had a cyber lay but how do you moan This world is too high tech for me. The world is a circus and Gandhi is a freak of the West - ShowTime Negro black colored African American ----confused. Lets go to America where roads are paved with gold and dollars are growing on the trees And United States of America is like a ship ----overloaded Ready to be drowned in her own filth. Close the borders close the borders. Animal rights activist wearing furs and buying animal food at pet mart. Rome was not built in one day and then again it was not Chicago either. History is the biggest lie people believe in And then make wars. You pick up children from a third world orphanage like a pet from anti cruelty society Those hand picked children are very lucky They will not starve to death. They will be kept in a golden cage. Thanks a million thanks. If you can not find anything to write Do some Muslim bashing buy a fatwa (every religious institution is for sale - for the right price) Create a controversy about freedom of speech and then shit on the paper People will buy it 'cause every one wants to be considered a serious reader. Screw the green peace and eat the whales and sharks before they eat you. Trade your pinstripe suit for a lungi and kurta and preach non-violence and vegetarianism And go to Kareem's hotel eat mutton and barra kabobs See all the depressing faces coming out of the jamia mosque after fajar prayer with Ali Baquer And run away to become a Hindu, go to a mandir and then run away to become a Christian, Go to church and run away again. Go to a synagogue to become a Jew and run away again to become A Buddhist. It is so fashionable but it is too Hollywood ----see no place to go ---long lines of believers And non-believers every where-----a mass confusion. ....... Third world is the slave colony of the first world Eliminating the second world The ants of the West let the slave larvae live with the mother. Our mothers are raising the army of slaves Do you ever think? We might be the reflection of what is under the soil ---- a perfect system of the colony of ants, which has not failed for the last 250 million years Are we programmed to work for a "Queen" named World Bank If the "life after" is the exact replica of this life Then where would people like you and I go? Ifti Nasim Chicago December,22nd,1997. From shohini at giasdl01.vsnl.net.in Sun Jan 20 10:38:49 2002 From: shohini at giasdl01.vsnl.net.in (shohini) Date: Sun, 20 Jan 2002 10:38:49 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] The Changing Moralscape of Calcutta Message-ID: <000001c1a1a6$0df6b680$9f74c8cb@shohini> Pride Walk with a Difference A report of Counsel Club's New Year Charity Walk Calcutta, December 30, 2001 Another New Year round the corner. Every heart seems to be singing melodiously to welcome it. The city seems to be dressed like a queen. We all expect another year of happiness, joy and prosperity. We wish others the same, our families, friends, colleagues and lovers. But what about the countless young living on the streets of the city? Would a New Year mean anything to them? Shouldn't it mean something? Something other than the daily struggle for survival! Counsel Club decided to make a difference, however small. Doing away with plans to hold its regular New Year's eve pay party (which usually attracts 60 to 70 LGBT people from all over eastern India), it decided to hold a charity walk for street children and their families. Donations upwards of Rs.100/- were collected from several members and friends of the group, all part of the vast network built over more than eight years of the group's existence. The money raised was used to purchase warm clothes for children and food items like rice, pulses, biscuits and sweets. Several people contributed old clothes as well, for both the young and the old. The idea was to walk down a six-kilometer stretch of south Calcutta, and distribute the clothes and food among the children and their families living on the pavements along the way. Several members of the group were disappointed at the cancellation of the party. Some of the walkers were also skeptical whether the walk would amount to anything. But when the day came, everybody had big smiles on their faces. The donation target had been exceeded, and far more clothes had been collected and bought than anticipated. Not to mention words of encouragement received from Counsel Club's supporters, both individuals and organizations, many from outside Calcutta's LGBT community! The clothes were packed into big jute bags, according to sex and age, while the food items were divided into separate packs for adults (rice, flour, pulses etc.) and children (biscuits, sweets etc.). It was a team of 15 men and women that gathered at the starting point in Gariahat. Four others joined the walk along the way. None of the friends from the media turned up, but a couple of the walkers had cameras and one had a camcorder to document the event. With pink ribbons (carrying Counsel Club's motto - "All roses are roses, but all roses are not red!") attracting the attention of passers-by as well as children, the walkers started off on their venture, little expecting the response awaiting them. It is one thing to pass by the poor dwelling on the pavements, wondering sympathetically how they manage to survive, quite another to interact with them, particularly when one is proposing to help them. First of all hunger and need do not allow for niceties like waiting in a queue. As it is that the children gathered at the starting point had guessed what the walkers intended to do. And news had spread down the road that something was in the offing. So when the distribution actually started, the walkers were all but mobbed by the children and their elders, everyone asking for something different all at the same time! It took a while before the walkers could gather their wits and start the distribution with some semblance of order. While the first distribution point was a completely new learning experience, it was at the second point that the walkers started enjoying their work. While it was sheer joy to see someone receive a sweater or a saree or a packet of rice and flour and walk away with a smile, it was also painful to disappoint some of the people as clothes fitting them were just not available. The best sight, however, was to see children jump with joy on receiving their food packets! Passing through Ballygunge Phari, Park Circus, Circus Avenue, Park Street, Royd Street, the walkers reached Free School Street, the end point. The first two distribution points had taken up almost 50% of the items to be given away. The remaining were given away all along the way, mostly to small groups of people and individuals. One man charmed all the walkers by putting on the sweater gifted him right away accompanied with a beaming toothless smile! That smile was infectious, for it was one big tired but happy family that settled down to tea and snacks at an eatery off Park Street at the end of a nearly three hour walk. Special toasts were raised for the walkers who had done most of the organizing work for the walk. There were many lessons learnt for similar efforts in future (for it was decided that such a walk should become an annual affair). It was felt that the distribution of clothes should be restricted to children, while the adults should be given food for the family. A more focused distribution would probably lead to fewer expectations remaining unfulfilled. Besides, more warm clothes should be distributed than ordinary ones, keeping in mind that it would be winter when the walk takes place again. Some people suggested that instead of a walk, a camp could also be organized, preferably in more than one place within and on the outskirts of the city. Also, more time should be kept in hand to organize such an event. This first walk had been organized in less than 10 days. With more time in hand, it would be possible to collect more money and clothes and the number of walkers would also be more, making the event more colourful and inspiring for those hesitating on the sidelines. Ringing out the old and ringing in the new with a thought for others was perhaps the best thing to do. One hopes that the walk does become an annual affair. An occasion to share joys and sorrow. An occasion also to show that the LGBT community believes in "gayness" for one and all, and not just for itself. Report prepared by : Arpan, Pawan (17/1/02) -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/attachments/20020120/0e2fe522/attachment.html From aiindex at mnet.fr Mon Jan 21 13:13:22 2002 From: aiindex at mnet.fr (Harsh Kapoor) Date: Mon, 21 Jan 2002 08:43:22 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] Mind your language at airport in Indian capital Message-ID: Mind your language at airport in Indian capital from Indo-Asian News Service New Delhi, Jan 20 (IANS) All they did was utter a word in Urdu that sounded like "missile," and two Indians at the airport here suddenly found themselves being bundled off by the police. With the attack on the Indian Parliament still fresh in people's minds, a terror mania is still doing the rounds of Delhi. Masood, a businessman from Rampur town in Uttar Pradesh, had come with a friend to receive his teacher at the Indira Gandhi International Airport here December 20, a week after the Parliament attack. The teacher was coming from Dubai. As the flight was delayed, Masood and his friends speculated the possible causes while waiting at the visitor's lounge. Masood told his friend in Urdu: "Wonder what 'masaail' (problems) would have happened. There are lots of 'masaail' in the airport. Customs clearance is one 'masaail' then there are other 'masaail'..." That's when an alert young man, Sameer, thought there was something fishy about the conversation, mistaking the word "masaail" for "missile." Sameer immediately told the police that the bearded Masood and his friend were talking about a "missile" at the airport. Within minutes the police zeroed in on Masood. A perplexed Masood pleaded that he did not know about any missile at the airport and explained that he had actually said "masaail," not "missile". But still the police reportedly handed them over to the Intelligence Bureau. Masood and his friend's fingerprints and photographs were taken from different angles. They were let off after nearly 12 hours. Sanjeev Gupta, a police officer at the airport, told IANS: "It was a minor thing. We just talked to them for a few hours. They were released after some clarification. We have to be vigilant given the kind of threat the city is facing. We cannot take a chance." --Indo-Asian News Service From zamrooda at sarai.net Mon Jan 21 16:08:17 2002 From: zamrooda at sarai.net (zamrooda) Date: Mon, 21 Jan 2002 16:08:17 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] video voyeurism Message-ID: <02012116081705.06860@legal.sarai.kit> Melissa traded keys with her neighbor, expecting her old childhood friend to keep an eye on the home when her family was away and use them only in an emergency. Instead, she and authorities contend, Steven Glover secretly installed a video camera in the attic above her and her husband's bedroom and later moved the camera into the bathroom. Prosecutors say Glover admitted to the taping, but he can't be prosecuted for it because Louisiana has no law against video voyeurism. It's a situation that some states, including Louisiana, are now beginning to address. "If I'm a Peeping Tom and look into your bedroom, I can be prosecuted," said Jerry Jones, the prosecutor in the Glover case. "If I put a video camera to do the same thing and I do not record sound, I am committing no crime." From aiindex at mnet.fr Tue Jan 22 03:08:14 2002 From: aiindex at mnet.fr (Harsh Kapoor) Date: Mon, 21 Jan 2002 22:38:14 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] Silicon Valley's Underbelly - High-tech's temp troops: Overworked, underpaid, essential Message-ID: San Francisco Chronicle Sunday, January 20, 2002 Silicon Valley's Underbelly High-tech's temp troops: Overworked, underpaid, essential Raj Jayadev At 5:30 a.m., not a lot of people are on the way to San Jose. A single- file strip of red taillights leads to what, cloaked by early morning darkness, easily could be a residential street but actually is the way to Hewlett- Packard's back property. I enter Building 535 and make my way to the production area. A supervisor named Ana immediately hands me off to the line mentor, Raquel. They are young Latinas, busy preparing the line for the workday. Ana doesn't look up from her desk. "Take him to box load," she says. Within two minutes, I'm at work on the assembly line for eight bucks an hour with no benefits. But a job is a job -- for as long as it lasts, anyway. It's the height of the high-tech boom. There's no better place to work than in Silicon Valley, where vast amounts of wealth are being made; the average wage is more than $75,000. But I quickly learn that the engine of the new economy is fueled by methods and labor practices more commonly associated with the old industrial era -- assembly plants, conveyer belts, physically demanding work and low pay. My team is assigned to cut open and pile boxes, to pull printers from stacks and place them on the conveyor belt. The work requires strong hands, quick feet and a flexible back. The machines are operated by loud gas pumps. The noise of their hissing and bumping is overwhelming at first, but after a while all the sounds seem to mute each other so you don't really hear any of them. On this day I put 800 foam bases in 800 cardboard boxes, then put 800 plastic bags over the 800 boxes. The events of this day alone are grounds to start a revolution. I move extra fast because Miguel is working next to me. Although Miguel is around my age, 23, he has worked at the plant for years and set his sights on a mentorship position that would elevate him to $10 an hour. Ambition fuels his speed, making him especially loud in demanding that others match his pace. I'm moving so fast I don't even have time to think. The cardboard boxes keep jabbing me, leaving a half dozen cuts on each hand. I find out later this is just part of the box-load job. Every new box loader realizes he should wear gloves. After he wears them for about a minute, he finds he can't open the plastic bags quickly enough. Seconds after this epiphany, the supervisor yells an inappropriately loud, "Come on, box load!" at which point the rookie puts down the gloves, gets cut repeatedly and never again tries to be innovative about his safety. By midday, I have learned to be mechanical. Although usually an undesirable state of being, it's one that you strive for on the line. Any disruption means a buildup of boxes and printer skeletons. Maybe the scanner isn't working or the boxes aren't coming out right but, whatever the reason, the pressure grows. People who have never spoken to me rain showers of, "What's the holdup?" from all down the line. The shouts have no malicious intent, and there is very little real curiosity; it's more a knee-jerk reaction. When I ask Barbara, a four-year veteran, about this, she explains: "They want to make target." Close to day's end, the line pauses. I am confused. My hands are idle, no work to do. I look down the line, and from my solar plexus, where my deep lungs sit, I yell, "What's the holdup?!" I can't explain why. Maybe I've learned to find comfort in the robotlike activity. A kink thrown into the motions awakens me to reality. It is strange when being reminded of your humanity is an insult. The recent economic downturn has done nothing to change an industry built on the backs of temp workers. For entry-level workers, all roads lead to the more than 200 temp agencies that have proliferated in Silicon Valley. According to the state Economic Development Department, 40,000 people were employed through temp agencies in Santa Clara County last year. That estimate is conservative. It doesn't take into account, for instance, the thousands of people who work directly for a company on temporary contracts. When Silicon Valley's bubble burst last year, temp workers were first to be fired. Analysts predict that as the economy picks up, as is currently predicted, more employers than ever will hire temps. On the supply end, many people will take whatever job becomes available as unemployment checks dry up. Their lives are hard, and for some temp workers I meet, about to get much harder. I get to know some of the more than 700 Manpower temp workers at HP. I learn that most folks are new -- to the country, to the city, or at least to the plant and this work. For some, this means they've moved from Los Angeles or another California city to booming Silicon Valley, where, according to word of mouth, jobs are opening up every day. For others, it means a move from politically torn homelands like Guatemala and Ethiopia. Housing costs in Silicon Valley are astronomical. Some workers live as far as 100 miles away. Patrick, an African American father of two, leaves Stockton at 3 a.m. to beat the traffic. I am amazed to learn there is a 4 a.m. rush hour. Patrick arrives at the plant around 4:30 and naps for an hour. Then he works until 2:30 p.m., clocks out, gets some coffee for the road and heads back to Stockton. He arrives around dinnertime if traffic is light. Esther, a veteran worker on my line, assembled Hewlett-Packard calculators in a plant in Cupertino from 1974 to 1977. I ask her what has changed. She says she is most struck by all the new shades of brown: Pacific Islanders, East Asians, South Asians and Africans have redefined the workforce and the culture of her plant, as well as of Santa Clara County. She hasn't seen much change in the work: the same assembly production, same hours, same pay. "Same pay?" I ask. "Yeah. I was pulling in about the same amount per week that I am now. Around $1,000 a month, except back then we had benefits, and HP would hire you permanent or let you go after 90 days." An African American woman, Barbara, has an unofficial (but unanimously accepted) leadership role on the line. Initially drawn by HP's reputation and good work standards, she worked at another of its plants for nine years and seven months. She had planned to stay until she completed a full 10 years in order to be eligible for retirement benefits. Five months before her decade was up, HP moved the plant out of the Bay Area (to a place where labor is cheaper), depriving her of her retirement and her permanent job. Barbara has been temping in this particular job for four years. She's what's known in the industry as a "perma-temp." No one on the line is supposed to talk. At the beginning of my second week, Robert is describing his weekend and our line supervisor, Ana, moves him to another part of the line. During breaks and lunch, people usually sit according to ethnic group so they can speak their native tongues. I don't speak the major native tongue (Hindi) of my ethnic group (Indian), so the first week, I sit blankly next to some South Asians who smile at me graciously now and then. This changes when I share my mother's food with them during lunch. Her cooking, apparently, is a lot more authentically Indian than I am. We quickly assume the roles of me as "beta" (young boy) and them as my honorary aunties and uncles, with all the resulting rights and responsibilities. Every conversation is capped with the kind and prodding advice to leave "this place." "Beta, you are young. This," they say, looking around disgustedly, "is no kind of life. You should go to school, then get a good job. You should learn computer science." I tell them I have some schooling, and that I will go back later. "Close the door -- shut it quick!" The guys in box load always manage to have fun at David's expense. His job is to tend to the machine that spits out the boxes I dress with plastic and foam. The machine looks like a one-man shack. When it breaks down, which is often, David has to enter it. A safety mechanism stops the machine from operating when its door is open. The guys joke about how they are going to close the door once David is inside. I picture a cartoon of David coming out looking like a Laser Jet printer box. Some of the guys start teasing. As usual, David erupts, but this time the argument escalates into a minor scuffle. Most folks are having a good time watching, welcoming the interruption of the monotonous day. Some goad David on. But Christopher, recently from Ethiopia, steps between the two brawlers, and they cool down. Ana, oblivious to this spontaneous ringside show, thinks we have stopped because we are tired, a sorry excuse. "Anyone who doesn't want to work can go home!" she shouts. I pull out my notebook and begin writing down what Ana has said, as I do after most supervisor power trips. My coworker Jivan asks, "What are you writing?" Jivan immigrated from southern India two years before. We have a running dialogue about life in India, and its differences from America. He declares, "You know, in India, workers would never stand for this!" Jivan runs through a flurry of tactics employees use to force management's hand. They put salt in machines to disrupt production output. They hold a garehoe, surrounding the higher-ups, not letting them leave until they agree to negotiate. They organize bandhs, city or even statewide strikes that paralyze all movement until worker demands are met. This technique was popularized in the struggle for independence from Britain and continues as a strategy against domestic oppression. I ask Jivan if we could take these actions in the United States, in Silicon Valley, maybe even at HP . . . "No, Raj," he says. "You need a union to do all that." Trust is one of the first casualties of temp work. It's replaced with suspicion, created by spontaneous layoffs, downsizings and messages left on answering machines saying your assignment is over. But fear of betrayal is not the only obstacle blocking temp workers from seeking improvements. Who exactly are the decision-makers? Assembling HP printers at an HP site would seem to make the target simple: Hewlett-Packard. But our checks say "Manpower," and Manpower says its boss is a company called MSL. These layers represent another key feature of the new economy: subcontracting. Subcontracting might be the strongest defense the top employer has against workers organizing, insulating the company from labor abuses in its own factories. The original puppeteer -- HP -- officially has no personnel at our plant. So complaints are directed at a management that is at most something like a ghost. The rumors of a line shutdown by management are like the slight breeze before a storm. The topic dominates the break-room discussion. The rumors coincide with complaints by employees who are getting systematically shorted on weekly paychecks. The strategic management response is certain: Never answer questions. A young mother named Kuldit, recently immigrated from Punjab, is missing a full week's pay, and the Manpower rep, Mark, looks annoyed whenever she asks him about it. The question travels from one end of the conveyer belt to the other: "Did the Indian lady get her money yet?" A couple minutes later, "Nah, Mark told her to check in next week." Later in the week, Ana calls a line meeting. I ask about the paycheck problems. She says to ask Mark. We decide to draft a letter to Manpower summarizing our concerns. The next day, Barbara looks it over and gives a thumbs-up. I tell her that it might be safer just to sign it "Manpower Employee" instead of identifying herself. She looks at me the way my mother does when I've said something especially foolish. She takes out a pen and signs her name, then gathers 10 more signatures. The letter becomes a petition, then develops into a plant-wide action. An impressive 70 out of 100 workers sign. Ten people volunteer to deliver the letter to Manpower, but in the end, just three of us go: Miguel and I from Line 1 and Joel from Line 3. We are all under 25 and people of color (they are from Mexico). Sue, the recruitment manager, is a Caucasian whose face is tense with rage, in combat mode from the moment she enters the room. Like a teacher who has found a cheat sheet, Sue tells us she has heard about the letter, as if this will foil our plans. "It was just a systems error!" she says. Joel and Miguel explain the hardships of shorted paychecks. Rent isn't paid. Checks bounce. We tell her we sympathize with Manpower's situation, but its actions are illegal. That takes some aggression out of Sue's voice. She tells us that "Manpower has been doing everything possible to fix the system," and that "everything will be back to normal soon." We take the petition with us, so that those brave enough to sign won't be punished. Almost every paycheck problem is resolved within two weeks, but the petition drive is a rubber band, stretched by workers wanting to express their rights. Unfortunately, the further the band is pulled, the stronger management snaps back. One day, I see Ana meeting with several people, very rare for her. Later, she calls Barbara over, and her words bring a smile to Barbara's face. When Barbara returns, she winks at me. "She was just telling me I had nothing to worry about if and when a line shutdown came," she says, "since she knew what a reliable worker I was." Barbara sees right through the ploy to defuse further group action. Then Ana begins calling on people who had been particularly insistent about meeting with managers. She tells them they are on a "hot list" to be fired. One more problem will result in their termination. The hot list is soon the talk of the line, and by lunchtime everyone has an opinion about who is on the list and why. The tactic is already working. Linda, for example, tells me: "I saw Raquel staring at me. I'm not gonna say anything anymore." That Wednesday, Mark says he wants to tell me about a job, elsewhere, for $10 an hour. He tells me to call Susan, another manager, to find out more details. I do, hoping to also get a place for my friend Thomas, but during our talk, Susan reveals that only people on the layoff list are getting referred for these jobs. I go back to Mark. "So I guess I am getting laid off?" He looks sheepish. "Layoff list? I've never seen it. Let me ask around." He avoids me until the next day. When I finally corner him, he says, "Oh, Raj, yeah, I am still trying to get ahold of that list." "I just want to know if I should be saying goodbye to my friends." "I will talk to Ana today," he promises. Mark drags up to me later that day and says, almost apologetically, "MSL policy won't allow us to say. If I tell you anything, they will come down on me." When I get home, a nice woman from Manpower calls to tell me my assignment has ended and that I need to hand in my badge. "Do you know why my assignment was ended?" "No, I'm sorry, I wasn't given that information." "Could I ask the supervisor at the plant?" "No, you are not supposed to have any contact with anyone from the plant anymore. When you return your badge, please do so at our main office, not the plant." I receive one more phone call that night. It's from Kuldit, the coworker who complained about the missing paycheck. She too has received the phone call from Manpower. Raj Jayadev is editor of siliconvalleydebug.com, a Web magazine sponsored by Pacific News Service devoted to improving working conditions in Silicon Valley. Jayadev worked at Hewlett Packard for six months in 1999. A version of this article originally appeared in To-Do List magazine. ©2002 San Francisco Chronicle Page D - 1 -- From announcements-request at sarai.net Tue Jan 22 11:12:36 2002 From: announcements-request at sarai.net (announcements-request at sarai.net) Date: Tue, 22 Jan 2002 06:42:36 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] Announcements digest, Vol 1 #11 - 1 msg Message-ID: <200201220542.GAA07164@zelda.intra.waag.org> Send Announcements mailing list submissions to announcements at sarai.net To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to announcements-request at sarai.net You can reach the person managing the list at announcements-admin at sarai.net When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific than "Re: Contents of Announcements digest..." Today's Topics: 1. Talk by Arjun Appadurai (PUKAR) --__--__-- Message: 1 Date: Mon, 21 Jan 2002 14:08:16 +0530 To: SARAI Media Initiative:; From: PUKAR Subject: [Announcements] Talk by Arjun Appadurai The P.E.N. ALL-INDIA CENTRE and PUKAR (Partners For Urban Knowledge Action & Research, Mumbai) invite you, with your friends, to 'War, Terror and Identity: Disciplinary Lines of Control' A Talk by ARJUN APPADURAI Date: Thursday, 31 January 2002 Time: 6:15 pm Venue: The ULT Library Theosophy Hall (third floor) 40, New Marine Lines Churchgate Bombay 400 020 : ALL ARE WELCOME : Arjun Appadurai is Samuel N. Harper Distinguished Service Professor at the University of Chicago, where he teaches in the Departments of Anthropology and South Asian Languages and Civilizations. He is also Director of the Globalization Project at the University of Chicago. Professor Appadurai was born in Bombay, where he graduated from St. Xavier's High School and took hisIntermediate Arts degree from Elphinstone College before leaving for the United States. He took his B.A. from Brandeis University in 1967, and his M.A. and Ph.D(1976) from the University of Chicago. He is the author of numerous books and articles in scholarly journals. His most recent book is Modernity at Large: Cultural Dimensions of Globalization, (1996,University of Minnesota Press; 1997, Oxford University Press, Delhi). His previous scholarly publications have covered such topics as religion, cuisine, agriculture and mass culture in India. Professor Appadurai is one of the founding editors, with Carol A. Breckenridge, of the journal Public Culture, and was the founding Director of the Chicago Humanities Institute at the University of Chicago (1992-1998), during which time he held the Richard J. and Barbara E. Franke Professorship. He is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He serves or has served on numerous national and international advisory bodies, including the advisory council of the Smithsonian Institute, and the governing boards of: the Institute for Cultural Pluralism (Rio de Janeiro), the Research Center for Religion and Society (Amsterdam), Amsterdam School for Social Science Research, and the Social Science Research Council (New York). He has served or is serving as a consultant or advisor to a wide range of public and private organizations, including the Ford Foundation, UNESCO and the World Bank. His current research has three foci: ethnic violence in the context of globalization, with a special focus on ethnic relations in Mumbai in the late 1980s and 1990s; a longer term collaborative project on the cultural dimensions of social crisis in Mumbai, focusing on housing, poverty, media and violence; and a comparative ethnographic project on grass-roots globalization, intended to illuminate emergent transnational organizational forms and new practices of sovereignty. _____ PUKAR (Partners for Urban Knowledge Action & Research) P.O. Box 5627 Dadar, Mumbai 400014, India E-Mail Phone +91 98200.45529, +91 98204.04010 Web Site http://www.pukar.org.in/ --__--__-- _______________________________________________ Announcements mailing list Announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements End of Announcements Digest From ranita at sarai.net Tue Jan 22 18:42:14 2002 From: ranita at sarai.net (Ranita Chatterjee) Date: Tue, 22 Jan 2002 18:42:14 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Archive on the Public Domain Message-ID: <02012218421402.00948@saumya.sarai.kit> Dear Readers, SARAI is building a digital archive on the Public Domain. We welcome suggestions, ideas and contributions through articles, links and readings on the Public Domain. You could mail your suggestions to ranita at sarai.net or tripta at sarai.net. For starters I'm enclosing a link that provides a comprehensive collection of articles on thinking about the public domain. Cheers Ranita. From geert at desk.nl Wed Jan 23 07:07:13 2002 From: geert at desk.nl (geert lovink) Date: Wed, 23 Jan 2002 12:37:13 +1100 Subject: [Reader-list] RICK PERLSTEIN: THINKERS IN NEED OF PUBLISHERS (NYT) References: <02012218421402.00948@saumya.sarai.kit> Message-ID: <075c01c1a3ae$822feb20$bade3dca@geert> not a problem anymore for those who contributed to the second sarai reader, which is now in the making! ciao, geert --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Copyright 2002 The New York Times Company --------------------------------------------------------------------------- http://www.nytimes.com/2002/01/22/opinion/22PERL.html January 22, 2002 THINKERS IN NEED OF PUBLISHERS By RICK PERLSTEIN Every semester brings a new symposium, every season a new book, every Sunday a new furrowed-brow disquisition. The topic is "public intellectuals" -- writers and thinkers who address a general audience on matters of broad public concern -- and the theme is decline. Russell Jacoby, who coined the phrase, delivered the consensus judgment in the title of his 1987 book, "The Last Intellectuals: American Culture in the Age of Academe": There are none to speak of. And as Mr. Jacoby noted in the splashy 2000 edition, "Happenings since its publication do not cause me to revise its main points." The old lament is now back under the elegiac title "Public Intellectuals: A Study of Decline," a book by the federal judge Richard A. Posner, a senior lecturer at the University of Chicago's law school. Why, the question runs, are there no more public intellectuals? Ever the gentlemen, both of these authors claim to indict impersonal forces: for Russell Jacoby, the disappearance of cheap bohemian neighborhoods; for Richard Posner, a technical failure in the intellectual- services marketplace. But in the final analysis both end up tacitly playing the same blame game. Once giants roamed the earth: George Orwell and Dwight Macdonald, C. Wright Mills and Lewis Mumford, Hannah Arendt and Lionel Trilling, smart people writing for ordinary people, openly and unashamedly, on issues people care about. And now? Nothing save the gusts of postmodern academics and the ill- informed bleats of publicity-hound law professors. The previous generations of non-university intellectuals, the Jacoby-Posner story line goes, were made of sterner moral stuff. "A literate, indeed hungry public still exists," Mr. Jacoby writes in the 2000 edition of "The Last Intellectuals." "What is lacking is the will and ability to address it." I would like to interrupt this bit of rote programming. Where are all the public intellectuals? A well- stroked three-wood aimed out my Brooklyn window could easily hit half a dozen. In one direction: an author of two literary, daring and original travelogues about life on the cusp between wilderness and civilization, who is also a gifted miniaturist of the city à la Joseph Mitchell. In another direction: an erudite and fearless muckraker whose freelance exposés of international rogues and investigation of the corporate takeover of American universities are but two achievements of a young career spent writing on just about everything under the sun. In still another direction: the editor of a searing (self-published) magazine of media criticism, at work on a critical study on the history of advertising. And a freelancer who has just come out with a rattling new study on the depredations of the American prison system. And there are more than a few impressive young literary critics and cultural reporters in my neighborhood, too, one of whom also happens to be a smashingly effective film critic. These are just a few people I know. My Brooklyn neighborhood happens to be unusually well stocked with but-for-the-name public intellectuals. But they are plentiful in other cities: young men and women without university affiliations, who rendezvous in barroom salons, are under 40, practice exacting self-discipline and don't sell out. All can hold their own with professors in one or more areas of expertise. If you read widely you have read them, even the ones who have yet to find much public success: in the dwindling numbers of newspaper book reviews, in the corners of the Sunday paper labeled "Insight" or "Outlook"; in one of the few quarterly magazines that still pay something or one of the few magazines that publish writing on serious issues. But are they equal to any from those golden generations -- the Orwells, Mumfords, Paul Goodmans? Are they great, or potentially great? To attempt an answer would be foolish. For what is on display in most debates about public intellectuals is nostalgia, and nostalgia is systematically cruel to the present. We only remember those who pass the test of time: the stars. Then, in our minds we remake the past in these lions' images. Here in the unruly present, however, we are thrown back on nothing more than our critical discernment to make judgments. It's also hard to judge because it isn't fashionable to look for young intellectual talent any more. People once believed there were notable independent intellectuals because they were instructed to seek out and prize them. "The most brilliant young critic of our day," trumpeted the cover of Norman Podhoretz's first book, an anthology of essays that was published when he was 33. There is no such trumpeting today, partly because there are no such anthologies being published today. I can think of several brilliant young critics who deserve them. The story I'm telling is really one of extraordinary resilience and willpower. Just try, as many young writers do, to support yourself writing book reviews. You can still string together enough income for a rice- and-beans year from what you can turn out in cultural essays for newspapers and semi-prominent magazines: maybe 30 pieces, probably averaging about $400 each. You can even end up, after a few or more faithful years, with a middle-class sinecure at some publication, perhaps with the perquisite of a year's leave to write a book someday, maybe even to become some future generation's intellectual giant from the good old days. But the farm teams are folding. In the 90's, future household names were writing regularly for magazines like Lingua Franca and Feedmag.com. Both ceased publication last year, as did several book-review sections. Other regular outlets have cut back precipitously -- paying less, shutting out new voices. Academia, once a potential solace, is out: at the professional conferences these days new Ph.D.'s walk around with a kicked-in-the-teeth look. The non-Ph.D.'s, of course, are not even in the game. And still they write. That's the thing. The fact is that there are no "last intellectuals." The will and ability to write smartly and well for a general audience seems to be indomitable. The intellectuals are there; the public need not feel starved; we need no more jeremiads. What today's public intellectuals need are publishers, and maybe a few publicists, too. ------- Rick Perlstein is author of "Before the Storm: Barry Goldwater and the Unmaking of the American Consensus." From zamrooda at sarai.net Wed Jan 23 11:54:10 2002 From: zamrooda at sarai.net (zamrooda) Date: Wed, 23 Jan 2002 11:54:10 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] video voyeurism Message-ID: <02012311541000.01324@legal.sarai.kit> Melissa traded keys with her neighbor, expecting her old childhood friend to keep an eye on the home when her family was away and use them only in an emergency. Instead, she and authorities contend, Steven Glover secretly installed a video camera in the attic above her and her husband's bedroom and later moved the camera into the bathroom. Prosecutors say Glover admitted to the taping, but he can't be prosecuted for it because Louisiana has no law against video voyeurism. It's a situation that some states, including Louisiana, are now beginning to address. "If I'm a Peeping Tom and look into your bedroom, I can be prosecuted," said Jerry Jones, the prosecutor in the Glover case. "If I put a video camera to do the same thing and I do not record sound, I am committing no crime." From jskohli123 at yahoo.com Mon Jan 21 00:49:43 2002 From: jskohli123 at yahoo.com (Jaswinder Singh Kohli) Date: Mon, 21 Jan 2002 00:49:43 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] A Cop in Every Computer Message-ID: <3C4B184F.F3403AD@yahoo.com> A Cop in Every Computer The content and technology industries differ over an initiative that would build infringement-sniffing powers into new computers Mike Godwin IP Worldwide January 16, 2002 There's a war looming in cyberspace over copyright. The war will not be about whether to combat the spread of unauthorized copies of computer programs, music or movies. On that point, the combatants agree. This will be a war about tactics and solutions. The content industry -- especially Hollywood and the record labels -- wants the solution built into computers and other digital devices, such as Palm Pilots and MP3 players. The industry also wants it built into software, operating systems, Web browsers, and routers -- the devices that guide Internet traffic. It's a solution designed around the assumption that nearly all computer and Internet users are potential large-scale infringers. In short: The content industry wants to place a copyright cop in your computer. It also wants to station one anyplace else on the Internet where an unauthorized copy might be made. And if the industry has its way, we all may feel the consequences. Digital videos you shot in 1999 may be unplayable on your computer in 2009. You may no longer be able to move music or video files around easily from one computer to another (from, say, a home desktop to a laptop or to a personal digital assistant). The content companies, on the other hand, see something different at stake. In a speech before Congress in 2000, Michael Eisner, chief executive of The Walt Disney Co., voiced the worries of the content industry when he said that "the future of the American entertainment industry [and] the future of American consumer" is at stake over the issue. The content companies, with Eisner in the lead, argue that failure to build copy protection into the very digital environment itself will lead to their industry's destruction. In previous battles over copyright, Hollywood and the large record labels have received the full support of their powerful friends in the software and computer industry. But this time, many of the high-tech companies are on the other side. They're satisfied that current law -- rather than future Rube Goldberg design mandates -- can do the trick. "We think mandating these protections is an abysmally stupid idea," says Emery Simon, special counsel to the Business Software Alliance (BSA), an antipiracy trade group whose members include the Adobe, Microsoft, Intel and IBM corporations. A recent legislative proposal floated by Fritz Hollings, D-S.C., chairman of the Senate commerce committee, is the most public manifestation of the content industry's struggle. The Hollings bill, called the Security System Standards and Certification Act (SSSCA), makes it a civil offense to make or sell digital technologies that do not contain what it calls "certified security technologies," built-in systems that prevent the copying of content. Draft versions of the legislation, which hasn't yet been formally introduced, also would impose criminal penalties -- up to five years in prison -- upon anyone who alters existing security technologies or disables copy protection mechanisms. There's more than one way to prevent copying of copyrighted content. Various approaches, sometimes referred to as digital-rights management schemes, exist. One general method, called encryption, involves scrambling content in a "digital envelope." Encryption is what protects DVD movie and video game software from piracy. But the content industry wants to do more than just protect content. If encryption is broken -- and hackers are often able to break it -- content is free to be copied. To prevent this, the industry wants content to be labeled or digitally "watermarked," and it wants computers and other devices to be redesigned to look for the watermark, and to limit copying accordingly. Supporters of the Hollings proposal don't couch the legislation in terms of protecting embattled copyright interests. They frame it as a measure designed to promote digital content and the use of broadband, high-speed Internet services. If Hollywood could be assured that its content would be protected on the broadband Internet, the argument goes, it would develop more compelling programs for the Web and spur greater consumer demand for broadband. An aide to the Senate commerce committee says there are likely to be hearings on the bill as early as February 2002; hearings that had been set for fall of 2001 were postponed because of the Senate anthrax scare. Back in 1998, Hollywood, record labels and software and technology companies came together to support the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. That act -- now law -- prohibited the creation, dissemination, and use of tools that circumvent digital-rights management technologies. There won't be a similar broad-based coalition behind anything like the Hollings bill. Software and technology companies simply aren't ready for a state-ordered restructuring of their entire industrial sector. In remarks made in December at a business technology conference in Washington, D.C., Intel Corp. chief executive Craig Barrett spoke out against legislation like the Hollings bill. Let the private sector work out its own systems for protecting copyright, Barrett said. A few companies are so big and so diverse that they don't fall easily into the content or technology camp. AOL Time Warner, for example, is conflicted. The movie companies and other content producers under the AOL Time Warner umbrella tend to favor efforts that lock down cyberspace, but AOL itself and some of the company's cable subsidiaries oppose compulsory designs. "We like the DMCA," says Jill Lesser, AOL Time Warner's senior vice president for domestic public policy. "There isn't from our perspective a need for additional remedies of copyright violations." Broad as it is, the Hollings proposal is only one small part of a global effort to make the digital world safe for copyrighted materials. Standards groups, industry gatherings and global business policy forums are all working to create industrywide standards that don't require the approval of lawmakers. A group called 4C Entity is promoting a standard for building digital rights management into digital storage devices, such as hard drives and possibly writable CD-ROM drives (the devices that copy CD-ROMs). The 5C Consortium is developing a copy protection standard for digital television, and interindustry forums like the Content Protection Technology Working Group are also working on digital TV. But the content industry complains that the standard-setting process is proceeding at a tortoise's pace. The Hollings bill is meant to speed up the process, acting as a lever to compel the technology companies to negotiate more and faster. The movie and TV studios are trying to ward off a possible Napster-like scenario. Though the free music-sharing service is now gone, other file-sharing systems, more decentralized and less easy to sue, remain. And Napster's legacy still casts a shadow over the music industry -- and on the content owners as a whole. A technology expert at News Corporation says that Napster signals the music industry's downfall. Music fans are now accustomed to copying CDs with CD burners, and downloading music from the Internet as MP3 files. "Within five years," the expert says, "music will be a cottage industry." Rubbish, responds Matthew Gerson, the vice president for public policy at Vivendi Universal S.A., which produces and sells both music (Universal Music Group) and movies (Universal Studios Inc.). "We know that if we build a safe, consumer-friendly site that has all the bells and whistles and features that music fans want, it will flourish," Gerson says. "Fans will have no trouble paying for the music that they love, and compensating the artists who bring it to them -- established stars as well as the new voices the labels introduce year after year." But maintaining that model -- with the record label serving as the conduit between creation and consumption -- depends both on large streams of revenue and on control of copyrighted works. The Internet and digital technology could cut off the revenue stream by moving music consumers to a world in which trading music online for free is the norm. The record labels and the movie and TV studios see watermarks -- undetectable yet traceable digital imprints -- as their way to prevent a future world of widespread trading in free music, movies, and other types of content. How would those watermarks work? For an example, let's use digital television, a nascent technology that transmits high-quality television broadcasts using a digital, rather than an analog, signal. A digital broadcast would include a watermark that identifies the content as copyrighted and might contain certain instructions. Devices and software designed according to the content-industry's mandate would look for the watermark. Those devices, in turn, would have strict limitations built in as to whether, and how often, a copy of that broadcast could be made. The reverse might also be true: Those components might be designed not to play un-watermarked content. Otherwise, it would only encourage pirates to learn how to strip out the watermarks. In a world in which all consumer digital technology looks for watermarks, our legacy digital videos and MP3 collections might no longer be playable. Digital television is the most pressing worry. Unlike DVD movies, which are encrypted on disc and decrypted every time they're played, digital broadcast television must be delivered unscrambled. The Federal Communications Commission requires that broadcast television be sent in the clear as a matter of public policy. The prospect of high-quality, unencrypted content, delivered digitally, scares Hollywood. Without watermarking, consumers could simply record their favorite shows, trade them with friends, or -- worst of all -- make them available on the Internet, à la Napster. Content owners are also worried about the computer as it becomes not just a stand-alone device but also a component within the overall home entertainment system. Says the BSA's Simon: "That's the multipurpose device that has them terrified." The fear is that computers will leak copyrighted content all over the world, he says. And that, says Simon, is why the Hollings legislation is so broadly drafted. It's designed to close up all the leaks that digital technology might pose. In the drafts made available in the fall of 2001, the Hollings bill would make it a civil offense to develop a new computer or related technology that does not include a federally approved security standard preventing the unlicensed copying of copyrighted works. In at least one version, the law would make it a felony to remove a watermark or flag from copyrighted content. It would also outlaw logging onto the Internet with any computer that removes or sidesteps the copy protection technology. Before the draft legislation was circulated, "we didn't know how broad this was," says one lawyer for cable company interests. Many cable companies are worried that the measure will interfere with their customers' viewing experience. Although the Hollings legislation is controversial, its supporters are working to garner support. Preston Padden, the executive vice president for government relations for Disney, traces the origins of the bill to the Global Business Dialog on e-Commerce, a public policy group whose members come from a wide range of businesses. The group's IP subcommittee is chaired by Eisner, who, after much give and take with software and computer companies, shepherded through language favoring government "facilitation" of copyright protection standards. With the group's recommendations in hand, Eisner could go to Congress and say there was a general business consensus favoring the passage of new laws to protect content on the Internet. But there is a big difference between what that group generally recommended and what the Hollings bill specifically proposes. The devil will be in the details. IBM, Microsoft and other technology companies are all developing their own ways of protecting copyright. Their digital rights management schemes are generally based on encryption, not watermarks. These companies don't want design mandates, which would effectively kill a market they are poised to exploit. Moreover, technology companies have a "philosophical problem" with being told how to build their technologies, says Disney's Padden. With the exception of export controls on encryption, the computer and software industry does not have much experience with government mandates. Not surprisingly, Rick Lane, News Corp.'s vice president for governmental affairs, and the other content industry lawyers think that the computer companies need to get over it. After all, mandates have been a fact of life for the consumer electronics industry -- particularly radio and television equipment -- for decades. Forty years ago, for example, the government told television makers to build UHF-reception capability into all new TVs. The real problem runs deeper than mere resistance to government control. There's a philosophical difference that separates the content industry from the technology companies. You can see that difference in the way each industry refers to its customers. The content companies refer to "consumers," while the tech industry refers to "users." If you see a world of "consumers," your major concern is setting prices at the right level, so that buyers will purchase your products -- while you still make money. You control access to your merchandise, and do everything you can to prevent theft. For the same reason that supermarkets have cameras by the door and bookstores have electronic theft detectors, content companies want copy protection to prevent theft of their wares. Allowing people to take stuff for free is inconsistent with their business model. But if you see a world of "users," you want to give that market more features and powers for less money. The impulse to empower users was at the heart of the microcomputer revolution. Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak, for example, founded Apple Computer Inc. partly because they wanted to put computing power into ordinary people's hands. Redesigning the world of digital tools so that every device, application and operating system is on the lookout for copyrighted works is at odds with that view. What gets lost in the debate is the voice of consumers -- whatever they are called. Maybe they are willing to trade away open, robust, relatively simple digital tools for a more constrained digital world in which they have more content choices. But maybe they aren't. The Hollings bill is unlikely to attract them to the debate, pitched as a "security standard" rather than as a new copyright law. Like the larger philosophical war that is raging around the world in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks, the looming war between these two sides has the potential to be a long, difficult fight without a foreseeable conclusion. And if and when peace talks begin between the two sides, there's no guarantee that the rest of us will have a seat at the table. taken from www.law.com -- Regards Jaswinder Singh Kohli jskohli at fig.org :::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: The Uni(multi)verse is a figment of its own imagination. In truth time is but an illusion of 3D frequency grid programs. From jskohli123 at yahoo.com Mon Jan 21 00:50:59 2002 From: jskohli123 at yahoo.com (Jaswinder Singh Kohli) Date: Mon, 21 Jan 2002 00:50:59 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Phillips moves to put 'poison' label on protected audio CDs Message-ID: <3C4B189B.5A40B2CA@yahoo.com> Philips moves to put 'poison' label on protected audio CDs By John Lettice Posted: 18/01/2002 at 13:19 GMT Netherlands giant Philips Electronics has lobbed a grenade into the audio copy protection arena by insisting that that CDs including anti-copying technology should bear what is effectively a plague warning. They should in Philips' view clearly inform users that they are copy-protected, and they shouldn't use the "Compact Disc" logo because they are not, in Philips' considered view, proper compact discs at all. The Philips move comes as the major record companies start to introduce copy-protection as quietly as they can. Unfortunate incidents such as Bertelsmann's Natalie Imbruglia lash-up have had the humorously opposite effect, widely publicising copy-protected CDs as poison packages to be avoided at all costs, and they've also clearly had an effect on Philips' thinking. As custodian of the standard, the company has decided it will oppose anything that will degrade it, and detract from the consumer's experience of it. But we mustn't at this juncture run away with the notion that :Philips is going to fight a long-term heroic battle from the standpoint of the company that supports our MP3s. So far, it is opposing the copy protection technology because it is "troublesome and cumbersome," not because it thinks an audio free-for-all should be maintained (well, it wouldn't think that, would it?) That probably means that Philips will act to impede the introduction of the flakier copy-protection mechanisms, but that as and when technology that doesn't break things is available, it may be open to cutting a deal with the record companies. Even that, however, is a serious set-back for the music industry's plans, because practically every test CD they're putting out now will have to be relabelled in some way. The labelling itself will be an interesting issue. It's not clear that Philips could require protected CDs to be prominently labelled as such, and although it can force the removal of the logo, you'll note that this is generally on the CD itself, inside the packaging, so you're probably not going to get a prominent skull and crossbones to prompt you to pass on to the next rack in the store. Philips might however be able to argue that companies are "passing off" by selling something that consumers think is a CD, but isn't. Meanwhile, the second barrel of the Philips shotgun is CD burning. In a Reuters interview Gerry Wirtz, general manager of Philips' copyright office, said that the company would be building CD burners that can read and burn copy protected CDs. He argues that the protection system is not a protection system as such, but simply a mechanism for stopping the playback of music. This interesting claim allows him to contend that the protection systems are not covered by the Digital Millenium Copyright Act, and lays the ground for the mother of all sue-fests with the number of large and rich companies who are most certainly not going to agree with him. Tin hats all round taken from theregister.co.uk -- Regards Jaswinder Singh Kohli jskohli at fig.org :::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: The Uni(multi)verse is a figment of its own imagination. In truth time is but an illusion of 3D frequency grid programs. From aiindex at mnet.fr Wed Jan 23 18:13:18 2002 From: aiindex at mnet.fr (Harsh Kapoor) Date: Wed, 23 Jan 2002 13:43:18 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] God needs to get New Message-ID: God needs to get New Tony Benn Wednesday January 23, 2002 The Guardian (UK) The announcement that the Church of England is to be privatised has been welcomed by the CBI, the World Trade Organisation and the Central Bank in Frankfurt as a bold new initiative to bring religion closer to the consumers, which is how congregations are described in the white paper, New Christians, launched in Westminster Abbey yesterday. Speaking at a press conference, the prime minister explained that the success of the policy would have to be judged mainly in terms of the new resources that a public-private partnership would make available for the renewal of the church, which had suffered from falling attendance for many years. Christos, one of the biggest multinational corporations in the world, based in Los Angeles and already well-known for its success in the arms trade, has offered to invest billions in this "exciting project" and provide a new management able to make fuller use of the assets now owned by the church. Graveyards are to be cleared and returfed for sporting events and pop concerts, but the headstones will be carefully preserved and sold to bereaved families to keep at home, instead of having to go out to see them at the weekends. Consultants are already at work assessing ways in which church property could be developed and have begun discussions with the new minister appointed to conduct the negotiations on behalf of the archbishop. The new Department for Excellence in Anglican Development (Dead) has modernised the 10 comandments. Two redrafts of existing commandments have aroused a great deal of interest: "Though shalt not kill" has had these words added by the Ministry of Defence: "unless ordered to do so", and "Thou shalt honour thy mother and father" has been amended by the Treasury to add: "by seeing that the cost of their care in old age does not fall upon the state". Prayer books are to be reprinted with advertisements and both Pret a Manger and McDonald's have commissioned leading designers to provide suitable copy to accompany the Holy Communion. Churches are to be opened for commercial performances and Madonna is to be asked to sing next Christmas, with tickets priced in euros to help familiarise the audience with the new currency before it is introduced in Britain. Confession is now to be made much more widely available by putting it on TV, after the success of the Jerry Springer and Kilroy shows, where people have opened up about their private lives, and the high ratings have proved how popular sin can be with a national audience. When a vacancy for a bishop, or archbishop occurs, any individual will be free to put in a bid and it is hoped that many people in the City of London, who may never have thought of a career as a New Christian, might be tempted to test their entrepreneurial skills in a completely new field, while continuing to enjoy comparable financial rewards. The synod will be replaced by a focus group which specialises in the needs of the market to test public reactions to sermons before they are delivered; to maintain the non-political nature of the church, none will deal with controversial issues such as peace or social justice. In a clear statement of the need for responsibility and accountability, the prime minister has decided to set up a new regulatory body, Ofgod, to name and shame ministers who have failed to live up to the high standards expected. Chris Woodhead is to be asked to take it on, following his success at Ofsted. Lord Birt, whose experience at the BBC in privatising its services won the respect of broadcasters, is to be appointed to Number 10 as the prime minister's spiritual adviser, with the task of seeing that standards of management are maintained at the same level we have seen in Railtrack and other public services moved into the private sector. Critics have been dismissed as dinosaurs who are living in the past and reminded on many occasions that we must live in the real world and try to forget the Old Christians who are always harping on about Bethlehem and Jerusalem, which simply do not interest the younger generation and are responsible for the decline of religion in modern Britain. One New Labour minister, speaking on Newsnight, summed it all up by saying: "Jesus drove the money changers out of the Temple, but as a business-friendly government, we are trying to get them back in there." Here again Britain is now in the lead and the prime minister's decision to visit the Vatican to persuade the Pope to follow suit has been hailed as a new example of his global leadership and determination to put Britain at the heart of Europe. tony at tbenn.fsnet.co.uk -- From jeebesh at sarai.net Thu Jan 24 13:07:04 2002 From: jeebesh at sarai.net (Jeebesh Bagchi) Date: Thu, 24 Jan 2002 13:07:04 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Commons to Enclosures - Tragedy or Comedy Message-ID: <02012413070403.00899@pinki.sarai.kit> `The Enclosure Movement` - the process of fencing off commons (primarily began with land, later water, forests etc got added to the ever hungry list) and bringing in regimes of complicated property rights (private, state, corporate through grab, franchise, lease etc) have been going on for a very long time. Some bright economists looked into a small tract of these commons in England (around 16th - 19thC) and generated a popular theory called the `The Tragedy of the Commons`. The argument is simple. The commons where either underutilised or overutilised and thus could not be taken care of. The enclosures worked because it allowed for incentives to make things productive. This argument. is now gathering momentum around the internet and the knowledge industry. I am enclosing an article by an `Nobel` economist who evokes the tragedy of the commons to argue a business model for the net. His conclusion and his arguments seems to be in two different direction. interesting read. cheers Jeebesh    The Tragedy Of The Commons Daniel McFadden, Forbes ASAP, 09.10.01 http://www.forbes.com/asap/2001/0910/061_2.html Immigrants to New England in the 17th century formed villages in which they had privately owned homesteads and gardens, but they also set aside community-owned pastures, called commons, where all of the villagers' livestock could graze. Settlers had an incentive to avoid overuse of their private lands, so they would remain productive in the future. However, this self-interested stewardship of private lands did not extend to the commons. As a result, the commons were overgrazed and degenerated to the point that they were no longer able to support the villagers' cattle. This failure of private incentives to provide adequate maintenance of public resources is known to economists as "the tragedy of the commons." Contemporary society has a number of current examples of the tragedy of the commons: the depletion of fish stocks in international waters, congestion on urban highways, and the rise of resistant diseases due to careless use of antibiotics. However, the commons that is likely to have the greatest impact on our lives in the new century is the digital commons, the information available on the Internet through the portals that provide access. The problem with digital information is the mirror image of the original grazing commons: Information is costly to generate and organize, but its value to individual consumers is too dispersed and small to establish an effective market. The information that is provided is inadequately catalogued and organized. Furthermore, the Internet tends to fill with low-value information: The products that have high commercial value are marketed through revenue-producing channels, and the Internet becomes inundated with products that cannot command these values. Self-published books and music are cases in point. Management of the digital commons is perhaps the most critical issue of market design that our society faces. Four major models exist for how such a market can be organized. In the first model, the information that consumers seek is bundled with advertisements that companies are willing to purchase. In this model, the Internet works like magazines or supermarket newspapers. Advertisers pay the costs of supply, and the price to consumers is zero, sort of, except for the implicit cost of screening out banner ads. This is the business model that the Internet portals adopted in the mid-'90s. Self-generated advertising sustained the model for a few years, but the bursting of the dot-com bubble suggests that it may be a long time before it happens again. A second model ties information content and organization to Internet access. In this model, your ISP account includes a monthly fee for content, a portal, and personal services, with competition among access providers assuring the consumer of attractive services. Market operation would be analogous to that for cable TV, with subscribers offered packages that would access different channels of information. The flaw in this model is that your ISP has the same dearth of incentives to deliver comprehensive information services that your HMO has to provide you with comprehensive health care. To assure good delivery of services to customers would take a market with many more choices than are available. The third model considers Internet information and organization a private good, owned by a monopolist (read: Microsoft), which has a direct incentive to provide and charge for the information that consumers value. This is likely to be an expensive solution for consumers, but it may be a more practical and stable way to provide essential information than the earlier alternatives. The fourth model channels the supply of Internet information through a nonprofit corporation, like the Public Broadcasting System, or through a regulated monopoly, like electricity generators operating with the oversight of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. The free-spirited Internet user may bridle at the market models in which consumers pay for content either through an ISP or monopoly control of information. Nevertheless, the imperatives of survival are likely to push the digital information business in one of these directions, with significant restrictions on the breadth of information available, and costs to consumers that are likely to be occasionally large and always irritating. The PBS model is probably a nonstarter because few would want to have any quasi-governmental organization controlling information, and financing PBS-like organizations is itself a problem that invites political mischief. As for the virtues of regulation, history is fraught with examples that should dissuade anyone from going down that path. The advertising-supported business model is unlikely to attract venture capital for some years to come. Thus, your fate is likely to be determined by the forthcoming battle between ISP-based value-added services such as AOL and information channeled through the Microsoft juggernaut and bundled into the license fee for your operating system. All indications are that the legal system will follow up the demolition of Napster with rulings that extend intellectual property rights down every path that electronic ingenuity can devise to return revenues to providers. If the scenarios I have outlined seem dismal, it gets worse. One of the enchanting features of the Internet over the past decade has been unabashed, free-wheeling innovation. To become a billionaire, start with a garage. The evolving information market models are bad news for innovation. If you expect your ISP to encourage innovation, remember that these guys are your local telephone or cable company, organizations not known for their inventiveness. Microsoft or AOL might do a little better, but monopolists have little incentive to innovate unless they feel the hot breath of potential competitors on their backs. A monopolized information market, tightly bound with restrictive intellectual property rights and exclusivity arrangements, is likely to present formidable barriers to potential competitors. Is the looming problem of marketing information a serious impediment to recovery of the Internet economy and the digitalization of commerce? Probably not. The solutions that resolve the problem of the digital commons are likely to be ingenious ways to collect money from consumers with little noticeable pain, and these should facilitate the operation of the Internet as a market for goods and services. Just don't expect it to be free. Daniel McFadden won the Nobel Prize for economics in 2000. He is the E. Morris Cox Professor of Economics at the University of California, Berkeley. From kendall at altx.com Thu Jan 24 05:14:30 2002 From: kendall at altx.com (kendall at altx.com) Date: Wed, 23 Jan 2002 16:44:30 -0700 Subject: [Reader-list] Fwd: Re: Fwd: Histories of Internet Art: Fictions and Factions Message-ID: > > > > > >> >IMMEDIATE RELEASE >> > >> >Alt-X Launches "Histories of Internet Art" Website >> >Contact: Kendall Pata kendall at altx.com >> >January 23, 2002 >> > >> >THE ALT-X NETWORK, IN CONJUNCTION WITH THE DEPARTMENT OF FINE ARTS AT THE >> >UNIVERSITY OF COLORADO AT BOULDER, LAUNCHES NEW WEBSITE FEATURING >> >INTERVIEWS WITH MAJOR NET ARTISTS >> > >> >BOULDER, Colorado (January 23, 2002) -- The Alt-X Network, "where the >> >digerati meets the literati," has just released the "Histories of Internet >> >Art: Fictions and Factions" web site featuring seventeen video and email >> >interviews with international net artists including Mark Napier, Young >> >Hae-Chang Heavy Industries, Ben Benjamin of Superbad, Melinda Rackham, Lev >> >Manovich, Giselle Beiguelman, Heath Bunting, John F. Simon Jr., Erik Loyer >> >and many others. The site also includes a curated exhibition of 35 >> >net-based art works, a section devoted to net theory, and a survey of the >> >new work being created by students working in the recently created TECHNE >> >lab. This easy-to-navigate site with its stunning design and exploratory >> >content is produced by undergraduate and Graduate students inside the >> >University of Colorado's Department of Fine Arts in conjunction with the >> >blurr lab and ATLAS. >> > >> >The site is currently located at http://blurr2.colorado.edu/~hiaff >> > >> >"The site is still very much in its infancy and yet in six short months, >> >the students have produced an incredible amount of content," said CU >> >Professor and TECHNE Faculty Director Mark Amerika. "This upcoming Fall, >> >the site, with the support of the University of Colorado and Alt-X, will >> >feature newly commissioned works of Internet art created by artists >> >selected for the 2002 Whitney Biennial, all of whom will be invited to >> >participate in the opening panel discussion at a major symposium we have >> >slated for September. The forum will be coordinated with Christiane Paul, >> >Adjunct Curator of New Media at the Whitney." >> > >> >The Alt-X Network (www.altx.com) is one of the oldest surviving art and >> >writing sites on the net. It began as a gopher site back in early 1993 and >> >has since produced and distributed a vast array of content including the >> >Hyper-X online exhibition space, an artist ebook series, the "ebr" new >> >media forum, Alt-X Audio, Black Ice fiction, and various live net events. >> > >> >TECHNE is a practice-based research initiative located inside the >> >University of Colorado's Department of Fine Arts whose primary goal is to >> >create a Technologically Enhanced / Conceptually Heuristic / Networked >> >Environment (TECHNE) that faculty and students use to investigate the most >> >efficient and rewarding ways to augment the creative process as it relates >> >to a digital arts practice. >> > >> >blurr is an experimental center for digital innovation at the University >> >of Colorado underwritten by Omnicom. blurr's mission is to provide an >> >environment that challenges the usual distinctions and barriers between >> >disciplines within the university and also the traditional lines drawn >> >between industry and academe. >> > >> >ATLAS is a campuswide initiative at the University of Colorado at Boulder >> >and is dedicated to the understanding and application of information and >> >communication technology in curriculum, teaching, research, and outreach. >> > >> >For more information on the "Histories of Internet Art: Fictions and >> >Factions" or other projects at Alt-X, please send email to >> >kendall at altx.com >> >> >> -- >> -- From announcements-request at sarai.net Thu Jan 24 11:25:33 2002 From: announcements-request at sarai.net (announcements-request at sarai.net) Date: Thu, 24 Jan 2002 06:55:33 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] Announcements digest, Vol 1 #12 - 1 msg Message-ID: <200201240555.GAA11993@zelda.intra.waag.org> Send Announcements mailing list submissions to announcements at sarai.net To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to announcements-request at sarai.net You can reach the person managing the list at announcements-admin at sarai.net When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific than "Re: Contents of Announcements digest..." Today's Topics: 1. 26.1.2002: Republic Day (Mumbai Study Group) --__--__-- Message: 1 Date: Tue, 22 Jan 2002 22:17:42 +0530 To: Recipient List Suppressed:; From: Mumbai Study Group Subject: [Announcements] 26.1.2002: Republic Day Dear Friends: Due to the Republic Day holiday, the Academy of Architecture at Rachana Sansad will remain closed, and we will not hold our session this fortnight. The presentation earlier scheduled for 26 January 2002, "Food Security in Mumbai and Thane: A Study of the Rationing Kruti Samiti", has been postponed, and Mayank Bhatt has agreed to present the findings of his study on 27 April 2002. We look forward to seeing you for our next session on 9 FEBRUARY 2002, the day before the elections to the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation, in which we will have a presentation and discussion on the 74th Amendment to the Constitition, urban governance and decentralisation to the local and ward levels in cities. Navtej Kaur-Bhutani, activist and researcher who has recently completed a study of ward committees and questions of local politics in Mumbai, will be presenting the results of her study. Yours sincerely, Arvind Adarkar, Darryl D'Monte, Shekhar Krishnan and Pankaj Joshi Joint Convenors, Mumbai Study Group _____ MUMBAI STUDY GROUP SESSIONS in 2002 9 FEBRUARY 2002 "Local Governance and Municipal Politics: A Discussion on the Eve of the Civic Elections" Navtej Kaur-Bhutani 23 FEBRUARY 2002 "Mumbai Modern" by Dr Carol Breckenridge, University of Chicago Dept of History, Chicago, U.S.A. 9 MARCH 2002 Film Screening of "Jari-Mari: Of Cloth and Other Stories" Discussion with Surabhi Sharma, Producer and Director 23 MARCH 2002 "Girangaon: The Past, Present and Future of Mumbai's Textile Mills and Mill Workers" Participants to be Announced 13 APRIL 2002 "Gender and Space in Mumbai" by Shilpa Phadke, Visiting Lecturer in Sociology, Nirmala Niketan School of Social Work, Mumbai and Neera Adarkar, Architect, Adarkar Associates, Mumbai 27 APRIL 2002 "Food Security in Mumbai and Thane: A Study of the Rationing Kruti Samiti" by Mayank Bhatt, Journalist and Research Associate, Institute of Development Studies, University of Sussex, Brighton, U.K. ABOUT the MUMBAI STUDY GROUP The MUMBAI STUDY GROUP meets on the second and fourth Saturdays of every month, at the Rachana Sansad, Prabhadevi, Mumbai, at 10.00 A.M. Our conversations continue through the support extended by Shri Pradip Amberkar, Principal of the Academy of Architecture, and Prof S.H. Wandrekar, Trustee of the Rachana Sansad. Conceived as an inclusive and non-partisan forum to foster dialogue on urban issues, we have since September 2000 held conversations about various historical, political, cultural, social and spatial aspects of the Mumbai Metropolitan Region. Our discussions are open and public, no previous membership or affiliation is required. We encourage the participation of urban researchers and practitioners, experts and non-experts, researchers and students, and all individuals, groups and associations in Mumbai to join our conversations about the the city.The format we have evolved is to host individual presentations or panel discussions in various fields of urban theory and practice, and have a moderated and focussed discussion from our many practical and professional perspectives: whether as architects or planners, lawyers or journalists, artists or film-makers, academics or activists.Through such a forum, we hope to foster an open community of urban citizens, which clearly situates Mumbai in the theories and practices of urbanism globally. Previous sessions have hosted presentations by the following individuals: Kalpana Sharma, Associate Editor of The Hindu; Kedar Ghorpade, Senior Planner at the Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority; Dr Marina Pinto, Professor of Public Administration, retired from Mumbai University; Dr K. Sita, Professor of Geography, retired from Mumbai University, and former Garware Chair Professor at the Tata Institute of Social Sciences; Dr Arjun Appadurai, Professor of Anthropology at the University of Chicago, Director of Partners for Urban Knowledge Action & Research (PUKAR), Mumbai; Rahul Srivastava, Lecturer in Sociology at Wilson College; Sandeep Yeole, General Secretary of the All-India Pheriwala Vikas Mahasangh; Dr Anjali Monteiro, Professor and Head, and K.P. Jayashankar, Reader, from the Tata Institute of Social Sciences Unit for Media and Communications; Dr Sujata Patel, Professor and Head, Department of Sociology, University of Pune; Dr Mariam Dossal, Head, Department of History, Mumbai University; Sucheta Dalal, business journalist and Consulting Editor, Financial Express; Dr Arvind Rajagopal, Associate Professor of Culture and Communications at New York University; Dr Gyan Prakash, Professor of History at Princeton University, and member of the Subaltern Studies Editorial Collective; Dr Sudha Deshpande, Reader in Demography, retired from the Department of Economics, Mumbai University and former consultant for the World Bank, International Labour Organisation, and Bombay Municipal Corporation; Sulakshana Mahajan, doctoral candidate at the Taubman College of Architecture and Urban Planning, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, U.S.A., and former Lecturer, Academy of Architecture, Rachana Sansad; Dr Rohini Hensman, of the Union Research Group, Mumbai; Mrs Jyoti Mhapsekar, Head Librarian, Rachana Sansad and Member, Stree Mukti Sanghatana. Previous panel discussions have comprised of the following individuals: S.S. Tinaikar, former Municipal Commissioner of Bombay, Sheela Patel, Director of the Society for Promotion of Area Resource Centres (SPARC), and Bhanu Desai of the Citizens' Forum for the Protection of Public Spaces (Citispace) on urban policy making and housing; Shirish Patel, civil engineer and urban planner, Pramod Sahasrabuddhe and Abhay Godbole, structural engineers on earthquakes and the built form of the city; B. Rajaram, Managing Director of Konkan Railway Corporation, and Dr P.G. Patankar, from Tata Consultancy Services, and former Chairman of the Bombay Electric Supply & Transport Undertaking (BEST) on mass public transport alternatives; Ved Segan, Vikas Dilawari, and Pankaj Joshi, conservation architects, on the social relevance of heritage and conservation architecture; Debi Goenka, of the Bombay Environmental Action Group, Professor Sudha Srivastava, Dr Geeta Kewalramani, and Dr Dipti Mukherji, of the University of Mumbai Department of Geography, on the politics of land use, the city's salt pan lands, and the Coastal Regulation Zone (CRZ) Act; Nikhil Rao, of the University of Chicago Dept of History, Anirudh Paul and Prasad Shetty of the Kamala Raheja Vidyanidhi Insitute of Architecture, and members of the various residents associations and citizens groups of the Dadar-Matunga, on the history, architecture, and formation of middle-class communities in these historic neighbourhoods, the first suburbs of Bombay. CONTACT US We invite all urban researchers, practitioners, students, and other interested individuals to join us in our fortnightly conversations, and suggest topics for presentation and discussion. For any more information, kindly contact one of the Joint Convenors of the Mumbai Study Group: ARVIND ADARKAR, Architect, Researcher and Lecturer, Academy of Architecture, Phone 2051834, ; DARRYL D'MONTE, Journalist and Writer, 6427088 ; SHEKHAR KRISHNAN, Coordinator-Associate, Partners for Urban Knowledge Action & Research (PUKAR), 4142843, ; PANKAJ JOSHI, Conservation Architect, Lecturer, Academy of Architecture, and PUKAR Associate, 8230625, . --__--__-- _______________________________________________ Announcements mailing list Announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements End of Announcements Digest From jeebesh at sarai.net Thu Jan 24 15:01:24 2002 From: jeebesh at sarai.net (Jeebesh Bagchi) Date: Thu, 24 Jan 2002 15:01:24 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] In Defense of Public Space Message-ID: <02012415012403.01179@pinki.sarai.kit> This articles makes some very interesting comments about the `tragedy of the commons. so take it as a continuation of the earlier posting. cheers, jeebesh IN DEFENSE OF PUBLIC SPACE by Roderick T. Long http://freenation.org/a/f33l2.html   Nothing to Gain But Our Chains? In an important series of articles,1,2,3,4 Rich Hammer has recently invited us to rethink some of our assumptions about what a libertarian society would be like. We ordinarily think of a libertarian society as one of maximum freedom and maximum privacy: a society where you can do whatever you like (so long as it's peaceful) and no one else can pry into your personal affairs. Rich suggests otherwise. A libertarian society, he argues, is one in which public space — both physical space and decision space — has been privatized as far as possible. This is desirable, he says, because it is easier to police irresponsible behavior in private space than in public space. Since no one can be excluded from public space, no one has any incentive to maintain it properly, and so a "tragedy of the commons" is generated. By contrast, in a world where everything is privately owned, we must abide, wherever we go, by the rules laid down by the owners. Rich envisions a society in which no one is allowed access to the means of cooperation with others unless he submits to a multitude of restrictions: bonding, disarmament, full disclosure of finances, and so forth. Those who do not comply with these rules will find themselves cut off from food, drink, communication, transportation, even the use of restroom facilities. Rich's arguments are a useful corrective to the popular notion that a libertarian society would be a hopeless chaos. But we may feel some discomfort at how far Rich's vision goes in the direction of the opposite extreme. In a famous quote, the 19th-century anarchist Proudhon wrote:   "To be GOVERNED is to be kept in sight, inspected, spied upon, directed, law-driven, numbered, enrolled, indoctrinated, preached at, controlled, estimated, valued, censured, commanded, ...noted, registered, ... taxed, stamped, measured, ... assessed, licensed, authorized, admonished, forbidden, reformed, corrected, punished."5 But if to be free is also to be inspected, licensed, numbered, stamped, authorized, and so forth, we might wonder whether building a Free Nation is worth the effort. But is this world of hyper-regulated anarchy the only possible model for a libertarian society? I don't think so. But to see why it is not, I suggest we need to rethink our assumption that a libertarian society must be a society without public space. Public Property Without Government When we think of public property, we think of government property. But this has not traditionally been the case. Throughout history, legal doctrine has recognized, alongside property owned by the organized public (that is, the public as organized into a state and represented by government officials), an additional category of property owned by the unorganized public. This was property that the public at large was deemed to have a right of access to, but without any presumption that government would be involved in the matter at all. I have learned much about this idea from excellent recent articles by Carol Rose and David Schmidtz: "Implicit in these older doctrines is the notion that, even if a property should be open to the public, it does not follow that public rights should necessarily vest in an active governmental manager. ... the nineteenth-century common law ... recognized ... property collectively 'owned' and 'managed' by society at large ...."6 "Public property is not always a product of rapacious governments or mad ideologues. Sometimes it evolves spontaneously as a way of solving real problems."7 I have no interest in defending public property in the sense of property belonging to the organized public (i.e., the state). In fact, I do not think government property is public property at all; it is really the private property of an agency calling itself the government. (This agency may claim to be holding the property in trust for the public, but its activities generally belie this.) What I wish to defend is the idea of property rights inhering in the unorganized public. The Economic Argument Since the days of Aristotle, the traditional argument against collective ownership of any kind has been the tragedy of the commons: if each additional use depletes or degrades a resource, and yet there is no way of restricting access to the resource, then no one will be motivated to use the resource sparingly, since what one person refrains from, another may take, and so the first person is no better off for having refrained. Hence the need to restrict access by privatizing the commons. What Rose and Schmidtz point out is that this argument works only to the extent that additional use diminishes the value of the resource. But this is not always the case; sometimes, adding more users enhances the value of the resource: the more the merrier. When that is so, there is no point in restricting access; we then have what Rose calls a comedy of the commons (i.e., happy ending rather than sad). Rose's point is clearest when we consider decision space. Think of the libertarian movement as filling a decision space: which libertarian books and articles will be written, which libertarian projects and causes will be promoted, and how, etc. The libertarian movement is a public space; anyone can participate, at any time. And this is all to the good. It would be foolish to restrict access, to make it more difficult for people to participate in the movement, because the movement is not a scarce resource that can be used up; on the contrary, the more additional people start participating, the closer the aims of the movement as a whole will come to being achieved. (Consider how Ayn Rand and Leonard Peikoff have weakened the effectiveness of their own Objectivist movement by trying to make it into their own private property, purging potentially valuable contributors to the cause whenever they resisted the authority of the "owners.") Intellectual property is another comedy of the commons, I would argue, since one person's use of an idea does not deplete the idea for others, and ordinarily even enhances it. How else, after all, does civilization advance except via some people grabbing other people's ideas and improving on them, to the benefit of society as a whole? But the clearest case of a comedy of the commons, as Rose and Schmidtz point out, is the market itself. The more people participate in the market, the more everyone benefits. The market is a paradigm of public space. Protectionist laws attempt to turn the market, or portions of it, into private property by erecting coercive barriers to access; this sort of "privatization," though, is destructive, and anathema to libertarian ideals. Of course, these are easy cases of comedies of the commons, because things like markets, ideas, and political movements are not physical, and so are not subject to scarcity. Physical space, though, is always subject to scarcity; so how could there be comedies of the commons here? Mustn't any scarce resource inevitably succumb to the tragedy of the commons unless access is restricted? Not necessarily. There are some cases in which, at least within certain parameters, a physical resource's value is enhanced by increased use. As Rose and Schmidtz point out, this is particularly true when the resource is tied in some way to a non-physical comedy-of-the-commons resource, like a market or a town festival; since "the more, the merrier" applies to these non-physical resources, it also applies, to some extent, to the physical land on which the market or festival is held, and to the physical roadways leading there. Since everyone benefits from having more people come to the fair, everyone also benefits from making physical access to the fairgrounds free as well. Of course there are limits. If too many people come, the fair will be too crowded to be enjoyable. But this simply shows that some goods have both tragedy-of-the-commons and comedy-of-the-commons aspects, and which one predominates will depend on the circumstances. Public property may be the efficient solution in some cases, and private property in others. (Or a bundle of property rights may be split up, with some public, some private.) Most societies have had some common areas, policed by custom only, without overgrazing problems. The Ethical Argument On the libertarian view, we have a right to the fruit of our labor, and we also have a right to what people freely give us. Public property can arise in both these ways. Consider a village near a lake. It is common for the villagers to walk down to the lake to go fishing. In the early days of the community it's hard to get to the lake because of all the bushes and fallen branches in the way. But over time, the way is cleared and a path forms — not through any centrally coordinated effort, but simply as a result of all the individuals walking that way day after day. The cleared path is the product of labor — not any individual's labor, but all of them together. If one villager decided to take advantage of the now-created path by setting up a gate and charging tolls, he would be violating the collective property right that the villagers together have earned. Public property can also be the product of gift. In 19th-century England, it was common for roads to be built privately and then donated to the public for free use. This was done not out of altruism but because the roadbuilders owned land and businesses alongside the site of the new road, and they knew that having a road there would increase the value of their land and attract more customers to their businesses. Thus, the unorganized public can legitimately come to own land, both through original acquisition (the mixing of labor) and through voluntary transfer. Public and Private: Allies, Not Enemies Public space has both advantages and disadvantages. On the plus side, unrestricted access means you can do as you please there, without asking permission, so long as you don't violate others' rights. On the minus side, the difficulty of policing public space means there may well be more irresponsible behavior there. A society that permits both public and private spaces — that has public and private roads competing with each other, for example — allows individuals to make the trade-off for themselves. If you want the freedom to drive your motorcycle in the nude, with a howitzer strapped to your back, and you're willing to put up with a greater risk of irresponsible behavior from others, take the public road. If you prefer greater security, and are willing to obey a few more rules and suffer some invasion of privacy to get it, take the private road. If one option becomes too onerous, the other is still available. Private space can become oppressive if there is no public space to compete with it — and vice versa. I envision a world of many individual private spaces, linked by a framework of public spaces. The existence of such a framework may even be a prerequisite for complete control over one's own private space. Suppose a trespasser comes on my land and I want to push him off. If all the land around me is private as well, where can I push him, without violating the rights of my neighbors? But if there is a public walkway nearby, I have somewhere to push him. Thus, the availability of public space may be a moral precondition for the right to freedom from trespassers. D   References 1 Richard Hammer, "The Power of Ostracism," in Formulations, Vol. II, No. 2 (Winter 1994-95). 2 Richard Hammer, "Protection from Mass Murderers: Communication of Danger," in Formulations, Vol. II, No. 3 (Spring 1995). 3 Richard Hammer, "'Liberty' is a Bad Name," in Formulations, Vol. II, No. 4 (Summer 1995). 4 Richard Hammer, "Toward Voluntary Courts and Enforcement," in Formulations, Vol. III, No. 2 (Winter 1995-96). 5 Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, General Idea of the Revolution in the Nineteenth Century, 1851; trans. John B. Robinson (London: Pluto Press, 1989), p. 294. (This quotation is the inspiration for the heading "To be governed ..." on Cato Policy Report's back-page horror file.) 6 Carol Rose, "The Comedy of the Commons: Custom, Commerce, and Inherently Public Property," p. 720; in University of Chicago Law Review, Vol. 53, No. 3 (Summer 1986), pp. 711-781. 7 David Schmidtz, "The Institution of Property," p. 51; in Social Philosophy & Policy, Vol. 11 (1994), pp. 42-62.   From joy at www.sarai.net Fri Jan 25 09:46:29 2002 From: joy at www.sarai.net (joy at www.sarai.net) Date: Fri, 25 Jan 2002 04:16:29 -0000 Subject: [Reader-list] Gates Message-ID: <200201250416.FAA22026@zelda.intra.waag.org> For the first time in my life I found that to be short in height is definitely useful. For the last few years� residential areas in Delhi started installing gates at almost every corner of the streets. 10 feet high gates with solid iron rods. Designs seem to be inspired from Hollywood war films. Every gate splits open for the cars etc. but they are mostly closed except for very few. It is almost a living puzzle game to find the exact gate which is open to enter or exit. The gates which are closed they have a small opening of 4ft. by 2ft. for the pedestrians. These gates are useful for various kinds of people. One I have already mentioned. Second are those people who suffer from identity crisis can stand in front of the gate and boost their ego as almost every person bows in front of him/her. Tall Indians can feel proud remembering the sequence when Amitabh Bachchan emerges out of similar gate of the jail in his famous film Sholay. Doctors can be benefited from this gate as it can cause casualties to absent minded and rushing people. Though these gates are said to be made for security but number of locks in individual household doesn�t show respect to this huge gate. And finally these gates can be very interesting �idea� to write a book, make a film or paint a series. Joy From announcements-request at sarai.net Fri Jan 25 11:25:09 2002 From: announcements-request at sarai.net (announcements-request at sarai.net) Date: Fri, 25 Jan 2002 06:55:09 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] Announcements digest, Vol 1 #13 - 1 msg Message-ID: <200201250555.GAA26313@zelda.intra.waag.org> Send Announcements mailing list submissions to announcements at sarai.net To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to announcements-request at sarai.net You can reach the person managing the list at announcements-admin at sarai.net When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific than "Re: Contents of Announcements digest..." Today's Topics: 1. Border Lines : Draft Program up (Border Lines) --__--__-- Message: 1 Date: Thu, 24 Jan 2002 19:08:09 +1100 To: announcements at sarai.net From: Border Lines Subject: [Announcements] Border Lines : Draft Program up The BorderLines event will explore the different modes of media making, and the boundaries and challenges that affect those who want to engage and communicate the complex stories of our world. BorderLines will be a set of forums, workshops and meetings to be held in Adelaide during March 2002. Check out the website - http://borderlines.media2.org Use the automated invitation generator to get yourself an 'official' invite :-) Adelaide, AU - Forums on March 23-24 2002, followed by Workshops on March 25-26 2002. Brought to you by the Borderlines Team, SpaceStation Media Lab (Melb) and CIDE Limited Supported by Australian National Commission for UNESCO, Ngapartji Multimedia Centre and Australian Network for Art and Technology... After the BorderLines event, you can apply your skills and knowledge by going onwards to make media about Woomera (www.woomera2002.com) --__--__-- _______________________________________________ Announcements mailing list Announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements End of Announcements Digest From jeebesh at sarai.net Fri Jan 25 16:03:45 2002 From: jeebesh at sarai.net (Jeebesh Bagchi) Date: Fri, 25 Jan 2002 16:03:45 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] The Tragedy of the Commons Message-ID: <02012516034501.00596@pinki.sarai.kit> In my last postings there was refrences to the phrase `The Tragedy of the Commons`. On request from friends I am enclosing an article written in 1968 which kind of gave velocity to this phrase. cheers. Jeebesh The Tragedy of the Commons Garrett Hardin (1968) "The Tragedy of the Commons," Garrett Hardin, Science, 162(1968):1243-1248. At the end of a thoughtful article on the future of nuclear war, J.B. Wiesner and H.F. York concluded that: "Both sides in the arms race are confronted by the dilemma of steadily increasing military power and steadily decreasing national security. It is our considered professional judgment that this dilemma has no technical solution. If the great powers continue to look for solutions in the area of science and technology only, the result will be to worsen the situation.'' [1] I would like to focus your attention not on the subject of the article (national security in a nuclear world) but on the kind of conclusion they reached, namely that there is no technical solution to the problem. An implicit and almost universal assumption of discussions published in professional and semipopular scientific journals is that the problem under discussion has a technical solution. A technical solution may be defined as one that requires a change only in the techniques of the natural sciences, demanding little or nothing in the way of change in human values or ideas of morality. In our day (though not in earlier times) technical solutions are always welcome. Because of previous failures in prophecy, it takes courage to assert that a desired technical solution is not possible. Wiesner and York exhibited this courage; publishing in a science journal, they insisted that the solution to the problem was not to be found in the natural sciences. They cautiously qualified their statement with the phrase, "It is our considered professional judgment...." Whether they were right or not is not the concern of the present article. Rather, the concern here is with the important concept of a class of human problems which can be called "no technical solution problems," and more specifically, with the identification and discussion of one of these. It is easy to show that the class is not a null class. Recall the game of tick-tack-toe. Consider the problem, "How can I win the game of tick-tack-toe?" It is well known that I cannot, if I assume (in keeping with the conventions of game theory) that my opponent understands the game perfectly. Put another way, there is no "technical solution" to the problem. I can win only by giving a radical meaning to the word "win." I can hit my opponent over the head; or I can falsify the records. Every way in which I "win" involves, in some sense, an abandonment of the game, as we intuitively understand it. (I can also, of course, openly abandon the game -- refuse to play it. This is what most adults do.) The class of "no technical solution problems" has members. My thesis is that the "population problem," as conventionally conceived, is a member of this class. How it is conventionally conceived needs some comment. It is fair to say that most people who anguish over the population problem are trying to find a way to avoid the evils of overpopulation without relinquishing any of the privileges they now enjoy. They think that farming the seas or developing new strains of wheat will solve the problem -- technologically. I try to show here that the solution they seek cannot be found. The population problem cannot be solved in a technical way, any more than can the problem of winning the game of tick-tack-toe. What Shall We Maximize? Population, as Malthus said, naturally tends to grow "geometrically," or, as we would now say, exponentially. In a finite world this means that the per-capita share of the world's goods must decrease. Is ours a finite world? A fair defense can be put forward for the view that the world is infinite or that we do not know that it is not. But, in terms of the practical problems that we must face in the next few generations with the foreseeable technology, it is clear that we will greatly increase human misery if we do not, during the immediate future, assume that the world available to the terrestrial human population is finite. "Space" is no escape. [2] A finite world can support only a finite population; therefore, population growth must eventually equal zero. (The case of perpetual wide fluctuations above and below zero is a trivial variant that need not be discussed.) When this condition is met, what will be the situation of mankind? Specifically, can Bentham's goal of "the greatest good for the greatest number" be realized? No -- for two reasons, each sufficient by itself. The first is a theoretical one. It is not mathematically possible to maximize for two (or more) variables at the same time. This was clearly stated by von Neumann and Morgenstern, [3] but the principle is implicit in the theory of partial differential equations, dating back at least to D'Alembert (1717-1783). The second reason springs directly from biological facts. To live, any organism must have a source of energy (for example, food). This energy is utilized for two purposes: mere maintenance and work. For man maintenance of life requires about 1600 kilocalories a day ("maintenance calories"). Anything that he does over and above merely staying alive will be defined as work, and is supported by "work calories" which he takes in. Work calories are used not only for what we call work in common speech; they are also required for all forms of enjoyment, from swimming and automobile racing to playing music and writing poetry. If our goal is to maximize population it is obvious what we must do: We must make the work calories per person approach as close to zero as possible. No gourmet meals, no vacations, no sports, no music, no literature, no art I think that everyone will grant, without argument or proof, that maximizing population does not maximize goods. Bentham's goal is impossible. In reaching this conclusion I have made the usual assumption that it is the acquisition of energy that is the problem. The appearance of atomic energy has led some to question this assumption. However, given an infinite source of energy, population growth still produces an inescapable problem. The problem of the acquisition of energy is replaced by the problem of its dissipation, as J. H. Fremlin has so wittily shown. [4] The arithmetic signs in the analysis are, as it were, reversed; but Bentham's goal is unobtainable. The optimum population is, then, less than the maximum. The difficulty of defining the optimum is enormous; so far as I know, no one has seriously tackled this problem. Reaching an acceptable and stable solution will surely require more than one generation of hard analytical work -- and much persuasion. We want the maximum good per person; but what is good? To one person it is wilderness, to another it is ski lodges for thousands. To one it is estuaries to nourish ducks for hunters to shoot; to another it is factory land. Comparing one good with another is, we usually say, impossible because goods are incommensurable. Incommensurables cannot be compared. Theoretically this may be true; but in real life incommensurables are commensurable. Only a criterion of judgment and a system of weighting are needed. In nature the criterion is survival. Is it better for a species to be small and hideable, or large and powerful? Natural selection commensurates the incommensurables. The compromise achieved depends on a natural weighting of the values of the variables. Man must imitate this process. There is no doubt that in fact he already does, but unconsciously. It is when the hidden decisions are made explicit that the arguments begin. The problem for the years ahead is to work out an acceptable theory of weighting. Synergistic effects, nonlinear variation, and difficulties in discounting the future make the intellectual problem difficult, but not (in principle) insoluble. Has any cultural group solved this practical problem at the present time, even on an intuitive level? One simple fact proves that none has: there is no prosperous population in the world today that has, and has had for some time, a growth rate of zero. Any people that has intuitively identified its optimum point will soon reach it, after which its growth rate becomes and remains zero. Of course, a positive growth rate might be taken as evidence that a population is below its optimum. However, by any reasonable standards, the most rapidly growing populations on earth today are (in general) the most miserable. This association (which need not be invariable) casts doubt on the optimistic assumption that the positive growth rate of a population is evidence that it has yet to reach its optimum. We can make little progress in working toward optimum population size until we explicitly exorcise the spirit of Adam Smith in the field of practical demography. In economic affairs, The Wealth of Nations (1776) popularized the "invisible hand," the idea that an individual who "intends only his own gain," is, as it were, "led by an invisible hand to promote the public interest." [5] Adam Smith did not assert that this was invariably true, and perhaps neither did any of his followers. But he contributed to a dominant tendency of thought that has ever since interfered with positive action based on rational analysis, namely, the tendency to assume that decisions reached individually will, in fact, be the best decisions for an entire society. If this assumption is correct it justifies the continuance of our present policy of laissez faire in reproduction. If it is correct we can assume that men will control their individual fecundity so as to produce the optimum population. If the assumption is not correct, we need to reexamine our individual freedoms to see which ones are defensible. Tragedy of Freedom in a Commons The rebuttal to the invisible hand in population control is to be found in a scenario first sketched in a little-known Pamphlet in 1833 by a mathematical amateur named William Forster Lloyd (1794-1852). [6] We may well call it "the tragedy of the commons," using the word "tragedy" as the philosopher Whitehead used it [7]: "The essence of dramatic tragedy is not unhappiness. It resides in the solemnity of the remorseless working of things." He then goes on to say, "This inevitableness of destiny can only be illustrated in terms of human life by incidents which in fact involve unhappiness. For it is only by them that the futility of escape can be made evident in the drama." The tragedy of the commons develops in this way. Picture a pasture open to all. It is to be expected that each herdsman will try to keep as many cattle as possible on the commons. Such an arrangement may work reasonably satisfactorily for centuries because tribal wars, poaching, and disease keep the numbers of both man and beast well below the carrying capacity of the land. Finally, however, comes the day of reckoning, that is, the day when the long-desired goal of social stability becomes a reality. At this point, the inherent logic of the commons remorselessly generates tragedy. As a rational being, each herdsman seeks to maximize his gain. Explicitly or implicitly, more or less consciously, he asks, "What is the utility to me of adding one more animal to my herd?" This utility has one negative and one positive component. 1. The positive component is a function of the increment of one animal. Since the herdsman receives all the proceeds from the sale of the additional animal, the positive utility is nearly + 1. 2. The negative component is a function of the additional overgrazing created by one more animal. Since, however, the effects of overgrazing are shared by all the herdsmen, the negative utility for any particular decision­making herdsman is only a fraction of - 1. Adding together the component partial utilities, the rational herdsman concludes that the only sensible course for him to pursue is to add another animal to his herd. And another.... But this is the conclusion reached by each and every rational herdsman sharing a commons. Therein is the tragedy. Each man is locked into a system that compels him to increase his herd without limit -- in a world that is limited. Ruin is the destination toward which all men rush, each pursuing his own best interest in a society that believes in the freedom of the commons. Freedom in a commons brings ruin to all. Some would say that this is a platitude. Would that it were! In a sense, it was learned thousands of years ago, but natural selection favors the forces of psychological denial. [8] The individual benefits as an individual from his ability to deny the truth even though society as a whole, of which he is a part, suffers. Education can counteract the natural tendency to do the wrong thing, but the inexorable succession of generations requires that the basis for this knowledge be constantly refreshed. A simple incident that occurred a few years ago in Leominster, Massachusetts shows how perishable the knowledge is. During the Christmas shopping season the parking meters downtown were covered with plastic bags that bore tags reading: "Do not open until after Christmas. Free parking courtesy of the mayor and city council." In other words, facing the prospect of an increased demand for already scarce space, the city fathers reinstituted the system of the commons. (Cynically, we suspect that they gained more votes than they lost by this retrogressive act.) In an approximate way, the logic of the commons has been understood for a long time, perhaps since the discovery of agriculture or the invention of private property in real estate. But it is understood mostly only in special cases which are not sufficiently generalized. Even at this late date, cattlemen leasing national land on the Western ranges demonstrate no more than an ambivalent understanding, in constantly pressuring federal authorities to increase the head count to the point where overgrazing produces erosion and weed-dominance. Likewise, the oceans of the world continue to suffer from the survival of the philosophy of the commons. Maritime nations still respond automatically to the shibboleth of the "freedom of the seas." Professing to believe in the "inexhaustible resources of the oceans," they bring species after species of fish and whales closer to extinction. [9] The National Parks present another instance of the working out of the tragedy of the commons. At present, they are open to all, without limit. The parks themselves are limited in extent -- there is only one Yosemite Valley -- whereas population seems to grow without limit. The values that visitors seek in the parks are steadily eroded. Plainly, we must soon cease to treat the parks as commons or they will be of no value to anyone. What shall we do? We have several options. We might sell them off as private property. We might keep them as public property, but allocate the right to enter them. The allocation might be on the basis of wealth, by the use of an auction system. It might be on the basis of merit, as defined by some agreed­upon standards. It might be by lottery. Or it might be on a first-come, first-served basis, administered to long queues. These, I think, are all objectionable. But we must choose -- or acquiesce in the destruction of the commons that we call our National Parks. Pollution In a reverse way, the tragedy of the commons reappears in problems of pollution. Here it is not a question of taking something out of the commons, but of putting something in -- sewage, or chemical, radioactive, and heat wastes into water; noxious and dangerous fumes into the air; and distracting and unpleasant advertising signs into the line of sight. The calculations of utility are much the same as before. The rational man finds that his share of the cost of the wastes he discharges into the commons is less than the cost of purifying his wastes before releasing them. Since this is true for everyone, we are locked into a system of "fouling our own nest," so long as we behave only as independent, rational, free enterprisers. The tragedy of the commons as a food basket is averted by private property, or something formally like it. But the air and waters surrounding us cannot readily be fenced, and so the tragedy of the commons as a cesspool must be prevented by different means, by coercive laws or taxing devices that make it cheaper for the polluter to treat his pollutants than to discharge them untreated. We have not progressed as far with the solution of this problem as we have with the first. Indeed, our particular concept of private property, which deters us from exhausting the positive resources of the earth, favors pollution. The owner of a factory on the bank of a stream -- whose property extends to the middle of the stream -- often has difficulty seeing why it is not his natural right to muddy the waters flowing past his door. The law, always behind the times, requires elaborate stitching and fitting to adapt it to this newly perceived aspect of the commons. The pollution problem is a consequence of population. It did not much matter how a lonely American frontiersman disposed of his waste. "Flowing water purifies itself every ten miles," my grandfather used to say, and the myth was near enough to the truth when he was a boy, for there were not too many people. But as population became denser, the natural chemical and biological recycling processes became overloaded, calling for a redefinition of property rights. How to Legislate Temperance? Analysis of the pollution problem as a function of population density uncovers a not generally recognized principle of morality, namely: the morality of an act is a function of the state of the system at the time it is performed. [10] Using the commons as a cesspool does not harm the general public under frontier conditions, because there is no public; the same behavior in a metropolis is unbearable. A hundred and fifty years ago a plainsman could kill an American bison, cut out only the tongue for his dinner, and discard the rest of the animal. He was not in any important sense being wasteful. Today, with only a few thousand bison left, we would be appalled at such behavior. In passing, it is worth noting that the morality of an act cannot be determined from a photograph. One does not know whether a man killing an elephant or setting fire to the grassland is harming others until one knows the total system in which his act appears. "One picture is worth a thousand words," said an ancient Chinese; but it may take ten thousand words to validate it. It is as tempting to ecologists as it is to reformers in general to try to persuade others by way of the photographic shortcut. But the essence of an argument cannot be photographed: it must be presented rationally -- in words. That morality is system-sensitive escaped the attention of most codifiers of ethics in the past. "Thou shalt not " is the form of traditional ethical directives which make no allowance for particular circumstances. The laws of our society follow the pattern of ancient ethics, and therefore are poorly suited to governing a complex, crowded, changeable world. Our epicyclic solution is to augment statutory law with administrative law. Since it is practically impossible to spell out all the conditions under which it is safe to burn trash in the back yard or to run an automobile without smog­control, by law we delegate the details to bureaus. The result is administrative law, which is rightly feared for an ancient reason -- Quis custodies ipsos custodes? --Who shall watch the watchers themselves? John Adams said that we must have a "government of laws and not men." Bureau administrators, trying to evaluate the morality of acts in the total system, are singularly liable to corruption, producing a government by men, not laws. Prohibition is easy to legislate (though not necessarily to enforce); but how do we legislate temperance? Experience indicates that it can be accomplished best through the mediation of administrative law. We limit possibilities unnecessarily if we suppose that the sentiment of Quis custodiet denies us the use of administrative law. We should rather retain the phrase as a perpetual reminder of fearful dangers we cannot avoid. The great challenge facing us now is to invent the corrective feedbacks that are needed to keep custodians honest. We must find ways to legitimate the needed authority of both the custodians and the corrective feedbacks. Freedom to Breed Is Intolerable The tragedy of the commons is involved in population problems in another way. In a world governed solely by the principle of "dog eat dog" --if indeed there ever was such a world--how many children a family had would not be a matter of public concern. Parents who bred too exuberantly would leave fewer descendants, not more, because they would be unable to care adequately for their children. David Lack and others have found that such a negative feedback demonstrably controls the fecundity of birds. [11] But men are not birds, and have not acted like them for millenniums, at least. If each human family were dependent only on its own resources; if the children of improvident parents starved to death; if thus, over breeding brought its own "punishment" to the germ line -- then there would be no public interest in controlling the breeding of families. But our society is deeply committed to the welfare state, [12] and hence is confronted with another aspect of the tragedy of the commons. In a welfare state, how shall we deal with the family, the religion, the race, or the class (or indeed any distinguishable and cohesive group) that adopts over breeding as a policy to secure its own aggrandizement? [13] To couple the concept of freedom to breed with the belief that everyone born has an equal right to the commons is to lock the world into a tragic course of action. Unfortunately this is just the course of action that is being pursued by the United Nations. In late 1967, some thirty nations agreed to the following: "The Universal Declaration of Human Rights describes the family as the natural and fundamental unit of society. It follows that any choice and decision with regard to the size of the family must irrevocably rest with the family itself, and cannot be made by anyone else.'' [14] It is painful to have to deny categorically the validity of this right; denying it, one feels as uncomfortable as a resident of Salem, Massachusetts, who denied the reality of witches in the seventeenth century. At the present time, in liberal quarters, something like a taboo acts to inhibit criticism of the United Nations. There is a feeling that the United Nations is "our last and best hope," that we shouldn't find fault with it; we shouldn't play into the hands of the archconservatives. However, let us not forget what Robert Louis Stevenson said: "The truth that is suppressed by friends is the readiest weapon of the enemy." If we love the truth we must openly deny the validity of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, even though it is promoted by the United Nations. We should also join with Kingsley Davis [15] in attempting to get Planned Parenthood-World Population to see the error of its ways in embracing the same tragic ideal. Conscience Is Self-Eliminating It is a mistake to think that we can control the breeding of mankind in the long run by an appeal to conscience. Charles Galton Darwin made this point when he spoke on the centennial of the publication of his grandfather's great book. The argument is straightforward and Darwinian. People vary. Confronted with appeals to limit breeding, some people will undoubtedly respond to the plea more than others. Those who have more children will produce a larger fraction of the next generation than those with more susceptible consciences. The differences will be accentuated, generation by generation. In C. G. Darwin's words: "It may well be that it would take hundreds of generations for the progenitive instinct to develop in this way, but if it should do so, nature would have taken her revenge, and the variety Homo contracipiens would become extinct and would be replaced by the variety Homo progenitivus. [16] The argument assumes that conscience or the desire for children (no matter which) is hereditary-but hereditary only in the most general formal sense. The result will be the same whether the attitude is transmitted through germ cells, or exosomatically, to use A. J. Lotka's term. (If one denies the latter possibility as well as the former, then what's the point of education?) The argument has here been stated in the context of the population problem, but it applies equally well to any instance in which society appeals to an individual exploiting a commons to restrain himself for the general good -- by means of his conscience. To make such an appeal is to set up a selective system that works toward the elimination of conscience from the race. Pathogenic Effects of Conscience The long-term disadvantage of an appeal to conscience should be enough to condemn it; but it has serious short-term disadvantages as well. If we ask a man who is exploiting a commons to desist "in the name of conscience," what are we saying to him? What does he hear? -- not only at the moment but also in the wee small hours of the night when, half asleep, he remembers not merely the words we used but also the nonverbal communication cues we gave him unawares? Sooner or later, consciously or subconsciously, he senses that he has received two communications, and that they are contradictory: 1. (intended communication) "If you don't do as we ask, we will openly condemn you for not acting like a responsible citizen"; 2. (the unintended communication) "If you do behave as we ask, we will secretly condemn you for a simpleton who can be shamed into standing aside while the rest of us exploit the commons." Every man then is caught in what Bateson has called a "double bind." Bateson and his co-workers have made a plausible case for viewing the double bind as an important causative factor in the genesis of schizophrenia. [17] The double bind may not always be so damaging, but it always endangers the mental health of anyone to whom it is applied. "A bad conscience," said Nietzsche, "is a kind of illness." To conjure up a conscience in others is tempting to anyone who wishes to extend his control beyond the legal limits. Leaders at the highest level succumb to this temptation. Has any president during the past generation failed to call on labor unions to moderate voluntarily their demands for higher wages, or to steel companies to honor voluntary guidelines on prices? I can recall none. The rhetoric used on such occasions is designed to produce feelings of guilt in noncooperators. For centuries it was assumed without proof that guilt was a valuable, perhaps even an indispensable, ingredient of the civilized life. Now, in this post-Freudian world, we doubt it. Paul Goodman speaks from the modern point of view when he says: "No good has ever come from feeling guilty, neither intelligence, policy, nor compassion. The guilty do not pay attention to the object but only to themselves, and not even to their own interests, which might make sense, but to their anxieties.'' [18] One does not have to be a professional psychiatrist to see the consequences of anxiety. We in the Western world are just emerging from a dreadful two centuries-long Dark Ages of Eros that was sustained partly by prohibition laws, but perhaps more effectively by the anxiety-generating mechanisms of education. Alex Comfort has told the story well in The Anxiety Makers; [19] it is not a pretty one. Since proof is difficult, we may even concede that the results of anxiety may sometimes, from certain points of view, be desirable. The larger question we should ask is whether, as a matter of policy, we should ever encourage the use of a technique the tendency (if not the intention) of which is psychologically pathogenic. We hear much talk these days of responsible parenthood; the coupled words are incorporated into the titles of some organizations devoted to birth control. Some people have proposed massive propaganda campaigns to instill responsibility into the nation's (or the world's) breeders. But what is the meaning of the word conscience? When we use the word responsibility in the absence of substantial sanctions are we not trying to browbeat a free man in a commons into acting against his own interest? Responsibility is a verbal counterfeit for a substantial quid pro quo. It is an attempt to get something for nothing. If the word responsibility is to be used at all, I suggest that it be in the sense Charles Frankel uses it. [20] "Responsibility," says this philosopher, "is the product of definite social arrangements." Notice that Frankel calls for social arrangements -- not propaganda. Mutual Coercion Mutually Agreed Upon The social arrangements that produce responsibility are arrangements that create coercion, of some sort. Consider bank robbing. The man who takes money from a bank acts as if the bank were a commons. How do we prevent such action? Certainly not by trying to control his behavior solely by a verbal appeal to his sense of responsibility. Rather than rely on propaganda we follow Frankel's lead and insist that a bank is not a commons; we seek the definite social arrangements that will keep it from becoming a commons. That we thereby infringe on the freedom of would-be robbers we neither deny nor regret. The morality of bank robbing is particularly easy to understand because we accept complete prohibition of this activity. We are willing to say "Thou shalt not rob banks," without providing for exceptions. But temperance also can be created by coercion. Taxing is a good coercive device. To keep downtown shoppers temperate in their use of parking space we introduce parking meters for short periods, and traffic fines for longer ones. We need not actually forbid a citizen to park as long as he wants to; we need merely make it increasingly expensive for him to do so. Not prohibition, but carefully biased options are what we offer him. A Madison Avenue man might call this persuasion; I prefer the greater candor of the word coercion. Coercion is a dirty word to most liberals now, but it need not forever be so. As with the four-letter words, its dirtiness can be cleansed away by exposure to the light, by saying it over and over without apology or embarrassment. To many, the word coercion implies arbitrary decisions of distant and irresponsible bureaucrats; but this is not a necessary part of its meaning. The only kind of coercion I recommend is mutual coercion, mutually agreed upon by the majority of the people affected. To say that we mutually agree to coercion is not to say that we are required to enjoy it, or even to pretend we enjoy it. Who enjoys taxes? We all grumble about them. But we accept compulsory taxes because we recognize that voluntary taxes would favor the conscienceless. We institute and (grumblingly) support taxes and other coercive devices to escape the horror of the commons. An alternative to the commons need not be perfectly just to be preferable. With real estate and other material goods, the alternative we have chosen is the institution of private property coupled with legal inheritance. Is this system perfectly just? As a genetically trained biologist I deny that it is. It seems to me that, if there are to be differences in individual inheritance, legal possession should be perfectly correlated with biological inheritance-that those who are biologically more fit to be the custodians of property and power should legally inherit more. But genetic recombination continually makes a mockery of the doctrine of "like father, like son" implicit in our laws of legal inheritance. An idiot can inherit millions, and a trust fund can keep his estate intact. We must admit that our legal system of private property plus inheritance is unjust -- but we put up with it because we are not convinced, at the moment, that anyone has invented a better system. The alternative of the commons is too horrifying to contemplate. Injustice is preferable to total ruin. It is one of the peculiarities of the warfare between reform and the status quo that it is thoughtlessly governed by a double standard. Whenever a reform measure is proposed it is often defeated when its opponents triumphantly discover a flaw in it. As Kingsley Davis has pointed out, [21] worshipers of the status quo sometimes imply that no reform is possible without unanimous agreement, an implication contrary to historical fact. As nearly as I can make out, automatic rejection of proposed reforms is based on one of two unconscious assumptions: (1) that the status quo is perfect; or (2) that the choice we face is between reform and no action; if the proposed reform is imperfect, we presumably should take no action at all, while we wait for a perfect proposal. But we can never do nothing. That which we have done for thousands of years is also action. It also produces evils. Once we are aware that the status quo is action, we can then compare its discoverable advantages and disadvantages with the predicted advantages and disadvantages of the proposed reform, discounting as best we can for our lack of experience. On the basis of such a comparison, we can make a rational decision which will not involve the unworkable assumption that only perfect systems are tolerable. Recognition of Necessity Perhaps the simplest summary of this analysis of man's population problems is this: the commons, if justifiable at all, is justifiable only under conditions of low-population density. As the human population has increased, the commons has had to be abandoned in one aspect after another. First we abandoned the commons in food gathering, enclosing farm land and restricting pastures and hunting and fishing areas. These restrictions are still not complete throughout the world. Somewhat later we saw that the commons as a place for waste disposal would also have to be abandoned. Restrictions on the disposal of domestic sewage are widely accepted in the Western world; we are still struggling to close the commons to pollution by automobiles, factories, insecticide sprayers, fertilizing operations, and atomic energy installations. In a still more embryonic state is our recognition of the evils of the commons in matters of pleasure. There is almost no restriction on the propagation of sound waves in the public medium. The shopping public is assaulted with mindless music, without its consent. Our government has paid out billions of dollars to create a supersonic transport which would disturb 50,000 people for every one person whisked from coast to coast 3 hours faster. Advertisers muddy the airwaves of radio and television and pollute the view of travelers. We are a long way from outlawing the commons in matters of pleasure. Is this because our Puritan inheritance makes us view pleasure as something of a sin, and pain (that is, the pollution of advertising) as the sign of virtue? Every new enclosure of the commons involves the infringement of somebody's personal liberty. Infringements made in the distant past are accepted because no contemporary complains of a loss. It is the newly proposed infringements that we vigorously oppose; cries of "rights" and "freedom" fill the air. But what does "freedom" mean? When men mutually agreed to pass laws against robbing, mankind became more free, not less so. Individuals locked into the logic of the commons are free only to bring on universal ruin; once they see the necessity of mutual coercion, they become free to pursue other goals. I believe it was Hegel who said, "Freedom is the recognition of necessity." The most important aspect of necessity that we must now recognize, is the necessity of abandoning the commons in breeding. No technical solution can rescue us from the misery of overpopulation. Freedom to breed will bring ruin to all. At the moment, to avoid hard decisions many of us are tempted to propagandize for conscience and responsible parenthood. The temptation must be resisted, because an appeal to independently acting consciences selects for the disappearance of all conscience in the long run, and an increase in anxiety in the short. The only way we can preserve and nurture other and more precious freedoms is by relinquishing the freedom to breed, and that very soon. "Freedom is the recognition of necessity" -- and it is the role of education to reveal to all the necessity of abandoning the freedom to breed. Only so, can we put an end to this aspect of the tragedy of the commons. Notes 1. J. B. Wiesner and H. F. York, Scientific American 211 (No. 4), 27 (1964). 2. G. Hardin, Journal of Heredity 50, 68 (1959), S. von Hoernor, Science 137, 18, (1962). 3. J. von Neumann and O. Morgenstern, Theory of Games and Economic Behavior (Princeton University Press, Princeton, N.J., 1947), p. 11. 4. J. H. Fremlin, New Scientist, No. 415 (1964), p. 285. 5. A. Smith, The Wealth of Nations (Modern Library, New York, 1937), p. 423. 6. W. F. Lloyd, Two Lectures on the Checks to Population (Oxford University Press, Oxford, England, 1833). 7. A. N. Whitehead, Science and the Modern World (Mentor, New York, 1948), p. 17. 8. G. Hardin, Ed., Population, Evolution, and Birth Control (Freeman, San Francisco, 1964), p. 56. 9. S. McVay, Scientific American 216 (No. 8), 13 (1966). 10. J. Fletcher, Situation Ethics (Westminster, Philadelphia, 1966). 11. D. Lack, The Natural Regulation of Animal Numbers (Clarendon Press, Oxford, England, 1954). 12. H. Girvetz, From Wealth to Welfare (Stanford University Press, Stanford, Calif, 1950). 13. G. Hardin, Perspectives in Biology and Medicine 6, 366 (1963). 14. U Thant, International Planned Parenthood News, No. 168 (February 1968), p. 3. 15. K. Davis, Science 158, 730 (1967). 16. S. Tax, Ed., Evolution After Darwin (University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1960), vol. 2, p. 469. 17. G. Bateson, D. D. Jackson, J. Haley, J. Weakland, Behavioral Science 1, 251 (1956). 18. P. Goodman, New York Review of Books 10 (8), 22 (23 May 1968). 19. A. Comfort, The Anxiety Makers (Nelson, London, 1967). 20. C. Frankel, The Case for Modern Man (Harper & Row, New York, 1955), p. 203. 21. J. D. Roslansky, Genetics and the Future of Man (Appleton-Century-Crofts, New York, 1966), p. 177. THE TRAGEDY OF THE COMMON REVISITED by Beryl Crowe (1969) reprinted in MANAGING THE COMMONS by Garrett Hardin and John Baden W.H. Freeman, 1977; ISBN 0-7167-0476-5 "There has developed in the contemporary natural sciences a recognition that there is a subset of problems, such as population, atomic war, and environmental corruption, for which there are no technical solutions. "There is also an increasing recognition among contemporary social scientists that there is a subset of problems, such as population, atomic war, environmental corruption, and the recovery of a livable urban environment, for which there are no current political solutions. The thesis of this article is that the common area shared by these two subsets contains most of the critical problems that threaten the very existence of contemporary man." [p. 53]ASSUMPTIONS NECESSARY TO AVOID THE TRAGEDY "In passing the technically insoluble problems over to the political and social realm for solution, Hardin made three critical assumptions: (1) that there exists, or can be developed, a 'criterion of judgment and system of weighting . . .' that will 'render the incommensurables . . . commensurable . . . ' in real life; (2) that, possessing this criterion of judgment, 'coercion can be mutually agreed upon,' and that the application of coercion to effect a solution to problems will be effective in modern society; and (3) that the administrative system, supported by the criterion of judgment and access to coercion, can and will protect the commons from further desecration." [p. 55] ERODING MYTH OF THE COMMON VALUE SYSTEM "In America there existed, until very recently, a set of conditions which perhaps made the solution to Hardin's subset possible; we lived with the myth that we were 'one people, indivisible. . . .' This myth postulated that we were the great 'melting pot' of the world wherein the diverse cultural ores of Europe were poured into the crucible of the frontier experience to produce a new alloy -- an American civilization. This new civilization was presumably united by a common value system that was democratic, equalitarian, and existing under universally enforceable rules contained in the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. "In the United States today, however, there is emerging a new set of behavior patterns which suggest that the myth is either dead or dying. Instead of believing and behaving in accordance with the myth, large sectors of the population are developing life-styles and value hierarchies that give contemporary Americans an appearance more closely analogous to the particularistic, primitive forms of 'tribal' organizations in geographic proximity than to that shining new alloy, the American civilization." [p. 56] "Looking at a more recent analysis of the sickness of the core city, Wallace F. Smith has argued that the productive model of the city is no longer viable for the purposes of economic analysis. Instead, he develops a model of the city as a site for leisure consumption, and then seems to suggest that the nature of this model is such is such that the city cannot regain its health because the leisure demands are value-based and, hence do not admit to compromise and accommodation; consequently there is no way of deciding among these value- oriented demands that are being made on the core city. "In looking for the cause of the erosion of the myth of a common value system, it seems to me that so long as our perceptions and knowledge of other groups were formed largely through the written media of communication, the American myth that we were a giant melting pot of equalitarians could be sustained. In such a perceptual field it is tenable, if not obvious, that men are motivated by interests. Interests can always be compromised and accommodated without undermining our very being by sacrificing values. Under the impact of electronic media, however, this psychological distance has broken down and now we discover that these people with whom we could formerly compromise on interests are not, after all, really motivated by interests but by values. Their behavior in our very living room betrays a set of values, moreover, that are incompatible with our own, and consequently the compromises that we make are not those of contract but of culture. While the former are acceptable, any form of compromise on the latter is not a form of rational behavior but is rather a clear case of either apostasy or heresy. Thus we have arrived not at an age of accommodation but one of confrontation. In such an age 'incommensurables' remain 'incommensurable' in real life." [p. 59]EROSION OF THE MYTH OF THE MONOPOLY OF COERCIVE FORCE "In the past, those who no longer subscribed to the values of the dominant culture were held in check by the myth that the state possessed a monopoly on coercive force. This myth has undergone continual erosion since the end of World War II owing to the success of the strategy of guerrilla warfare, as first revealed to the French in Indochina, and later conclusively demonstrated in Algeria. Suffering as we do from what Senator Fulbright has called 'the arrogance of power,' we have been extremely slow to learn the lesson in Vietnam, although we now realize that war is political and cannot be won by military means. It is apparent that the myth of the monopoly of coercive force as it was first qualified in the civil rights conflict in the South, then in our urban ghettos, next on the streets of Chicago, and now on our college campuses has lost its hold over the minds of Americans. The technology of guerrilla warfare has made it evident that, while the state can win battles, it cannot win wars of values. Coercive force which is centered in the modern state cannot be sustained in the face of the active resistance of some 10 percent of the population unless the state is willing to embark on a deliberate policy of genocide directed against the value dissident groups. The factor that sustained the myth of coercive force in the past was the acceptance of a common value system. Whether the latter exists is questionable in the modern nation-state." [p.p. 59-60]EROSION OF THE MYTH OF ADMINISTRATORS OF THE COMMONS "Indeed, the process has been so widely commented upon that one writer postulated a common life cycle for all of the attempts to develop regulatory policies. The life cycle is launched by an outcry so widespread and demanding that it generates enough political force to bring about establishment of a regulatory agency to insure the equitable, just, and rational distribution of the advantages among all holders of interest in the commons. This phase is followed by the symbolic reassurance of the offended as the agency goes into operation, developing a period of political quiescence among the great majority of those who hold a general but unorganized interest in the commons. Once this political quiescence has developed, the highly organized and specifically interested groups who wish to make incursions into the commons bring sufficient pressure to bear through other political processes to convert the agency to the protection and furthering of their interests. In the last phase even staffing of the regulating agency is accomplished by drawing the agency administrators from the ranks of the regulated." [p.p. 60-61] From sopan_joshi at yahoo.com Fri Jan 25 16:49:07 2002 From: sopan_joshi at yahoo.com (=?iso-8859-1?q?Sopan=20Joshi?=) Date: Fri, 25 Jan 2002 11:19:07 +0000 (GMT) Subject: [Reader-list] Colonial Gatecrashing In-Reply-To: <200201250416.FAA22026@zelda.intra.waag.org> Message-ID: <20020125111907.26944.qmail@web9801.mail.yahoo.com> This is in response to Joy's posting "Gates": ours was the corner house. so when the good people of our Delhi "colony" decided that security depended on a tall, heavy iron gate--just the sort that Joy mentions--it came up just outside our very own 'main gate'. the gate was constructed by one of the gentlemen residing in the colony who, i think, was in the construction business. the stalwart who guarded this gate was over 50, had a wrinkled face, and used to walk with a limp. he could barely carry the weight of his lathi. one day the gate came down upon the chowkidar and smashed his head. he died. the gentleman who had got the gate constructed handled the matter with the kind of concern and dexterity that one associates with Delhi Police. he paid some compensation to the chowkidar's wife and blamed the man who had welded the gate. some concerned people in the colony also contributed. a few days later, we shifted to another colony. this house is on the main road. so no gates have to be negotiated. but the gate is three two houses away. and the chowkidar here is a young man with the first inklings of facial hair. --- joy at www.sarai.net wrote: > For the first time in my life I found that to be > short in height is > definitely useful. For the last few years’ > residential areas in Delhi started > installing gates at almost every corner of the > streets. 10 feet high gates > with solid iron rods. Designs seem to be inspired > from Hollywood war films. > Every gate splits open for the cars etc. but they > are mostly closed except > for very few. It is almost a living puzzle game to > find the exact gate which > is open to enter or exit. The gates which are closed > they have a small > opening of 4ft. by 2ft. for the pedestrians. These > gates are useful for > various kinds of people. One I have already > mentioned. Second are those > people who suffer from identity crisis can stand in > front of the gate and > boost their ego as almost every person bows in front > of him/her. Tall Indians > can feel proud remembering the sequence when Amitabh > Bachchan emerges out of > similar gate of the jail in his famous film Sholay. > Doctors can be benefited > from this gate as it can cause casualties to absent > minded and rushing > people. Though these gates are said to be made for > security but number of > locks in individual household doesn’t show respect > to this huge gate. And > finally these gates can be very interesting “idea” > to write a book, make a > film or paint a series. > > Joy > _________________________________________ > reader-list: an open discussion list on media and > the city. > Critiques & Collaborations > To subscribe: send an email to > reader-list-request at sarai.net with subscribe in the > subject header. > List archive: __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Everything you'll ever need on one web page from News and Sport to Email and Music Charts http://uk.my.yahoo.com From sopan_joshi at yahoo.com Fri Jan 25 17:02:02 2002 From: sopan_joshi at yahoo.com (=?iso-8859-1?q?Sopan=20Joshi?=) Date: Fri, 25 Jan 2002 11:32:02 +0000 (GMT) Subject: [Reader-list] Colonial Gatecrashing Message-ID: <20020125113202.60390.qmail@web9806.mail.yahoo.com> This is in response to Joy's posting "Gates": ours was the corner house. the good people of our Delhi "colony" decided that security depended on a tall, heavy iron gate. it came up just outside our very own 'main gate' and was just the sort that Joy mentions. one of the gentlemen residents of the colony got the gate constructed. I’m not sure, but i think he was in the construction business. the stalwart who guarded this gate was over 50, had a wrinkled face, and used to walk with a limp. he could barely carry the weight of his lathi. one day the gate came down upon the chowkidar and smashed his head. he died. the gentleman who had got the gate constructed handled the matter with the kind of concern and dexterity that one associates with the Delhi Police. he paid some compensation to the chowkidar's wife (and blamed the man who had welded the gate). some concerned people in the colony also contributed. a few days later, we shifted to another colony. this house is on the main road. So we don’t have to negotiate any gates. but the gate--bigger and heavier than the one that crashed--is two houses away. and the chowkidar here is a young man with the first suggestions of facial hair. __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Everything you'll ever need on one web page from News and Sport to Email and Music Charts http://uk.my.yahoo.com From lachlan at london.com Sat Jan 26 08:07:40 2002 From: lachlan at london.com (Lachlan Brown) Date: Fri, 25 Jan 2002 21:37:40 -0500 Subject: [Reader-list] Tragedy of the Commons/Tragedy of Capital? Message-ID: <20020126023742.28553.qmail@iname.com> Jeebesh, There is a bit of a debate on the use and relevance of 'tragedy of the commons' with reference to contemporary and historical redistributed media in Nettime bbs. I cannot find your previous post and would be really interested to see it. Best, Lachlan Brown C. (416) 826 6937 VM. (416) 822 1123 http://third.net > > In my last postings there was refrences to the phrase `The Tragedy of the > Commons`. On request from friends I am enclosing an article written in 1968 > which kind of gave velocity to this phrase. cheers. Jeebesh > > > The Tragedy of the Commons > Garrett Hardin (1968) > > "The Tragedy of the Commons," Garrett Hardin, Science, 162(1968):1243-1248. > > At the end of a thoughtful article on the future of nuclear war, J.B. Wiesner > and H.F. York concluded that: "Both sides in the arms race are confronted by > the dilemma of steadily increasing military power and steadily decreasing > national security. It is our considered professional judgment that this > dilemma has no technical solution. If the great powers continue to look for > solutions in the area of science and technology only, the result will be to > worsen the situation.'' [1] > > I would like to focus your attention not on the subject of the article > (national security in a nuclear world) but on the kind of conclusion they > reached, namely that there is no technical solution to the problem. An > implicit and almost universal assumption of discussions published in > professional and semipopular scientific journals is that the problem under > discussion has a technical solution. A technical solution may be defined as > one that requires a change only in the techniques of the natural sciences, > demanding little or nothing in the way of change in human values or ideas of > morality. > > In our day (though not in earlier times) technical solutions are always > welcome. Because of previous failures in prophecy, it takes courage to assert > that a desired technical solution is not possible. Wiesner and York exhibited > this courage; publishing in a science journal, they insisted that the > solution to the problem was not to be found in the natural sciences. They > cautiously qualified their statement with the phrase, "It is our considered > professional judgment...." Whether they were right or not is not the concern > of the present article. Rather, the concern here is with the important > concept of a class of human problems which can be called "no technical > solution problems," and more specifically, with the identification and > discussion of one of these. > > It is easy to show that the class is not a null class. Recall the game of > tick-tack-toe. Consider the problem, "How can I win the game of > tick-tack-toe?" It is well known that I cannot, if I assume (in keeping with > the conventions of game theory) that my opponent understands the game > perfectly. Put another way, there is no "technical solution" to the problem. > I can win only by giving a radical meaning to the word "win." I can hit my > opponent over the head; or I can falsify the records. Every way in which I > "win" involves, in some sense, an abandonment of the game, as we intuitively > understand it. (I can also, of course, openly abandon the game -- refuse to > play it. This is what most adults do.) > > The class of "no technical solution problems" has members. My thesis is that > the "population problem," as conventionally conceived, is a member of this > class. How it is conventionally conceived needs some comment. It is fair to > say that most people who anguish over the population problem are trying to > find a way to avoid the evils of overpopulation without relinquishing any of > the privileges they now enjoy. They think that farming the seas or developing > new strains of wheat will solve the problem -- technologically. I try to show > here that the solution they seek cannot be found. The population problem > cannot be solved in a technical way, any more than can the problem of winning > the game of tick-tack-toe. > > What Shall We Maximize? > > Population, as Malthus said, naturally tends to grow "geometrically," or, as > we would now say, exponentially. In a finite world this means that the > per-capita share of the world's goods must decrease. Is ours a finite world? > > A fair defense can be put forward for the view that the world is infinite or > that we do not know that it is not. But, in terms of the practical problems > that we must face in the next few generations with the foreseeable > technology, it is clear that we will greatly increase human misery if we do > not, during the immediate future, assume that the world available to the > terrestrial human population is finite. "Space" is no escape. [2] > > A finite world can support only a finite population; therefore, population > growth must eventually equal zero. (The case of perpetual wide fluctuations > above and below zero is a trivial variant that need not be discussed.) When > this condition is met, what will be the situation of mankind? Specifically, > can Bentham's goal of "the greatest good for the greatest number" be > realized? > > No -- for two reasons, each sufficient by itself. The first is a theoretical > one. It is not mathematically possible to maximize for two (or more) > variables at the same time. This was clearly stated by von Neumann and > Morgenstern, [3] but the principle is implicit in the theory of partial > differential equations, dating back at least to D'Alembert (1717-1783). > > The second reason springs directly from biological facts. To live, any > organism must have a source of energy (for example, food). This energy is > utilized for two purposes: mere maintenance and work. For man maintenance of > life requires about 1600 kilocalories a day ("maintenance calories"). > Anything that he does over and above merely staying alive will be defined as > work, and is supported by "work calories" which he takes in. Work calories > are used not only for what we call work in common speech; they are also > required for all forms of enjoyment, from swimming and automobile racing to > playing music and writing poetry. If our goal is to maximize population it is > obvious what we must do: We must make the work calories per person approach > as close to zero as possible. No gourmet meals, no vacations, no sports, no > music, no literature, no art I think that everyone will grant, without > argument or proof, that maximizing population does not maximize goods. > Bentham's goal is impossible. > > In reaching this conclusion I have made the usual assumption that it is the > acquisition of energy that is the problem. The appearance of atomic energy > has led some to question this assumption. However, given an infinite source > of energy, population growth still produces an inescapable problem. The > problem of the acquisition of energy is replaced by the problem of its > dissipation, as J. H. Fremlin has so wittily shown. [4] The arithmetic signs > in the analysis are, as it were, reversed; but Bentham's goal is > unobtainable. > > The optimum population is, then, less than the maximum. The difficulty of > defining the optimum is enormous; so far as I know, no one has seriously > tackled this problem. Reaching an acceptable and stable solution will surely > require more than one generation of hard analytical work -- and much > persuasion. > > We want the maximum good per person; but what is good? To one person it is > wilderness, to another it is ski lodges for thousands. To one it is estuaries > to nourish ducks for hunters to shoot; to another it is factory land. > Comparing one good with another is, we usually say, impossible because goods > are incommensurable. Incommensurables cannot be compared. > > Theoretically this may be true; but in real life incommensurables are > commensurable. Only a criterion of judgment and a system of weighting are > needed. In nature the criterion is survival. Is it better for a species to be > small and hideable, or large and powerful? Natural selection commensurates > the incommensurables. The compromise achieved depends on a natural weighting > of the values of the variables. > > Man must imitate this process. There is no doubt that in fact he already > does, but unconsciously. It is when the hidden decisions are made explicit > that the arguments begin. The problem for the years ahead is to work out an > acceptable theory of weighting. Synergistic effects, nonlinear variation, and > difficulties in discounting the future make the intellectual problem > difficult, but not (in principle) insoluble. > > Has any cultural group solved this practical problem at the present time, > even on an intuitive level? One simple fact proves that none has: there is no > prosperous population in the world today that has, and has had for some time, > a growth rate of zero. Any people that has intuitively identified its optimum > point will soon reach it, after which its growth rate becomes and remains > zero. > > Of course, a positive growth rate might be taken as evidence that a > population is below its optimum. However, by any reasonable standards, the > most rapidly growing populations on earth today are (in general) the most > miserable. This association (which need not be invariable) casts doubt on the > optimistic assumption that the positive growth rate of a population is > evidence that it has yet to reach its optimum. > > We can make little progress in working toward optimum population size until > we explicitly exorcise the spirit of Adam Smith in the field of practical > demography. In economic affairs, The Wealth of Nations (1776) popularized the > "invisible hand," the idea that an individual who "intends only his own > gain," is, as it were, "led by an invisible hand to promote the public > interest." [5] Adam Smith did not assert that this was invariably true, and > perhaps neither did any of his followers. But he contributed to a dominant > tendency of thought that has ever since interfered with positive action based > on rational analysis, namely, the tendency to assume that decisions reached > individually will, in fact, be the best decisions for an entire society. If > this assumption is correct it justifies the continuance of our present policy > of laissez faire in reproduction. If it is correct we can assume that men > will control their individual fecundity so as to produce the optimum > population. If the assumption is not correct, we need to reexamine our > individual freedoms to see which ones are defensible. > > Tragedy of Freedom in a Commons > > The rebuttal to the invisible hand in population control is to be found in a > scenario first sketched in a little-known Pamphlet in 1833 by a mathematical > amateur named William Forster Lloyd (1794-1852). [6] We may well call it "the > tragedy of the commons," using the word "tragedy" as the philosopher > Whitehead used it [7]: "The essence of dramatic tragedy is not unhappiness. > It resides in the solemnity of the remorseless working of things." He then > goes on to say, "This inevitableness of destiny can only be illustrated in > terms of human life by incidents which in fact involve unhappiness. For it is > only by them that the futility of escape can be made evident in the drama." > > The tragedy of the commons develops in this way. Picture a pasture open to > all. It is to be expected that each herdsman will try to keep as many cattle > as possible on the commons. Such an arrangement may work reasonably > satisfactorily for centuries because tribal wars, poaching, and disease keep > the numbers of both man and beast well below the carrying capacity of the > land. Finally, however, comes the day of reckoning, that is, the day when the > long-desired goal of social stability becomes a reality. At this point, the > inherent logic of the commons remorselessly generates tragedy. > > As a rational being, each herdsman seeks to maximize his gain. Explicitly or > implicitly, more or less consciously, he asks, "What is the utility to me of > adding one more animal to my herd?" This utility has one negative and one > positive component. > > 1. The positive component is a function of the increment of one animal. Since > the herdsman receives all the proceeds from the sale of the additional > animal, the positive utility is nearly + 1. > > 2. The negative component is a function of the additional overgrazing created > by one more animal. Since, however, the effects of overgrazing are shared by > all the herdsmen, the negative utility for any particular decision­making > herdsman is only a fraction of - 1. > > Adding together the component partial utilities, the rational herdsman > concludes that the only sensible course for him to pursue is to add another > animal to his herd. And another.... But this is the conclusion reached by > each and every rational herdsman sharing a commons. Therein is the tragedy. > Each man is locked into a system that compels him to increase his herd > without limit -- in a world that is limited. Ruin is the destination toward > which all men rush, each pursuing his own best interest in a society that > believes in the freedom of the commons. Freedom in a commons brings ruin to > all. > > Some would say that this is a platitude. Would that it were! In a sense, it > was learned thousands of years ago, but natural selection favors the forces > of psychological denial. [8] The individual benefits as an individual from > his ability to deny the truth even though society as a whole, of which he is > a part, suffers. Education can counteract the natural tendency to do the > wrong thing, but the inexorable succession of generations requires that the > basis for this knowledge be constantly refreshed. > > A simple incident that occurred a few years ago in Leominster, Massachusetts > shows how perishable the knowledge is. During the Christmas shopping season > the parking meters downtown were covered with plastic bags that bore tags > reading: "Do not open until after Christmas. Free parking courtesy of the > mayor and city council." In other words, facing the prospect of an increased > demand for already scarce space, the city fathers reinstituted the system of > the commons. (Cynically, we suspect that they gained more votes than they > lost by this retrogressive act.) > > In an approximate way, the logic of the commons has been understood for a > long time, perhaps since the discovery of agriculture or the invention of > private property in real estate. But it is understood mostly only in special > cases which are not sufficiently generalized. Even at this late date, > cattlemen leasing national land on the Western ranges demonstrate no more > than an ambivalent understanding, in constantly pressuring federal > authorities to increase the head count to the point where overgrazing > produces erosion and weed-dominance. Likewise, the oceans of the world > continue to suffer from the survival of the philosophy of the commons. > Maritime nations still respond automatically to the shibboleth of the > "freedom of the seas." Professing to believe in the "inexhaustible resources > of the oceans," they bring species after species of fish and whales closer to > extinction. [9] > > The National Parks present another instance of the working out of the tragedy > of the commons. At present, they are open to all, without limit. The parks > themselves are limited in extent -- there is only one Yosemite Valley -- > whereas population seems to grow without limit. The values that visitors seek > in the parks are steadily eroded. Plainly, we must soon cease to treat the > parks as commons or they will be of no value to anyone. > > What shall we do? We have several options. We might sell them off as private > property. We might keep them as public property, but allocate the right to > enter them. The allocation might be on the basis of wealth, by the use of an > auction system. It might be on the basis of merit, as defined by some > agreed­upon standards. It might be by lottery. Or it might be on a > first-come, first-served basis, administered to long queues. These, I think, > are all objectionable. But we must choose -- or acquiesce in the destruction > of the commons that we call our National Parks. > > Pollution > > In a reverse way, the tragedy of the commons reappears in problems of > pollution. Here it is not a question of taking something out of the commons, > but of putting something in -- sewage, or chemical, radioactive, and heat > wastes into water; noxious and dangerous fumes into the air; and distracting > and unpleasant advertising signs into the line of sight. The calculations of > utility are much the same as before. The rational man finds that his share of > the cost of the wastes he discharges into the commons is less than the cost > of purifying his wastes before releasing them. Since this is true for > everyone, we are locked into a system of "fouling our own nest," so long as > we behave only as independent, rational, free enterprisers. > > The tragedy of the commons as a food basket is averted by private property, > or something formally like it. But the air and waters surrounding us cannot > readily be fenced, and so the tragedy of the commons as a cesspool must be > prevented by different means, by coercive laws or taxing devices that make it > cheaper for the polluter to treat his pollutants than to discharge them > untreated. We have not progressed as far with the solution of this problem as > we have with the first. Indeed, our particular concept of private property, > which deters us from exhausting the positive resources of the earth, favors > pollution. The owner of a factory on the bank of a stream -- whose property > extends to the middle of the stream -- often has difficulty seeing why it is > not his natural right to muddy the waters flowing past his door. The law, > always behind the times, requires elaborate stitching and fitting to adapt it > to this newly perceived aspect of the commons. > > The pollution problem is a consequence of population. It did not much matter > how a lonely American frontiersman disposed of his waste. "Flowing water > purifies itself every ten miles," my grandfather used to say, and the myth > was near enough to the truth when he was a boy, for there were not too many > people. But as population became denser, the natural chemical and biological > recycling processes became overloaded, calling for a redefinition of property > rights. > > How to Legislate Temperance? > > Analysis of the pollution problem as a function of population density > uncovers a not generally recognized principle of morality, namely: the > morality of an act is a function of the state of the system at the time it is > performed. [10] Using the commons as a cesspool does not harm the general > public under frontier conditions, because there is no public; the same > behavior in a metropolis is unbearable. A hundred and fifty years ago a > plainsman could kill an American bison, cut out only the tongue for his > dinner, and discard the rest of the animal. He was not in any important sense > being wasteful. Today, with only a few thousand bison left, we would be > appalled at such behavior. > > In passing, it is worth noting that the morality of an act cannot be > determined from a photograph. One does not know whether a man killing an > elephant or setting fire to the grassland is harming others until one knows > the total system in which his act appears. "One picture is worth a thousand > words," said an ancient Chinese; but it may take ten thousand words to > validate it. It is as tempting to ecologists as it is to reformers in general > to try to persuade others by way of the photographic shortcut. But the > essence of an argument cannot be photographed: it must be presented > rationally -- in words. > > That morality is system-sensitive escaped the attention of most codifiers of > ethics in the past. "Thou shalt not " is the form of traditional ethical > directives which make no allowance for particular circumstances. The laws of > our society follow the pattern of ancient ethics, and therefore are poorly > suited to governing a complex, crowded, changeable world. Our epicyclic > solution is to augment statutory law with administrative law. Since it is > practically impossible to spell out all the conditions under which it is safe > to burn trash in the back yard or to run an automobile without smog­control, > by law we delegate the details to bureaus. The result is administrative law, > which is rightly feared for an ancient reason -- Quis custodies ipsos > custodes? --Who shall watch the watchers themselves? John Adams said that we > must have a "government of laws and not men." Bureau administrators, trying > to evaluate the morality of acts in the total system, are singularly liable > to corruption, producing a government by men, not laws. > > Prohibition is easy to legislate (though not necessarily to enforce); but how > do we legislate temperance? Experience indicates that it can be accomplished > best through the mediation of administrative law. We limit possibilities > unnecessarily if we suppose that the sentiment of Quis custodiet denies us > the use of administrative law. We should rather retain the phrase as a > perpetual reminder of fearful dangers we cannot avoid. The great challenge > facing us now is to invent the corrective feedbacks that are needed to keep > custodians honest. We must find ways to legitimate the needed authority of > both the custodians and the corrective feedbacks. > > Freedom to Breed Is Intolerable > > The tragedy of the commons is involved in population problems in another way. > In a world governed solely by the principle of "dog eat dog" --if indeed > there ever was such a world--how many children a family had would not be a > matter of public concern. Parents who bred too exuberantly would leave fewer > descendants, not more, because they would be unable to care adequately for > their children. David Lack and others have found that such a negative > feedback demonstrably controls the fecundity of birds. [11] But men are not > birds, and have not acted like them for millenniums, at least. > > If each human family were dependent only on its own resources; if the > children of improvident parents starved to death; if thus, over breeding > brought its own "punishment" to the germ line -- then there would be no > public interest in controlling the breeding of families. But our society is > deeply committed to the welfare state, [12] and hence is confronted with > another aspect of the tragedy of the commons. > > In a welfare state, how shall we deal with the family, the religion, the > race, or the class (or indeed any distinguishable and cohesive group) that > adopts over breeding as a policy to secure its own aggrandizement? [13] To > couple the concept of freedom to breed with the belief that everyone born has > an equal right to the commons is to lock the world into a tragic course of > action. > > Unfortunately this is just the course of action that is being pursued by the > United Nations. In late 1967, some thirty nations agreed to the following: > "The Universal Declaration of Human Rights describes the family as the > natural and fundamental unit of society. It follows that any choice and > decision with regard to the size of the family must irrevocably rest with the > family itself, and cannot be made by anyone else.'' [14] > > It is painful to have to deny categorically the validity of this right; > denying it, one feels as uncomfortable as a resident of Salem, Massachusetts, > who denied the reality of witches in the seventeenth century. At the present > time, in liberal quarters, something like a taboo acts to inhibit criticism > of the United Nations. There is a feeling that the United Nations is "our > last and best hope," that we shouldn't find fault with it; we shouldn't play > into the hands of the archconservatives. However, let us not forget what > Robert Louis Stevenson said: "The truth that is suppressed by friends is the > readiest weapon of the enemy." If we love the truth we must openly deny the > validity of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, even though it is > promoted by the United Nations. We should also join with Kingsley Davis [15] > in attempting to get Planned Parenthood-World Population to see the error of > its ways in embracing the same tragic ideal. > > Conscience Is Self-Eliminating > > It is a mistake to think that we can control the breeding of mankind in the > long run by an appeal to conscience. Charles Galton Darwin made this point > when he spoke on the centennial of the publication of his grandfather's great > book. The argument is straightforward and Darwinian. > > People vary. Confronted with appeals to limit breeding, some people will > undoubtedly respond to the plea more than others. Those who have more > children will produce a larger fraction of the next generation than those > with more susceptible consciences. The differences will be accentuated, > generation by generation. > > In C. G. Darwin's words: "It may well be that it would take hundreds of > generations for the progenitive instinct to develop in this way, but if it > should do so, nature would have taken her revenge, and the variety Homo > contracipiens would become extinct and would be replaced by the variety Homo > progenitivus. [16] > > The argument assumes that conscience or the desire for children (no matter > which) is hereditary-but hereditary only in the most general formal sense. > The result will be the same whether the attitude is transmitted through germ > cells, or exosomatically, to use A. J. Lotka's term. (If one denies the > latter possibility as well as the former, then what's the point of > education?) The argument has here been stated in the context of the > population problem, but it applies equally well to any instance in which > society appeals to an individual exploiting a commons to restrain himself for > the general good -- by means of his conscience. To make such an appeal is to > set up a selective system that works toward the elimination of conscience > from the race. > > Pathogenic Effects of Conscience > > The long-term disadvantage of an appeal to conscience should be enough to > condemn it; but it has serious short-term disadvantages as well. If we ask a > man who is exploiting a commons to desist "in the name of conscience," what > are we saying to him? What does he hear? -- not only at the moment but also > in the wee small hours of the night when, half asleep, he remembers not > merely the words we used but also the nonverbal communication cues we gave > him unawares? Sooner or later, consciously or subconsciously, he senses that > he has received two communications, and that they are contradictory: 1. > (intended communication) "If you don't do as we ask, we will openly condemn > you for not acting like a responsible citizen"; 2. (the unintended > communication) "If you do behave as we ask, we will secretly condemn you for > a simpleton who can be shamed into standing aside while the rest of us > exploit the commons." > > Every man then is caught in what Bateson has called a "double bind." Bateson > and his co-workers have made a plausible case for viewing the double bind as > an important causative factor in the genesis of schizophrenia. [17] The > double bind may not always be so damaging, but it always endangers the mental > health of anyone to whom it is applied. "A bad conscience," said Nietzsche, > "is a kind of illness." > > To conjure up a conscience in others is tempting to anyone who wishes to > extend his control beyond the legal limits. Leaders at the highest level > succumb to this temptation. Has any president during the past generation > failed to call on labor unions to moderate voluntarily their demands for > higher wages, or to steel companies to honor voluntary guidelines on prices? > I can recall none. The rhetoric used on such occasions is designed to produce > feelings of guilt in noncooperators. > > For centuries it was assumed without proof that guilt was a valuable, perhaps > even an indispensable, ingredient of the civilized life. Now, in this > post-Freudian world, we doubt it. > > Paul Goodman speaks from the modern point of view when he says: "No good has > ever come from feeling guilty, neither intelligence, policy, nor compassion. > The guilty do not pay attention to the object but only to themselves, and not > even to their own interests, which might make sense, but to their > anxieties.'' [18] > > One does not have to be a professional psychiatrist to see the consequences > of anxiety. We in the Western world are just emerging from a dreadful two > centuries-long Dark Ages of Eros that was sustained partly by prohibition > laws, but perhaps more effectively by the anxiety-generating mechanisms of > education. Alex Comfort has told the story well in The Anxiety Makers; [19] > it is not a pretty one. > > Since proof is difficult, we may even concede that the results of anxiety may > sometimes, from certain points of view, be desirable. The larger question we > should ask is whether, as a matter of policy, we should ever encourage the > use of a technique the tendency (if not the intention) of which is > psychologically pathogenic. We hear much talk these days of responsible > parenthood; the coupled words are incorporated into the titles of some > organizations devoted to birth control. Some people have proposed massive > propaganda campaigns to instill responsibility into the nation's (or the > world's) breeders. But what is the meaning of the word conscience? When we > use the word responsibility in the absence of substantial sanctions are we > not trying to browbeat a free man in a commons into acting against his own > interest? Responsibility is a verbal counterfeit for a substantial quid pro > quo. It is an attempt to get something for nothing. > > If the word responsibility is to be used at all, I suggest that it be in the > sense Charles Frankel uses it. [20] "Responsibility," says this philosopher, > "is the product of definite social arrangements." Notice that Frankel calls > for social arrangements -- not propaganda. > > Mutual Coercion Mutually Agreed Upon > > The social arrangements that produce responsibility are arrangements that > create coercion, of some sort. Consider bank robbing. The man who takes money > from a bank acts as if the bank were a commons. How do we prevent such > action? Certainly not by trying to control his behavior solely by a verbal > appeal to his sense of responsibility. Rather than rely on propaganda we > follow Frankel's lead and insist that a bank is not a commons; we seek the > definite social arrangements that will keep it from becoming a commons. That > we thereby infringe on the freedom of would-be robbers we neither deny nor > regret. > > The morality of bank robbing is particularly easy to understand because we > accept complete prohibition of this activity. We are willing to say "Thou > shalt not rob banks," without providing for exceptions. But temperance also > can be created by coercion. Taxing is a good coercive device. To keep > downtown shoppers temperate in their use of parking space we introduce > parking meters for short periods, and traffic fines for longer ones. We need > not actually forbid a citizen to park as long as he wants to; we need merely > make it increasingly expensive for him to do so. Not prohibition, but > carefully biased options are what we offer him. A Madison Avenue man might > call this persuasion; I prefer the greater candor of the word coercion. > > Coercion is a dirty word to most liberals now, but it need not forever be so. > As with the four-letter words, its dirtiness can be cleansed away by exposure > to the light, by saying it over and over without apology or embarrassment. To > many, the word coercion implies arbitrary decisions of distant and > irresponsible bureaucrats; but this is not a necessary part of its meaning. > The only kind of coercion I recommend is mutual coercion, mutually agreed > upon by the majority of the people affected. > > To say that we mutually agree to coercion is not to say that we are required > to enjoy it, or even to pretend we enjoy it. Who enjoys taxes? We all grumble > about them. But we accept compulsory taxes because we recognize that > voluntary taxes would favor the conscienceless. We institute and > (grumblingly) support taxes and other coercive devices to escape the horror > of the commons. > > An alternative to the commons need not be perfectly just to be preferable. > With real estate and other material goods, the alternative we have chosen is > the institution of private property coupled with legal inheritance. Is this > system perfectly just? As a genetically trained biologist I deny that it is. > It seems to me that, if there are to be differences in individual > inheritance, legal possession should be perfectly correlated with biological > inheritance-that those who are biologically more fit to be the custodians of > property and power should legally inherit more. But genetic recombination > continually makes a mockery of the doctrine of "like father, like son" > implicit in our laws of legal inheritance. An idiot can inherit millions, and > a trust fund can keep his estate intact. We must admit that our legal system > of private property plus inheritance is unjust -- but we put up with it > because we are not convinced, at the moment, that anyone has invented a > better system. The alternative of the commons is too horrifying to > contemplate. Injustice is preferable to total ruin. > > It is one of the peculiarities of the warfare between reform and the status > quo that it is thoughtlessly governed by a double standard. Whenever a reform > measure is proposed it is often defeated when its opponents triumphantly > discover a flaw in it. As Kingsley Davis has pointed out, [21] worshipers of > the status quo sometimes imply that no reform is possible without unanimous > agreement, an implication contrary to historical fact. As nearly as I can > make out, automatic rejection of proposed reforms is based on one of two > unconscious assumptions: (1) that the status quo is perfect; or (2) that the > choice we face is between reform and no action; if the proposed reform is > imperfect, we presumably should take no action at all, while we wait for a > perfect proposal. > > But we can never do nothing. That which we have done for thousands of years > is also action. It also produces evils. Once we are aware that the status quo > is action, we can then compare its discoverable advantages and disadvantages > with the predicted advantages and disadvantages of the proposed reform, > discounting as best we can for our lack of experience. On the basis of such a > comparison, we can make a rational decision which will not involve the > unworkable assumption that only perfect systems are tolerable. > > Recognition of Necessity > > Perhaps the simplest summary of this analysis of man's population problems is > this: the commons, if justifiable at all, is justifiable only under > conditions of low-population density. As the human population has increased, > the commons has had to be abandoned in one aspect after another. > > First we abandoned the commons in food gathering, enclosing farm land and > restricting pastures and hunting and fishing areas. These restrictions are > still not complete throughout the world. > > Somewhat later we saw that the commons as a place for waste disposal would > also have to be abandoned. Restrictions on the disposal of domestic sewage > are widely accepted in the Western world; we are still struggling to close > the commons to pollution by automobiles, factories, insecticide sprayers, > fertilizing operations, and atomic energy installations. > > In a still more embryonic state is our recognition of the evils of the > commons in matters of pleasure. There is almost no restriction on the > propagation of sound waves in the public medium. The shopping public is > assaulted with mindless music, without its consent. Our government has paid > out billions of dollars to create a supersonic transport which would disturb > 50,000 people for every one person whisked from coast to coast 3 hours > faster. Advertisers muddy the airwaves of radio and television and pollute > the view of travelers. We are a long way from outlawing the commons in > matters of pleasure. Is this because our Puritan inheritance makes us view > pleasure as something of a sin, and pain (that is, the pollution of > advertising) as the sign of virtue? > > Every new enclosure of the commons involves the infringement of somebody's > personal liberty. Infringements made in the distant past are accepted because > no contemporary complains of a loss. It is the newly proposed infringements > that we vigorously oppose; cries of "rights" and "freedom" fill the air. But > what does "freedom" mean? When men mutually agreed to pass laws against > robbing, mankind became more free, not less so. Individuals locked into the > logic of the commons are free only to bring on universal ruin; once they see > the necessity of mutual coercion, they become free to pursue other goals. I > believe it was Hegel who said, "Freedom is the recognition of necessity." > > The most important aspect of necessity that we must now recognize, is the > necessity of abandoning the commons in breeding. No technical solution can > rescue us from the misery of overpopulation. Freedom to breed will bring ruin > to all. At the moment, to avoid hard decisions many of us are tempted to > propagandize for conscience and responsible parenthood. The temptation must > be resisted, because an appeal to independently acting consciences selects > for the disappearance of all conscience in the long run, and an increase in > anxiety in the short. > > The only way we can preserve and nurture other and more precious freedoms is > by relinquishing the freedom to breed, and that very soon. "Freedom is the > recognition of necessity" -- and it is the role of education to reveal to all > the necessity of abandoning the freedom to breed. Only so, can we put an end > to this aspect of the tragedy of the commons. > > Notes > > 1. J. B. Wiesner and H. F. York, Scientific American 211 (No. 4), 27 (1964). > > 2. G. Hardin, Journal of Heredity 50, 68 (1959), S. von Hoernor, Science 137, > 18, (1962). > > 3. J. von Neumann and O. Morgenstern, Theory of Games and Economic Behavior > (Princeton University Press, Princeton, N.J., 1947), p. 11. > > 4. J. H. Fremlin, New Scientist, No. 415 (1964), p. 285. > > 5. A. Smith, The Wealth of Nations (Modern Library, New York, 1937), p. 423. > > 6. W. F. Lloyd, Two Lectures on the Checks to Population (Oxford University > Press, Oxford, England, 1833). > > 7. A. N. Whitehead, Science and the Modern World (Mentor, New York, 1948), p. > 17. > > 8. G. Hardin, Ed., Population, Evolution, and Birth Control (Freeman, San > Francisco, 1964), p. 56. > > 9. S. McVay, Scientific American 216 (No. 8), 13 (1966). > > 10. J. Fletcher, Situation Ethics (Westminster, Philadelphia, 1966). > > 11. D. Lack, The Natural Regulation of Animal Numbers (Clarendon Press, > Oxford, England, 1954). > > 12. H. Girvetz, From Wealth to Welfare (Stanford University Press, Stanford, > Calif, 1950). > > 13. G. Hardin, Perspectives in Biology and Medicine 6, 366 (1963). > > 14. U Thant, International Planned Parenthood News, No. 168 (February 1968), > p. 3. > > 15. K. Davis, Science 158, 730 (1967). > > 16. S. Tax, Ed., Evolution After Darwin (University of Chicago Press, > Chicago, 1960), vol. 2, p. 469. > > 17. G. Bateson, D. D. Jackson, J. Haley, J. Weakland, Behavioral Science 1, > 251 (1956). > > 18. P. Goodman, New York Review of Books 10 (8), 22 (23 May 1968). > > 19. A. Comfort, The Anxiety Makers (Nelson, London, 1967). > > 20. C. Frankel, The Case for Modern Man (Harper & Row, New York, 1955), p. > 203. > > 21. J. D. Roslansky, Genetics and the Future of Man (Appleton-Century-Crofts, > New York, 1966), p. 177. THE TRAGEDY OF THE COMMON REVISITED > by Beryl Crowe (1969) > reprinted in MANAGING THE COMMONS > by Garrett Hardin and John Baden > W.H. Freeman, 1977; ISBN 0-7167-0476-5 > > "There has developed in the contemporary natural sciences a recognition that > there is a subset of problems, such as population, atomic war, and > environmental corruption, for which there are no technical solutions. > > "There is also an increasing recognition among contemporary social scientists > that there is a subset of problems, such as population, atomic war, > environmental corruption, and the recovery of a livable urban environment, > for which there are no current political solutions. The thesis of this > article is that the common area shared by these two subsets contains most of > the critical problems that threaten the very existence of contemporary man." > [p. 53]ASSUMPTIONS NECESSARY TO AVOID THE TRAGEDY > > "In passing the technically insoluble problems over to the political and > social realm for solution, Hardin made three critical assumptions: > > (1) that there exists, or can be developed, a 'criterion of judgment and > system of weighting . . .' that will 'render the incommensurables . . . > commensurable . . . ' in real life; > > (2) that, possessing this criterion of judgment, 'coercion can be mutually > agreed upon,' and that the application of coercion to effect a solution to > problems will be effective in modern society; and > > (3) that the administrative system, supported by the criterion of judgment > and access to coercion, can and will protect the commons from further > desecration." [p. 55] > > ERODING MYTH OF THE COMMON VALUE SYSTEM > > "In America there existed, until very recently, a set of conditions which > perhaps made the solution to Hardin's subset possible; we lived with the myth > that we were 'one people, indivisible. . . .' This myth postulated that we > were the great 'melting pot' of the world wherein the diverse cultural ores > of Europe were poured into the crucible of the frontier experience to produce > a new alloy -- an American civilization. This new civilization was presumably > united by a common value system that was democratic, equalitarian, and > existing under universally enforceable rules contained in the Constitution > and the Bill of Rights. > > "In the United States today, however, there is emerging a new set of behavior > patterns which suggest that the myth is either dead or dying. Instead of > believing and behaving in accordance with the myth, large sectors of the > population are developing life-styles and value hierarchies that give > contemporary Americans an appearance more closely analogous to the > particularistic, primitive forms of 'tribal' organizations in geographic > proximity than to that shining new alloy, the American civilization." [p. 56] > > "Looking at a more recent analysis of the sickness of the core city, Wallace > F. Smith has argued that the productive model of the city is no longer viable > for the purposes of economic analysis. Instead, he develops a model of the > city as a site for leisure consumption, and then seems to suggest that the > nature of this model is such is such that the city cannot regain its health > because the leisure demands are value-based and, hence do not admit to > compromise and accommodation; consequently there is no way of deciding among > these value- oriented demands that are being made on the core city. > > "In looking for the cause of the erosion of the myth of a common value > system, it seems to me that so long as our perceptions and knowledge of other > groups were formed largely through the written media of communication, the > American myth that we were a giant melting pot of equalitarians could be > sustained. In such a perceptual field it is tenable, if not obvious, that men > are motivated by interests. Interests can always be compromised and > accommodated without undermining our very being by sacrificing values. Under > the impact of electronic media, however, this psychological distance has > broken down and now we discover that these people with whom we could formerly > compromise on interests are not, after all, really motivated by interests but > by values. Their behavior in our very living room betrays a set of values, > moreover, that are incompatible with our own, and consequently the > compromises that we make are not those of contract but of culture. While the > former are acceptable, any form of compromise on the latter is not a form of > rational behavior but is rather a clear case of either apostasy or heresy. > Thus we have arrived not at an age of accommodation but one of confrontation. > In such an age 'incommensurables' remain 'incommensurable' in real life." [p. > 59]EROSION OF THE MYTH OF THE MONOPOLY OF COERCIVE FORCE > > "In the past, those who no longer subscribed to the values of the dominant > culture were held in check by the myth that the state possessed a monopoly on > coercive force. This myth has undergone continual erosion since the end of > World War II owing to the success of the strategy of guerrilla warfare, as > first revealed to the French in Indochina, and later conclusively > demonstrated in Algeria. Suffering as we do from what Senator Fulbright has > called 'the arrogance of power,' we have been extremely slow to learn the > lesson in Vietnam, although we now realize that war is political and cannot > be won by military means. It is apparent that the myth of the monopoly of > coercive force as it was first qualified in the civil rights conflict in the > South, then in our urban ghettos, next on the streets of Chicago, and now on > our college campuses has lost its hold over the minds of Americans. The > technology of guerrilla warfare has made it evident that, while the state can > win battles, it cannot win wars of values. Coercive force which is centered > in the modern state cannot be sustained in the face of the active resistance > of some 10 percent of the population unless the state is willing to embark on > a deliberate policy of genocide directed against the value dissident groups. > The factor that sustained the myth of coercive force in the past was the > acceptance of a common value system. Whether the latter exists is > questionable in the modern nation-state." [p.p. 59-60]EROSION OF THE MYTH OF > ADMINISTRATORS OF THE COMMONS > > "Indeed, the process has been so widely commented upon that one writer > postulated a common life cycle for all of the attempts to develop regulatory > policies. The life cycle is launched by an outcry so widespread and demanding > that it generates enough political force to bring about establishment of a > regulatory agency to insure the equitable, just, and rational distribution of > the advantages among all holders of interest in the commons. This phase is > followed by the symbolic reassurance of the offended as the agency goes into > operation, developing a period of political quiescence among the great > majority of those who hold a general but unorganized interest in the commons. > Once this political quiescence has developed, the highly organized and > specifically interested groups who wish to make incursions into the commons > bring sufficient pressure to bear through other political processes to > convert the agency to the protection and furthering of their interests. In > the last phase even staffing of the regulating agency is accomplished by > drawing the agency administrators from the ranks of the regulated." [p.p. > 60-61] > > > --__--__-- > > _________________________________________ reader-list: an open discussion list on media and the city. > Critiques & Collaborations > To subscribe: send an email to reader-list-request at sarai.net with subscribe in the subject header. > List archive: > > > End of Reader-list Digest > > -- _______________________________________________ Sign-up for your own FREE Personalized E-mail at Mail.com http://www.mail.com/?sr=signup 1 cent a minute calls anywhere in the U.S.! http://www.getpennytalk.com/cgi-bin/adforward.cgi?p_key=RG9853KJ&url=http://www.getpennytalk.com From pnanpin at yahoo.co.in Sat Jan 26 23:44:32 2002 From: pnanpin at yahoo.co.in (=?iso-8859-1?q?pratap=20pandey?=) Date: Sat, 26 Jan 2002 18:14:32 +0000 (GMT) Subject: [Reader-list] Billi Gates Message-ID: <20020126181432.97535.qmail@web8104.in.yahoo.com> This is in response to Joy's write-up called "Gates". So what if Bill Gates is an American? We have our very own Billi Gates. Billi Gates -- wrought-ironed, welded into ship-shape, locked into the earth with brick-and-cement foundation, locked so that the earth may turn but Billi Gates will not -- sharpens his talons every night. Billi Gates has a thousand talons. The talons are bits of iron rod sharpened to a point. This, too, is a job. From joy at www.sarai.net Sun Jan 27 00:35:27 2002 From: joy at www.sarai.net (joy at www.sarai.net) Date: Sat, 26 Jan 2002 19:05:27 -0000 Subject: [Reader-list] Re: thought about this article In-Reply-To: <0201261547500C.00594@pinki.sarai.kit> Message-ID: <200201261905.UAA23158@zelda.intra.waag.org> Oh Jesus, I asked for rice, not the recipe of Beriani. One more thing I could not understand is what masters without slaves doing for �workers�� councils? I hope the word worker represents only name not class! Or the essay is reflecting on animal farm kind of playground. Problem is not with the space neither the astronauts but the imagination of community. In spite of constructing such a tall argument the whole thing can collapse like the WTC building on the last line, then gates will come up at every corner of the streets. Best Joy ------------------------- Jeebesh Bagchi said: > dear Joy and Sopan > > Reading your postings i was strangely reminded of this old situationist text. > i am not not sure how they are connected but it did resonate. best jeebesh > > The Conquest of Space in the Time of Power > By Eduardo RotheInternationale Situationniste #12, September 1969Translated > by Paul Sieveking and published in Omphalus 19721 > (http://www.notbored.org/conquest.html) > > Science in the service of capital, commodities and the spectacle are nothing > other than capitalized knowledge, fetishism of idea and method, alienated > image of human thought. Pseudo-dimension of man, its passive knowledge of > mediocre reality is the magical justification for a race of slaves. > > 2 > > It's been a long time since the power of knowledge has transformed itself > into the knowledge of power. Contemporary science, the experimental inheritor > of the religion of the Middle Ages, accomplished the same functions in > relation to class society: it balances the daily stupidity of men with the > eternal intelligence of the specialist. It sings in calculations of the > grandeur of the human race, when it is nothing more than the organized sum of > its own limitations and alienations. > > 3 > > Just as industry, destined to free man from work by machinery, has done > nothing up to the present but alienate people from the work of the machines, > science -- destined to free man historically and rationally from nature -- > has done nothing but alienate them in an irrational and antihistorical > society. The mercenary of separate thought, science works for survival, and > therefore cannot conceive of life except as a mechanical or moral formula. In > practice, it does not conceive of man as subject, nor human thought as > action, and it is for this reason that it ignores history as premeditated > activity, and makes men "patients" in its hospitals. > > 4 > > Founded on the essential fallacy of its function, science can do nothing but > lie to itself. And its pretentious mercenaries have inherited from their > ancestor priests the taste and necessity for mystery. A dynamic element in > the justification of the state, the scientific body jealously guards its > corporate laws and the secrets of Machina ex Deo, which makes it a despicable > sect. It is hardly astonishing, for example, that doctors -- handy-men of the > power of work -- have illegible handwriting: it is the police code of > monopolized survival. > > 5 > > But if the historical and ideological identification of science with temporal > powers clearly shows that it is a servant of the state, and therefore wrongs > no one, it was necessary to wait until now to see the last separations > disappear between class society and a science that wished to remain neutral > and "at the service of Humanity." In practice, the actual impossibility of > scientific research and application without having access to enormous means, > has placed knowledge -- spectacularly concentrated -- into the hands of > power, and has directed it towards the objectives of the state. Today there > is no science that is not in the service of the economy, the military and > ideology; and the science of ideology reveals its other side, the ideology of > science. > > 6 > > Power, which cannot tolerate a void, has never forgiven surreal territories > for being vague terrains left to the imagination. Since the origin of class > society, we have always placed the unreal source of separated power in the > skies. When the state justified itself in terms of religion, the sky was > included in the time of religion [ie, the After-life]; now that the state > wishes to justify itself scientifically, the sky is in the space of science. > >From Galileo to Werner von Braun, there is only one question concerning the > ideology of the state: religion wished to preserve its time, and therefore > has not been concerned with space. Faced with the impossibility of prolonging > its time, power must restore its unbounded space [ie, the space program]. > > 7 > > If the heart transplant is still a miserable artisan technique remaining > aware of the chemical and nuclear massacres of science, the "Conquest of the > Cosmos" is the greatest spectacular expression of scientific oppression. The > spatial scholar is to the small doctor what Interpol is to the policeman on > the beat. > > 8 > > The sky promised once upon a time by the priests in black cassocks has now in > fact been seized by the white-uniformed astronauts. Sexless, neutral, > super-bureaucratized, the first men to escape through the atmosphere are the > stars of a spectacle that floats day and night over our heads, that can > master temperatures and distances, and that tramples us from above as the > cosmic dust of God. As an example of survival in its most elevated > manifestation, the astronauts make, without wishing to do so, a critique of > the earth: condemned to orbital flight -- under pain of dying from cold and > hunger -- they submissively accept ("technically") the boredom and misery of > being satellites. Inhabitants of an urbanism of necessity in their cabins, > prisons of scientific gadgets, they are the example -- in vitro -- of their > contemporaries who do not escape, in spite of distance, from the designs of > power. Publicity panel-men, the astronauts float in space or leap about on > the moon to make men march to the time of work. > > 9 > > And if the Christian astronauts of the Occident and the cosmonaut bureaucrats > of the East amuse themselves with metaphysics and secular morals -- Gargarin > "did not see God" and Borman prayed for the small Earth -- it is because they > workship their special "command service" that must be at the core of their > religion. Remember Exupery, the "saint," who spoke profundities from a great > altitude, but whose truth lay in his three-fold role of militarist, patriot > and idiot. > > 10 > > The conquest of space is part of the planetary hope of an economic system > that, saturated with commodities, power and spectacle, ejaculates in space > when it arrives, drooling with its terrestrial contradictions, at the > celestial cunt. A new America, space must serve the state in place of its > wars and colonies: employing the producer-consumers who will in this way make > possible the supersession of the planet's limitations. Province of > accumulation, space is destined to become an accumulation of provinces, for > which laws, treaties and international tribunals already exist. A new Yalta, > the apportionment of space shows the incapacity of the capitalists and > bureaucrats to resolve, here on earth, their antagonisms and their struggles. > > 11 > > But the old revolutionary mole, which today gnaws at the bases of the system, > will destroy the barriers that separate science from the generalized > knowledge of historical man. The more ideas of separated power, the more > power of separated ideas. Generalized self-management of the permanent > transformation of the world by the masses will make science a fundamental > banality, and no longer a truth of the state. > > 12 > > Men [sic] will enter into space to make the universe the playground of the > last revolt: that which will go against the limitations that nature imposes. > And, smashing the walls that separate men from science today, the conquest of > space will no longer be economic or military "promotion," but the blossoming > of human liberties and realizations, attained by a race of gods. We will > enter into space, not as employees of an astronautic administration, nor as > "volunteers" of a state project, but as masters without slaves who review > their domains: the entire universe put in a bag for the Workers' Councils. > -- From pnanpin at yahoo.co.in Sun Jan 27 14:43:13 2002 From: pnanpin at yahoo.co.in (=?iso-8859-1?q?pratap=20pandey?=) Date: Sun, 27 Jan 2002 09:13:13 +0000 (GMT) Subject: [Reader-list] More on Billi Gates Message-ID: <20020127091313.42368.qmail@web8101.in.yahoo.com> Immanent to Billi Gates is what may be called the ethic of "new feudalism". It is an objectification of a subjectivity-fetish. (A subjectivity-fetish may be defined as a subject-position in conjunctural circulation, a subject-position available and highly valued as cultural capital in the "selfic" market). It is an objectification of that subjectivity-fetish that may be called as desiring-to-become a global aeducated Indian. When Billi Gates swings open to let you in, or swings shut to keep you out, or scrutinises you as you bend your head and walk through the pedestrian entrance/orifice, you come face-to-face with the cultural logic of globalisation in India. Culturally, this "new feudalism" ethic may be understood as the transparent display of rentier-landlordism, a cultural form of property-ownership that allows entry into global aeducated Indian-ness. It is an ethic that celebrates self-regarding action. In this ethic, the Other is an expensive unattainable whose desire must be tracked down and overcome, whose desire must be understood, subdued and taken over. "new feudalism" is the celebration of the moment of take-over, the ultimate act for the self in which the Other is no longer necessary in order to become. The possibilities of becoming are those, and only those, that are laid down by the Self itself. "new feudalism" is joissance at having overcome difference, at having resolved it into sameness (reduced it, one may say. Thus Billi Gates signifies a great transformation in the cultural logic of modern citified India. It is a way to understanding how selves shape-up and get shaped-up as societies transform. If we today exist in a society where becoming is also a form of productivity, then Billi Gates signifies one such historically-specific form of production of self: Being of the class of global aeducated Indian. The fantasy-structure in which this celebration ________________________________________________________________________ Looking for a job? Visit Yahoo! India Careers Visit http://in.careers.yahoo.com From aiindex at mnet.fr Mon Jan 28 06:44:57 2002 From: aiindex at mnet.fr (Harsh Kapoor) Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 02:14:57 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] Grass/Bourdieu Speaking Up Message-ID: Pierre Bourdieu died on 23rd January 2002 [Posted below are 2 items (the first in English and the second one in French) that might be of interest. Both of these are based on a recorded dialogue between Gunter Grass, and the sociologist Pierre Bourdieu telecast on Arte the Franco-German television channel on 5 December 1999 Harsh ] o o o #1. appeared in "Die Zeit," January 2000 Grass/Bourdieu conversation. [Translated by David Hudson ] Grass/Bourdieu: Speaking Up. Pierre Bourdieu: Mr. Grass, you said somewhere that there is a European or German tradition which is also a good French tradition: speaking up. I'd like to do that here with you. G¸nther Grass: It's unusual in Germany for a sociologist and a writer to sit down together. Here, the philosophers sit in one corner, the sociologists in another, while the writers squabble in the back room. The kind of communication we have here rarely takes place. When I think of your book, _The Weight of the World: Social Suffering in Contemporary Societies_, or of my last book, _My Century_, I see that we do share one thing in our work: we tell stories from the bottom up. We don't glaze over society and don't speak from the position of the victor. Instead, within our fields, we are notoriously on the side of the losers. In _The Weight of the World_, you and your collaborators were able to focus on the concept of understanding rather than on an air of superior knowledge: a view of the social conditions in France which can certainly be applied to those in other countries. As a writer, I'm tempted to use your stories as raw material. For example, the description of the Narcissus Way in which metal workers, who are often the third generation to go to the factories, are now unemployed and all but shut out of society. Or the study of the young woman who comes to Paris from the country and sorts letters on the night shift. Social problems are made clear in the descriptions of the workplace without their being shoved overtly to the foreground. I liked that. I wish we had a book like this on social relationships in our country. The only question that arose for me might be one related to the discipline of sociology: humor doesn't appear in such books. The comedy of failure, which plays such an important role in my stories, is missing; the absurdities that arise in certain confrontations. Why is that? Bourdieu: When you hear about such experiences directly from the people who have lived them, the effect is pretty devastating, and it's almost unthinkable to keep the necessary distance. In the end, we took out several of the stories because they were too moving. Grass: May I interrupt? By humor, I mean that tragedy and comedy aren't mutually exclusive, that the lines between the two are blurred. Bourdieu: What we wanted to do was to present the brutal absurdity to the reader without any sort of special effects. When it comes to human dramas, one is often tempted to write "beautifully". Instead, we tried to be as merciless as possible in order to present the violent aspects of the reality. For scientific but also literary reasons. We didn't want to become "literary" in order to be literary in a different sort of way. Of course, there were also political reasons. We felt that the violence currently being practiced by neoliberal politics was so great that theoretical analyses alone wouldn't do it justice. Critical thinking is not done on the level of the effects produced by these policies. Grass: I should elaborate a bit on my question. Both of us -- you as a sociologist and me as a writer -- are children of the Enlightenment, a tradition which today, at least in Germany and France, is being called into question, as if the process of the European Enlightenment had failed. I don't think so. I see the failed developments in the process of the Enlightenment, for example, the reduction of reason to what is purely technically feasible. Many aspects which existed in the beginning, and here I'm thinking just of Montaigne, have been lost over the centuries. Among them, humor. Voltaire's _Candide_ or Diderot's _Jacques le Fataliste_, for example, are books in which the conditions of the age are also hideous, and yet the human capability to also present a comic, and in this sense, a victorious figure, even in pain and failure, perseveres. Bourdieu: But this feeling that we are losing our grip on the tradition of the Enlightenment is related to a reversal of the entire world view which is enforced by the currently predominant neoliberal view of things. The neoliberal revolution, and here in Germany, I can attempt such a comparison, is actually a deeply conservative revolution -- in the sense that one spoke of a conservative revolution in the 30s in Germany. Such a revolution is an extremely rare event. It recasts the past in its own light and at the same time presents itself as progressive so that those who fight the return to the old ways are perceived themselves as yesterday's news. Both of us are constantly facing this; we're always being treated as eternally behind the times. In France, one is an "old iron". Grass: Dinosaurs... Bourdieu: Exactly. There it is, the great power of conservative revolutions, "progressive" restorations. Even your argument could be laid out that way. They say we have no sense of humor. But the times aren't funny! There's nothing to laugh at. Grass: I wasn't saying that we're living in hilarious times. Laughter in the dark which can be released by literary means is also a protest against the conditions. What's being sold these days as neoliberalism is a return to the methods of the Manchester liberalism of the 19th century. Even in the 70s, there was a relatively successful attempt throughout Europe to civilize capitalism. If I assume that both socialism and capitalism are ingenious wayward children of the Enlightenment, their relationship nevertheless betrayed a certain function to control one another. Even capitalism was expected to bear certain responsibilities. In Germany, we called it the social market economy, and even in the conservative party, there was an understanding that conditions such as those in the Weimar Republic were never to be allowed to return. This consensus was broken down in the 80s. Ever since the breakdown of the communist hierarchies, capitalism has felt it could go wild, out of control. There is no opposite force anymore. Today, even the few responsible capitalists are issuing warnings because they see that their instruments are out of control, that neoliberalism is repeating the mistakes of communism in that it is issuing articles of faith that claim infallibility. Bourdieu: But the power of neoliberalism is so overwhelming that it's being implemented by people who call themselves socialists. Whether it's Schr–der, Blair or Jospin, these are people who practice neoliberal politics in the name of socialism. That makes analyses and criticism extraordinarily difficult because everything's so mixed up. Grass: A capitulation to the economy. Bourdieu: At the same time, it's extremely difficult to develop a critical position to the left of these social democratic governments. In France, there were the great strikes of 1995 which mobilized large numbers of workers, employees and intellectuals. Then came the unemployment movement, the great European march of the unemployed, the movement of immigrants who had no rights to stay -- a sort of permanent agitation that swept the social democrats to power where they at least acted as if they were carrying on a socialist discourse. But on a practical level, this critical movement is very weak, in large part because it remains captive within national borders. An effective position left of the social democratic governments must be made viable on an international level. That's why I ask myself: What can we, the intellectuals, do for such a movement for a "social Europe"? The power of those in control is not just an economic one, but an intellectual, a spiritual one. That's why it's so important to "speak up," to recreate a collective utopia: because among the capabilities of neoliberal governments is the ability to kill utopias, to allow utopias to appear passÈ. Grass: The socialistic or social democratic parties have themselves in part believed in the thesis that with the demise of communism, socialism has disappeared from the world as well and have lost their faith in the workers movement which has existed far longer than communism. If you part with your own tradition, you give yourself up. In Germany, there were definitely minor attempts at organizing the workers. For years, I've tried to tell the unions: You can't just see to the workers as long as they're working; as soon as they're shut out, they fall into the bottomless pit. You have to found a pan-European union for the unemployed. We complain that the unification of Europe is only transpiring on an economic level, but what's missing are the attempts on the part of the unions to break out of the national framework into a form of organization and action that transcends the borders. We have to stand up to global neoliberalism. But in the meantime, many intellectuals swallow everything down. And all you get from swallowing is indigestion, nothing more. You have to speak out. That's why I doubt that intellectuals alone can be counted on. While "the intellectuals" are still constantly spoken of in France -- at least that's the way it seems to me -- my German experience tells me that it's a misunderstanding to believe that being an intellectual means being on the left. The history of the 20th century, all the way to National Socialism, proves just the opposite: a man like Goebbels was an intellectual. For me, to be an intellectual is not a guarantee of quality. Your book, in fact, _The Weight of the World_, shows that people who come from the world of work who have organized themselves socially have far more experience in the social area than intellectuals. Today, they're either unemployed or retired and no one seems to need them anymore. Their strengths go completely unused. Bourdieu: _The Weight of the World_ is an attempt to carry over to intellectuals a very modest yet at the same time very useful function. The public writer, as I know them from the countries in northern Africa, is someone who makes applies his writing abilities to the services of others so that they can record the things they know about. Here, sociologists are in a very particular position; they are people who can usually -- not always -- listen, who can decipher what people tell them, translate it and deliver it. That may be a little guild-like, but I think it's important that intellectuals take part in this work. Grass: At the same time, you would have to appeal to the intellectuals given to neoliberalism. There are people among them who are beginning to doubt whether the utterly unchecked circulation of money around the globe, whether the mania that has broken out within capitalism ought to be countered. For example, mergers without meaning or purpose resulting in five or ten thousand people are put out of work. The maximizing of profits alone is reflected in the stock exchanges. Bourdieu: Unfortunately, it's not merely a matter of countering the predominant mindset. In order to see any sort of success, one must encourage critical discourse to make it public. Right now we're talking with each other in order to try to break out of the small circle of intellectuals. I'd like to break through the wall of silence a bit -- precisely because it's not merely a wall of money. There's a contradiction in television: it's an instrument that allows us to speak here and at the same time silences the likes of us. We're stormed and overpowered by the predominant mindset, and we leave nothing behind. The great majority of journalists are often unwitting accomplices to the predominant discourse, the unanimity of which is almost impossible to break. It's very difficult in France -- with the exception of a few well-respected personalities -- to step out before the public. But unfortunately, many highly placed people are going silent and there are only a few who put symbolic capital to use to speak -- even to those who can't find the words themselves. Grass: Television, like all grand institutions, of course, has come up with its own superstitions: the ratings, whose dictates are honored. That's why conversations like the one we're having now rarely appear in the major programs, but rather, on Arte. I never take part in talk shows. I think the form is hopeless because it doesn't communicate anything. In all this blather, the one who comes out on top is the one who talks the longest or most stridently ignores his conversation partner. Further, as a rule, very little ever comes out of it because just when things might get interesting, when things are coming to a head, the moderator breaks it off. Both of us come from the tradition that reaches back to the Middle Ages, to the dispute. Two people, two different opinions, two sets of experiences that complement each other. Then, if we put some effort into it, something can come of it. Perhaps that would be a recommendation to this Moloch television, to reach back to the proven form of dialogue, focusing on a theme, as in a dispute. Bourdieu: Unfortunately, a certain set of circumstances would have to come together in order for producers of the discourse, writers, artists, researchers to be able to once again appropriate their means of production. I'm very consciously putting the terms of the somewhat old-fashioned terms of Marxism to use here. It's a paradox that people of the word have no control of the means of production and distribution these days; they have to pull back into niches, find alternative routes. Grass: Just so we don't fall into the realm of complaint: we've always been in the minority, and the amazing thing is that when you look at the process of history, you can see just how much effect a minority can have. Of course, tactics have to be developed in order to be heard. I see myself, for example, as a citizen, forced to break a fundamental rule for a writer: "Don't repeat yourself!" In politics, you have to repeat a proven thesis almost like a parrot, which is exhausting because you're constantly hearing the echo of your own voice. But this is evidently a part of it if you're going to find any listeners at all such a loud world. Bourdieu: What I admire about your work is your search for means of expression that will allow a critical, subversive message to reach a large audience. Nevertheless, I think that circumstances today are quite different from those in the century of the Enlightenment. The Encyclopedia was a weapon, a means of communication to be used against obscurantism. We have to fight these days against completely new forms of obscurantism. Grass: But still as a minority. Bourdieu: Only the opposition back then was far weaker. Today, we're dealing with powerful media-multis, and there is no safe island left. For publishers, for example, publication is becoming more and more difficult and critical books are more and more of a problem. And as important as I may find my conversation with you, it's with the idea in mind of coming up with a message and communicating it. Instead of being a tool of television, we have to make television a tool of understanding in the service of that which we want to say. Grass: The playing room is limited. And there's something else I have to wonder about myself: I never thought that the day would come when I would have to demand more state. We always had way too much state in Germany, particularly the state of order. But now we're heading off toward the other extreme. Without aiming to have anything to do with ideology, neoliberalism has taken on the wishes of anarchy to do away with the state, to shove it off to the side. Get rid of it, we'll handle it. If a necessary reform takes place at all these days, whether it be in Germany or in France, nothing happens until industry, the economy approves. Anarchists could only dream of such disempowerment of the state, and so, I find myself -- and you probably do as well -- in the curious position of ensuring that the state takes on its responsibilities again, regulates again. Bourdieu: It's exactly this reversal of situations that I'm talking about. But is it enough for us to demand "more" state? In order not to fall into the trap of the conservative revolution, one has to think about inventing a different sort of state. Grass: Just so we don't misunderstand each other: neoliberalism naturally only wants to do away with that interest it economically. The state will be allowed to go on policing, representing the state of order. But if the powers of order are taken away from the state, the powers that have to do with the layers of society -- not just the social cases, children and old people who have been shut out of work or are still in -- if an economy spreads that shies away from every responsibility as it rushes toward some sort of globalism, then society has to find a way to take care of them above and beyond the state. Irresponsibility is the determining principle of the neoliberal system. Bourdieu: In _My Century_, you call up a series of events, for example, the story of the small boy who is brought along to the talk by Liebknecht and then pees on his father's neck. I don't know if this is a personal memory, but regardless, it's a completely unique way of discovering socialism. Or what you said about J¸nger and Remarque: there are several things between the lines about the role of intellectuals who make themselves accomplices to tragic events. I also like what you had to say about Heidegger, about whose rhetoric I wrote a very critical book. Grass: That, for example, is something that amuses me: the fascination expressed by French intellectuals for J¸nger and Heidegger because all the clichÈs Germany and France hold for one another are turned on their heads. That all the smokiness which led to such terrible events in Germany is admired in France is absurd. Bourdieu: It was because I separated myself from the Heideggerian mysticism and fought against it on the deepest level that I was pretty ostracized. It's not too comfortable being a Frenchman formed by the Enlightenment in a country that throws itself at the mercy of such obscurantism... A president of the French Republic awarded J¸nger a medal; that was a horrible event. Grass: This story about Liebknecht. What was important to me was that, on the one hand, Karl Liebknecht agitated the young -- a progressive movement moves forward in the name of socialism -- and at the same time, the father, in all his excitement, doesn't notice that the boy wants down from his shoulders. When the son pees on him, the father beats him. This authoritative behavior leads the son to volunteer when the First World War breaks out, and so, ends up doing precisely what Liebknecht was warning against. And concerning J¸nger and Heidegger: it might be more useful for French intellectuals to pay more attention to the Germans of the Enlightenment. There was not only Diderot and Voltaire, but also Lessing; there was Lichtenberg -- a very funny man of the Enlightenment, by the way, whose statements would likely be more appreciated by the French than by J¸nger. Bourdieu: Ernst Cassirer, as a great inheritor of the Enlightenment, was only moderately successful, while his opponent, Heidegger, aroused tremendous interest. One often has the terrible impression that, like some fraud of history, the French take on the bad things from Germany, and vice versa, the Germans from the French. Grass: In _My Century_, I depict a professor who, during his Wednesday seminar, thinks about what he would have done as a student in 1966/67/68. Back then, he came out of the Heideggerian philosophy of the sublime, and he ends up there again. In between, he's given to radical swerves and becomes one of those people who publicly tear into Adorno. That's a very typical biography for this period. I was right in the middle of the events of the 60s. The student protests were necessary and had more effect than the spokespeople of pseudo-revolution of the generation of 68 would liked to have admitted. The revolution didn't happen -- there was no basis for it -- but society changed. In _From the Diary of a Snail_, I describe how the students yelled out when I said: Progress is a snail. Verbally, of course, you can make the great leap -- they were of the Maoist school -- but the original phase, namely, the society it's about, is not in a hurry. You wonder when things snap back and you call it counter-revolution, all in the full-blown vocabulary of a communism that even then was teetering. But there was little understanding. Bourdieu: I published a book in 1964, _The Inheritors_, in which I describe the varying positions of students from petite bourgeois and those from bourgeois backgrounds. Political radicalism was far more visible in those students from bourgeois backgrounds, while students from petite bourgeois or workers backgrounds were more conservative and given to reform. Grass: Usually it was sons from good houses, as I called them somewhat provocatively, who had never dared to carry out their conflicts with their fathers out of fear that their money would be cut off that transferred the conflict to society. Bourdieu: In 1968 there was an ostentatious, above all, symbolic, artistic revolution -- very radical if you were to go on appearances. On the other hand, there were people who introduced measured proposals to change the education system, the entrance requirements for the high schools. In those days, they were held in contempt as reformists, and therefore, laughable by the same people who are conservatives today. Grass: In the 70s, in Germany and the Scandinavian countries, there arose a consciousness of the idea that if the economy were allowed to go on exploiting natural resources, the environment would be destroyed. The ecological movement came about. But the socialist and social democratic parties concentrated solely on the old social questions and shut out ecology or viewed it as something oppositional, and this still goes on to a certain degree. If we expect the neoliberal side to realize its intellectual potential in order to come back to its senses, then the same thing has to be said about the left side. It has to be recognized at last that ecology cannot be separated from the theme of work. All decisions have to pass the test: are they ecologically acceptable? Bourdieu: All these pseudo-terms such as social liberalism, Blairism are mystifications of the ruling power over the ruled. Europeans are fundamentally ashamed of their civilization and don't dare to do anything more. This is beginning quite obviously with the economy, but more and more, it's reaching into cultural areas; they're ashamed of their cultural tradition. In a way, the Europeans are living in a state of sin which is being perceived and judged as a defense of backward traditions -- in the fields of the cinema, in literature and so on. Grass: In our country, those aligned with Schr–der see themselves as modernizers and the others are dismissed as traditionalists which is a hilarious misnomer. The neoliberals snicker when social democrats and socialists in Germany and in other countries are confined to such meaningless definitions. Bourdieu: To pick up on the problem of culture: I was truly glad to see that you were awarded the Nobel Prize because it honors a magnificent European writer who "speaks up" and defends a certain type of art that many perceive as having had its day. The campaign against your novel _Ein weites Feld_ was carried out under the pretense that it was literarily behind its time. In the same way, the same twisted logic is currently being applied more and more to the formalistic accomplishments of the avant garde in that they are being cast as old-fashioned. In France, there is a full-blown debate on contemporary art which is actually about the autonomy of art versus the economy. Grass: About the Nobel Prize: I could live quite well without it, and I hope I'll be able to live well with it. Some said, "Finally!" or "Too late!", but I'm glad to have received it in my advanced age, well beyond 70. When a young author receives the Nobel Prize, I can imagine that it's quite a load to carry because the expectations are going to be so high. Today, I can deal with it ironically and still be happy about it. But that should be that as far as that theme goes. I think we should be making offers which cannot be ignored. The large television production companies are also at a loss in their misguided faith in ratings. One has to help them out. The same goes for the relationship between neighboring France and Germany who have fought each other to the point of near extinction, whose wounds are still palpable and who are making every rhetorical attempt at reconciliation. And suddenly, one realizes: It's not just the language barrier; there are other dimensions in between which are not being perceived. I referred to this earlier, that we're not even able to recognize a shared history of European Enlightenment. This was better in times when nation states weren't as dominant. The French recognized what happened in Germany, and vice versa; there was a correspondence between both groups which in those days fought as minorities and managed to see through the process of the Enlightenment despite censorship. It's time to reestablish that relationship because we have nothing else in hand besides the experiences of the process of European Enlightenment -- including the developments that failed. We are right to decry the dominance neoliberalism has attained in the meantime and the areas it rules over irresponsibly. But we should also consider: What did we get wrong in the process of European Enlightenment? Somehow, capitalism and socialism, as children of the Enlightenment, need to come together at a single table again. Bourdieu: You may be a bit optimistic here. I think the economic and political powers of neoliberalism weigh so heavily on Europe that the accomplishments of the Enlightenment are truly in danger. The French historian Daniel Roche is currently writing a book in which he shows that the tradition of the Enlightenment in France and Germany had very different meanings. What was meant by "Aufkl”rung" was quite different from what the French meant by "lumiÈres". These differences have to be overcome if one wants to avoid the destruction of all that we associate with the Enlightenment -- the progress of science, technology and the taming of this progress. The invention of a new utopianism is needed, one that exercises social powers. Because of the danger that this will be perceived as a regression to old political thought, new social movements must be brought to life. In their current form, the unions are no longer contemporary. They have to change, redefine themselves, go international, rationalize; they also have to challenge the social sciences to do well what they should. Grass: That means a fundamental reform of the union movement, and we know how difficult it is to get this apparatus moving. Bourdieu: Yes, but we can certainly take on a role here. For example, the social movement in the last few years has been far more successful than it had been for years for historical reasons. The traditions of the French workers movements were always very much of the roll-up-your-sleeves tradition, often hostile to intellectuals, at least in part. Today, in times of crisis, the workers movement is much more open and capable of listening to our objections. The movement is more thoughtful and takes on more and more new forms of criticism. These critical, reflexive social movements are, in my opinion, the future. Grass: I see that somewhat more skeptically. We're both at an age in which we can be counted on to speak up as long as we remain healthy, but the time frame is coming to an end. I don't know what it's like in France -- I assume not much better -- but I see very little preparedness and very little interest in the younger generation in the field of literature to carry on this tradition, which is part of the Enlightenment, namely, to speak up, to get involved. If nothing appears in this area and relieves us, this part of a good European tradition will also be lost. _______ #2. Le Monde 02.12.99 | 13h23 * MIS A JOUR LE 24.01.02 | 13h37 Pierre Bourdieu et Günter Grass : la tradition "d'ouvrir sa gueule" Dans un entretien daté du 5 décembre 1999 diffusé sur Arte, le sociologue Pierre Bourdieu et l'écrivain allemand Günter Grass, Prix Nobel de littérature 1999, parlaient librement du rôle des intellectuels, de l'humour, ou de l'absence d'humour, en sociologie, et des faux-semblants du socialisme. "Pierre Bourdieu : vous avez parlé quelque part de "la tradition européenne ou allemande - qui est d'ailleurs aussi une tradition française -, d'ouvrir sa gueule" ; et lorsque nous avions pensé à faire ce dialogue public avec des syndicalistes, je ne savais pas évidemment que vous seriez Prix Nobel. Je me réjouis beaucoup que vous soyez Prix Nobel et je me réjouis aussi beaucoup que vous n'ayez pas été transformé par le prix Nobel, que vous soyez aussi disposé qu'avant à "ouvrir votre gueule" et j'aimerais bien que nous l'ouvrions ensemble. - Günter Grass : compte tenu de l'expérience allemande, il est relativement rare qu'un sociologue et un écrivain se rencontrent. Chez nous, il est plus fréquent que les philosophes se rassemblent dans un coin de la pièce, les sociologues dans un autre et les écrivains, en froid les uns avec les autres, dans l'arrière-boutique. Une communication comme entre nous est l'exception. Lorsque je pense à votre livre, La Misère du monde, ou à mon dernier ouvrage, Mon Siècle, il y a une chose qui nous réunit dans le travail : nous racontons l'Histoire vue d'en bas. Nous ne parlons pas par-dessus la tête de la société, nous ne prenons pas le point de vue des vainqueurs de l'Histoire mais, de par notre métier, nous sommes notoirement du côté des perdants, de ceux qui sont en marge, des exclus de la société. "Dans La Misère du monde, vous avez réussi avec vos collaborateurs à mettre votre individualité en retrait et à miser tout sur la compréhension, sans prétention de tout savoir mieux : une vue des conditions sociales et de l'état de la société française qui peut très bien être transposée sur d'autres pays. Vos histoires induisent l'écrivain que je suis en tentation de m'en servir comme matière brute. Par exemple, l'étude d'une jeune femme venue de la campagne à Paris pour trier des lettres la nuit. La description de leur poste de travail fait comprendre les problèmes sociaux sans pour autant les mettre en exergue d'une manière ostentatoire. Cela m'a beaucoup plu. "Je voudrais qu'un tel livre existe sur les conditions sociales dans chaque pays. "La seule question qui m'a frappé fait peut-être partie du domaine de la sociologie : il n'y a pas d'humour dans ce genre de livre. Il manque le comique de l'échec, qui joue un grand rôle dans mes histoires, les absurdités découlant de certaines confrontations. - P. B. : vous avez magnifiquement raconté un certain nombre de ces expériences que nous avons évoquées. Mais celui qui reçoit ces expériences directement de la personne qui les a vécues est un peu écrasé, accablé, et l'idée de prendre de la distance n'est presque pas pensable. Par exemple, nous avons été amenés à exclure du livre un certain nombre de récits parce qu'ils étaient trop poignants et trop pathétiques, trop douloureux. - G. G. : en parlant de "comique", je veux dire que tragédie et comédie ne s'excluent pas mutuellement, que les frontières entre les deux sont fluctuantes. - P. B. : absolument... C'est vrai... En fait, ce que nous voulions, c'était jeter devant les yeux des lecteurs cette absurdité brute, sans aucun effet. Une des consignes que nous avions données était qu'il fallait éviter de faire de la littérature. Je vais peut-être vous choquer, il y a une tentation, quand on est devant des drames comme ceux-là, c'est de bien écrire. La consigne était d'essayer d'être aussi brutalement positif que possible, pour restituer à ces histoires leur violence extraordinaire, presque insupportable. Cela pour deux raisons : des raisons scientifiques et aussi, je pense, littéraires, parce que nous voulions ne pas être littéraires pour être littéraires d'une autre façon. Mais aussi des raisons politiques. Nous pensions que la violence qu'exerce actuellement la politique néo-libérale mise en oeuvre en Europe et en Amérique latine, et dans beaucoup de pays, la violence de cette action est si grande qu'on ne peut pas en rendre compte par des analyses purement conceptuelles. La critique n'est pas à la hauteur des effets que produit cette politique. - G. G. : nous sommes tous les deux, le sociologue et l'écrivain, des enfants des Lumières européennes, d'une tradition remise en question partout actuellement - en tout cas en France et en Allemagne -, comme si le mouvement européen de l'Aufklärung, des Lumières, avait échoué. Beaucoup d'aspects existants au début - ne pensons qu'à Montaigne - se sont perdus au fil des siècles. L'humour, entre autres, en fait partie. Le Candide de Voltaire ou Jacques le Fataliste de Diderot, par exemple, sont des livres où les conditions sociales décrites sont également affreuses. N'empêche que même dans la douleur et l'échec, la capacité humaine d'être comique et, dans ce sens, victorieux s'impose. - P. B. : oui, mais ce sentiment que nous avons d'avoir perdu la tradition des Lumières est lié au renversement de toute la vision du monde qui a été imposée par la vision néo-libérale, aujourd'hui dominante. Je pense - ici en Allemagne, je peux employer cette comparaison -, je pense que la révolution néo-libérale est une révolution conservatrice - au sens où on parlait de révolution conservatrice en Allemagne dans les années 30 -, et une révolution conservatrice est quelque chose de très étrange : c'est une révolution qui restaure le passé et qui se présente comme progressiste, qui transforme la régression en progrès. Si bien que ceux qui combattent cette régression ont l'air eux-mêmes régressifs. Ceux qui combattent la terreur ont l'air eux-mêmes terroristes. C'est une chose que nous avons subie en commun : nous sommes volontiers traités d'archaïques, en français on dit "ringards", "arriérés"... (Grass : "dinosauria") "dinosaures", exactement. C'est ça, la grande force des révolutions conservatrices, des restaurations "progressistes". Même ce que vous dites, je crois, participe... de l'idée... On nous dit : vous n'êtes pas drôles. Mais l'époque n'est vraiment pas drôle ! Vraiment, il n'y a pas de quoi rire. - G. G. : je n'ai pas prétendu que nous vivions une époque drôle. Le rire infernal, déchaîné par les moyens littéraires, est aussi protestation contre nos conditions sociales. Ce qui se vend aujourd'hui comme néo-libéralisme est un retour aux méthodes du libéralisme Manchester du XlXe siècle. Dans les années 70, on faisait partout en Europe une tentative relativement réussie de civiliser le capitalisme. Si je pars du principe que le socialisme et le capitalisme sont tous les deux les enfants génialement ratés des Lumières, ils avaient une certaine fonction de contrôle réciproque. Même le capitalisme était soumis à certaines responsabilités. En Allemagne, nous appelions cela l'économie sociale du marché et il y avait un consensus, y compris avec le parti conservateur, que des conditions telles que sous la République de Weimar ne devaient plus jamais se reproduire. Ce consensus a été rompu au début des années 80. Depuis l'écroulement des hiérarchies communistes, le capitalisme se croit tout permis, comme s'il échappait à tout contrôle. Le pôle opposé fait défaut. Même les rares capitalistes responsables qui restent appellent aujourd'hui à la prudence, parce qu'ils se rendent compte que leurs instruments perdent le nord, que le système néo-libéral répète les erreurs du communisme en créant des dogmes, une espèce de revendication d'infaillibilité. - P. B. : oui, mais la force de ce néo-libéralisme est qu'il est mis en application, au moins en Europe, par des gens qui s'appellent socialistes. Que ce soit Schröder, que ce soit Blair, que ce soit Jospin, ce sont des gens qui invoquent le socialisme pour faire du néo-libéralisme. - G. G. : c'est une capitulation devant l'économie. - P. B. : du même coup, faire exister une position critique à la gauche des gouvernements socio-démocrates est devenu extrêmement difficile. En France, il y a eu le mouvement des grandes grèves de 1995 qui ont mobilisé très largement la population des travailleurs, des employés, etc., et aussi des intellectuels. Ensuite, il y a eu toute une série de mouvements : le mouvement des chômeurs, la marche européenne des chômeurs, le mouvement des sans-papiers, etc. Il y a eu une sorte d'agitation permanente qui a obligé les sociaux-démocrates au pouvoir à faire semblant, au moins, de tenir un discours socialiste. Mais, dans la pratique, ce mouvement critique reste très faible, en grande partie parce qu'il est enfermé à l'échelle nationale, et une des questions majeures, me semble-t-il, au plan politique, est de savoir comment faire exister à l'échelle internationale une position , à la gauche des gouvernements socio-démocrates, qui soit capable d'influencer réellement ces gouvernements. "Mais je pense que les tentatives pour créer un mouvement social européen sont actuellement très incertaines ; et la question que je me pose est la suivante : qu'est-ce que nous, intellectuels, pouvons faire pour contribuer à ce mouvement, qui est indispensable, parce que, contrairement à la vision néo-libérale, toutes les conquêtes sociales ont été acquises par la force des luttes. Donc, si nous voulons avoir une "Europe sociale", comme on dit, il faut qu'il y ait un mouvement social européen. Et je pense - c'est mon impression - que les intellectuels ont une responsabilité très grande dans la constitution d'un tel mouvement, parce que la force des dominants n'est pas seulement économique, elle est aussi intellectuelle, elle est aussi du côté de la croyance. Et c'est pour ça, je crois, qu'il faut "ouvrir sa gueule", pour essayer de restaurer l'utopie, parce qu'une des forces de ces gouvernements néo-libéraux , c'est qu'ils tuent l'utopie. - G. G. : les partis socialistes et sociaux-démocrates ont un peu cru eux-mêmes cette thèse, prétendant que l'écroulement du communisme allait également rayer le socialisme de la mappemonde, et ils ont perdu confiance dans le mouvement européen des travailleurs qui existait d'ailleurs depuis bien plus longtemps que le communisme. Si l'on abandonne ses propres traditions, on s'abandonne soi-même. "En Allemagne, il y a seulement eu quelques timides approches pour organiser les chômeurs. Depuis des années, je cherche à dire aux syndicats : vous ne pouvez quand même pas vous contenter d'encadrer les travailleurs tant qu'ils ont un travail et, dès qu'ils n'en ont plus, ils tombent dans un abîme sans fond. Vous devez fonder un syndicat des chômeurs pour toute l'Europe. "Nous nous lamentons que la construction de l'Europe ne se réalise que dans le domaine économique, mais il manque un effort des syndicats pour trouver une forme d'organisation et d'action qui dépasse le cadre national et qui ait de I'impact au-delà des frontières. Il faut créer un contrepoids au néo-libéralisme mondial. "Mais, peu à peu, beaucoup d'intellectuels avalent tout, et cela ne donne rien, sinon des ulcères. Il faut dire les choses. C'est pourquoi je doute que l'on puisse compter exclusivement sur les intellectuels. Tandis qu'en France, me semble t-il, on parle toujours sans hésitation "des intellectuels", mes expériences allemandes me démontrent que c'est un malentendu de croire qu'être intellectuel équivaut à être de gauche. On trouve les preuves du contraire dans toute l'histoire du XXe siècle, y compris dans le nazisme : un homme comme Goebbels était un intellectuel. Pour moi, être un intellectuel n'est pas une preuve de qualité. "Votre livre La Misère du monde montre bien que ceux qui viennent du monde du travail, qui sont syndiqués, ont bien plus d'expérience dans le domaine social que les intellectuels. Ces gens-là sont aujourd'hui au chômage ou à la retraite et personne ne semble plus avoir besoin d'eux. Leur potentiel reste en jachère. - P. B. : je reviens une seconde à ce livre, La Misère du monde. C'est un effort pour donner une fonction beaucoup plus modeste et, en même temps, je crois, beaucoup plus utile qu'à l'accoutumée, aux intellectuels : la fonction d'écrivain public. L'écrivain public, que j'ai bien connu dans les pays d'Afrique du Nord, est quelqu'un qui sait écrire et qui prête sa compétence aux autres pour qu'ils puissent dire des choses qu'ils savent, en un sens, mieux que celui qui les écrit. Les sociologues sont dans une position tout à fait particulière. Ce ne sont pas des intellectuels comme les autres ; ce sont des gens qui savent la plupart du temps - pas tous - écouter, déchiffrer ce qui leur est dit, et transcrire, et transmettre. - G. G. : mais cela voudrait dire en même temps qu'il faudrait faire appel aux intellectuels qui se situent à proximité du néo-libéralisme. Quelques-uns parmi eux commencent à se demander si cette circulation de l'argent autour du globe, qui se soustrait à tout contrôle, si cette forme de folie qui règne dans le sillage du capitalisme ne doit se heurter à aucune opposition. Des fusions, par exemple, sans utilité ni raison, qui provoquent le licenciement de 2 000, 5 000, 10 000 personnes. Seul le profit maximum compte pour les cotations à la Bourse. - P. B. : oui, malheureusement, il ne s'agit pas simplement de contrarier et de contrecarrer ce discours dominant qui se donne des allures d'unanimité. Pour le combattre efficacement, il faut pouvoir diffuser, rendre public le discours critique. Nous sommes sans arrêt envahis et assaillis par le discours dominant. Les journalistes, dans leur grande majorité, sont souvent inconsciemment complices de ce discours, et quand on veut rompre cette unanimité, c'est très difficile. D'abord parce que, dans le cas de la France, en dehors de personnes très consacrées, très reconnues, il est très difficile d'accéder à l'espace public. Quand je disais, en commençant, que j'espérais que vous alliez "ouvrir votre gueule", c'est que je pense que les gens consacrés sont les seuls, en un sens, à pouvoir briser le cercle. Mais malheureusement, on les consacre parce qu'ils sont tranquiles et silencieux, et pour qu'ils le restent, et il y en a très peu qui utilisent le capital symbolique que leur donne la consécration pour parler, pour parler tout simplement, et aussi pour faire entendre la voix de ceux qui n'ont pas de parole. "Dans Mon Siècle, vous évoquez une série d'événements historiques et un certain nombre d'entre eux m'ont beaucoup touché - je pense à l'histoire du petit garçon qui va à la manifestation de Liebknecht et qui fait pipi sur le dos de son papa : je ne sais pas si c'est un souvenir personnel, mais en tout cas c'est une façon très originale d'apprendre le socialisme. J'ai beaucoup aimé aussi ce que vous dites sur Jünger et Remarque : vous dites entre les lignes beaucoup de choses sur le rôle des intellectuels, leur manière d'être complices avec des événements tragiques, même quand ils ont l'air critiques. J'ai aussi beaucoup aimé ce que vous dites sur Heidegger. C'est encore une chose que nous avons en commun. J'avais fait toute une analyse de la rhétorique de Heidegger qui a sévi terriblement en France pendant... presque jusqu'à aujourd'hui, paradoxalement... - G. G. : cette histoire avec Liebknecht... Il m'importait dans cette histoire qu'il y ait d'un côté Liebknecht, I'agitateur de la jeunesse - un mouvement progressiste au nom du socialisme se met en marche - et de l'autre côté le père qui, dans son enthousiasme, ne se rend pas compte que le fils veut descendre de ses épaules. Lorsque le petit fait pipi dans le cou du père, celui-ci lui donne une énorme fessée. Ce comportement autoritaire fait que le garçon se porte volontaire à la mobilisation pour la première guerre mondiale et qu'il fait ainsi exactement ce contre quoi Liebknecht avait voulu mettre les jeunes en garde. "Dans Mon Siècle, je décris un professeur qui réfléchit pendant son séminaire du mercredi à ses réactions en 1966/67/68. A l'époque, son point de départ est la philosophie des postures sublimes. C'est là qu'il arrive à nouveau. Entre-temps, il a quelques élans radicalistes et il fait partie de ceux qui démontent Adorno en public sur le podium. C'est une biographie très typique de cette époque. "Dans les années 60, j'étais au coeur des événements. Les protestations des étudiants étaient nécessaires et elles ont mis plus de choses en branle que les porte-parole de la pseudo-révolution de 68 ont bien voulu l'admettre. Soit, la révolution n'a pas eu lieu, elle n'avait aucune base, mais la société a changé. Dans Le Journal d'un escargot, je décris comment les étudiants ont hurlé lorsque j'ai dit : le progrès est un escargot. Très peu voulaient comprendre. Nous sommes tous les deux arrivés à un âge où nous pouvons, certes, assurer que nous continuerons à ouvrir notre gueule, à condition de rester en bonne santé, mais le temps est limité. Je ne sais pas ce qu'il en est en France - je crois que ce n'est pas mieux -, mais je constate que la jeune génération de la littérature allemande fait preuve de peu de disponibilité et d'intérêt pour perpétuer cette tradition inhérente aux Lumières, la tradition d'ouvrir sa gueule et de s'immiscer. S'il n'y a pas de renouvellement, pas de relève pour nous, alors cette partie d'une bonne tradition européenne sera également perdue. Les propos de Günter Grass sont traduits de l'allemand par Gabriele Wennemer -- From rustam at cseindia.org Mon Jan 28 10:27:40 2002 From: rustam at cseindia.org (rustam) Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 10:27:40 +530 Subject: [Reader-list] Fw: The Globalizer Who Came In From the Cold Message-ID: <19FD14CA2@cseindia.org> I got this forwarded mail which I thought would interest many on the list, though it does not state where and when was this article published. Rustam ------- Forwarded message follows ------- From: "Pervin" To: "rustam" , "gandhis pop" , "yasmin bhagat" , "RYAN" , "pravin" , "subhash sule" , "tista setalvad" , "Sadhana Weekly, Pune" , "salmaan ahmed" , "salil sham patil" , "shyam patil" , "samar bagchi" , "Sameer Renukdas" , "sanctuary" , "sanctuary" , "sanjay sangvai" , "sanjaymang" , , "ndtv" , "sanjeev" , "Sanu" , , "Sarang Yadwadkar" , "sarosh" , "sastry subramanya" Subject: Fw: The Globalizer Who Came In From the Cold (fwd) Date sent: Fri, 25 Jan 2002 06:42:43 +0530 Send reply to: pjehangir at hotmail.com ----- Original Message ----- From: "R. P. Ravindra" To: ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; "Venu Govindu" ; Sent: Thursday, January 24, 2002 10:23 AM Subject: The Globalizer Who Came In From the Cold (fwd) **************************************************** Ravindra.R.P./Ph.D.student/Biomed.Engg. 22,QIP Quarters, Hillside **** A.I. Lab Phone-5720224 **** Phone ext.-8749 **************************************************** ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Thu, 24 Jan 2002 08:09:01 +0530 (IST) From: Shiva Shankar To: Undisclosed recipients: ; Subject: The Globalizer Who Came In From the Cold (fwd) The Globalizer Who Came In From the Cold By Greg Palast The World Bank's former Chief Economist's accusations are eye-popping - including how the IMF and US Treasury fixed the Russian elections. "It has condemned people to death," the former apparatchik told me. This was like a scene out of Le Carre. The brilliant old agent comes in from the cold, crosses to our side, and in hours of debriefing, empties his memory of horrors committed in the name of a political ideology he now realizes has gone rotten. And here before me was a far bigger catch than some used Cold War spy. Joseph Stiglitz was Chief Economist of the World Bank. To a great extent, the new world economic order was his theory come to life. I "debriefed" Stigltiz over several days, at Cambridge University, in a London hotel and finally in Washington in April 2001 during the big confab of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. But instead of chairing the meetings of ministers and central bankers, Stiglitz was kept exiled safely behind the blue police cordons, the same as the nuns carrying a large wooden cross, the Bolivian union leaders, the parents of AIDS victims and the other `anti-globalization' protesters. The ultimate insider was now on the outside. In 1999 the World Bank fired Stiglitz. He was not allowed quiet retirement; US Treasury Secretary Larry Summers, I'm told, demanded a public excommunication for Stiglitz' having expressed his first mild dissent for globalization World Bank style. Here in Washington we completed the last of several hours of exclusive interviews for The Observer and BBC TV's Newsnight about the real, often hidden, workings of the IMF, World Bank, and the bank's 51% owner, the US Treasury. And here, from sources unnamable (not Stiglitz), we obtained a cache of documents marked, "confidential," "restricted," and "not otherwise (to be) disclosed without World Bank authorization." Stiglitz helped translate one from bureaucratise, a "Country Assistance Strategy." There's an Assistance Strategy for every poorer nation, designed, says the World Bank, after careful in-country investigation. But according to insider Stiglitz, the Bank's staff `investigation' consists of close inspection of a nation's 5-star hotels. It concludes with the Bank staff meeting some begging, busted finance minister who is handed a `restructuring agreement' pre-drafted for his `voluntary' signature (I have a selection of these). Each nation's economy is individually analyzed, then, says Stiglitz, the Bank hands every minister the same exact four-step program. Step One is Privatization - which Stiglitz said could more accurately be called, `Briberization.' Rather than object to the sell-offs of state industries, he said national leaders - using the World Bank's demands to silence local critics - happily flogged their electricity and water companies. "You could see their eyes widen" at the prospect of 10% commissions paid to Swiss bank accounts for simply shaving a few billion off the sale price of national assets. And the US government knew it, charges Stiglitz, at least in the case of the biggest `briberization' of all, the 1995 Russian sell-off. "The US Treasury view was this was great as we wanted Yeltsin re-elected. We don't care if it's a corrupt election. We want the money to go to Yeltzin" via kick-backs for his campaign. Stiglitz is no conspiracy nutter ranting about Black Helicopters. The man was inside the game, a member of Bill Clinton's cabinet as Chairman of the President's council of economic advisors. Most ill-making for Stiglitz is that the US-backed oligarchs stripped Russia's industrial assets, with the effect that the corruption scheme cut national output nearly in half causing depression and starvation. After briberization, Step Two of the IMF/World Bank one-size-fits-all rescue-your-economy plan is `Capital Market Liberalization.' In theory, capital market deregulation allows investment capital to flow in and out. Unfortunately, as in Indonesia and Brazil, the money simply flowed out and out. Stiglitz calls this the "Hot Money" cycle. Cash comes in for speculation in real estate and currency, then flees at the first whiff of trouble. A nation's reserves can drain in days, hours. And when that happens, to seduce speculators into returning a nation's own capital funds, the IMF demands these nations raise interest rates to 30%, 50% and 80%. "The result was predictable," said Stiglitz of the Hot Money tidal waves in Asia and Latin America. Higher interest rates demolished property values, savaged industrial production and drained national treasuries. At this point, the IMF drags the gasping nation to Step Three: Market-Based Pricing, a fancy term for raising prices on food, water and cooking gas. This leads, predictably, to Step-Three-and-a-Half: what Stiglitz calls, `The IMF riot.' The IMF riot is painfully predictable. When a nation is, "down and out, [the IMF] takes advantage and squeezes the last pound of blood out of them. They turn up the heat until, finally, the whole cauldron blows up," as when the IMF eliminated food and fuel subsidies for the poor in Indonesia in 1998. Indonesia exploded into riots, but there are other examples - the Bolivian riots over water prices last year and this February, the riots in Ecuador over the rise in cooking gas prices imposed by the World Bank. You'd almost get the impression that the riot is written into the plan. And it is. What Stiglitz did not know is that, while in the States, BBC and The Observer obtained several documents from inside the World Bank, stamped over with those pesky warnings, "confidential," "restricted," "not to be disclosed." Let's get back to one: the "Interim Country Assistance Strategy" for Ecuador, in it the Bank several times states - with cold accuracy - that they expected their plans to spark, "social unrest," to use their bureaucratic term for a nation in flames. That's not surprising. The secret report notes that the plan to make the US dollar Ecuador's currency has pushed 51% of the population below the poverty line. The World Bank "Assistance" plan simply calls for facing down civil strife and suffering with, "political resolve" - and still higher prices. The IMF riots (and by riots I mean peaceful demonstrations dispersed by bullets, tanks and teargas) cause new panicked flights of capital and government bankruptcies. This economic arson has it's bright side - for foreign corporations, who can then pick off remaining assets, such as the odd mining concession or port, at fire sale prices. Stiglitz notes that the IMF and World Bank are not heartless adherents to market economics. At the same time the IMF stopped Indonesia `subsidizing' food purchases, "when the banks need a bail-out, intervention (in the market) is welcome." The IMF scrounged up tens of billions of dollars to save Indonesia's financiers and, by extension, the US and European banks from which they had borrowed. A pattern emerges. There are lots of losers in this system but one clear winner: the Western banks and US Treasury, making the big bucks off this crazy new international capital churn. Stiglitz told me about his unhappy meeting, early in his World Bank tenure, with Ethopia's new president in the nation's first democratic election. The World Bank and IMF had ordered Ethiopia to divert aid money to its reserve account at the US Treasury, which pays a pitiful 4% return, while the nation borrowed US dollars at 12% to feed its population. The new president begged Stiglitz to let him use the aid money to rebuild the nation. But no, the loot went straight off to the US Treasury's vault in Washington. Now we arrive at Step Four of what the IMF and World Bank call their "poverty reduction strategy": Free Trade. This is free trade by the rules of the World Trade Organization and World Bank, Stiglitz the insider likens free trade WTO-style to the Opium Wars. "That too was about opening markets," he said. As in the 19th century, Europeans and Americans today are kicking down the barriers to sales in Asia, Latin American and Africa, while barricading our own markets against Third World agriculture. In the Opium Wars, the West used military blockades to force open markets for their unbalanced trade. Today, the World Bank can order a financial blockade just as effective - and sometimes just as deadly. Stiglitz is particularly emotional over the WTO's intellectual property rights treaty (it goes by the acronym TRIPS, more on that in the next chapters). It is here, says the economist, that the new global order has "condemned people to death" by imposing impossible tariffs and tributes to pay to pharmaceutical companies for branded medicines. "They don't care," said the professor of the corporations and bank loans he worked with, "if people live or die." By the way, don't be confused by the mix in this discussion of the IMF, World Bank and WTO. They are interchangeable masks of a single governance system. They have locked themselves together by what are unpleasantly called, "triggers." Taking a World Bank loan for a school "triggers" a requirement to accept every "conditionality" - they average 111 per nation - laid down by both the World Bank and IMF. In fact, said Stiglitz the IMF requires nations to accept trade policies more punitive than the official WTO rules. Stiglitz greatest concern is that World Bank plans, devised in secrecy and driven by an absolutist ideology, are never open for discourse or dissent. Despite the West's push for elections throughout the developing world, the so-called Poverty Reduction Programs "undermine democracy." And they don't work. Black Africa's productivity under the guiding hand of IMF structural "assistance" has gone to hell in a handbag. Did any nation avoid this fate? Yes, said Stiglitz, identifying Botswana. Their trick? "They told the IMF to go packing." So then I turned on Stiglitz. OK, Mr Smart-Guy Professor, how would you help developing nations? Stiglitz proposed radical land reform, an attack at the heart of "landlordism," on the usurious rents charged by the propertied oligarchies worldwide, typically 50% of a tenant's crops. So I had to ask the professor: as you were top economist at the World Bank, why didn't the Bank follow your advice? "If you challenge [land ownership], that would be a change in the power of the elites. That's not high on their agenda." Apparently not. Ultimately, what drove him to put his job on the line was the failure of the banks and US Treasury to change course when confronted with the crises - failures and suffering perpetrated by their four-step monetarist mambo. Every time their free market solutions failed, the IMF simply demanded more free market policies. "It's a little like the Middle Ages," the insider told me, "When the patient died they would say, 'well, he stopped the bloodletting too soon, he still had a little blood in him.' " I took away from my talks with the professor that the solution to world poverty and crisis is simple: remove the bloodsuckers. A version of this was first published as "The IMF's Four Steps to Damnation" in The Observer (London) in April and another version in The Big Issue - that's the magazine that the homeless flog on platforms in the London Underground. Big Issue offered equal space to the IMF, whose "deputy chief media officer" wrote: "... I find it impossible to respond given the depth and breadth of hearsay and misinformation in [Palast's] report." Of course it was difficult for the Deputy Chief to respond. The information (and documents) came from the unhappy lot inside his agency and the World Bank. ------- End of forwarded message ------- **************************************************************** * NOTE CHANGE IN OUR EMAIL ADDRESS: PLEASE NOTE IT AS FOLLOWS * **************************************************************** CENTRE FOR SCIENCE AND ENVIRONMENT ( CSE ) 41, TUGHLAKABAD INSTITUTIONAL AREA, NEW DELHI- 110 062 TELE: 608 1110, 608 1124 608 3394, 608 6399 FAX : 91-11-608 5879 VISIT US AT: http://www.cseindia.org Email: rustam at cseindia.org **************************************************************** From zamrooda at sarai.net Mon Jan 28 15:59:23 2002 From: zamrooda at sarai.net (zamrooda) Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 15:59:23 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] hoardings in the city Message-ID: <0201281559230F.01153@legal.sarai.kit> 1984, half past one in the afternoon as the school bus inched towards the Times of India building, Bhadhur Shah Zafar Marg, for the first time a girl of 8 years witnessed the impact of a builletin board on the streets of Delhi. The board clearly stated Prime Minister Indira Gandhi shot dead. The slow humming of the engine was breaking into the silence of the afternoon. The slow weeping of the passengers adding to the hummig. From geert at xs4all.nl Mon Jan 28 15:12:32 2002 From: geert at xs4all.nl (geert) Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 20:42:32 +1100 Subject: [Reader-list] dialognow Message-ID: <002201c1a7e2$2e3de3e0$b2de3dca@geert> anyone on the reader list has seen this? any thoughts? it's a india-pakistan dialogue site built with open source scoop weblog software. scoop is a variation of for instance slashcode and php nuke. geert http://www.dialognow.org/ Annoucing Dialognow.org By rashmi, Section Project [] Posted on Thu Jan 10th, 2002 at 01:52:20 PM PST DialogNow.org is a forum to promote dialog between the two peoples of India and Pakistan. In spite of being neighbours, there is little or not communication between people of the two countries, and consequently a lot of misunderstanding about the viewpoints of the other side. There are a few Yahoo message boards where people animatedly discuss such issues, but it always degenerates into a shouting match. The hope is that a Scoop type moderation system can keep the dialog civil and meaningful. From boud_roukema at camk.edu.pl Mon Jan 28 17:07:38 2002 From: boud_roukema at camk.edu.pl (boud) Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 12:37:38 +0100 (CET) Subject: [Reader-list] Fw: The Globalizer Who Came In From the Cold In-Reply-To: <19FD14CA2@cseindia.org> Message-ID: On Mon, 28 Jan 2002, rustam wrote: > I got this forwarded mail which I thought would interest many on the > list, though it does not state where and when was this article > published. When in doubt, search the Left Bible/Koran/Talmud/Veda/etc. ;-), AKA (also known as) ZNet! > Subject: Fw: The Globalizer Who Came In From the Cold (fwd) > Date sent: Fri, 25 Jan 2002 06:42:43 +0530 http://www.zmag.org/noblestiglitz.htm The Observer, London October 10, 2001 The globalizer who came in from the cold Joe Stiglitz: Today's winner of the nobel prize in economics by Greg Palast From sandipan at molbio.unizh.ch Mon Jan 28 21:36:16 2002 From: sandipan at molbio.unizh.ch (Sandipan Chatterjee) Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 17:06:16 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] =?iso-8859-1?Q?Bol=E8ro?= Message-ID: Here is an article from one of the best scientific journals - Nature. Best wishes, Sandipan ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Brain disease shaped Boléro Ravel's last music bears the mark of his deteriorating brain. 22 January 2002 JOHN WHITFIELD Brain disease influenced Ravel's last compositions including his Boléro, say researchers. Orchestral timbres came to dominate his late music at the expense of melodic complexity because the left half of his brain deteriorated, they suggest1. Timbre is mainly the province of the brain's right hemisphere. French composer Maurice Ravel suffered from a mysterious progressive dementia from about 1927 when he was 52 years old. He gradually lost the ability to speak, write and play the piano. He composed his last work in 1932, and gave his last performance in 1933. He diedin December 1937. Neurologists have puzzled over his illness ever since. Many have suggested Alzheimer's disease. But François Boller, of the Paul Broca Research Centre in Paris, believes the symptoms began too young, and that too much of Ravel's memory, self-awareness and social skills were preserved for this diagnosis to be correct. Ravel probably suffered from two conditions, Boller proposes. One, progressive primary aphasia, erodes the brain's language centres. The other, corticobasal degeneration, robs patients of movement control. Ravel became trapped in his body, says Boller: "He didn't lose the ability to compose music, he lost the ability to express it." The composer's failings, particularly his loss of language, were predominantly in faculties dealt with by the left half of the brain. Musical abilities are spread throughout the brain; different areas deal with pitch,melody, harmony and rhythm. Un-Ravel Boller and his colleagues believe that two of Ravel's last pieces show the early effects of the weakening left hemisphere, with the timbre-processing right brain coming to the fore. The works are Boléro written in 1928, and his 1930 piano concerto for the left hand. Boléro contains only two themes, each repeated eight times. But it has30 superimposed lines, and 25 different combinations of sounds. Ravel himself described it as "an orchestral fabric without music". Likewise the concerto for the left hand features shorter phrases than Ravel's previous works, and subsumes the soloist into the orchestra more than his other piano concerto.Mathematical analyses also indicate that this work differs from the rest of Ravel's compositions. "It's a captivating hypothesis, and in keeping with what we know," says Alzheimer's researcher Giovanni Frisoni of the National Centre for Research and Care of Alzheimer's Disease in Brescia, Italy. But it will probably be impossible, he warns, to ever know for sure what drove Ravel to write the way he did. "Boléro occupies a funny place in Ravel's oeuvre," agrees Deborah Mawer, a music researcher at Lancaster University, UK. But it's hard to distinguish between his musical development and his gradually altering mental state, she cautions. Ravel became interested in mechanization and modern machinery at the end of his life, which could account for the repetitiveness of the piece. References 1.Amaducci, L., Grassi, E. & Boller, F. Maurice Ravel and right-hemisphere musical creativity: influence of disease on hislast musical works?. European Journal of Neurology, 9, 75 -82, (2002). © Nature News Service / Macmillan Magazines Ltd 2002 From boud_roukema at camk.edu.pl Tue Jan 29 04:53:26 2002 From: boud_roukema at camk.edu.pl (boud) Date: Tue, 29 Jan 2002 00:23:26 +0100 (CET) Subject: [Reader-list] dialognow In-Reply-To: <002201c1a7e2$2e3de3e0$b2de3dca@geert> Message-ID: On Mon, 28 Jan 2002, geert wrote: > anyone on the reader list has seen this? any thoughts? > it's a india-pakistan dialogue site built with open > source scoop weblog software. scoop is a Well, it's certainly a good thing to see. :-) But in science there's always a (healthy) struggle between theory and empirical data ("experiment", "observation"). The ideal is a balance between the two, which are constantly forced to accept and come to terms with each others' existence and development. And I think it's clear that the empirical data often surprises the bejeepers out of theorists - who would have expected that simultaneity of time is not absolute before this was established by experiment? (In certain special situations, A happens before B for me, but A happens *after* B for you, and you and I are both perfectly correct in saying which happens first - and this is hard physics, not just poetry...) In social sciences, I tend to agree with Chomsky that there really doesn't exist much theory, though there is a lot of empirical data, and there are some general descriptions of the empirical data which are valid. My feeling is that the site as such risks being mainly "theoretical", but where the only empirical data is that chosen by the elites and the elite media. Sure, it's definitely better than no dialogue at all! But a much more powerful way to dialogue is by building up sites focussed on empirical data, and preferably grass-roots data. If you had Indians and Pakistanis talking to each other about the sort of grass-roots issues in the http://india.indymedia.org central column, and the equivalent from a Pakistani Indymedia site (it's apparently under discussion, any volunteers who want to join in, and who preferably are in Pakistan and in contact with grass-roots groups in Pakistan who accept principles of openness, non-hierarchy, etc., should send an email to new-imc at lists.indymedia.org saying this), then I think that it would become much more obvious what are the most important questions to be dealing with. E.g. the issues highlighted on the site at the moment include: the Barefoot College in Rajasthan, Narmada and the courtroom, Tehri flooding and police violence, POTO, the Indo-Pak conflict, police vs hawkers in Mumbai, Anil Agarwal, and Gujarat earthquake followup. Discussion based on these sorts of diverse issues in both countries could help avoid a narrow focus on personnification of "nation" and "Pakistan says this" and "India should do this". This way, electronic people bridges could be built on a whole variety of concrete issues so that public debate would shift towards them and suddenly the whole vaporous "nation" thing would come to seem rather secondary to concrete things like human rights (the whole spectrum of human rights, not just selected ones), even in the eyes of the elites. Well, you asked for thoughts... From oneworld at del3.vsnl.net.in Tue Jan 29 09:56:36 2002 From: oneworld at del3.vsnl.net.in (Kanti Kumar) Date: Tue, 29 Jan 2002 09:56:36 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] Colonial Gatecrashing In-Reply-To: <20020125113202.60390.qmail@web9806.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: Dear Friends, Some Gates open frontiers of worlds afar and relationships distant, and some shut away the neighbours next door and relationships more real. Even as we seem to believe the world is shrinking thanks to Internet and email, Delhi citizens in recent years have suddenly developed such sense of insecurity about humans next door that they prefer to limit themselves into smaller worlds. One such middle+upper middle-class colony of South Delhi where we lived five years ago had these iron gates erected at every entry point to a street or lane. Interestingly, the gates were placed strategically in such a way that the enclosed area conveniently excluded - from late evening to morning - our poorer neighbours who lived in shanties in the parks and open spaces just next to bungalows and kothis. Those who lived in the kothis, however, used to depend on our poorer neighbours for the daily household chores during the rest of the day! One stormy evening those five years ago, my wife suddenly fell ill. She felt excruciating pain in the legs and back. Our family physician's medicines gave her relief, but only for a few hours. As the night progressed, the intensity of her pain increased and around 3 in the morning it seemed she would collapse due to the pain. It was then that I rushed, in desperation, to the only nursing home in the colony which was barely 100 metres from our house. But there stood between me and the nursing home a locked iron gate. I went to all the sides of the locality, from one to the next, looking for a gate that would be open to get an ambulance or doctor. But all the six entry points to that locality - less than 1 sq km in area - had been locked and there was no sight of any watchman or guard in that weather. I returned to my ailing wife disgusted - and completely drenched in the pouring rain - only to witness helplessly her suffering for another four hours before the gates to some succour would open. It's another matter that the doctor who examined my wife next morning gave her medicines for gastro-enteritis and made her suffer for two more days while what actually caused the pain was an ovarian cyst! Today it's easier to connect to the farthest than to relate to the nearest! Kanti Kumar -----Original Message----- From: reader-list-admin at sarai.net [mailto:reader-list-admin at sarai.net]On Behalf Of Sopan Joshi Sent: 25 January 2002 17:02 To: reader-list at sarai.net Subject: Re: [Reader-list] Colonial Gatecrashing This is in response to Joy's posting "Gates": ours was the corner house. the good people of our Delhi "colony" decided that security depended on a tall, heavy iron gate. it came up just outside our very own 'main gate' and was just the sort that Joy mentions. one of the gentlemen residents of the colony got the gate constructed. I’m not sure, but i think he was in the construction business. the stalwart who guarded this gate was over 50, had a wrinkled face, and used to walk with a limp. he could barely carry the weight of his lathi. one day the gate came down upon the chowkidar and smashed his head. he died. the gentleman who had got the gate constructed handled the matter with the kind of concern and dexterity that one associates with the Delhi Police. he paid some compensation to the chowkidar's wife (and blamed the man who had welded the gate). some concerned people in the colony also contributed. a few days later, we shifted to another colony. this house is on the main road. So we don’t have to negotiate any gates. but the gate--bigger and heavier than the one that crashed--is two houses away. and the chowkidar here is a young man with the first suggestions of facial hair. __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Everything you'll ever need on one web page from News and Sport to Email and Music Charts http://uk.my.yahoo.com _________________________________________ reader-list: an open discussion list on media and the city. Critiques & Collaborations To subscribe: send an email to reader-list-request at sarai.net with subscribe in the subject header. List archive: From patrice at xs4all.nl Tue Jan 29 14:28:40 2002 From: patrice at xs4all.nl (Patrice Riemens) Date: Tue, 29 Jan 2002 09:58:40 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] Fwd from CSL: Globalisation debate Message-ID: <20020129095840.A27547@xs4all.nl> With the usual apologies for X-posting... ----- Forwarded message from John Armitage ----- Reply-To: The Cyber-Society-Live mailing list is a moderated discussion list for those interested Subject: [CSL]: Globalisation debate [Hi folks, there is yet another "heated debate" on "what is etc. being conducted by Paul Hirst and David Held at the open democracy site. John.] -------------------------------------------------------------------- -----Original Message----- From: openDemocracy [mailto:openDemocracy at opendemocracy.net] Sent: Monday, January 28, 2002 10:40 AM To: john.armitage Subject: Extra!Extra! www.opendemocracy.net exists for world debate on the great issues of ourtime. Now, in a sparkling exchange, David Held and Paul Hirst clash daily on perhaps the most important of them all - globalisation after September 11th. 1. What is Globalisation? 2. Is it new? 3. Are the protestors justified? 4. Is the WTO better than nothing? 5. What are the alternatives? 6. Is Europe a model? 7. Can we create global democracy? 8. If not.... http://www.opendemocracy.net/forum/document_details.asp?CatID=99&DocID=1009 Today is day 5. The exchange ends as Davos starts in New York and the protestors gather at Porto Alegre. This is an experiment for openDemocracy. We are not going daily! But we want to make this defining argument available in short, accessible pieces. Please: Forward this email to as many people as possible, so they can read www.openDemocracy.net Ask them to register for our usual once-a-week email updates. Encourage them to consider helping us with a donation of $40, £25 or EUR40, or however much they can afford. http://www.opendemocracy.net/dynamics/donation.asp (or send a cheque to openDemocracy, 67-71 Goswell Rd, London, EC1V 7EN) And above all, add your voice: join the debate, email your questions and responses, and tell us what you think. Many thanks. From patrice at sarai.net Wed Jan 30 00:19:01 2002 From: patrice at sarai.net (Patrice Riemens) Date: Wed, 30 Jan 2002 00:19:01 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] The Anarchogeek interview Message-ID: <02013000190104.01859@janta7.sarai.kit> original on: http://www.anarchogeek.com Interview about the anti-globalization movement Dec 26 2001 This is from an interview i did for a grad student working on her thesis about the anti-globalization movement. First, may I have your name and affiliation/position for bibliographic purposes? If you do not wish to be cited by name in my thesis, please let me know, and I will include only anonymous information. People keep telling me I should be quite about my name and try and hide my idendity from my work. They're probally right. Although all i do is make websites, fix computers, and help organize media centers i probally do put myself at risk. That said I've been "outed" so many times and so publically that it often doesn't feel worth hiding things. I'm Evan Henshaw-Plath. At the moment i'm in rural northern california where I grew up but I've been traveling the anti-globalization circuit for most of the time since the seattle protests. I've been to in central and western europe, and throughout the americas. I'm a volunteer with the imc-tech collective, a loose network of radical techies and geeks who support indymedia projects. We don't have titles or leaders. Aside from indymedia in 98 i founded an activist website, protest.net, which is a global calendar of protests and activism. Protest.net is maintained as a closed collective project which i work on with three other net activists. I'd say if you had to give me a title, it would be net activist although i'm not sure i like the term. It brings up visions of people who think they are making social change because they send lots of emails and spam their friends with guilt ridden emails. In my research on the anti-globalization movement, your name and/or organization came up. I have a basic understanding of the direction of your work and the issues you are concerned with, and I do not want to ask you for information that is available elsewhere, so please tell me where I can find such information in order to save your understandably valuable time. 1) Is it fair to characterize your work as anti-globalization? Why or why not? It's the title we've got. For better or worse we are the anti-globalization movement. At least it's more creative than being called the "new left." :) Perhaps we should be more accurately called the anti-neo-liberalism movement. That is infact what the EZLN says in their famous quote, "Against Neoliberalism and for humanity." The problem is that most people, especially in the anglo world don't understand what neoliberalism means. In the US we have this warped notion that liberalism and the left are one in the same. People get confused. They might think, well neoliberalism, liberals means democrats, and you have the new democratics like the DLC and Clinton. Therefore neoliberalism is what clinton advocates, which is true, but by then you've lost most people. For a while after Seattle I always insisted on saying Anti-Corporate-Globalization. I know others use the term anti-capitalist-globalization. Infact outside the US the term anti-globalization and anti-capitalist are used somewhat interchangeably. There are american activists who have tried to bring that practice in to the rhetoric of the american anti-globalization movement but it doesn't resonate. The problem is that most americans have a pretty blury understanding of the differnece between democracy and capitalism. This is why I prefer the term anti-corporate because americans know what corporations are, they know how they affect their lives, and they can take a stand against corporations. All that said, we've got the term anti-globalization movement. It could be worse but I still perfer it us being called the "new new left" or "really quite new left" or the "post this that and the other and don't remind us of the 60's left." The Economist keeps trying to brand the movement anti-globalist, but it dosen't seem to be catching on. By the same account i know plenty of activist who try and call it the movement for alternative globalization but that doesn't sound very catchy to me. 2) Do you consider yourself part of a movement? Please explain why. Yeah it's a movement, or maybe a movement of movements. For me i finally stopped wondering if it was a movement when I saw people returning from the Quebec City FTAA protests pumped up at getting involved and wanting to learn even though was the first protest they'd ever partipated in. In someways the question of is it a movement can be answered the same way you answer 'am i in love?' If you still have to ask your self the question then the answer is no, once the answer becomes 'of course' then you've got your answer. I could go in to looking at how we're creating counter structures, our own insitutions, ideologies, spectrum of groups, goals, and tactics, but the short answer is we're a movement. 3) How do you define globalization? You could write a whole book on that subject. Infact there is a whole new category of books and academic scholarship growing up around globalization studies as i'm sure you're aware. I'd recommend No Logo by Naomi Klein and Empire by Negri and Hardt as two books i've found interesting. Globalization is the whole series of social, economic, and political transformations that are taking place as our technology and social institutions shift and become highly integrated. The principle problem with globalization is it's being driven by a neoliberal economic agenda which includes free trade, privitization, the gutting of the fordist welfare state, and the shift of power from nominally democratic nation-states to unaccountable supranational bodies. 4) What elements of globalization are you taking action against? What is your message? The part above. The whole point about the anti-globalization movement is that we're actually quite globalist. I'd use the term internationalist but really it's also anti-nationalist. We're perfectlly happy to see the nation state whither away. The problem is what it's being replaced with. 5) Many people have described activist networks when speaking of the anti-globalization movement and others. Can you comment on the nature of such networks, and the particular weaknesses, or strengths of these networks? Well first off you need to know that there are many parts of the anti-globalization movement. There are parts of the movement such as ATTAC, or in the US the Green Party / Nader groups, which are creating big ngo / political party type organizations. There is nothing really new about how these groups are organizing. They are working to construct a new social democratic order and are using pretty traditional methods. The more radical parts of the anti-globalization movement, both the street activists and the more with it NGO's have adopted a new model for organizing. We've used a lot of technology and communitarian, decentralized, anti-authoritarian values with their roots in the anarchist tradition. Mailinglists, cellphones, websites, affinity groups are all the tools of our movement. It means we have no offical spokes people, we have no offices or party line. We have a hard time raising a lot of money or supporting big personalities. On the other hand we can get things done that could never be done regardless of the money. We grew indymedia from one center with a dozen volunteers to a network of 75 media centers in 23 countries in a dozen languages which has produced a dozen feature length documentary films, printed dozens of local newspapers, and more in under two years. I was talking to some friends with indymedia norway. They were setting up a media center to cover an ATTAC conference. Attac had the conference very well organized, paid for people to fly in, got the speakers lined up, got the publicity, and even had pretty good attendance. Quite a logistical feat. But the imcistas asked if they could help them get a car to move computers and equpitment for the media lab and attac couldn't do it. The imcistas had to figure it out. Despite all the resources of attac they couldn't do something as simple as get a car. Indymedia and the more PGA inspired end of the anti-globalization movement almost never have a problem finding a car. When the shit hits the fan everything just starts working. People stand up and contribute and it's amazing. You should really spend some time in an imc durring a major action. Really without seeing a convergence you can't know what the anti-globalization movement is about. 7) Can you comment on the role of new technology in your tactics? How has new technology affected your work? Well i'm basically a net activist, so technology plays a huge role in my tactics. We joke that we're 'tech support for the revolution.' It's true in a way, we may not get a revolution, or if we do it might not turn out like we intend, but we are the tech support for the movement. Most of my work is focused on communcations technology. Websites, email, mailinglists, cell phones, radios, media labs, video cameras, magazines, newspapers, filers, community, web and pirate radio, public access tv, theaters, all come together to provide the infrastructure upon which the movement communicates. This is both internal communcation where we are debating an comeing to develop critiques, coordanate ourselves, and to present to the world our perspective. We can and do work to get our ideas and messages out to the CNN's of the world but that's a very limited medium. The anti-globalization movement could not exist without the internet. This is not to say that we wouldn't be struggling over similar issues but the movement that we have now wouldn't exist. We wouldn't be making the connections and coalitions. We couldn't organize such massive coalitions with almost non-existant overhead if we didn't have email, mailinglists, and websites. I think the tactics of having very large broad protests with indymedia centers, converence spaces, counter conferences, legal protests, illegal protests, and direct action wouldn't be possible without the net. There has some been some interesting stuff on the subject that has come out of the RAND corporation about networked organizations. It's worth reading. They basically looked at how technology was changing organizations and wars. They've analized the EZLN and the black bloc, they were the ones to come up with the concepts of cyberwar and infowar. That's basically what we are fighting. It's not a war with bullets, a civil war, or a cold war. It's a war of ideas and real power politics played out between governments, coporations, and civil society. Governments have really lost their power over their own economies which puts them in an increasingly weak possition. It's a fight over the legitimacy of new institutions as we struggle over the nature of a globalized society that is coming in to being. The technology is playing a huge roll in shaping society and the struggle. This is nothing new, i mean Marx considered the state of technological development to part of the base, a fundamental part of the economy from which the superstructure of society is formed. I'm not a marxist and I don't agree with the modernist dicotomy between base and superstructure that Marx articulated but it's interesting to note. Today we have seen the growth of electronics and especially computers shift who can be an engineer and creator of tools of production. The huge growth of the internet is in part due to the changing nature of technology which allows anybody with a computer to recreate the software it runs. This isn't directly connected to globalization but it's a big interest of mine. Technology has gotten suffently advanced that digital computers have become the domain of popular innovation and production. 8) Can you comment on administrative (government, law enforcement) responses to your actions, and its effects on your efforts? They don't like us. They want us to go away. They want to get rid of us but they don't know how. It's a struggle over legitmacy and in some cases we have as much or more legitimacy than they do. That doesn't mean that they aren't stepping up repression, activists are starting to get longer jail time for arrests during protests. The assault on the imc and the school across the road during Genoa doesn't bode well. We are seeing a slow convergence between police tactics in the third world and those in the first. From jeebesh at sarai.net Tue Jan 29 17:34:07 2002 From: jeebesh at sarai.net (Jeebesh Bagchi) Date: Tue, 29 Jan 2002 17:34:07 +0530 Subject: [Reader-list] The Anarchogeek interview In-Reply-To: <02013000190104.01859@janta7.sarai.kit> References: <02013000190104.01859@janta7.sarai.kit> Message-ID: <02012917340703.00951@pinki.sarai.kit> Thanks Patrice. for the posting. One paragraph really struck me in term of it's range, the posssible intricate combination and the multiplicity of communication levels. >" Most of my work is focused on communcations technology. Websites, email, > mailinglists, cell phones, radios, media labs, video cameras, magazines, > newspapers, filers, community, web and pirate > radio, public access tv, theaters, all come together to > provide the infrastructure upon which the movement > communicates. This is both internal communcation where > we are debating an comeing to develop critiques, > coordanate ourselves, and to present to the world our > perspective. " In conversation with Henk (henk at waag.org) i was struck by possiblitity of combination-media practice. - Combine email with website (like the reader-list) - Combine mailing list with sms messages - SMS messaging to radio programme (a computer takes the sms message then reads out through a text to speech programme - you can stream it again into internet radio. This can be done with emails also) - You can combine community television with online chat programme. - Combine irc chat with sms. - Printouts from online messages as wall papers. You can combine anything with anything. And you go really micro, low scale. best Jeebesh From henk at waag.org Wed Jan 30 11:05:04 2002 From: henk at waag.org (henk at waag.org) Date: Wed, 30 Jan 2002 06:35:04 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] WEF/WSF: The IMC Radio Network is Bringing you another Global Broadcast for the Revolution: January 31st - February 4th! Message-ID: <20020130053504.GI1362@waag.org> Indymedia's Radio Group - D.R.O.P. project will Produce a Live Internet Broadcast: Thursday January 31st - Monday February 4th. For Immediate release, Monday, January 28th, 2002 Contact: imc-audio at indymedia.org http://radio.indymedia.org 1. The World Social Forum in Porto Alegre, Brazil 2. The World Economic Forum and protests in New York City 3. The Munich Conference on Security Policy protests in Munich 4. Additional Programming from India, the UK, San Francisco and Seattle, among others. The World Economic Forum Some very important people are missing from the headlines and the stories of the world's most influential economic institutions like the International Monetary Fund, the World Trade Organization (WTO), and the Free Trade Area of the Americas. The real players--corporate representatives--meet for the World Economic Forum (WEF) this year in New York City with minimal remote press access. Teach-ins and protests planned in New York City get to the heart of corporate globalization and US economic power. http://www.weforum.org http://www.anotherworldispossible.com The World Social Forum Also missing from the headlines are the alternatives devised by grassroots organizations and the world's non-elites. Set to happen at the same time as the WEF is the World Social Forum in Porto Alegre, Brazil, a conference exploring such alternatives to an increasingly standard corporate agenda. http://www.forumsocialmundial.org.br/eng/index.asp The Munich Conference on Security Policy This annual meeting brings together the government officials and the military of NATO and the EU. Much of the coalition behind the military coalitions that brought us the wars in Afghanistan, Kosovo, and Iraq are forged in conferences like this security conference. The last few months have seen military coalition involvement from Japan and Germany unprecedented since WWII. European activists are planning to bring their message held by most of the world: not to expand the "War on Terrorism" to more countries. http://www.carneval-against-nato.de/ http://www.anti-nato.de.vu/ During our broadcast, Stations can: 1. Stream the live broadcast any time 2. Download audio highlights from the live stream for broadcast; or 3. Download produced MP3 programs giving background, updates, headlines, stories and wrap-ups. The live internet stream will begin on January 31st and last through February 4th from stations in Seattle, San Francisco, Vermont, New York, Munich, Porto Alegre, and India. To View a Schedule of the Broadcast please go to http://www.Protest.Net/drop/ To broadcast or listen to the Stream link to one of the following url's: http://freeteam.nl:8000/drop - 24kbps http://live.waag.org:7800/drop -24kbps http://xaos.pvl.at:8000/drop - 24kbps http://radio.uk.solpsists.org:8000/drop - 24kbps http://www.autistici.org:8000/drop - 24kbps http://radio.us.solpsists.org:8000/drop - 24 kbps http://notowar.com/blast.m3u - 16kbps For archived mp3's of the broadcast go to +http://radio.indymedia.org/drop/archive.html Some portions of the stream may be in Portuguese, Spanish, French, or German. If you have any questions about playing the broadcast, please email imc-audio at indymedia.org For more details, go to: http://radio.indymedia.org ------------------------------------------ Since the WTO protests in Seattle, 1999, the Independent Media Center (IMC) has been covering the voices of those critiquing these global institutions and their impact on democratic structures, then streaming it over the internet. Likewise, the IMC will produce live breaking coverage of the forums and protests in Brazil, New York, and Munich. Hundreds of media activists will be calling in reports, conducting phone interviews and collecting audio on the front lines, in workshops, and at teach-ins. For more about the IMC, go to: http://www.indymedia.org http://www.indymedia.org/about.php3 See also Microradio.net for more information about live web streaming: http://www.microradio.net From henk at waag.org Wed Jan 30 11:31:29 2002 From: henk at waag.org (henk at waag.org) Date: Wed, 30 Jan 2002 07:01:29 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] The Anarchogeek interview In-Reply-To: <02012917340703.00951@pinki.sarai.kit> References: <02013000190104.01859@janta7.sarai.kit> <02012917340703.00951@pinki.sarai.kit> Message-ID: <20020130060129.GJ1362@waag.org> Today on www.slashdot.org (News for Nurds, Stuff that Matters): - the world's first TCP/IP-enabled Lego brick Imagine what the possabilities could be for combined-media practice :-) http://news.lugnet.com/robotics/rcx/legos/?n=2247 Something completely different but with some crossing border site steps: - Beginning Perl for Bioinformatics this book is 'an introduction to Perl for biologists. it's also an introduction to biology and bioinformatics for Perl programmers, and it's also an introduction to both Perl *and* biology for people that have never really been exposed to either field. The author has clearly thought a lot about making one book to please these different audiences, and he has pulled it off nicely, in a way that manages to explain basic topics to people learning about each field for the first time while not coming off as condescending or slow-paced to those that might already have some exposure to it. http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/begperlbio/ grtz, henk On Tue, Jan 29, 2002 at 05:34:07PM +0530, Jeebesh Bagchi wrote: > Thanks Patrice. for the posting. One paragraph really struck me in term of > it's range, the posssible intricate combination and the multiplicity of > communication levels. > > >" Most of my work is focused on communcations technology. Websites, email, > >?mailinglists, cell phones, radios, media labs, video cameras, magazines, > > newspapers, filers, community, web and pirate > > radio, public access tv, theaters, all come together to > > provide the infrastructure upon which the movement > > communicates. This is both internal communcation where > >?we are debating an comeing to develop critiques, > > coordanate ourselves, and to present to the world our > >?perspective. " > > In conversation with Henk (henk at waag.org) i was struck by possiblitity of > combination-media practice. > > - Combine email with website (like the reader-list) > - Combine mailing list with sms messages > - SMS messaging to radio programme (a computer takes the sms message then > reads out through a text to speech programme - you can stream it again into > internet radio. This can be done with emails also) > - You can combine community television with online chat programme. > - Combine irc chat with sms. > - Printouts from online messages as wall papers. > > You can combine anything with anything. And you go really micro, low scale. > > > best > Jeebesh > > > > > _________________________________________ reader-list: an open discussion list on media and the city. > Critiques & Collaborations > To subscribe: send an email to reader-list-request at sarai.net with subscribe in the subject header. > List archive: From dfontaine at fondation-langlois.org Wed Jan 30 22:06:38 2002 From: dfontaine at fondation-langlois.org (Dominique Fontaine) Date: Wed, 30 Jan 2002 11:36:38 -0500 Subject: [Reader-list] =?iso-8859-1?Q?Communiqu=E9_de_presse_/_Press_Release?= Message-ID: (english version follows) ------------------------------------------ La fondation Daniel Langlois est heureuse d'annoncer les deux premiers chercheurs en résidence : MM. Gerald O'Grady et Jeff Rothenberg Montréal, 30 janvier 2002 - La fondation Daniel Langlois pour l'art, la science et la technologie a le plaisir de présenter les deux chercheurs choisis lors d'un concours international tenu cette année pour la première fois dans le cadre de son Programme de bourses destinées aux chercheurs résidents. Pour 2002, il s'agit de MM. Gerald O'Grady et Jeff Rothenberg. M. Gerald O'Grady, D. Ph., poursuivra ses travaux dans le Fonds Steina et Woody Vasulka, acquis par la fondation en 2000 et conservé au Centre de recherche et de documentation (CR+D). Dans le cadre de sa recherche, M. O'Grady se consacrera à un projet provisoirement intitulé Early History of Electronic and Digital Art in New York State (Les débuts de l'art électronique et numérique dans l'État de New York), qui place l'oeuvre des Vasulka dans un contexte historique. À titre d'universitaire, M. O'Grady a contribué activement aux débuts de l'art électronique, en fondant plusieurs départements d'études médiatiques, en particulier à la State University of New York at Buffalo. Le corps professoral de SUNY Buffalo comprenait d'éminents artistes tels que les Vasulka, Hollis Frampton, Paul Sharits, Tony Conrad, Peter Weibel et James Blue. M. O'Grady a enseigné dans diverses universités américaines, parmi lesquelles la Columbia University, New York et la New School for Social Research. Plus récemment, il a été nommé fellow du W.E.B. Du Bois Institute for Afro-American Research et membre du Département d'études afro-américaines à Harvard, où il a dirigé des recherches portant sur les films du Mouvement des droits civiques. Aujourd'hui à la retraite, M. O'Grady a récemment été le premier professeur invité (Gastwissenschaftler) du Zentrum für Kunst und Medientechnologie à Karlsruhe, Allemagne, où il a prononcé des conférences sur le travail de Marshall McLuhan, à propos de qui il rédige un ouvrage. Depuis 1979, M. O'Grady a édité, publié à compte d'auteur et contribué des essais à plus de 30 catalogues dans le cadre de rétrospectives ou de séries de films, dont The Films of the Civil Rights; Remembering Malcom X; et Czech Filmaking, 1963-1990 pour The Public Theater de Joseph Papp; des essais sur le réalisateur brésilien Nelson Pereiros dos Santos pour la Film Society of Lincoln Center; sur Theo Angelopoulos pour le Museum of Modern Art de New York; sur Dziga Vertov pour le Collective for Living Cinema (NY); sur Dusan Mizoguchi pour la Cinématheque Ontario (Toronto); sur David MacDougall pour Media Study/Buffalo; et Articulate Energy: The Emergence of the Abstract Film in America pour la Harvard University and Anthropology Film Archives. À titre de chercheur résident, M. Jeff Rothenberg travaillera à l'élaboration d'un projet pilote visant la préservation d'oeuvres d'art faisant appel aux technologies numériques. Il concevra également des stratégies pour la tenue de tels essais. Aux fins de cette recherche, il définira des paramètres pour la sélection d'oeuvres tout en tenant compte du résultat voulu, soit de mieux anticiper les problèmes de la conservation des oeuvres numériques. Informaticien principal à la RAND Corporation à Santa Monica, Californie, M. Rothenberg est spécialiste en conservation des archives et dossiers numériques et conseiller auprès de nombreuses archives nationales, dont celles des Pays-Bas. Il agira comme chercheur principal pour le projet et préparera le projet pilote dans le cadre de Variable Media Network, une collaboration entre la fondation Daniel Langlois et le Musée Guggenheim de New York. Le concours international de la fondation a pris fin le 31 août. Les projets choisis cette année répondent à deux grands objectifs : favoriser la recherche fondée sur notre documentation et nos collections d'archives ainsi que la recherche avancée sur la conservation des oeuvres d'art faisant appel aux technologies numériques. La fondation estime que ces deux projets contribueront de manière essentielle et exceptionnelle à la recherche dans le domaine des arts et des nouvelles technologies. Le site Web de la fondation, , affichera, au cours des prochains mois, des mises à jour concernant ces projets et leurs résultats. Jean Gagnon, Directeur des programmes Audrey Navarre, adjointe à la Direction des programmes (514) 987-7177 anavarre at fondation-langlois.org www.fondation-langlois.org ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------- The Daniel Langlois Foundation Is Proud to Announce the First Two Researchers in Residence: Gerald O'Grady and Jeff Rothenberg Montreal, January 30, 2002 - The Daniel Langlois Foundation for Art, Science, and Technology is pleased to present the two researchers selected in the international competition held this year for the first time within the Program of Grants for Researchers in Residence. The two researchers in residence for 2002 are Gerald O'Grady and Jeff Rothenberg. Gerald O'Grady, Ph.D., will continue his work on the Steina and Woody Vasulka Archives, which were added to the Foundation's collection in 2000 and are kept at the Centre for Research and Documentation (CR+D). In exploring these archives, Dr. O'Grady will focus on a research project tentatively titled Early History of Electronic and Digital Art in New York State, which places the Vasulkas' work in its proper historical context. As an academic, Dr. O'Grady was actively involved in the early years of electronic art, founding several departments of media studies, particularly at the State University of New York at Buffalo. The faculty at SUNY Buffalo included such eminent artists as the Vasulkas, Hollis Frampton, Paul Sharits, Tony Conrad, Peter Weibel and James Blue. Dr. O'Grady has taught at several U.S. universities, including New York, Columbia and the New School for Social Research. Most recently, he was a fellow of the W.E.B. Du Bois Institute for Afro-American Research and a member of the Department of Afro-American Studies at Harvard University, where he conducted research on the films of the Civil Rights Movement. Now retired, Dr. O'Grady was recently the first guest professor (Gastwissenschaftler) invited by the Zentrum für Kunst und Medientechnologie in Karlsruhe, Germany, where he gave a series of lectures on the work of Marshall McLuhan, on whom he is writing a book. Since 1979, Dr. O'Grady has edited, independently published and contributed essays to over 30 catalogues for film retrospectives or series including The Films of the Civil Rights; Remembering Malcom X; and Czech Filmaking, 1963-1990 for Joseph Papp's The Public Theater; on the Brazilian filmmaker Nelson Pereiros dos Santos for the Film Society of the Lincoln Center; on Theo Angelopoulos for the Museum of Modern Art in New York; on Dziga Vertov for the Collective for Living Cinema (NY); on Dusan Mizoguchi for the Cinématheque Ontario (Toronto); on David MacDougall for Media Study/Buffalo; and Articulate Energy: The Emergence of the Abstract Film in America for Harvard University and Anthropology Film Archives. As a researcher in residence, Jeff Rothenberg will work to set up a test case for the preservation of artworks that use digital technology. He will also develop strategies for conducting such a test. As part of this research, he will define parameters for selecting the artwork while keeping in mind the desired outcome, which is to better anticipate the problems of preserving digital works. Mr. Rothenberg serves as a senior computer scientist for the RAND corporation in Santa Monica, California. He has gained expertise in preserving digital archives and records and advises many national archives including the National Archives of the Netherlands. Mr. Rothenberg will act as senior researcher in the project and prepare our emulation test case as part of the Variable Media Network, a collaboration between the Daniel Langlois Foundation and the Guggenheim Museum in New York. The international competition held by the Foundation closed on August 31. The projects selected this year meet two basic goals: to favour research that makes use of our documentation and archive collections and to conduct advanced research into preserving artworks that rely on digital technologies. The Foundation believes that these two projects will make an essential and exceptional contribution to research in the field of arts and new technologies. Over the coming months, our Web site, , will post updates on the two projects and their findings. - 30 - Jean Gagnon, Director of Programs Audrey Navarre, Assistant Director of Programs (514) 987-7177 anavarre at fondation-langlois.org www.fondation-langlois.org From announcements-request at sarai.net Thu Jan 31 11:32:21 2002 From: announcements-request at sarai.net (announcements-request at sarai.net) Date: Thu, 31 Jan 2002 07:02:21 +0100 Subject: [Reader-list] Announcements digest, Vol 1 #14 - 1 msg Message-ID: <200201310602.HAA01907@zelda.intra.waag.org> Send Announcements mailing list submissions to announcements at sarai.net To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to announcements-request at sarai.net You can reach the person managing the list at announcements-admin at sarai.net When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific than "Re: Contents of Announcements digest..." Today's Topics: 1. n.paradoxa: international feminist art journal (Monica Narula) --__--__-- Message: 1 Date: Wed, 30 Jan 2002 11:14:46 +0530 To: announcements at sarai.net From: Monica Narula Subject: [Announcements] n.paradoxa: international feminist art journal Dear Colleague, I am writing to draw your attention to the latest volume of n.paradoxa: international feminist art journal, now available in print: Volume 9, (Eco)Logical, Jan 2002. Now in its fifth year of publication, n.paradoxa remains the only international feminist art journal dedicated to discussion of the work of contemporary women artists' work and feminist theory, both online and in print. n.paradoxa will prove to be an invaluable resource for you and your students studying feminism and contemporary art. If your University or College library does not already stock this publication, please consider placing an order. Volume 9 is the first of 4 volumes to be published with the support of the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, New York. n.paradoxa is not a typical art magazine:- in so far as exhibitions are not reviewed on a topical basis, instead artists' projects and work in a wide range of media are discussed and analysed in depth through articles and interviews. Each journal is structured around a particular theme. In addition to articles, interviews and features, n.paradoxa reviews websites by women artists and books and CD-Roms. n.paradoxa will be profiled at the Bookfair at College Art Association in Philadelphia (20-23 Feb) and in 'The Written Word' section of Arco '02, Madrid (14-17 Feb). Volume 9 is on the theme of (Eco) Logical. Contents:- Artists' pages from Mierle Laderman Ukeles (USA), Hale Tenger (Turkey), Fiona Hall (Australia). Articles:- Collection: Pennina Barnett interviews Weibke Siem Maria Fernandez Heart and Hearth: Enduring Domesticity and Memorial Display on the work of Leslie Hakim-Dowek Ann Rosenthal Bridging the Binaries: Assessing Ecoart Practices within the Context of Environmental Activism at WASTE Katya Andreyev Some Types of Clothing The work of Natalya Pershina-Yakimanskaya Masque, Residence pour la Nuit Bisi Silva interviews Pelagie Gbaguidi and Myriam Mihindou Cornelia Hesse-Honneger Leaf Bugs, Radioactivity and Art Reverie, Osmose and Eph�re Carol Gigliotti interviews Char Davies Egofugal: Women Artists at the 7th Istanbul Biennial Interviews with Henrietta Lehtonen, Rachel Berwick, Joyce Hinterding, Louise (and Jane) Wilson, Maya Bajevic Dialogue: Ann Huber-Sigwart interviews Shelly Silver ISSN 1461-0434, 96pp., 54 b&w illus., 21 cm x 26 cm Publishers: KT press, 38 Bellot Street, East Greenwich, London, SE10 OAQ, UK. Tel/Fax +44 208-858 3331 n = noun , para = beyond, doxa = taught or accepted opinion. Editor: Katy Deepwell Editorial Board: Renee Baert (Canada); Joanna Frueh (USA); Hagiwara Hiroko (Japan); Janis Jefferies (UK); Hilary Robinson (Ireland); Olabisi Silva (UK). Below is information about the print editions which are available by mail order. Individual Subscription (2 volumes annually, Jan, July) 2 Volumes (UK/Europe) � 18 4 Volumes (UK/Europe) � 32 2 Volumes (USA/RoW) $ 38 4 Volumes (USA/RoW) $ 66 Institutional subscription (2 volumes annually, Jan, July) : 2 Volumes (UK/Europe) � 32 4 Volumes (UK/Europe) � 56 2 Volumes (USA/RoW) $ 72 4 Volumes (USA/RoW) $ 124 Full details of content of Volumes 1-9 available on web-site. n.paradoxa is published in print twice a year in January and July. Volume 1 - Feminism/Post Feminism January 1998. Volume 2 - Women and New Media July 1998. Volume 3 - Body.Space and Memory January 1999. Volume 4 - Public Art/Sculpture/Installation July 1999. Volume 5 - About Time January 2000. Volume 6 - Desire and the Gaze July 2000. Volume 7 - Urban Fictions January 2001 Volume 8 - Economies/Exchanges July 2001. Volume 9 - (Eco) Logical (current) Jan 2002 Forthcoming Volume 10 - Rethinking Revolution July 2002. Volume 11 - Identities/ Identification Mechanisms Jan 2003 Volume 12 - Out of Order July 2003 Orders can be made by mail or fax to address below. Back volumes can be ordered as 2 or 4 volume orders. Different prices are given for individuals and institutions; orders for 2 or 4 volumes (ie a 1 year or 2 year subscription) and for different postal areas. Please specify which volumes you intend to order in correspondence and include your mailing address. Please fax or mail VISA or Mastercard payments with order, name on card, card number, expiry date, and signature. No AMEX. No credit card orders accepted by email, so please post or fax with signature of cardholder. Mail Cheques or International Money Orders made payable to 'KT press' in � sterling or US dollars. Only Institutional orders (for payment by invoice) can be received by email. If you have not browsed the website: http://web.ukonline.co.uk/n.paradoxa/index.htm n.paradoxa carries unique and well-researched listings of over 300 books on contemporary women artists from around the world, over 30 women's arts organisations and specialist archives, lists of women's art magazines and women's film and video festivals. n.paradoxa was established online in December 1996 (with Issue numbers) and went into print as a bi-annual in January 1998 (with Volume Numbers). The online and print versions of n.paradoxa are different ! They carry separate ISSN's and separate copy. Katy Deepwell Editor of n.paradoxa KT press, 38 Bellot Street, London, SE10 OAQ Tel/Fax +44 (0) 208 858 3331 http://web.ukonline.co.uk/n.paradoxa/index.htm -- Monica Narula Sarai:The New Media Initiative 29 Rajpur Road, Delhi 110 054 www.sarai.net --__--__-- _______________________________________________ Announcements mailing list Announcements at sarai.net https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/announcements End of Announcements Digest From abirbazaz at rediffmail.com Thu Jan 31 22:32:40 2002 From: abirbazaz at rediffmail.com (abir bazaz) Date: 31 Jan 2002 17:02:40 -0000 Subject: [Reader-list] Little Tibet : Baltistan(Kashmir) Message-ID: <20020131170240.11754.qmail@mailweb20.rediffmail.com> LITTLE TIBET Renaissance and Resistance in Baltistan While the forces of globalisation may be Westernising other Himalayan tourist hubs like Kathmandu, Leh and Dharamsala, they are helping to shape a new identity in Baltistan. by Tarik Ali Khan The cold winter nights in the Karakorum are warmed by Radio Pakistan's Skardu broadcast of the life story of Ali Sher Khan Anchan. At a time of growing sectarian and political divisions, the 17th-century Balti king is one figure everyone shares a love for. Other heroes include Hazrat Ali (the son-in-law of Prophet Muhammad) and the legendary Tibetan folk icon, Gesar of Ling, the latter although Baltistan's traditional links with the Tibetan plateau have been severed for the past 50 years. But despite being on the margins of the Pakistani nation state, the pace of cultural change in what the Mughals once called Tibet-i-Khurd (Little Tibet) is quickening. In recent decades, Balti identity has been re-shaped by ties with the Iranian Revolution and Pakistan's Punjabi-dominated culture. But as the new generation enters the information age, in Baltistan's de facto capital, Skardu, more and more Baltis are dreaming of the day when the ceasefire lines will no longer separate them from their Himalayan kin in Ladakh and Tibet. The agrarian communities that inhabit the valleys of the Indus, the Shyok, and their tributaries, have cultural affinities that stretch from Lhasa to Tehran. Linguists say that Balti may be one of the most archaic forms of spoken Tibetan. Its closest relatives are Purig (spoken across the ceasefire line in Kargil), Ladakhi and the Amdo dialect of Eastern Tibet. Over the centuries, Balti has become mixed with Persian, Urdu and Arabic, for here in the arid valleys of the Karakorum lie the historic junction of the Buddhist and Islamic worlds. Since 1948, the region has been under Pakistani control, and is now part of its federally administered Northern Areas, a region yearning for recognition and political rights. On Pakistan's periphery Although it er [titular] Tibetan, and later Ladakhi rule, the five main valleys of Baltistan (Skardu, Shigar, Rongdu, Khapalu and Kharmang) were more often principalities left to the rule of maqpons, or `dukes'. Baltis are proud of Ali Sher Khan Anchan (1590- 1625) of the Maqpon dynasty as the king who unified Baltistan and briefly expanded its frontiers up to Ladakh and Western Tibet in the east, and Chitral in the west. In 1840, Baltistan was annexed by the Dogras of Jammu as part of their conquest of Kashmir. Their rule is chiefly remembered for its exploitation, with Balti villages forced to pay tribute to masters in Srinagar in the form of forced labour (begar) and heavy taxes. After the British conquered Punjab, they allowed the Dogras to keep nominal control over Baltistan under the 1846 Treaty of Amritsar, but maintained a watchful eye on the Maharaja's domains. Imperial Russia was expanding its Central Asian frontiers, and nearby Leh and Gilgit had become key listening posts in the `Great Game'. Baltistan's traditional cultural and trade arteries to Ladakh, Kashmir and Yarkand were severed by the 1948 war between India and Pakistan. The 1949 UN Ceasefire Line, which is regularly rocked by cross-border shelling, erected a solid barrier to what was once a most natural trade route. Isolation, the ceasefire line, and the subsequent wars between Pakistan and India (1965 and 1971) have ensured Baltistan's absorption into the Pakistani nation state. Regular Boeing 737 flights and the completion of an all-weather highway connecting Baltistan to the Karakorum Highway have made integration into Pakistan more of a reality both economically and politically. Out-migration by Balti men due to the region's high birth rate and small land-holdings are also contributing to the integration. Baltistan has seen some development projects in recent years, but most locals believe that these have been provided more due to the region's strategic importance than because of Islamabad's concern for the welfare of Baltis. But for the ongo Siachen Glacier, they believe there would be minimal infrastructure. It is also a fact that the presence of the Pakistan army in Baltistan provides a major boost to the local economy, particularly in winter when trekkers and tourists are scarce. Indeed, the army, and particularly the Northern Light Infantry (a successor to the British-raised Gilgit Scouts), is the largest employer in Baltistan. Political bind Pakistan's Golden Jubilee celebrations on 14 August, 1997 were met with indifference by the 400,000 residents of Balti-yul (yul = `land' in Tibetan). A week later, the Baltistan Students Federation (BSF) organised a `black day' to highlight the fact that Baltis are still denied basic rights such as voting in national elections and the ability to approach a higher court. The Baltis' disillusionment with Pakistan lies in the 1947 uprising which overthrew the Dogra rulers of Jammu and Kashmir. Since the mid-1800s the Dogras had also exercised nominal suzerainty over neighbouring Gilgit. The British, keen to protect their frontier from Russian expansion, formed the Gilgit Scouts as a local paramilitary force, trained a group of young men from the region's feudal families as Viceroy's Commissioned Officers (VCOs), and placed a British Political Agent in Gilgit. When the British left India, they handed control of Gilgit over to the (Hindu) Maharaja of Kashmir two weeks before the partitioning of the Subcontinent. The Muslim majority of Gilgit favoured joining Pakistan, and when it became known that the Maharaja of Kashmir had declared accession to India, Gilgit saw an insurrection on 1 November 1947. The Dogra governor was imprisoned, and the Gilgit Scouts, together with a Muslim company of the State Troops, took over the local garrison. A provisional local government was established in Gilgit under the presidency of Raja Shah Rais Khan, a member of a former local ruling dynasty. Before the insurrection, the officers of the Scouts had asked for assistance from Pakistan's ailing founder, Muhammad Ali Ji sed his inability to help due to the pressing problems faced by his new government. However, the insurrectionists were determined to join Pakistan, and, two weeks later, a Pakistani representative flew in and took over as Political Agent for Pakistan. Serious differences emerged immediately between the Political Agent and the local leaders since the Agent stripped the latter of all power, and it was only after they backed down that Agent withdrew his threat to return to Karachi. The fighting was on, and the local troops, hastily enforced, continued their advance. Soon the fighters reached Skardu where they found the local populace eager to force the Dogras out. Balti irregulars armed with matchlock rifles helped lay siege to the Dogra soldiers in the Skardu Cantonment. Others were trained as guerillas and sent ahead to capture Ladakh. Despite having little by way of rations, they fought through the winter of 1948, seizing Kargil, Dras and the strategic Zoji-la Pass. One group reached within 16 kilometres of Leh before being pushed back by India's better-equipped forces. Another occupied Padum in Zangskar for six months after the ceasefire of 1949, unaware that a truce had been signed between India and Pakistan. Pakistan's chunk of the erstwhile Maharaja's domains which are not technically termed "Jammu and Kashmir" include Baltistan and Gilgit. In 1949, the Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) Government officially delegated powers to Islamabad to control both regions through the Pakistani Political Agent. Baltistan and Gilgit were then governed under the Frontier Crimes Regulation (FCR). The arrangement was remarkably similar to the one that existed in colonial times, with the local rajas and mirs allowed to maintain their power and continue to tax their subjects. Little had changed. Until, that is, the 1970s when Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, the only Pakistani politician who is regarded well in Baltistan, abolished the FCR and ended the oppressive system of land revenue. By then, the entity known as the `Northern Area rising of Baltistan's two districts, Skardu and Ganche, as well as Gilgit, Ghizar and Diamar. But despite Bhutto's reforms, there has been little commitment to resolve the political bind that the people of the Northern Areas find themselves in. Administratively, they are ruled by the federal government while constitutionally they are attached to Azad J&K. Shia writ The completion of the Karakorum Highway to China/Tibet in 1978 brought rapid change to the once-isolated Northern Areas. NGOs such as the Aga Khan Foundation have transformed it into a busy nest of development activity,and the region has emerged as Pakistan's chief destination for tourists and trekkers. But unlike other trekking regions in the Himalaya, Baltistan is not characterised by tourist ghettos, Bob Marley blaring out of cafes, or leather-jacketed local youth trying to pick up Western women. The graffiti and billboards in Skardu make it clear that Western influence is regarded with suspicion. The Shias, who represent roughly 60 percent of the population, turn to Iran for education and guidance. Shia imams also offer formidable resistance to the forces of cultural change sweeping South Asia. There are no movie theatres in Skardu, satellite dishes are frowned upon, and even the all-pervasive video shops are scarce. Skardu's Urdu graffiti extols the virtues of prayer and Qur'anic study, with the occasional anti-US slogan thrown in. There are numerous reminders to visitors to keep their bodies covered. A recent poster called for a day of mourning to mark the 1967 Israeli occupation of Jerusalem, Islam's third holiest city. As in so many other parts of Pakistan, a growing population of educated unemployed youth is fuelling the transformation of Balti culture via religious politics. Bolstered by the success of the Iranian Revolution, the imams have become active politically and are represented by the Tehrik-i-Jaffaria Pakistan (TJP), a party which promotes Shia interests. Although Balti loyalty once rested with the Pakistan People's Party, of Bhutto's willingness to abolish feudal power, the TJP emerged as a significant force in the 1994 National Assembly Council elections. They now hold four of Baltistan's nine Council seats (the other five are held by the PPP and independents) and are a force to be reckoned with in Skardu and Shigar. Rinchen to Sadruddin The hold of Islam on Balti consciousness cannot be doubted. But there is also another identity that Baltis cling to – the pre-Islamic one that looks to Tibet and Ladakh.European historians claim that the original inhabitants of Western Tibet, Ladakh and Baltistan were the so-called Aryan `Dards', and have suggested that Bolor (the name for Gilgit and Baltistan) was once a centre of Bon shamanism, the indigenous religion of the High Himalaya.Buddhism came into Baltistan with the advent of the Mons, an Indo-Aryan tribe which arrived with Buddhist missionaries in the second century. (Mons today are "low-caste" musicians and carpenters.) Later, as the Indus Valley began to feature as an important artery of the `silk route', Baltistan served as the conduit for the diffusion of Mahayana Buddhism from India into Central Asia and China. The spread of Islam in the area can be traced to rGyalbu Rinchen (or Rinchana Bhoti), a Tibetan prince who ruled Kashmir from 1319-1323. Inspired by the example of a Muslim sage, Bulbul Shah, Rinchen converted to Islam and changed his name to Sadruddin. By the late 1300s, Sufi preachers had begun to arrive from Persia, ushering in the Islamic era in Kashmir and Baltistan . But despite the Islamicisation of Baltistan, intermarriages between the royal families of Ladakh and Baltistan were common. Buddhist kings took Muslim wives and raised some of their sons as Muslims. Even Baltistan's legendary Ali Sher Khan Anchan is said to have given his daughter Gul Khatoon (aka Mindoq rGyalmo) to the Ladakhi King Jamyang Namgyal (r.1560-1590). Arrangements between the two religions may have been flexible; official records are not so accepting. Ladakhi songs in praise of its ro mit the names of princes who converted to Islam. A.H. Francke, a Moravian missionary writing in 1907, speculated that, in turn, the maqpons of Baltistan may have fabricated their pedigrees with more Muslim names in a firm attempt to erase pre-Islamic history. Reclaiming the Tibetan Things are changing though. There are Baltis who lament the loss of pre-Islamic cultural practices, which have disappeared under pressure from the imams. Meanwhile, wedding rituals have become more `Pakistani'. Traditional dancing and pre-Islamic Balti festivals such as Me-phang (literally `throwing fire') have almost disappeared. A small liberal set, which includes local scholars and a growing section of educated youth, are now making attempts to re-establish links with all things Tibetan or Ladakhi in a last-ditch attempt to save their culture from total Iran-style Islamicisation. Besides, they claim, culture is more than a question of being Islamic and non-Islamic. One man involved in the renaissance is Syed Abbas Kazmi. As part of his dedicated efforts to save Baltistan's heritage from extinction, he prefers to eat out of a photoh, a traditional wooden bowl that today one only finds in Skardu's antique shops. Kazmi has erected a barbed wire fence around Skardu's ancient Buddha carvings to protect it from vandals and has plans to excavate monastery ruins above Shigar. The real threat, says Kazmi, is Pakistan's dominant Punjabi culture. "We have lost our link with the past. To wear our traditional woollen clothes, or even to speak Balti is considered a sign of backwardness. We dress like and eat like the Punjabis even though many of their customs are just as foreign to us as those from the West."For Mohammad Hasnain, a textile engineer settled in Lahore who goes by the Tibetan nickname "Senge Tshering", cultural erosion began with the arrival of the first Islamic missionaries, who introduced the Arabic and Persian languages as the media for religious instruction. This erosion continues in the modern era because of Baltist tion in the Pakistani scheme of things.Says Tshering, "I feel sad about the drastic changes that have taken place in the last 30 to 40 years, and particularly since the Iranian Revolution. We have been destroying our culture and losing our identity." With the help of email that is available in Lahore, Tshering now communicates with Tibetan scholars and activists worldwide. Tshering, whose chosen name is understandably unique in the city he lives in, believes that it is important to bring back the Tibetan script. Arabic is quite inadequate to bring out the richness of the Balti language in the written form. The Balti inferiority complex is rooted in education, he believes. "Government schools use Urdu as the chief medium for instruction. So children learn Balti at home, then Urdu at school, and now English medium schools are confusing them further. To preserve our unique history and culture we have to learn the Tibetan script again."After centuries of Persian and now Pakistani influence, Tshering, Kazmi and others like him seek to reconstruct their community's bonds with the Tibetan- speaking world. They gather books, videos and anything to do with Tibet in an effort to reconstruct the long-lost past. One of the latest video hits in Skardu has been the development documentary film, Learning from Ladakh, brought in by Western trekkers. A film made by the development activist Helena Norberg-Hodge which emphasises the cultural and economic strengths of Ladakh, Learning from Ladakh allowed Baltis a rare glimpse of their kin across the impenetrable border.Local scholars have taught themselves how to read the Tibetan script and have initiated a dialogue with their counterparts in Ladakh. They research and publish mostly in Urdu, on topics ranging from the ancient Bon tradition to the Gesar epic. Kazmi feels the tide is slowly turning. "Young people have begun to come to me to learn more about our cultural heritage. They ask me to teach them the Tibetan script. Recently, I encouraged the Baltistan Students Federa stika), our ancient Bon symbol of prosperity, as their logo. There are signs of change." Despite the geo-political barriers, the prospects of communication may soon improve. Flights from Karachi to Kathmandu have spawned a trickle of trade in turquoise, a jewellery item that once came to Baltistan from Ladakh. Trekkers and climbers bring information from the other end of the Himalaya. Frustrated for the past 50 years by poor communications, the imminent arrival of email and Internet facilities in Skardu could also change things for Baltistan significantly. The process of Islamicisation of Baltistan was gradual. Tibetan Buddhism and Bon were replaced over the course of centuries. But Baltistan's absorption into Pakistan and the modern era of improved communications have quickened the pace of change. While the Iranian revolution is re-shaping its identity, the information age and current soul searching may help Baltistan embrace its ancient diversity. T.A. Khan is an MSc candidate in Rural Planning and Development at the University of Guelph, Canada. He worked as a researcher in Baltistan for six months during 1997-1998.