Tag Archive for: European Union

The United States and the Sahel

There are two principal foreign actors operating in the Sahel: the EU and the United States. President Obama took considerable interest in Africa, just like his predecessor George W. Bush who allocated billions of dollars for President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), which provided antiretroviral treatment and care for HIV/AIDS patients, overseeing such initiatives as Power Africa. This was a $7 billion program aimed at doubling access to electricity across sub-Saharan Africa. At the same time, Obama also authorised a greater US military presence in the Africa by dispatching drones, special forces and private contractors to the area with the aim of countering the presence of salafi–jihadi groups.

It’s safe to assume that President Trump is unlikely to have a great interest in Africa, although three of the countries on his proposed travel ban list are African: Libya, Somalia and Sudan. Trump’s foreign policy agenda, such as it is, focuses more on the Middle East, and specifically on the Islamic State as it operates in Iraq and Syria, which it seeks to annihilate. Moreover, the Trump State Department has been marginalised: hundreds of posts remain vacant, primarily because the administration hasn’t nominated anyone for the various positions that are available within the department. Additionally, the Trump administration appears committed to massive budget reductions, which includes eliminating such entities as the African Development Foundation, a government agency that provides grants to support community enterprises and small businesses across Africa. In 2016, the foundation supported 500 businesses that generated US$80 million in new economic activity.

In respect of the Sahel, recent reports suggest that US diplomats, with support from the UK, resisted a UN Security Council resolution authorising a West African force to counter terrorism and trafficking. Official it seems that American opposition to the resolution is based on the claim he draft French resolution was unwarranted and too broad, although one should add that the US is seeking to have a reduction in the $7.8 billion UN peacekeeping budget, to which is contributes 28.57%.

One of the major concerns about the Sahel is climate change, which means that it’s becoming harder for people to extract a livelihood from the earth. For example, Gnagna Province in eastern Burkina Faso has seen an increase in dust storms, a decline of 200 mm in annual rainfall in the past 30 years, and an increase in the average temperature in the region. Diawari Barbibilé, a local farmer, notes that in the 2000s he could harvest ‘five cartloads’ of grain, but in 2015 he brings in barely two cartloads. This decline means that he and his family have very little to live on.

Consequently, as the ability of people to forge a living from traditional sources declined, they turned to non-conventional, often illegal avenues, such as cooperating with criminal organisations that smuggle goods and people, as well as with militant groups, which provide salaries to members.

The Islamic State theology has little appeal in the Sahel, as the Islam practised in the region is manifestly different from the Islam practised in the Middle East. However, there’s some evidence of Saudi presence in the region, which has led to suggestions that the region is adopting a Wahhabist/Salafist Islam. The salafi-Wahhabi influence is seen with Al-Qaeda of the Islamic Maghreb and Boko Haram, both of which are designated foreign terrorist organisations and whose leaders have taken the bay’ah (an oath of allegiance) to the Islamic State.

Strong military tactics—specifically, annihilation—are unlikely to work in the Sahel, as innocent civilians are harmed when such tactics are carried out by local militaries and militias, leading to more tensions between local communities, militaries and foreign actors. Moreover, armed jihadists are moving to the countryside, where they find it easier to move around, to establish relations with local communities and launch attacks against urban centres and government forces. For example, the International Crisis Group has noted that repeated attacks in and around Gao, Mopti and Timbuktu in Mali have meant that government forces and African Union peacekeepers are devoting more time to protecting the cities, leading to a substantial reduction in forward operating bases.

Brigadier General Donald C. Bolduc, the head of US Special Operations Command Africa, has focused his attention on training local forces to ‘act properly’ and not kill indiscriminately. General Thomas D. Waldhauser, the fourth commander of US Africa Command, has testified that ‘the greatest threat to US interests emanating from Africa is violent extremist organizations’, although he also noted that taking out jihadists doesn’t end the problem, as ‘by the end of the week, so to speak, those ranks would be filled.’

However, without political support from Washington and a disorganised US State Department, it’s unlikely that the US can and will sustain its soft footprint in Africa, especially as many of Trump’s senior commanders and advisers, such as retired Marine Corps general Jim Mattis and Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster are veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan, where there was a growing reliance on special forces. That would allow the EU, which has an operation in Niger and Mali as well as expansive aid and humanitarian operations in Chad, to assume more of a leadership position.

One can’t underestimate the importance of the European presence in Mali: from a purely geographical perspective, Mali lies at the heart of Africa and is the preferred route for traversing from east to west, whereas movement from the west to northern Africa requires one to go through Mali. Consequently, it does appear that the Europeans, who developed a policy strategy towards the Sahel—the EU Sahel Strategy—are committed to the security and development of the region.

The European Union and the Sahel

 

It was remarkable that the first foreign trip taken by newly elected French President Macron was to Mali to meet French troops undertaking an anti-insurgency/terrorism operation in the north of the country (within days, Federica Mogherini, the EU’s High Representative, was also in Mali). Macron also met President Keita, with whom he discussed ‘terrorism’.

On 4 June 2017, the G5 Sahel countries—Chad, Niger, Burkina Faso, Mali and Mauritania—requested €50 million from the EU to support the setting up of a multinational force to counter Islamist militant groups that continue to operate in the region. The aid request was made by General Didier Dacko, Mali’s military chief. Dacko was building on an initiative floated in 2016 to establish specialist units (of 100 men per unit) that would be trained in counterterrorism to respond quickly to information about jihadi groups. That is, this would be a rapid reaction force whose purpose would be to take on jihadi groups before they establish a foundation in areas in the Sahel. Within three days, Federica Mogherini approved the request, thus laying the foundation for the formation of a force of 10,000 soldiers.

As all of this is taking place, the EU is laying out the final parts of an EU military structure—something that had been in the works since 2003, as Europe grappled with debates over a European Constitution but also adopted the European Security Strategy, which not only identified key security threats for the EU but declared a European commitment to address those challenges.

In early June, the EU also approved the setting up of the European Defence Fund, to be managed by the European Commission. The fund has been allocated €500 million ($560 million) for defence ‘development and acquisition’ in 2019 and 2020, and it could increase to $5 billion by the mid-2020s. Interestingly, both Jyrki Katainen, the European Commission Vice-President for Jobs, Growth, Investment and Competitiveness, and Commissioner Elżbieta Bieńkowska (Internal Market, Industry, Entrepreneurship and SMEs) have welcomed the fund. They see it as an effective way for the EU to become a security actor, to help the EU’s defence industry to grow, and to harmonise the EU defence sector. According to Brussels, the member states waste around €100 billion a year on defence duplication; for example, within the EU there are 37 different types of armoured personnel carrier and 12 types of tanker aircraft, which could create difficulties should the EU engage in more overseas operations. It’s also worth noting that the costs of the Eurofighter Typhoon jet, a joint project between Spain, Italy, Britain and Germany, continue to spiral out of control.

The European Defence Fund is very much the brainchild of Commission President Juncker and German Chancellor Merkel, who as early as 2016 indicated that the EU had to take charge of its own security. On 8 June, the European Council approved the establishment of the military planning and conduct capability (MPCC), placing it within the EU military staff, which is within the purview of the High Representative. The MPCC will command the EU’s non-executive military missions, of which there are three: EUTM, Mali; EUTM, Somalia; and EUTM, République Centrale Africaine. These missions are part of the EU’s commitment to prevent and counter radicalisation in the Sahel, to create appropriate conditions for youth employment, to address the issue of migration and mobility, especially as the Sahel is a major route for human smuggling, and to manage borders (the Sahel Regional Action Plan).

With the British, who in many ways undermined the process to establish the MPCC (as they object to the language used to describe the capability), out of the picture, it’s highly conceivable that European defence integration will receive a major boost, especially as it appears that Macron, Merkel and Juncker are of a similar mindset.

The EU will need to double its involvement in Libya and the Sahel: the 2017 Manchester bomber, Salman Abedi, and the 2016 Berlin Christmas market attacker, Anis Amri, had ties to Libya; there’s evidence that the Islamic State is seeking to establish itself in Libya; and Libya is a major disembarkation point for irregular and forced migrants seeking to reach Europe. Increasingly, Europe sees its own security as being dependent on addressing political, economic and social conditions in the Sahel, especially as asylum-related costs are spiralling out of control. German expenditure on asylum-related costs in 2016–2017 will total €43 billion. When secondary costs are taken into account, this raises the EU’s expenditure on addressing refugee inflows from $16–32 billion to $150 billion annually. And it’s expected that the US will play a lesser role in Africa as it comes to terms with the 2016 presidential election and possible Russian influence on the result.

Alternative for Germany: when populism isn’t popular

Over the past dozen years, Germany has earned the title of de facto leader of the European Union, shepherding the bloc through the existential threats of the euro crisis, and showing the way in the face of Russian aggression, the Syrian refugee crisis and the Brexit vote. Those challenges remain, but so too does Angela Merkel, and she looks set to stay on for a record fourth term as Chancellor after Germany’s national elections on 24 September. Decisive wins in three recent regional elections have given Merkel the momentum over her rival Martin Schulz. With the populist challenges in the Dutch and French elections (temporarily) silenced, and noting the tendency among commentators to cast Alternative for Germany (AfD) as part of the same trend, it’s time to consider the fortunes of Germany’s supposedly populist party.

Four months out from the national election, AfD’s campaign has hit a major bump in the road. A mixed bag of Eurosceptics, populists and xenophobic nationalists, the party has been beset by infighting, shaky leadership and the absence of a clear election platform. Its poor showing in the polls underscores AfD’s weaknesses.

At its inception in 2013, the AfD was more protest party than populist. Born during the euro crisis in opposition to the bailouts, it was a centre-right party favouring Swiss-style direct democracy and operating on a mildly Eurosceptic platform. It took a sharp right turn during the 2015 refugee crisis, happily dialling up anti-immigrant and anti-Islamic sentiment so long as it seemed to match the mood of the electorate. That rhetoric has stuck, and decisions made at the party conference on 22 April—including a change in leadership—and the news that the Saxony branch appeared alongside the far-right group PEGIDA (Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the West) for the first time, signpost the AfD’s now wholehearted embrace of its right wing.

Just days ahead of the conference, then-leader Frauke Petry cited a desire to end party infighting when she voluntarily stepped down, but perhaps she just saw the writing on the wall. At the conference, Petry failed to gain support from the 600 delegates for her vision, which included writing an anti-racism clause into the party’s charter. Instead, delegates endorsed measures including stopping ‘unrestrained mass immigration’, leaving the Eurozone, and boosting birth rates to ensure the propagation of the Staatsvolk (‘own constitutive people’). That hasn’t pleased all supporters: a poll in late April (in German) revealed that 39% of AfD supporters complained about the party not disassociating itself enough from right-wing extremist members and content. And, while 34% of respondents supported Marine Le Pen in the French election, 31% supported Emmanuel Macron.

The new leadership team is unlikely to be a unifying force—if anything, the election of Alexander Gauland and Alice Weidel as co-leaders further exposes the party’s division. Gauland is a 76-year-old former member of the Christian Democratic Union and was one of the most vocal defenders of his colleague Björn Höcke after Höcke made comments challenging Germany’s culture of holocaust remembrance. Weidel, just 38, is a libertarian ex-Goldman Sachs banker. As one commentator put it, ‘one would be pushed to find anyone who could be further down the other end of the party spectrum from Gauland.’ It’s doubtful that the party’s new platform and leaders will bring back the almost 50% of support lost since AfD’s 16% high in September 2016.

The AfD’s rightward trajectory into nationalism and xenophobia is anathema to Germany’s sociopolitical culture. Its history critically differentiates its susceptibility to right-wing populism from its European neighbours and Western relatives. Germany is a nation constantly holding a mirror up to itself, unafraid to acknowledge its history and perpetually afraid of repeating it. Divisive politics, racism and nationalism don’t sit well atop Germany’s national memory. As a member of the Bundestag said, ‘after the strong and bloody ideologies of the 20th century, Germans are fed up. They appreciate pragmatism.’ While there will always be a portion of society harbouring views of the political extreme, a large majority of Germans find such views distasteful.

That’s reflected in the polls. The AfD reached its electoral high point in 2016, winning 12–20% of the vote across five state elections. Since then, support has dropped, and in the three state elections this year it just scraped past the 5% threshold required for a seat in parliament. Recent national polls give the party between 7% and 10% of the national vote—lows not seen since December 2015. But there’s no denying that the AfD has made remarkable gains. In less than four years, its representatives have entered 13 out of 16 state parliaments; in three of those states, the AfD is the largest opposition party. If the party manages to maintain more than 5% support going into the election, it will join the Bundestag for the first time this year.

Elsewhere in Europe, populism is fundamentally challenging political systems and has prompted mainstream parties to adopt messaging and policies more commonly associated with the extremes. But in Germany, for a body politic that considers right-wing extremism and nationalist ideology beyond the pale, Alternative for Germany’s variety of populism isn’t proving very popular at all.

France’s anti-populist populist

Democrats of all stripes have been celebrating the prospect that the pro-European centrist Emmanuel Macron—not the far-right National Front’s Marine Le Pen—will be France’s next president. But while Macron’s victory is good news, it does not augur the defeat of populism in Europe. On the contrary, Macron represents a kind of ‘enlightened populism’ that comes with its own set of problems.

Macron’s candidacy, like Le Pen’s, was a rebuke to France’s mainstream political parties. He persuaded voters with his promise of a Scandinavian-style combination of economic liberalism and a flexible welfare state. But it may be time to concede that Scandinavia is unique, and programs that succeed there may not be replicable elsewhere.

Nonetheless, Macron’s populism may not be altogether a bad thing in the short term. Perhaps, in France and elsewhere nowadays, only a populist can beat a populist. If so, Macron’s enlightened populism certainly is preferable to the nationalist populism that Le Pen espouses. The question is whether enlightened populism can play a role in steering political systems away from populism altogether—and toward real solutions to their countries’ problems.

The only true antidote to populism—the only real way to resolve the problems that ordinary people are facing—is greater political globalization. After all, it is economic globalization without political globalization that produces nationalism. Populists promise to halt economic globalization; in reality, they can stop (or reverse) only political globalization. So the rise of populists to power creates a self-reinforcing dynamic, in which nationalism becomes increasingly salient.

Yet, as Macron proves, not all populism need be nationalist. Historically, left-wing populism has been more common than its right-wing variant, the strength of which in the West nowadays reflects the perception, in the eyes of many citizens, that the left has become elitist. There is, therefore, a case to be made that populism can be taken back from the nationalists and used to advance European integration and political globalization.

But, despite widespread enthusiasm about Macron’s victory, most of us remain subconscious fatalists on the matter of political globalization. Who today believes in global democracy, or even in the United States of Europe?

Long before the current wave of nationalist populism, Europeans rejected a cautious European constitution. Compared to this earlier ambition, even the most daring of Macron’s proposals for eurozone integration is in fact a minor revision. German Chancellor Angela Merkel, after congratulating Macron, made clear that she will consider no fiscal-policy changes—a stance that precludes a common eurozone treasury.

Past experience with enlightened populism reinforces this somewhat bleak perspective. Enlightened populism’s founding father was Donald Tusk, the former Polish prime minister who is now President of the European Council. Before he became Poland’s prime minister, Tusk, like Macron, left a mainstream party to establish his own popular movement, Civic Platform. And, like Macron’s En Marche !, that movement emphasized youth, optimism, and the promise of harnessing people’s talents and energies.

As prime minister, Tusk would respond to questions about his political vision by quipping that anyone who experienced visions should go see a doctor. He selected people from both the left and the right to staff his government (an approach reflected in Macron’s claim that his brand of politics transcends the left-right divide). Tusk assembled a kaleidoscope of views and people, and he shook the kaleidoscope whenever there was a need for a new perspective.

But Tusk, like Macron, faced a formidable challenge from nationalist populism, which in Poland came in the form of the Law and Justice (PiS) party, led by the late Lech Kaczyński and his twin brother Jarosław, who today is Poland’s de facto leader. Even after Tusk came to power, it was the Kaczyńskis who shaped the agenda and tone of Polish political debate. With Tusk forced to remain on the defensive, Polish politics came to consist of the PiS and the anti-PiS.

Macron may find himself in a similar situation, characterized by three key risks. First, Le Pen—who, in her concession speech, called on ‘patriots’ to commit to ‘the decisive battle that lies ahead’—may continue to set the tone of the political debate. In that case, Macron could be forced to concentrate on managing a cordon sanitaire comprising those whose perspectives converge only on one issue: opposition to Le Pen.

Second, the pressure to stop Le Pen could compel Macron to abandon bold reforms, rather than risk driving away more voters than he can afford to lose and opening the way for Le Pen and the National Front to strengthen their position. In Poland, reforms were realized despite politics, not thanks to politics. Rather than implementing an ambitious agenda, Tusk’s policy amounted to ‘keeping warm water in the taps.’ Macron could end up doing the same.

Third, Macron could inadvertently help to bring the National Front to power. The existing political division between right and wrong, rather than between right and left, can become a self-fulfilling prophecy. Even the best politician is bound to make a mistake at some point, or simply to bore the electorate. If Le Pen remains Macron’s primary opponent, it is only a matter of time before she will reach for power as Kaczyński did, and ruin her country. Macron is thus both the bulwark against Le Pen and the guarantor of her success.

Only a proper division into left and right can guarantee the survival of liberal democracy, as it gives voters multiple safe choices. But the elements of such a structure are possible only within a political community that enjoys economic sovereignty, and that will not be possible until we have political globalization. And everything comes full circle.

To discern whether we are seeing the high tide or ebb tide of populism in Europe, the results of individual elections mean little. The focus must remain on the structural factors—above all, economic globalization in the absence of political globalization—underpinning the rise of populism. And in this regard, nothing has changed.

The French presidential election: a victory on many fronts

Image courtesy of Flickr user Korz 19.

The election of Emmanuel Macron as the next President of France has been welcomed as a sign of stability and a positive future for the country and the embattled European Union.

Equally important, however, is what didn’t happen.

In the months leading up to the election, it appeared the twin forces of populism and Islamist extremism could threaten to tear the country—and the EU—apart. Since the shock of the Brexit vote each pending European national election has been accompanied by a dread of the rise of populist right-wing parties. The Dutch general elections in March threatened to bring the controversial Geert Wilders and his Party for Freedom into an influential position, but this did not occur. The French presidential campaign similarly saw the seemingly unstoppable rise of Marine Le Pen and the Front National, but they did not win. Forthcoming elections in Italy and Germany have been beset with similar concerns.

Despite Macron’s decisive victory, the French election saw the far-right Front National attract historically high levels of support. It remains to be seen how the FN vote will translate into the National Assembly elections in June. But the message is clear: the democratic process has allowed these voices to be heard but not dominate and—as Macron has promised—their needs must now be accommodated. The result is the emergence intact of Frances’s pluralist society led by its varied democratically-elected representatives.

The second great victory of France’s presidential election is the success of its counter-terrorism efforts. Since 2015 France has borne the brunt of terrorist attacks in Western Europe, sustaining significant mass-casualty attacks on the Charlie Hebdo offices and the Hypercacher supermarket in January 2015, followed by the attacks in central Paris in November 2015, and the Bastille Day 2016 attack in Nice. French authorities also had to deal with extreme threats of attack during the presidential election campaign.

Islamist terrorist groups seek to undermine the authority of governments through symbolic attacks. For democracies—which are anathema to terrorists—there is no more potent symbol than free and fair elections. Thousands of polling booths around the country also provide potential mass-casualty targets and propaganda headlines for terrorists.

In the lead up to the Presidential election, the so-called Islamic State (IS) terrorist group even went so far as to devote the French-language edition of its online magazine, Rumiyah, to a call for attacks. It featured a typically dramatic image of polling booths with a graphic overlay of flames, as it appealed to Muslims to attack French candidates, polling booths and voters in their supposed ‘duty’ to jihad. But France’s Muslims clearly disagreed with this call, turning out to cast votes rather than attack the electoral process .

French CT agencies, supported by additional police, gendarmerie and military resources were on  high alert to identify and disrupt any looming threats. Ten people were arrested during the election period in relation to the January 2015 Hypercacher attack, but the full range of threats faced and prevented during the campaign may never be fully known. Future charges and prosecutions will provide some indicators.

French authorities should be applauded for their ability to protect the French public and the election process from the dispersed and outsourced threat of Islamist terrorism. As we have seen in Australia with the four low-level single-actor terrorist attacks experienced since 2014, and the recent vehicle attack in London, it is extremely difficult to identify and prevent ‘inspired’ attacks by individuals not already identified as investigative priorities. That French authorities were able to do this for the nation’s polling stations is extraordinary.

The French presidential election campaign was not entirely free from acts of terrorism. The murder of policeman Xavier Jugelé by a criminal-turned-jihadist on the Champs Elysées in central Paris on 21 April continued the terrorism practice of targeting law enforcement officers. An error by IS in claiming the attack for the group—they got the identity wrong—detracted somewhat from its propaganda value. For IS to fail so abjectly in its attempts to incite attacks in France belies its claims  to have strong support in that country and more broadly across Europe.

France’s CT efforts have come at the cost of significant investment and a high operational tempo as well as deaths and injuries of both security personnel and civilians. As Christophe Lecourtier, France’s ambassador in Australia, observed last year, the CT challenge is also a larger battle of values. But, despite the enormity of the task, France is clearly winning.

The triumph of France’s maintaining its open democratic process in the face of the violent threat of terrorism as well as calming and accommodating nationalism and populism is a credit to its people and its CT authorities.

Information warfare versus soft power

Image courtesy of Flickr user Goshadron.

Russia’s interference in the 2016 US presidential election, and its suspected hacking of French President Emmanuel Macron’s campaign servers, should surprise no one, given President Vladimir Putin’s (mis)understanding of soft power. Before his re-election in 2012, Putin told a Moscow newspaper that ‘soft power is a complex of tools and methods to achieve foreign policy goals without the use of force, through information and other means of influence.’

From the Kremlin’s perspective, color revolutions in neighboring countries and the Arab Spring uprisings were examples of the United States using soft power as a new form of hybrid warfare. The concept of soft power was incorporated into Russia’s 2013 Foreign Policy Concept, and in March 2016, Russian Chief of General Staff Valery Gerasimov stated that responding to such foreign threats ‘using conventional troops is impossible; they can be counteracted only with the same hybrid methods.’

What is soft power? Some think it means any action other than military force, but this is wrong. Soft power is the ability to get what you want through attraction and persuasion rather than threats of coercion or offers of payment.

Soft power is not good or bad in itself. Value judgments depend on the ends, means, and consequences of an action. It is not necessarily better to twist minds than to twist arms (though the subject usually has more autonomy in mental rather than physical processes). Osama bin Laden neither threatened nor paid the men who flew aircraft into the World Trade Center in September 2001: he attracted them by his ideas to do evil.

The soft power of attraction can be used for offensive purposes. Countries have long spent billions on public diplomacy and broadcasting in a game of competitive attractiveness—the ‘battle for hearts and minds.’ Soft-power instruments like the Marshall Plan and the Voice of America helped to determine the outcome of the Cold War.

After the Cold War, Russian elites believed that European Union and NATO enlargement, and Western efforts at democracy promotion, were designed to isolate and threaten Russia. In response, they tried to develop Russian soft power by promoting an ideology of traditionalism, state sovereignty, and national exclusivity. This resonated in countries like Hungary, where Prime Minister Victor Orbán has praised ‘illiberal democracy,’ as well as among the diaspora along Russia’s borders, in impoverished countries of Central Asia, and among right-wing populist movements in Western Europe.

Information warfare can be used offensively to disempower rivals, and this could be considered ‘negative soft power.’ By attacking the values of others, one can reduce their attractiveness and thus their relative soft power.

Nongovernmental actors have long understood that multinational corporations are vulnerable to having their brand equity diminished through ‘naming and shaming’ campaigns. The available evidence suggests that when the Russians began their intervention in the American presidential election in 2015, their objective was to sully and discredit the US democratic process. The election of Donald Trump, who had praised Putin, was a bonus.

Now, Russian interference in European democracies’ domestic politics is designed to reduce the attractiveness of NATO, the embodiment of Western hard power, which Russia views as a threat. In the nineteenth century, the outcome of contests for mastery of Europe depended primarily on whose army won; today, it also depends on whose story wins.

Information warfare goes well beyond soft power, and it is not new. Manipulation of ideas and electoral processes by cash payments has a long history, and Hitler and Stalin were pioneers in radio attacks. But broadcasting that seems too propagandistic lacks credibility and thus does not attract—or produce soft power among—some audiences.

With international politics becoming a game of competitive credibility, exchange programs that develop personal relations among students and young leaders are often far more effective generators of soft power. In the 1960s, the broadcaster Edward R. Murrow said the most important part of international communications is not the ten thousand miles of electronics, but the final three feet of personal contact.

But what happens in today’s world of social media, where ‘friends’ are a click away, fake friends are easy to fabricate, and fake news can be generated and promoted by paid trolls and mechanical bots? Russia has perfected these techniques.

In addition to formal public diplomacy mouthpieces like Russia Today and Sputnik, Russia employs armies of paid trolls and botnets to generate false information that can later be circulated and legitimated as if it were true. Then, in 2016, Russian military intelligence went a step further, by hacking into the private network of the Democratic National Committee, stealing information, and releasing it online to damage Hillary Clinton’s presidential candidacy.

Though information warfare is not new, cyber technology makes it cheaper, faster, and more far-reaching, as well as more difficult to detect and more easily deniable. But while Russian information warfare has been somewhat successful in terms of disruption, affecting the 2016 US election somewhat, it has failed in terms of generating soft power. The Portland Consultancy in London publishes a ‘Soft Power 30‘ index that ranks Russia 27th.

In 2016, Finland’s Institute of International Affairs found that Russian propaganda had little impact on mainstream Western media and had never resulted in any change in policy. And a Chicago Council on Global Affairs poll in December indicated that Russia’s popularity among Americans was the lowest since the Cold War year of 1986.

Ironically, rather than pocketing the Trump bonus, Russia’s information warfare has handicapped the US president by greatly reducing Russia’s soft power in America. As some analysts point out, the best response to a ‘fire hose of falsehoods’ is not to try to answer each lie, but to forewarn and inoculate against the process. As Macron’s victory has shown, the European elections of 2017 may benefit from such forewarnings.

 

President Macron: a ceremonial figurehead?

Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

Emmanuel Macron will most likely win the French presidency in the second round of the election process, much to the delight of those quaking in fear of populism and the threat it poses to the European Union, globalisation and NATO. The barometers of the status quo—the stock markets and the currency traders—both responded strongly and favourably to Macron’s emergence as frontrunner from the first round. But the sense that a high water mark has been reached and that reaction to the failures and disappointments of the international institutions of the post-Cold War era is receding is premature.

While the pro-globalization economist Macron topped the first round poll with 23.8% of the vote, the more significant figure in the longer term is the 46% that went to Eurosceptic candidates. On the basis of the current polling results, Macron has a 20% lead over Marine Le Pen and even taking account of early stumbles in his final campaign, expectations are that he’ll win. Yet there’s still a chance that the result will be much closer than anticipated if antipathy to Macron results in a low turnout of voters for the second round.

On top of the Eurosceptics’ reluctance to endorse the internationalist neoliberal project of Macron, he remains vulnerable over perceptions of elitism and overconfidence and his past close association with the unpopular Hollande. His main advantage remains not his own project or popularity but the suspicion with which many French voters view the extremism and uncertainty of the National Front.

Given that Macron is most likely to be the next French President, it remains wishful thinking to believe that his election will represent a victory against the Eurosceptics and nationalists. Macron will be arguably the most constrained and powerless president of the Fifth Republic. Depending on the outcome of the June National Assembly elections he could finish up as a largely ceremonial figurehead.

France’s constitution provides for a separation of powers between the executive (the president and the government), the legislature (the National Assembly and the Senate) and the judiciary. The president, as head of state, appoints the government—the prime minister and ministers of state. In this system only the National Assembly, and not the president, can dismiss the prime minister or the government. This ensures that generally it is critical for prime ministers to have the support of the majority of the National Assembly.

Elections for the parliament follow the presidential election and deputies and senators are also elected for five years. One of the unusual features of Macron’s En Marche progressive movement is its disdain for traditional politics and party structures. However, his lack of a formal political base and the combination of widespread Eurosceptic sentiment and resistance to many of the reforms he’s signalled could produce a National Assembly that’s at best opposed to many of his proposed initiatives and at worst hostile to his basic philosophy and platform.

The initial optimism over the prospect of a Macron presidency could soon dissipate—particularly if Le Pen cuts Macron’s campaign lead in the final days and generates momentum for the National Front going into the National Assembly elections. Moreover, those French electors who reluctantly vote for Macron to thwart Le Pen’s presidential bid are likely to default in large numbers back to their traditional parties.

It’s worth recalling that far left candidate Jean-Luc Mèlenchon received 19.5% of the vote in the first round and that his supporters share Le Pen’s anti-EU and globalization platform. Similarly, Macron’s National Assembly candidates are not expected to secure many of the Republican Party’s centre right voters who gave Francois Fillion 19.5% in the first round. The 6.2% of voters who supported the Socialist Party’s Benoit Hamon are also unlikely to support En Marche candidates.

The probable outcome is a neophyte politician, in his first elected office as President of France, forced to work with a hostile National Assembly—or at least an Assembly with no clear governing coalition. There seems little prospect given the likely state of the National Assembly that Macron will be able to appoint a prime minister sympathetic or amenable to his reform program.

Apart from being an important European economy and a force in European politics, France is a key member of NATO and a significant independent player in the security of its former colonies in Africa. This isn’t a good time for France to be hobbled with an ineffective President.

The challenges of economic revival, Brexit negotiations, together with the threats of Russian adventurism, terrorism and illegal immigration will demand strong leadership from France.

Saving the centre

Image courtesy of Flickr user Alan.

There is no doubt about the waves of discontent and anger sweeping Western politics. The United Kingdom voted to leave the European Union after four decades of membership, jeopardizing all the intricate trading and political connections that such a long relationship created. Against all forecasts by political pundits, Donald Trump won the United States presidency, something the political class thought virtually inconceivable. Throughout Europe, new political parties are springing up, all based on variations on the same theme: the political establishment has ignored us, and we will throw them out in protest.

One defining feature of this uprising is that the impetus for change has become more important than any consideration of what change might mean in practice. The things said by leaders riding this wave can be wildly out of kilter with normal rules of political conduct; but none of it matters. What matters is that the revolt is happening, and whoever happens to catch the wave will be born aloft.

By contrast, politicians who make reasoned arguments of a conventional kind merely irritate rebellious voters, arousing impetuous dismissal, if not contempt and derision.

There are stacks of analysis of the factors underlying the populist surge: stagnant working- and middle-class incomes; the marginalization felt by people just managing to get by; the disruption of communities as a result of economic change; and resistance to the seemingly relentless forces of globalization: trade and immigration.

Social media is a major part of this wave. It enables movements to grow in scale quickly, contributes to the fragmentation of media, and creates a new world of information in which rules of objectivity do not apply, and where every conspiracy theory can stampede over the facts—and fact-checkers—standing impotently in its way.

In a country like Britain around 20 years ago, when I was first contesting elections as a leader, the BBC’s main nightly news had an audience of roughly ten million; today, the figure is just over 2.5 million. What was one conversation is now many—often among people with the same views.

This change in the method of receiving and debating information is a revolutionary phenomenon in its own right. The traditional media, which could reassert their role as purveyors of trustworthy news, have decided that it is easier and more commercially feasible to reinforce audiences’ loyalty by not challenging them.

Of course, some feel a sense of power in flouting convention and shaking the established order. But we shouldn’t kid ourselves. Shaking up the system can produce necessary change; but it can also produce consequences that are neither intended nor benign.

We are entering a very dangerous political period of politics. A recent poll showed that a significant minority of French citizens are no longer convinced that democracy is the right system for France. Support for an authoritarian model of leadership is rising everywhere.

Populism is not new. Economic change is not new. Anxiety about immigration is not new. Exploitation of people’s dissatisfaction is not new.

But the context is new, and the political center’s inability to respond effectively is also new.

The truth is that center-left and center-right forces have become complacent and out of touch. We (I say ‘we’ intentionally, because I identify completely with a centrist, pragmatic view of politics) have become passive managers of the status quo, not catalysts of change.

In Europe, the EU struggles to restore economic growth, and reforms are being pursued against a background of austerity’s often-brutal effects. In the US, it is clear that white working people in the Midwestern Rust Belt felt neglected and left behind.

Immigration is changing communities, and though there is little doubt that in sum and over time, immigrants’ fresh energy and vigor benefits a country, the immediate impact can be disruptive and troubling. There is no doubt, either, that in general more trade creates more jobs, and protectionist policies bring fewer. But in the short term, higher-paid skilled jobs often disappear. Technology will intensify these changes.

Add to this mix the fact and aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis and the extremism that, since 2001, has dominated security concerns and fed immigration concerns, and the turbulence of our present political condition is not surprising. On the contrary, it appears inevitable.

So the left goes anti-business, the right goes anti-immigrant, and the center sways uneasily between appeasement and alarm.

This was never how the center won in the past. The center—particularly the progressive center—wins when it has the initiative, when it is leading the debate, when the solutions it is putting forward are radical as well as sensible. Only a strong and revitalized center can defeat the populist surge.

This is the urgent requirement of today. It is no use denigrating voters’ anger. The center must respond politically. From macroeconomic policy to the transformation of the public sector (including education and health care through technology) and security and immigration policies that address people’s worries while protecting our values, the center must rediscover the policy agenda that owns the future, because it is based on answers, not anger.

If the center does this, it will draw back to it the reasonable-minded voters who have joined the revolution out of frustration at being ignored. That is enough: the margin of defeat, whether in the UK’s Brexit referendum or Trump’s victory, was not that of an electoral landslide.

People have a lot to lose from chaos and instability, and their natural inclination is to avoid anything that brings them closer. But they need to know they are being listened to. Then we can turn our present political condition toward a better and more hopeful future.

Strategic autonomy for the European Union

In the face of an increasingly contested international order, the European Union is strengthening its security and defence capacities.

In June, the 28 Leaders of the European Union welcomed the Global Strategy for the European Union’s Foreign and Security Policy that was presented by Federica Mogherini, the EU’s High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy.

The Strategy, released straight after the British referendum, calls for a stronger Europe to act as a security provider in a more contested global scenario.

Over the last four months the focus has been on implementing the Strategy’s security and defence plan, which is based on three elements.

The first is defining a ‘comprehensive level of ambition’. The EU Foreign and Defence Ministers agreed last November to enable the EU to respond more comprehensively, rapidly and decisively to external conflicts and crises; to enhance the security and defence capacities of our partners; and to strengthen the EU’s capacity to protect European citizens, working in an integrated manner on our internal and external security.

The second element is to strengthen the EU–NATO strategic partnership. At the NATO Warsaw Summit in July the EU Presidents of the Council and Commission and the Secretary General of NATO signed a joint declaration to give new impetus to the 15-year old partnership. High Representative Mogherini and NATO Secretary General Stoltenberg will present 40 proposals to deepen EU-NATO cooperation in seven areas, including countering hybrid threats, maritime security, cyber security and interoperable defence capabilities development .

The third element is to support the industrial basis for European Defence. The European Commission adopted on November 30 the European Defence Action Plan (EDAP). It will support defence research, unlock EU tools to invest into the whole European Defence supply chain, make a proposal for a European Defence Fund, and improve the Single Market for defence.

The 28 Heads of State and Government will discuss this political, security and industrial package at the European Council in December in Brussels.

It doesn’t entail the creation of an ‘EU Army’ (nor does NATO have its own forces), nor imply a military alliance, which is a task for NATO and its members.

The package will emerge at a critical moment and spur a new strategic momentum to guarantee the security of EU Member States and citizens and promote peace globally.

With the international rules-based order under challenge, the EU must develop its current and future security and defence capability, and enhance its strategic autonomy and ability to cooperate with its close partners. As the Global Strategy underlines there’s a direct connection between European prosperity and Asian security. In light of Asia’s economic importance to the EU (and vice versa), peace and stability in Asia are crucial for EU prosperity.

The Strategy calls for developing a ‘more politically rounded approach to Asia,’ one that seeks to make greater practical contributions to all aspects of Asian security, from continuing to support the reconciliation process in Afghanistan and promoting non-proliferation in the Korean peninsula, to upholding freedom of navigation and promoting human rights and democratic transitions such as in Myanmar/Burma. We will continue to work with our partners on the basis of respect for rule of law, both domestically and internationally.

The EU and Australia already cooperate closely on foreign and security issues including through regular meetings at the Foreign Minister level and bilateral dialogues on security, counterterrorism, Asia and migration policy. In 2015 the EU and Australia signed a Crisis Management Agreement to enable Australia to take part in EU operations, like the EUCAP Nestor operation in Horn of Africa, one of the 16 civil and military crisis management operations currently deployed by the EU globally. The EU Australia Framework Agreement, now fully negotiated and ready to sign, formalises further the areas for cooperation on foreign and security matters, including human rights, rule of law, crisis management, WMD, ICC, counterterrorism, and cyberspace.

Progress towards EU strategic autonomy should be a welcome development for our close partners, including Australia.

The last stand against populism

Image courtesy of Flickr user Ian Insch.

There was a time, immediately after German reunification in 1990, when many French feared Germany. Today, the roles are reversed. But Germans are not afraid so much of France as for it. In the wake of June’s Brexit referendum in the United Kingdom and Donald Trump’s triumph earlier this month in the United States’ presidential election, France, too, could fall victim to destructive populist forces, if voters choose the far-right National Front’s Marine Le Pen as their next president.

Germans may be pleased to see Chancellor Angela Merkel referred to by American media as ‘the liberal West’s last defender’—an island of stability in an ocean of chaos. But it is one thing to be described as the best pupil in class—Germany is used to that; it is quite another to feel like the only pupil showing up at all.

With the US out, there are indeed few decent pupils left. Though Trump has backed away from some of his more radical campaign promises, he is unlikely to drop his ‘America first’ approach; as a result, the US may be about to break decisively with the universalism and global engagement that has characterized the last 70 years.

The situation is no better in Europe. Poland is following in Hungary’s illiberal footsteps. Austria, another German neighbor, may well be about to elect the far-right nationalist Freedom Party’s Norbert Hofer as president. And the British are on their way out of the European Union altogether.

Yet none of this will be as destabilizing for Germany as a Le Pen presidency in France. A Le Pen victory would amount to abandonment not just of Germany, but also of the values, principles, and norms that have enabled Germany to reconcile with itself and its neighbors, beginning with France. It would sever the Franco-German axis around which the EU rotates.

What is needed now is precisely the opposite: a reset of Franco-German relations. The reality is that Germany and France have not played in the same league for a while. It is not that Germany has become too strong, as it may have seemed in the post-reunification period, but rather that France has become too weak, leaving Germany to lead the way in addressing Europe’s myriad crises in recent years.

Now, Germany is widely viewed as Europe’s hegemon. It was in Merkel’s hands that US President Barack Obama placed the torch of democracy following Trump’s victory, during his final official tour of Europe.

But Merkel cannot carry that torch alone. France must stand with Germany, shoulder to shoulder, as it once did. For that to happen, France must be as tall, strong, confident, and present as Germany. It must renew itself, guided by its own long-held values—values that Le Pen and her National Front do not share.

France does not need to match Germany’s economic might. What it can offer nowadays is at least as important. With Europe facing a combination of external threats, such as turmoil in the Middle East and Russian adventurism, and internal challenges, such as homegrown terrorism, security and defense cannot take a backseat to economic policy. And, in these areas, France has real comparative advantages.

Given the risks confronting Europe, not to mention Trump’s isolationist tendencies, the Franco-German relationship will assume greater regional and global importance. With Le Pen in charge, that relationship will almost certainly suffer, driving events in a dangerous direction.

To be sure, France’s two-round voting system, which ensures that the president obtains the support of a majority of voters, makes it extremely unlikely that a radical candidate like Le Pen can take power. (By contrast, in the US, Trump received more than two million fewer votes than his opponent, and George W. Bush lost the popular vote to Al Gore in 2000 by more than a half-million.)

But, given the electoral upsets that have taken place lately, Germans will probably not be reassured until after the votes are counted. After all, if Le Pen does manage to succeed in France’s run-off system, she will gain a strong and genuine mandate to implement policies that controvert everything post-war Germany—and, indeed, the EU—is supposed to stand for.

Of course, Germany has its own political challenges to overcome, with federal elections set for next October. Recent state elections indicated a popular mood that is suspicious of openness, particularly to refugees, with the National Front’s German counterpart, the Alternative for Germany, making large strides in some regions.

If Germany is to remain the pillar of stability that it has been in recent years, it must avoid going any farther down that path, and instead deliver a fourth premiership to Merkel. Fortunately, that scenario remains likely, though far from guaranteed.

In any case, France’s political trajectory will be decided well before Germany’s. To ensure a safe and prosperous future, French voters must support a person of authority, wisdom, and experience, who is willing and able to undertake urgently needed reforms without exacerbating social divisions—someone wholly unlike Marine Le Pen. In doing so, they would prove that the current wave of right-wing populism can be resisted. And they would give the European project a real shot at continued success.