31 January 2007
"The great unbundling of production"
An interesting paper by economist Richard Baldwin on globalisation and offshoring. Worth a read/skim for impacts on jobs in developed countries like Australia. As offshoring spreads from manufacturing into services (the basis of our economy) things are in for a shake up. Baldwin argues that its questionable if governments can predict the impact accurately, but they can prepare in a general sense - ie: spend more on education, skills and knowledge. To paraphrase Thomas Friedman 'any process that can be digitised can be offshored and probably will be'.
30 January 2007
Melbourne Place....
Somehow appropriate that Melbourne should be celebrated in London with a semi-lit laneway behind Australia House. Here's the history of Australia House.... wild flowers once bloomed on the vacant site.
28 January 2007
Flag-caping takes the world
While I'm pretty sure there were no Australian sporting fixtures taking place in Covent Garden on friday night (unless I missed a game of street cricket), the cobble stoned laneways were peppered with caped crusaders - Aussies celebrating our national day. It's nice to see the beer'n'barbie festivities transposed across the world in such numbers. And just to clarify, I don't think everyone draped in a flag is a racist - far from it. I just feel sad that my own impression of the flag has been tinged with such connotations. I like Rohan Connolly's piece in The Age about jingoistic nationalism. He captures it well.
On friday night, a woman sat opposite us to remove her ice skates - underneath lay one yellow and one green sock.
On friday night, a woman sat opposite us to remove her ice skates - underneath lay one yellow and one green sock.
Here is the illustrious High Commission
23 January 2007
Badawi lecture
I saw Abdullah Badawi (PM Malaysia) speak at IISS today. Sensible chap. Here are a few of his pertinent points.
Tension between Islam and west can be diffused/isolated by:
- Resolving iconic grievances like Israel-Palestine and Iraq.
- Focusing on the economic development of Islamic countries (particularly human capital).
- Learning more about Islam, and its internal divisions.
He added that:
- Islam is not incompatible with democracy and economic development/ modernity.
- Radical islam feeds off perceived exclusion, ignorance, poverty and trans-national grievances.
- Muslim majority countries must respect and treat equally non-muslim minorities.
- Muslim minorities in non-muslim countries should obey the laws of their country (ie: Islam does not necessarily trump western democracy).
- He ended by calling for a jihad on economic development, listing areas where muslim countries in the OIC can cooperate to encourage mutual development.
On the whole an interesting presentation.
Tension between Islam and west can be diffused/isolated by:
- Resolving iconic grievances like Israel-Palestine and Iraq.
- Focusing on the economic development of Islamic countries (particularly human capital).
- Learning more about Islam, and its internal divisions.
He added that:
- Islam is not incompatible with democracy and economic development/ modernity.
- Radical islam feeds off perceived exclusion, ignorance, poverty and trans-national grievances.
- Muslim majority countries must respect and treat equally non-muslim minorities.
- Muslim minorities in non-muslim countries should obey the laws of their country (ie: Islam does not necessarily trump western democracy).
- He ended by calling for a jihad on economic development, listing areas where muslim countries in the OIC can cooperate to encourage mutual development.
On the whole an interesting presentation.
22 January 2007
Flagging racism
It's not often that a raging antipodean controversy coincides so neatly with my environment here. While the virtues of the Australian flag as a symbol of national pride is debated downunder, Our glorious High Commission over the road is this week festooned with flags in preparation for Oz day. More than twenty fly like bondi blue spinnakers, capturing the chilly breeze (as if in anticipation of an inter-embassy regatta). They're quite striking on the eye and transform a decadently non-descript building into an identifiably Australian palace.
My views on the flag debate itself are simple. It's time to consider a new one.
National pride is neither all bad, nor all good. How it manifests itself owes much to the framing it is given by opinion formers - quite a responsibility. Our flag can be a symbol of inclusion only if all are able to feel included, or it can be framed as a symbol of exclusion if the slightest license is given for a negative association to be created (a la the caped crusaders protecting their beaches). Once created, a negative association is extraordinarily difficult to shift. This I fear is what has happened to our flag. Where I used to see sporting success, I now see Crunulla. Where I used to see optimism I now see hubris. Where I used to see multiculturalism, I now see white Australia. Where I used to grudgingly accept the flag's heritage I now see it as a symbolic anachronism. It's time to change the symbols of 1900 into the symbols of 2007 - a lot has changed in our country.
Yes, I'm a friggin ex-pat latte sipping chardonnay chugging socialist and my views are less worthy as a consequence, but I can't help but feel that the majority of Australians are also a little uncomfortable about the tangent our flag has taken down Sutherland Shire way. The explosion of flag-caping since Crunulla suggest that the flag is increasingly worn as a political statement (of the "we choose who... blah blah.." variety). How many post-white Australia policy immigrant communities feel like flying the flag at the moment? Not many I'm guessing. The image of a Muslim woman caped in the flag is only noteworthy for its implied protest - if it were an inclusive symbol nobody would notice.
Two anecdotal snippets. A Canadian of Maltese descent who I study with, was recounting a discussion with a young Australian of Maltese descent as both visited relatives in Malta. My friend was struck by this young Australian's views about immigration, and how openly he discussed them. Though from a recent immigrant family, he was anti-immigration. However, despite this, he had been worried that the rampaging Crunulla brigade may mistaken his Mediterranean skin for Lebanese. Complex identity issues in modern Australia.
The second experience questions whether racism in our country is dormant or on the march. Last year a close friend from South Africa visited Australia for the first time. A highly sophisticated gallery curator, who invests in edgy art, works cocktail parties like a movie star and travels the world consulting, he is as black as a gloriously moonless Kruger sky. We took him to the footy (Swannies vs Freo at the SCG) and then to a smoky pub in Surrey Hills (bearing a Barry Hall badge and matching swannies scarf). As we walked home through prosperous streets, he talked on his mobile to his wife in Johannesburg (thank goodness!). A couple of drunk young blokes began screaming at him to "piss off home you b***k c***. I've never wanted to hit someone so much in my life. He never heard (I think), and they swayed off down a laneway to piss in someone's letterbox. But I'm still completely mortified by the memory. They may as well have been wearing capes.
Anyway, I blame those who neglected to frame our nationalism in terms of inclusion, and failed to call racism by its name. Racism is simply evil, and no half-way solution will overcome it, no matter how electorally unpopular such a simple repudiation may be. People need to feel bad about expressing racist views, and challenged to be more tolerant. And if that takes ripping the flags off exclusionary thugs at rock concerts well so be it. Bravo to the BDO.
My views on the flag debate itself are simple. It's time to consider a new one.
National pride is neither all bad, nor all good. How it manifests itself owes much to the framing it is given by opinion formers - quite a responsibility. Our flag can be a symbol of inclusion only if all are able to feel included, or it can be framed as a symbol of exclusion if the slightest license is given for a negative association to be created (a la the caped crusaders protecting their beaches). Once created, a negative association is extraordinarily difficult to shift. This I fear is what has happened to our flag. Where I used to see sporting success, I now see Crunulla. Where I used to see optimism I now see hubris. Where I used to see multiculturalism, I now see white Australia. Where I used to grudgingly accept the flag's heritage I now see it as a symbolic anachronism. It's time to change the symbols of 1900 into the symbols of 2007 - a lot has changed in our country.
Yes, I'm a friggin ex-pat latte sipping chardonnay chugging socialist and my views are less worthy as a consequence, but I can't help but feel that the majority of Australians are also a little uncomfortable about the tangent our flag has taken down Sutherland Shire way. The explosion of flag-caping since Crunulla suggest that the flag is increasingly worn as a political statement (of the "we choose who... blah blah.." variety). How many post-white Australia policy immigrant communities feel like flying the flag at the moment? Not many I'm guessing. The image of a Muslim woman caped in the flag is only noteworthy for its implied protest - if it were an inclusive symbol nobody would notice.
Two anecdotal snippets. A Canadian of Maltese descent who I study with, was recounting a discussion with a young Australian of Maltese descent as both visited relatives in Malta. My friend was struck by this young Australian's views about immigration, and how openly he discussed them. Though from a recent immigrant family, he was anti-immigration. However, despite this, he had been worried that the rampaging Crunulla brigade may mistaken his Mediterranean skin for Lebanese. Complex identity issues in modern Australia.
The second experience questions whether racism in our country is dormant or on the march. Last year a close friend from South Africa visited Australia for the first time. A highly sophisticated gallery curator, who invests in edgy art, works cocktail parties like a movie star and travels the world consulting, he is as black as a gloriously moonless Kruger sky. We took him to the footy (Swannies vs Freo at the SCG) and then to a smoky pub in Surrey Hills (bearing a Barry Hall badge and matching swannies scarf). As we walked home through prosperous streets, he talked on his mobile to his wife in Johannesburg (thank goodness!). A couple of drunk young blokes began screaming at him to "piss off home you b***k c***. I've never wanted to hit someone so much in my life. He never heard (I think), and they swayed off down a laneway to piss in someone's letterbox. But I'm still completely mortified by the memory. They may as well have been wearing capes.
Anyway, I blame those who neglected to frame our nationalism in terms of inclusion, and failed to call racism by its name. Racism is simply evil, and no half-way solution will overcome it, no matter how electorally unpopular such a simple repudiation may be. People need to feel bad about expressing racist views, and challenged to be more tolerant. And if that takes ripping the flags off exclusionary thugs at rock concerts well so be it. Bravo to the BDO.
18 January 2007
The effigy industry
Just a partially formed thought.... but is there an effigy building/burning industry, and is this another area where the forces of comparative advantage and emerging markets are concentrating production in developing countries? It's hard not to be impressed by the speed with which effigys are rolled out for the edification of international cameras - a good measure of globalisation if ever there was. Offence is caused and minutes later an effigy is on fire somewhere in the world. The quality varies from simple straw man, to elaborate life-like puppets, but the principles are the same.
An Effigy must resemble a man (women are never effigied), must be highly flamable (much like a bbq, there is nothing worse than an effigy that fails to light), must fall apart quickly to fit a 5 second tv slot, must include 'insert your slogan here' space (not all effigys are meant to resemble people - issues can be effigied too) and above all else, must be accompanied by angry shouting men (who should appear deeply aggrieved even if they love burning straw men).
Perhaps effigy firms (I'd call mine 'Men on Fire for Hire') have a product range much like shaving razors - there's your basic effigy that resembles a dissassembled bale of hay (cheap because peasants can make them but effective), your middling effigy for the aspirants out there (a touch of artistry, but like a gel strip or flexi-head mostly superfluous fluff), and then the rolls royce of effigies, (manic grin, brill creamed hair, and petrol pockets for explosive impact). I imagine the market would be quite lucrative. You know demand is on the rise when even a tv show as stale as Big Brother can elicit this.....
17 January 2007
On a rainy day...
Occasionally I wake in two minds. The veil of darkness lifted slowly this morning to reveal an earth-soaking downpour, my favourite start to any day, perfect but for its cycling-unfriendliness. Resigned to inferior transport I grabbed my tube pass and joined the weaving masses underground.
My pod concocted a soundtrack for today's 'me' movie, the mundane glamorised. I walked to the station like a rockstar, all strut and purpose. Passing traffic, flashes of advertising, the train filling shuffle, all were rendered rhythmic and colourful. I walked along a half empty platform backed by the strum of Malian blues guitar - is it acceptable to skip if nobody else hears the music (or even if they do)? Others join me in the iAnonymity - an occasionally synchronised footstep hints at a common soundtrack.
In the carriage humanity hides from its own imperfect reflection, scanning faces, inventing life stories, passing instant judgements in the flickering of a meeting eye. A peak hour carriage produces a thousand silent thoughts, some well formed, some with barely a shape, some in Polish and Hindi. I find myself wondering what thoughts crossed the minds of those on the fateful carriages last July. What proportion joined the dots of the impending? How many were blissfully unaware, led by their white pod plugs to a more inviting time and place? Who saw the scared/not scared face of the bomber? Was the carriage silent that day? The arbitrariness is chilling. A carriage stops at a station and gathers a random mix of lives and stories, drawn together for mere seconds before diverging again. One bad day the polite silence was shattered.
I imagine taking the names and numbers of all on board today, slowly learning their stories, cataloguing their lives into book of carriage 23423784 as at 0954am 17/1/07 - normality, temporarily entwined and rendered rich. Today a million independent city trails are burnt on the London map, each the learned and automatic paths trod by servants of the city's present and its future. The tube is rich.
At 9am outside a Holborn pub two men are chewing pistachio nuts, the shells scattered across the clear puddles at their feet.
My pod concocted a soundtrack for today's 'me' movie, the mundane glamorised. I walked to the station like a rockstar, all strut and purpose. Passing traffic, flashes of advertising, the train filling shuffle, all were rendered rhythmic and colourful. I walked along a half empty platform backed by the strum of Malian blues guitar - is it acceptable to skip if nobody else hears the music (or even if they do)? Others join me in the iAnonymity - an occasionally synchronised footstep hints at a common soundtrack.
In the carriage humanity hides from its own imperfect reflection, scanning faces, inventing life stories, passing instant judgements in the flickering of a meeting eye. A peak hour carriage produces a thousand silent thoughts, some well formed, some with barely a shape, some in Polish and Hindi. I find myself wondering what thoughts crossed the minds of those on the fateful carriages last July. What proportion joined the dots of the impending? How many were blissfully unaware, led by their white pod plugs to a more inviting time and place? Who saw the scared/not scared face of the bomber? Was the carriage silent that day? The arbitrariness is chilling. A carriage stops at a station and gathers a random mix of lives and stories, drawn together for mere seconds before diverging again. One bad day the polite silence was shattered.
I imagine taking the names and numbers of all on board today, slowly learning their stories, cataloguing their lives into book of carriage 23423784 as at 0954am 17/1/07 - normality, temporarily entwined and rendered rich. Today a million independent city trails are burnt on the London map, each the learned and automatic paths trod by servants of the city's present and its future. The tube is rich.
At 9am outside a Holborn pub two men are chewing pistachio nuts, the shells scattered across the clear puddles at their feet.
Heard of the Carteret Islands?
British television has its highs and lows. Last night a deadly serious topic was given such a thick coating of sugared-cliche that I began questioning whether the report was a fabrication. ITV was reporting live from ...... the Carteret Islands, 'deep in the Pacific Ocean' (cue short flash of imprecise map). I'm ashamed to say I'd never heard of them - and our excitable reporter chose not to mention that they form part of Papua New Guinea (an inconvenient fact it turns out). The highest point in the island group is 170cm above sea level - not a huge margin for error to begin with.
The islands hold the dubious honour of being among the first rendered less-habitable by tidal surges. The looming issue of forced removals due to rising sea levels is an important one, both humanitarian, and in what it implies for our collective future. I have no reason to question that the increased incidence and severity of tidal surges is linked to climate change. But it is impossible to engage seasoned sceptics on these issues by playing loose with the facts.
Here are a few of the skin-deep grabs in the ITV report:
'These people have nowhere to go' - Actually as citizens of PNG they have an entire country to relocate to. And it turns out that a number of island residents shifted there relatively recently escaping the Bouganville conflict. Bouganville (now peaceful), mainland, neither salubrious, but neither underwater either.
'When the tides recede mosquito's breed in the pools of water' - according to the WHO, mosquitoes larvae do not breed in sea water, and where brackish, rely on the addition of another source of water - ie: receding sea water would not by itself encourage malaria growth (http://www.who.int/malaria/docs/tsunamiTN2005.pdf). Semantics perhaps, but loose with the causalities.
'What have these people done to deserve to lose their home' - there are some suggestions that bomb fishing on the reef has accentuated the increase in tidal surges (UNDP). Also the islands lie in a geologically unstable region, and geological shifts may be reducing the islands elevation. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carteret_Islands)
I don't doubt that these poor people are enduring great suffering and uncertainty as they face drastic changes to their living environment, and perhaps evacuation. Nor do I question that climate change caused by industrial emissions is partly to blame. But presenting these issues in kindergarten simplicity begs questions where there should be none. To not mention that the Carteret Islands form part of the Papua New Guinean state, no doubt a deliberate journalistic ploy to embellish the impression of insecurity, would seem a cynical play on the limited geographical awareness of us couch potatoes. I've been poring over maps and spinning globes since I was a little kid, and I'd never heard mention of these islands.
Anyway..... poor them. Where countries are faced with such scenarios across their entire landmass (Tuvalu) I reckon we should be doing the neighbourly thing and making room on our lounge room floors. Until then, my frustration with journalists (and anyone else for that matter) playing loose with the facts on climate change will not diminish. There are some evil cigar-puffing industrialists out there who chuckle heartily every time someone blames a rainy day in summer on climate change. Simplicity, and the omission of 'inconvenient truths' spells the death of a cogent argument.
The islands hold the dubious honour of being among the first rendered less-habitable by tidal surges. The looming issue of forced removals due to rising sea levels is an important one, both humanitarian, and in what it implies for our collective future. I have no reason to question that the increased incidence and severity of tidal surges is linked to climate change. But it is impossible to engage seasoned sceptics on these issues by playing loose with the facts.
Here are a few of the skin-deep grabs in the ITV report:
'These people have nowhere to go' - Actually as citizens of PNG they have an entire country to relocate to. And it turns out that a number of island residents shifted there relatively recently escaping the Bouganville conflict. Bouganville (now peaceful), mainland, neither salubrious, but neither underwater either.
'When the tides recede mosquito's breed in the pools of water' - according to the WHO, mosquitoes larvae do not breed in sea water, and where brackish, rely on the addition of another source of water - ie: receding sea water would not by itself encourage malaria growth (http://www.who.int/malaria/docs/tsunamiTN2005.pdf). Semantics perhaps, but loose with the causalities.
'What have these people done to deserve to lose their home' - there are some suggestions that bomb fishing on the reef has accentuated the increase in tidal surges (UNDP). Also the islands lie in a geologically unstable region, and geological shifts may be reducing the islands elevation. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carteret_Islands)
I don't doubt that these poor people are enduring great suffering and uncertainty as they face drastic changes to their living environment, and perhaps evacuation. Nor do I question that climate change caused by industrial emissions is partly to blame. But presenting these issues in kindergarten simplicity begs questions where there should be none. To not mention that the Carteret Islands form part of the Papua New Guinean state, no doubt a deliberate journalistic ploy to embellish the impression of insecurity, would seem a cynical play on the limited geographical awareness of us couch potatoes. I've been poring over maps and spinning globes since I was a little kid, and I'd never heard mention of these islands.
Anyway..... poor them. Where countries are faced with such scenarios across their entire landmass (Tuvalu) I reckon we should be doing the neighbourly thing and making room on our lounge room floors. Until then, my frustration with journalists (and anyone else for that matter) playing loose with the facts on climate change will not diminish. There are some evil cigar-puffing industrialists out there who chuckle heartily every time someone blames a rainy day in summer on climate change. Simplicity, and the omission of 'inconvenient truths' spells the death of a cogent argument.
10 January 2007
Things I saw that made today special
* In Camden, traffic was stopped as a mother and her two young daughters crossed the road with grace and at a leisurely pace. Mother gave a lookaway wave as thanks, and daughter followed suit, keeping her chin high and back straight, a perfect mimic at the age of 4.
* Atop Parliament Hill the vista was lit bright by overnight rain and a burst of sunshine. A cloud shadow moved slowly across London before me, dulling in turn Kings Cross, St Pauls, the pickle and Canary Warf.
* In a nearby street a blue plaque told me George Orwell had once lived in a house at the end of a long terrace, metres from the Heath.
* On the Heath a grown man flew a kite in the middle of Wednesday afternoon, alone on a vast expanse of grass. Perhaps he was a modern day Orwell clearing a moment of writers block.
* An old lady slowly carrying her shopping home, stopped at an anonymous corner and threw some breadcrumbs to expectant pigeons. She shuffled onward, a daily pleasure fulfilled.
* Atop Parliament Hill the vista was lit bright by overnight rain and a burst of sunshine. A cloud shadow moved slowly across London before me, dulling in turn Kings Cross, St Pauls, the pickle and Canary Warf.
* In a nearby street a blue plaque told me George Orwell had once lived in a house at the end of a long terrace, metres from the Heath.
* On the Heath a grown man flew a kite in the middle of Wednesday afternoon, alone on a vast expanse of grass. Perhaps he was a modern day Orwell clearing a moment of writers block.
* An old lady slowly carrying her shopping home, stopped at an anonymous corner and threw some breadcrumbs to expectant pigeons. She shuffled onward, a daily pleasure fulfilled.
Iran from above - Magic
On a flight from Dubai to London we flew the length of Iran. I took these snaps (and kicked myself I didn't pull the camera out earlier for the desert mountains in the south). Particularly interesting were the towns secluded deep in bone dry valleys - and further north, isolated within the folds of snow-blanketed mountain ranges. We flew high, but the scale of the landscape made it feel lower. Beautiful country.
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