Insights, analysis and must reads from CNN's Fareed Zakaria and the Global Public Square team, compiled by Global Briefing editor Chris Good Seeing this newsletter as a forward? Sign up here. January 26, 2024 |
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Is Giorgia Meloni Mainstream? |
Is Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni a neo-fascist, or a center-right conservative who has proven sensible, tough, and totally acceptable to Europe's mainstream despite overloud alarm bells when she won Italy's premiership in 2022?
Different observers have different answers, and some still fear sheep's clothing. But Italy's first female prime minister, representing the country's first far-right party in power since World War II, has steered her country in unexpected directions.
The tricolor flame logo of Meloni's Brothers of Italy party—a holdover insignia from the neo-fascist Italian Social Movement (MSI), a party formed in 1946 by supporters of Mussolini—still disquiets some. So did the disturbing video of black-shirted men in Rome delivering a fascist salute, marking the anniversary of a long-ago murder of neo-fascists. Historian, author and political commentator Ruth Ben-Ghiat writes in her Lucid newsletter that Meloni resists criticizing fascists and echoes the so-called "Great Replacement theory"—a conspiracy theory positing White citizenries in Europe and North America will be supplanted—in her immigration politics.
The Economist sees things differently, proclaiming Meloni "has proved the doubters wrong." Under her leadership, "(r)elations with Italy's NATO allies are good. Italy has given enthusiastic backing, and arms, to Ukraine and rather more muted support to Israel." The EU's pandemic-recovery fund has helped Italy avoid a bond sell-off. Irregular immigration—against which Meloni ran for office—has actually increased. "Of all the countries in Europe," the magazine writes, "Italy is for once among those prompting least concern." Elsewhere, The Economist examines Meloni's "not-so-scary right-wing government," noting: "She has not teamed up with (Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor) Orban or other populists to block EU decision-making, nor attracted the censure of the EU's rule-of-law watchdogs."
At New Lines Magazine, Barbara Serra shares the concerns of Meloni's critics, observing that "thousands of far-right activists have been emboldened by seeing her in power" and arguing that Meloni's mainstreaming is mostly about everyone else having changed. Appearing at a recent right-wing conference in Rome, British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak—among Meloni's friends on the European political stage—blasted illegal immigration in forceful terms. Serra writes, referring to Sunak: "Such language is exactly what used to get Meloni branded 'extremist.' … Make no mistake: Giorgia Meloni is a formidable politician. Millions of Italians voted for her because they think she is Italy's best chance. Many ignore concerns about her radical past and inclinations in the name of pragmatism. The international community seems to be doing the same, seeing Meloni as more mainstream because they need her but also because the very concept of 'mainstream' is changing." |
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Criticizing Israel, Amid a Generational Divide |
Is it fair to criticize Israel for the way it's prosecuting its war in Gaza? Many certainly think so. Scathing critiques fill international opinion pages, especially in the Arab press. South Africa has accused Israel of pursuing genocide against Palestinians, which Israel denies. Although the figures ultimately come from Hamas, tens of thousands of Palestinians are believed to have died under Israel's bombardment.
Others see it differently. In mid-November, as criticism of Israel's war effort surged, RAND Strategy and Doctrine Program Director Raphael S. Cohen wrote for Foreign Policy: "I am a military expert. I have studied military operations in Gaza for a decade now. What would a more targeted operation look like? I have no idea." Other countries have bombarded enemies embedded in civilian populations, including the Allies in World War II and the coalition force against ISIS in Iraq. They didn't face international opprobrium. Antisemitism hangs over the debate.
At The New York Times, columnist Ezra Klein probes a generational divide in US views of Israel, noting that polls show Americans 65 and older are far more sympathetic to Israel than those aged 18–29. From there, Klein wades into the substantive argument, pointing out that older Americans know the Israel of past decades, a post-Holocaust miracle for the Jewish people defending itself against enemies attacking it from all sides; millennials know a powerful Israel, but one open to peace and a Palestinian state; but Gen-Z Americans know only the Israel of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu—dominating, opposed to Palestinian statehood, and maintaining a sometimes-brutal occupation. Opposition to Israel on college campuses has raised alarms, but Klein argues that "Israel is losing the support of a generation, not a few student groups. And it is losing it because of what it does, not what it is." |
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Ecuador's Struggle—and Latin America's |
The news from Ecuador was not good. Early this month, a drug kingpin escaped from prison, prisoners rioted, a TV station was taken hostage by masked gunmen, and President Daniel Noboa declared a state of internal conflict. Those events prompted much reflection on how Ecuador, known only a few years ago as an oasis of peace between historic drug producers Colombia and Peru, came to be so violent.
Now, attention has turned to how Latin American governments can respond to such problems of narco-violence. On one hand, the authoritarian crackdown pursued in El Salvador by President Nayib Bukele, featuring mass detentions, looms as an option. At the World Politics Review, Frida Ghitis writes: "(A)cross Latin America these days, a crisis like Ecuador's often creates the pernicious temptation to toss out democracy as the cost of regaining security. It's a baby-and-bathwater scenario we have seen most prominently in El Salvador, a country whose democracy is gradually vanishing in what the population seems to view as an acceptable price for restoring order. So far, Ecuadorian President Daniel Noboa shows no sign of wanting to imitate the draconian tactics of Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele. And Ecuador's citizens, who elected Noboa last year, showed they value their democracy when they chose him over a law-and-order candidate in the first-round ballot in August—even after Fernando Villavicencio, another candidate running on an anti-corruption platform, was assassinated less than two weeks before the election."
At Americas Quarterly, Brian Winter argues most Latin American debate revolves around the opposite and "unrealistic" solutions of Bukele-style crackdowns and drug legalization. Absent a change in the US, like a federal legalization of marijuana that could give Latin American governments cover to follow suit, Winter writes of a third way: "Several (Latin American) governments are quietly seeking a truce or equilibrium with drug gangs, in which they try to largely leave them alone in the hope of not stirring violence … Others are advocating a multipronged approach, in which governments address drug use through more spending on public health, while also taking back control of prisons from gangs, and defending certain red lines from a law enforcement perspective such as the influence of cartels in politics. 'This is not just a security problem, but a state capacity problem,' the Chilean-Peruvian security expert Lucía Dammert recently told the Americas Quarterly Podcast. That might not make a compelling campaign slogan, or speech at the UN. But it's a problem that continues to defy simple solutions." |
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Green Energy's Mining Problem |
It's well known that in order to transition from fossil fuels to cleaner energy, humans will need to dig up lots of rare metals—nickel, cobalt, lithium, and the like—to build the necessary technology. The effect of mining on the cobalt-rich Democratic Republic of the Congo has caught media attention.
Less discussed are other mining efforts elsewhere. At the MIT Technology Review, James Temple depicts a scene reminiscent of the 2007 film "There Will Be Blood" (or the Upton Sinclair novel "Oil!" on which it was based) where Minnesota residents discussed plans for a new nickel mine, envisioned by a mining company marketing it as "Green Nickel" and having already agreed on sales to Tesla—nickel being a key component of electric-vehicle batteries.
"(A) lot of local citizens aren't eager for major mining operations near their towns, even if the end product could help cut greenhouse-gas emissions and ease global warming," Temple writes. "Mining proposals are the weak point where climate alliances will often fray, because blasting holes in the earth always comes at some environmental cost, and the impacts frequently fall harder on disadvantaged groups. The deep community tensions provoked by the proposal were apparent at (the bar) Jackson's Hole as soon as the question-and-answer period began. Attendees strained the 'Minnesota nice' stereotype, interrupting and talking over one another as they variously critiqued and defended the plan. The room went quiet, however, as a woman with dark hair stood up and introduced herself, first in Ojibwemowin and then in English, as Jean Skinaway-Lawrence, the chairwoman of the Sandy Lake Band of Mississippi Chippewa. She said she fears the mine will threaten the band's rights, secured under various treaties that date back to the early 1800s, to fish, hunt, and harvest plants across parts of the Upper Midwest." |
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