Forcing Argentines to Accept Evita Peron Bank Notes

♠ Posted by Emmanuel in at 7/10/2013 11:16:00 AM
It won't be easy--you'll think it strange--when I try to explain why so many Argentinians refuse to honour Evita Peron bank notes issued a year ago. Over half a century after her early death, she remains a polarizing figure in Argentina. Peronists including the present leader of Argentina (and the person largely responsible for these bank notes), Cristina Fernandez, style Evita as a champion of the poor and women's rights besides. Others think she was simply an opportunist who was at the right place at the right time. Obviously, being associated with General Juan Peron is tough. American media labelled him a dictator; others played up his fascist sympathies.

Regardless, can you imagine what sort of controversy would occur if, say, George W. Bush's image graced the $500 bill sixty years from now? While he has his admirers--he was voted US president twice, was he not--his detractors are legion. People have long memories, and many have still not gotten over Evita in Argentina it seems:
Argentina's central bank has warned businesses to stop rejecting commemorative bank notes bearing the image of Eva Peron to mark the 60th anniversary of the iconic former first lady's death. President Cristina Fernandez, whose fiery speaking style often prompts comparisons with that of “Evita”, unveiled the 100 peso bills emblazoned with her profile a year ago.

But publicity surrounding the newly-minted notes was not wide enough to overcome doubts from small businesses where cashiers have rejected the bills for being unfamiliar. So the central bank this week launched a hotline for people to report those who refuse to accept the bills, threatening to fine those who keep turning them away.
The yuck factor remains strong after all these years among some:
Some cashiers have snubbed the Evita notes because they did not recognize them as legal tender. Others turned their backs on the bills for political reasons. “There are always people who don't like Fernandez and Evita and just don't want to touch them,” said a cash register worker in Buenos Aires, declining to give his name.
And no, I would probably not take your George W. Bush bank notes if I'm still around sixty years from now.
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The Futility of Democracy, Egypt Edition

♠ Posted by Emmanuel in at 7/09/2013 02:16:00 PM
The miserable plight of Egypt post-Mubarak points out shortfalls of mindlessly championing the virtues of "democracy." Americans, already despised in the Middle East for their "elections are great...unless you elect Hamas" hypocrisy, are particularly guilty in this latest fiasco. Worthy of especially harsh condemnation is equating electoral democracy as the be-all and end-all of it.

For Western observers, the heart of the matter is that Islamic fundamentalism remains the most organized and potent political force in Egypt. While Mubarak's suppression of the Muslim Brotherhood and Salafists may not have been "democratic," the source of his brand of "extremism" was in keeping secularism in place as per Western desires. Without such restraints, it was only natural that fundamentalists would make their influence felt. After a short period of military-appointed caretaker rule, they won parliamentary elections. They won the presidential elections. They led in drafting an Islamic-tinged constitution.

Meanwhile, the military--previous guarantor of secularism--has demonstrated in the past week that it retains an itchy trigger finger when fundamentalists are in sight--whether they were isolated from politics in the Mubarak era or its central players during the current era. I thus remain wary of the prescribed cure this time around: After a short period of military-appointed caretaker rule, hold parliamentary elections. Hold presidential elections. Draft a new constitution. Is this the new spin cycle?
Egypt's interim rulers issued a faster than expected timetable for elections to try to drag the country out of crisis, a day after 51 people were killed when troops fired on a crowd supporting ousted President Mohamed Mursi. The streets of Cairo were quiet on Tuesday but Mursi's Muslim Brotherhood movement called for more protests later in the day, raising the risk of further violence. Under pressure to restore democracy quickly, Adli Mansour, the judge named head of state by the army when it brought down Mursi last week, decreed overnight that a parliamentary vote would be held in about six months. That would be followed by a presidential election.
I needn't point out the obvious: Short of banning Islamic fundamentalists from participating in yet more elections, the results of such exercises will likely resemble previous ones insofar as the opposition (if you can even speak of one) remains disorganized and fragmented. With the Muslim Brotherhood so aggrieved, will it not redouble its efforts at the ballot box? Or, won't the more politically astute Salafists pick up the slack that the Brothers may leave? Either way, the end result should look the same: Islamic fundamentalism leaving its mark on Egyptian government.

Truly, it is a lose-lose situation: Banning Islamic fundamentalists hardly seems a democratic option, but it's the best one if the intent is to shield Egypt from further ravages of their brand of politics. Meanwhile, allowing fundamentalists to run unimpeded will most likely result in yet another reality-challenged leadership configuration. It certainly makes any number of white people wish those Egyptian youths hadn't bothered with protesting against Mubarak in the first place since many of the things they desired that he provided for a long time--political stability, secularism, and a willing ally--no longer are there.

In closing, I have some pointed questions for the democratic fundamentalists in America and elsewhere:
  1. Why advocate holding elections when you do not recognize the legitimate winners--regardless of their identities?
  2. If the military simply carried out the "will of the people" protesting in the millions on Egyptian streets by overthrowing the democratically-elected Morsi regime, then why bother with elections and just have mob rule through selection processes determined by the thronging masses?  [Call it the "Free Barabbas!" school of democracy.]
Egyptian democracy is a joke. I honestly do not think that doing the same things over and over again--quickie elections and the rest of it--until you finally end up with a suitably pliant and passably palatable regime is the answer. Egyptians have tired of being pawns in regional power politics when it is they who suffer the most in this shambolic process.

UPDATE: Is Saudi Arabia giving these bankrupts $5 B really to demonstrate how overthrowing authoritarian regimes (like Saudi's own) doesn't necessarily promote better outcomes? Perhaps I didn't need convincing.
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Tennis Diplomacy? ROC-PRC Wimbledon Doubles Champs

♠ Posted by Emmanuel in , at 7/07/2013 06:41:00 PM
 As a casual tennis fan, I usually don't watch the doubles matches at Wimbledon. I guess it was by luck that I caught the women's doubles final after watching France's Marion Bartoli maul Germany's Sabine Lisicki. As with most doubles events--even the finals--the crowd at Centre Court was sparse. However, the result was remarkable from an International Relations standpoint insofar as the identities of the winning players went: Hsieh-Hsu Wei of Taiwan and Peng Shuai of China soundly defeated Australian duo Ashleigh Barty and Casey Dellacqua 7-6 6-1.  Despite it being 3 AM in Taipei and Beijing, you can rest assured that hordes of tennis fans there burnt the midnight oil!

How many times have you seen the ROC and PRC laud their joint achievements? Few and far between since cooperation is sparse. Remember that regular flights between the two did not exist until 2003. The officials news agencies are ecstatic. The only difference is that China Daily (Xinhua) names Peng before Hsieh, while Focus Taiwan (Central News Agency or CNA) names Hsieh before Peng!

Unlike most top women's players, neither is a product of the Nick Bolletieri's tennis academy in Florida. The TV commentator--American champion Tracy Austin--kept mentioning their "unorthodox" style of play. As a former doubles champion at Wilmbledon, she should know a thing or two about the subject. I particularly enjoyed it when she singled out a shot made by Hsieh that resembled her fanning out the racket. Austin implied that she'd never seen tennis pros make such a shot, but any table tennis fan would have recognized it as a topspin drive!

There's even a reunification story to match that concerning their non-Western ("unorthodox") approach to playing doubles tennis:
The pair, who are both 27, played a few tournaments together as amateurs but ended their partnership after turning pro. After a seven-year hiatus, Hsieh asked Peng at the 2008 US Open if she would be up for a renewed association. The duo reunited by the end of that year 2008 and won their first 11 matches, claiming titles in Bali and Sydney.

Both Peng and Hsieh play two-handed shots on both sides, like Marion Bartoli, who won the Wimbledon singles title on Saturday.

"It's probably the first time (two-handed players) win the singles and the doubles," Peng said. Peng and Hsieh said they opted for this unorthodox style of play because they were too small to hold their rackets with one hand when they were kids.
Yes, it's largely a non-story in the rest of the world since few watch doubles. But in Taiwan and China, it's big news that's been splashed on the front pages of either country. From sporting events, thawing of international relations may spring forth: Four decades ago ping-pong diplomacy heralded normalization of China-US ties when an American athlete mistakenly boarded the bus of Chinese players What more the symbolism of an ROC-PRC partnership to win one of the world's most prestigious sporting events?

After all, a doubles champion at Wimbledon is every much a winner of the event as that of the singles titles. That both China's won it is, well, unprecedented and laden with symbolism for what may lie ahead.
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WSJ: What Egypt Needs is Its Pinochet

♠ Posted by Emmanuel in at 7/05/2013 05:39:00 PM
I do not need convincing that Hosni Mubarak was a better compromise for an Egyptian leader than any of the buffoons that followed him. Witness the total bankruptcy of ideas demonstrated by the Muslim Brotherhood "leadership." While I was amused by their total lack of political sophistication and economic understanding--remember those interest- and conditionality-free IMF loans--things have been quite miserable for the Egyptian people.

What remedy, then, do the WSJ op-ed pages offer post-Mursi? Assuming that military rule is inevitable in such a tumultuous nation, they are looking for [gasp!] an Egyptian General Augusto Pinochet:
Egyptians would be lucky if their new ruling generals turn out to be in the mold of Chile's Augusto Pinochet, who took power amid chaos but hired free-market reformers and midwifed a transition to democracy. If General Sisi merely tries to restore the old Mubarak order, he will eventually suffer Mr. Morsi's fate.
I cannot make up something so distasteful or positively portray such an appalling figure: Isn't Pinochet the same guy who divided a nation over extrajudicial executions, disappearances and torture?
A Chilean commission investigating human rights abuses under the former military leader Gen Augusto Pinochet says there are many more victims than previously documented. Commission director Maria Luisa Sepulveda said they had identified another 9,800 people who had been held as political prisoners and tortured. The new figures bring the total of recognised victims to 40,018.
I fail to see what's so "democratic" about these practices, but then again, the WSJ op-ed folks--erstwhile champions of democracy--have been longstanding fans of Guantanamo Bay as a shining American example of it.

By drawing a comparison with Pinochet, what we can deduce is that the WSJ op-ed writers believe Mubarak didn't kill and maim enough to be a successful leader. What further "insights" can be gleaned I cannot fathom since those pages remain one of America's few remaining bastions of neoconservatism--an obscure faith if there ever was one.
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Agents of Imperialism? Bolivia Expelled USAID

♠ Posted by Emmanuel in ,, at 7/05/2013 08:52:00 AM
I have become captivated by the twists and turns of the Edward Snowden real-life spy caper. While the original accusation that the US was using its advantageous position in the Internet infrastructure to spy on its own citizens and its allies was expected--absolute power corrupts absolutely--its unfolding implications are far more interesting. Call it Frederick Forsyth...on crack. The IPE implications I've covered in some detail, from Ecuador unilaterally disavowing trade preferences given to it by the US to European lawmakers deliberating on whether to delay the start of EU-US FTA negotiations. The latest word is that EC President Manuel Barroso wants negotiations to occur alongside investigations of American spying. The sideshow is at least as interesting: I enjoy the (calculated) titillation as that master of self-promotion, former Russian spy Anna Chapman, has offered to marry spyboy / boytoy [!?] Edward Snowden and thus grant him rights to remain in Russia.

Back in Latin America, though, we recently had this misadventure of Bolivian President Evo Morales being harassed on his flight home from Russia by European nations France, Italy, Portugal and Spain--allegedly on suspicion that the Latin leftist may have been flying Snowden to Bolivian asylum. Just as spying has created a US-EU row, so too has perceived maltreatment of a Latin leader occasioned (surprise!) yet another continental conflict between the US and the Latin left. Where's Che Guevara when you need him--or Fidel Castro for that matter?

The story above pointed out something I was not previously aware of, though. Did you know that Bolivia expelled the US Agency for International Development (USAID) just last month? Just a short time ago Russia did the same as it was wary of the agency's "democracy promotion" agenda when it ought to have stuck with the task of development instead. Besides, who the heck needs all of that tied aid, anyway? At any rate, different country...same result. From Missus Clinton's favourite media outlet:
Bolivian president Evo Morales has expelled the US development agency from his country for allegedly seeking to undermine his leftist government. Morales claimed on Wednesday that the USAID is involved with "alleged political interference in peasant unions and other social organisations." He made the announcement before a crowd outside the presidential palace during a May Day rally. "Never again, never again USAID, who manipulate and use our leaders, our colleagues with hand-outs," Morales said in announcing the expulsion.
Given the United States' history of interfering in Latin America, you'd think USAID would have been more circumspect about "democracy promotion": fiddling with organized groups and so on. As with many things involving these parties, there is no real moral to the story, US protestations notwithstanding. Americans can be meddlesome hypocrites, while Latin blowhards like Morales blame the Latin left's repeated failures to lift their countries out of poverty on US interference. Same old, same old.

There are no protagonists here, but it does make you wonder if Morales has set himself up for additional harassment by expelling USAID.
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With (Spying) Friends Like US, Who Needs US-EU FTA?

♠ Posted by Emmanuel in ,, at 7/02/2013 12:02:00 PM
It seems the Yanks have gotten themselves into yet another fine mess with their Internet Unfreedom spying activities. [Hello NSA lackeys, I hope you're enjoying yourselves reading this post in between surfing porn sites.] Over the weekend, Der Spiegel added fuel to the fire over the US National Security Agency spying on Internet communications of American friends and foes alike. (Do the Yanks treat them all that differently?) Alike most everyone else, the Germans have come under massive surveillance:
The documents prove that Germany played a central role in the NSA's global surveillance network -- and how the Germans have also become targets of US attacks. Each month, the US intelligence service saves data from around half a billion communications connections from Germany.
However, linguistic ties being paramount, there is a set of favoured Anglophone nations who are exempt from a thorough covert investigation from the American spooks:
No one is safe from this mass spying -- at least almost no one. Only one handpicked group of nations is excluded -- countries that the NSA has defined as close friends, or "2nd party," as one internal document indicates. They include the UK, Australia, Canada and New Zealand. A document classified as "top secret" states that, "The NSA does NOT target its 2nd party partners, nor request that 2nd parties do anything that is inherently illegal for NSA to do."
The allegations right before US-EU FTA are scheduled to start. European responses thus differ based on the amount of spying each nation is purportedly subject to. The French are obviously up in arms over the idea that they should ink a free trade agreement with those stealing sensitive information from Europeans:
The spying allegations come just days before trade negotiations between the U.S. and the EU are scheduled to start on July 8. But [French President Francois] Hollande raised doubts about the talks, saying there should be no negotiations with the U.S. on any matter until it guarantees that it is not spying on its European allies. "We cannot have any negotiations or deals in any domain unless we've gotten these guarantees for France, and that goes for the EU as well," Mr. Hollande said.
However, the Brits who have not been targeted as much are more relaxed about the issue, saying the trade talks should continue anyway according to a UK spokesperson. Still, particularly alarming to the Europeans are claims that spying on the European Council building is widespread and unabated in their own lands:
The EU security experts managed to pinpoint the [spying] line's exact location -- a building complex separated from the rest of the headquarters. From the street, it looks like a flat-roofed building with a brick facade and a large antenna on top. The structure is separated from the street by a high fence and a privacy shield, with security cameras placed all around. NATO telecommunications experts -- and a whole troop of NSA agents -- work inside. Within the intelligence community, this place is known as a sort of European headquarters for the NSA.

A review of calls made to the remote servicing line showed that it was reached several times from exactly this NATO complex -- with potentially serious consequences. Every EU member state has rooms at the Justus Lipsius building for use by ministers, complete with telephone and Internet connections.
Ultimately, if serious objections are raised to the US-EU FTA over American espionage, they will likely come from the European Parliament instead of the European Council despite the latter coming under more direct American data attacks. Post-Lisbon Agenda, the European Parliament has expanded powers to turn down free trade deals--especially over human rights violations such as violating the privacy of Europeans. While the Americans can probably gain the acquiescence of European leaders through the time-tested way of buying them off in any number of ways, such a trick is harder to do with the more heterogeneous and newly assertive European Parliament given its increased discretion.

The EU Parliament used to be pretty lame, but it has since gained authority in certain respects. Unfortunately for the Yanks, these include again basing FTAs on human rights criteria. Martin Schulz, the current [German Social Democrat] president of that body, is certainly annoyed by the spying:
The head of the European Parliament has demanded that the United States provide full clarification over a report disclosed by American whistleblower Edward Snowden alleging that Washington spied on EU offices. Martin Schulz said on Saturday that the revelation would have severe impacts on the ties between the EU and the US if proven true.  

“On behalf of the European Parliament, I demand full clarification and require further information speedily from the US authorities with regard to these allegations,” Schulz stated.
At the very least, expect greater European Parliament scrutiny of these so-called "friends" of theirs in trade negotiations. After all, with lying and spying friends like the US, who needs enemies? 

UPDATE: France is suggesting that the US be given a "time out" by delaying US-EU FTA negotiations by two weeks. However, the European Commission does not agree. As I said earlier, the most likely source of disapproval will come from the European Parliament. That will happen later on assuming that the US and EU come up with something they believe domestic audiences shall sign up to.
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Ecuador's Eco-Econ Gimmick: Pay Us NOT to Drill

♠ Posted by Emmanuel in , at 6/30/2013 06:25:00 PM
Ah, Ecuador, home of central bankers with fake degrees and would-be destination of Edward "And the Truth Shall Set You Free" Snowden. Regardless of its harrumphing and chest-thumping, there's no getting away from the fact that Ecuador is a really, really hard-up nation. Just a few days ago, some faction of the Ecuadorian government claimed that it would unilaterally walk away from trade preferences given to it by the United States. More recently, though, Rafael Correa has implied that no such thing will happen and that Edward Snowden is not being granted asylum in Ecuador. Can't afford to upset the flower growers who provide one of Ecuador's few sources of foreign exchange, right?

So what is it, really? Let's just say these guys lurch from flights of fancy to the cold light of reality in the blink of an eye. Speaking of which, our friends over at the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists have an interesting feature wherein Ecuador's government--supposedly mindful of the environmental consequences of oil drilling but dependent on oil revenues at the same time--has a unique gambit to solve the environment / state revenue quandary. Get this: it is asking others to pay it NOT to drill, baby, drill in its ecotourism sanctuary known as Yasuni National Park:
This poses a quandary for Ecuador, a poor country that relies heavily on oil exports for income but is also an eco-tourism destination. As oil development continues to push deeper into the Ecuadorian rainforest, the government has put forth a unique proposal to protect a still-pristine tract covering about 700 square miles: It has invited other nations—most pointedly, those that grew rich on fossil fuels and are now worried about global climate change—to pay to leave the oil underground. At a time when the United States and other relatively wealthy nations are doing far too little to combat climate change, Ecuador’s proposal represents an innovative way to reduce emissions, and to protect habitat for monkeys, other wildlife, and indigenous humans in the process...

One-fifth of Ecuador’s known oil reserves are located beneath the three easternmost blocks of Yasuní National Park—the Ishpingo, Tambococha, and Tiputini sections, collectively known as ITT. They lie beyond the Tiputini Biodiversity Station in a remote area populated by only a few small groups of native people, some of whom live in voluntary isolation from the rest of the world. In a proposal called the Yasuní ITT Initiative, Ecuadorian president Rafael Correa has offered to forego oil drilling in these blocks in exchange for $3.6 billion from the international community. In so doing, the country would leave some 850 million barrels of oil untouched, and about 400 million tons of carbon dioxide un-emitted.
And how many takers have there been for this blackm...indecent prop...flimf...rack...I mean, financial arrangment? Few and far between. You see, it estimates the value of its 846 million barrels of recoverable oil in Yasuni National Park at $7.2 billion. If it collects half this amount in contributions for it not to drill by 2024, it won't do so. Otherwise, you know the, ah, drill::
The initiative was announced in 2010 and is hugely popular within Ecuador, but only a few European and South American nations have agreed to support it, promising about $50 million to the fund so far. Major outreach efforts just began this year, though, and Ecuador has a 13-year timeline for reaching its $3.6 billion goal.
The financial details on this fund to keep Ecuador from drilling are hosted by UNDP. You can even make a donation there if you wish. Me? I am generally sceptical of all things that have the words "official" and "Ecuador" in some combination.

Maybe that Snowden guy will "expose" the contrivances behind this plot if and when it becomes evident to him that he's been well and truly spurned by Ecuador.
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Snowden Files: Ecuador Cuts US Trade Benefits + More

♠ Posted by Emmanuel in , at 6/28/2013 02:16:00 PM
It's probably not the wisest thing to do, but at least Ecuador may be accepting the consequences of putting its foot in its mouth. Famously harbouring WikiLeaks' Julian Assange in its London embassy, it appears ready to up the stakes in testing America's (quite frankly idiotic) "Internet Freedom" concept by also harbouring former NSA contractor Edward Snowden. He famously leaked documents showing massive data gathering on Internet users on behalf of the US government and is under a global interdict from US authorities.

While this erstwhile hero to the nerdcore set has been sitting around in a Moscow airport waiting for a flight to Ecuador, a US senator threatened to remove American trade preferences granted to Andean nations:
The head of the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee said on Wednesday he would seek to end preferential treatment for Ecuadorean goods if the South American nation offers political asylum to fugitive former spy agency contractor Edward Snowden.

Senator Robert Menendez [D-New Jersey], chairman of the foreign relations panel, warned in a statement that accepting Snowden "would severely jeopardize" preferential trade access the United States provides to Ecuador under two programs that are up for renewal in Congress. Our government will not reward countries for bad behavior," Menendez said.
The trade preferences, by the way, are a continuation of a 1991 pact (the Andean Trade Preference Act) wherein the US granted Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador and Peru improved access to the American market in exchange for better cooperation fighting drug production. In Iran-Contra lingo, it was a "trade for drugs" deal. As it turns out, it needs to be renewed every two years by lawmakers, thus occasioning Menendez's threat of non-renewal the next time around. Given its meagre trade, Ecuador benefited from this trade benefit with the US significantly as demonstrated by lobbying quite hard to continue it despite a steady stream of anti-American rhetoric. Really, Correa, like his purported opponents, is quite the hypocrite.

But I suppose things may have changed and Latin brio has overcome common sense: Ecuador's government has recently said, "go ahead, make my day":
Ecuador's leftist government thumbed its nose at Washington on Thursday by renouncing U.S. trade benefits and offering to pay for human rights training in America in response to pressure over asylum for former intelligence contractor Edward Snowden. The angry response threatens a showdown between the two nations over Snowden, and may burnish President Rafael Correa's credentials to be the continent's principal challenger of U.S. power after the death of Venezuelan socialist leader Hugo Chavez.

"Ecuador will not accept pressures or threats from anyone, and it does not traffic in its values or allow them to be subjugated to mercantile interests," government spokesman Fernando Alvarado said at a news conference.
I especially like the part about how Ecuador will gladly pay for the human rights training of Americans who keep yakking about them while acting in...let's just say inconsistent ways:
In a cheeky jab at the U.S. spying program that Snowden unveiled through leaks to the media, the South American nation offered $23 million per year to finance human rights training.
The funding would be destined to help "avoid violations of privacy, torture and other actions that are denigrating to humanity," Alvarado said. He said the amount was the equivalent of what Ecuador gained each year from the trade benefits.
The Latin Left is alive and well. If it weren't, then nobody would be making PR stunts of this nature to contest the seat vacated by the late Hugo Chavez. That said, let's just say that Ecuador has some way to go before topping Chavez's stunt of subsidizing heating oil purchases of poor Americans via the CITGO subsidiary of state-owned firm PVDSA.

Meanwhile, like his immediate predecessor, Obama should just shut the hell up and think before making more retarded statements about "Internet freedom" and so on if his government is always so hellbent on prosecuting these evildoers. Making folk heroes out of ninnies is a quintessentially American government pastime. This guy isn't even on Ecuadorean soil, fer cryin' out loud.

UPDATE: Note that the US has already cut Andean Trade Preference Act benefits with Bolivia, another repeat transgressor of the Will of America. However, Bolivia's case was over its nonchalance in combating drug production there whereas Ecuador's concerns...unusual and unrelated things.
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Is the IMF Beating Colleges at Online Learning?

♠ Posted by Emmanuel in , at 6/24/2013 03:43:00 PM
There is a big debate raging in academia about the relevance of university education as we know it today: First, it is becoming increasingly expensive as salaries remain stagnant or even decline as in the US and other Western nations. Second, do what universities offer have relevant course content, or are they becoming increasingly isolated in ivory towers without much practical application? Third, doesn't a higher education degree become obsolete far more quickly nowadays with the rate of advancement in all fields of human endeavour?

More and more educators believe that today's university paradigm is outmoded--and I am one of those who are asking this same question. That is, what value-added does having a college degree really offer? One of the solutions proposed, of course, is delivering course content online via what they call Massive Online Open Courses (MOOC) that can potentially deal with the issues raised above. First, delivering courses digitally allows universities to deliver courses--save for face-to-face interaction, of course--more cheaply and to a geographically broader audience. Second, material can be more readily tailored online to reflect the latest real-world trends and developments in various subject areas instead of sticking to the inbred world of folks who've been stuck in academia for years and years--like me! Third, updating of content is easier when you're not stuck with using sporadically updated textbooks and other dated course materials.

A potentially surprising vote of confidence in this idea is coming from, of all sources, the IMF. It faces the challenge of providing knowledge to many stakeholders in far-flung nations who wish to train officials better in matters of public financial management. Delivering technical assistance (i.e., advice) after all is one its main lines of business--see the table above taken from this 2011 IMF survey. What's more, it is in fact not hard up given steady incoming funding at this time because of various financial crises in different parts of the globe, but it is nonetheless moving with the times in trying to shift more courses online. Say what you will about the IMF--its critics are legion and include me--but it definitely has a 'brand' when it comes to public financial management. Unlike many middling universities, the IMF also does not lack takers for its educational services regardless of your opinion of its content:
The International Monetary Fund will make its training sessions on financial policy and debt sustainability available online this year to government officials worldwide, allowing it to reach a bigger audience at lower cost, it said on Wednesday. IMF financial workshops are meant to help governments address economic dilemmas and are currently held in eight training centers worldwide, meaning officials must travel and remain onsite for weeks, said Sharmini Coorey, director of the IMF's Institute for Capacity Development. That model is expensive for the IMF and its donor countries - and the classes fill quickly, Coorey said. In 2012, the IMF trained 7,800 officials in 270 workshops held in places like Singapore, Brazil, Kuwait and the African island of Mauritius.

"We have a lot of demand for our training and we don't have the scale to meet that demand," Coorey said. The online courses will be hosted by edX, a nonprofit consortium founded by Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. So far, the platform has primarily been used to host massive open online courses, or MOOCs, from elite universities.
The learning arm of the IMF, by the way, is known as the IMF Institute for Capacity Development. Get this: the IMF is even looking to expand its 'student base' insofar as others may wish to learn more about public financial management including civil society actors, consultancies, and so forth. Its marketing is sharp, too, with course offerings being made in different languages in the near future:
The classes will be in English, but may carry subtitles in other languages. They will open first to government officials within the next few months. Coorey plans to open them to the broader public in 2014. "We hope it will enhance public awareness and elevate the debate about economic issues," she said. The financial arrangements have not been made public, but edX President Anant Agarwal said the IMF courses would bring in revenue for the consortium. If it's a success, Agarwal said he would seek similar deals with other institutions, as well as corporations and nonprofits.
Who'd think that the IMF of all institutions would be an innovator in delivering online education modules? You may not agree with IMF policies and prescriptions (I usually don't). You may not even believe that it performs its functions well as the world's lender of last resort (ditto). However, when it comes to keeping in tune with the times in delivering timely and cost-effective solutions in education, it is making noticeable strides. It's hard  to imagine, but yes, the IMF seems to understand the logic driving MOOCs more than any number of universities still wedded to increasingly outmoded learning models.

I can't believe I'm saying this, but perhaps it's time that we let the IMF show us the way in higher education.

In the meantime, repeat after me, class: Savings...good! Debt...bad!

UPDATE: Details for the distance learning modules, AKA MOOCs, are already listed online.
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2013=1997? Volatile Asian Markets + SE Asia Haze

♠ Posted by Emmanuel in , at 6/21/2013 02:54:00 PM

There is something about Asia that seemingly brings on the confluence of cataclysmic financial and environmental events . In 1997, the Asian financial crisis devastated wide swathes of the region in a credit crunch of epic proportions. To further the doomsday mood, the Indonesia-Malaysia-Singapore area was blanketed with suffocating smog emanating from Indonesia's recurrent forest fires. So, not only did market plunges in the values of stocks and bonds take your breath away, but so did inhaling the thick smog.

More recently, some family friends working in Singapore were scheduled to leave for Manila but ran into delays when one of their young'uns had to see a doctor due to the heavy haze blanketing the Indonesia-Malaysia-Singapore area once more. You would have hoped that Southeast Asian nations had dealt with transboundary haze in a satisfactory manner sixteen years later, but no: Forest fires still occur that devastate large areas of the Indonesian rainforest, supposedly started by slash-and-burn tactics of subsistence farmers. For, the easiest way to clear forest cover remains to set in on fire; pity if that fire goes of control.

As it so happens, the Indonesia-Malaysia-Singapore "tri-smog area" is also experiencing financial turmoil as markets here in Asia are being rocked hard. As you probably know, there is much whiplash in bond, currency and equity markets here due to uncertainty over whether the US Federal Reserve will stop buying Treasuries by the tens of billions each month via quantitative easing. There is also uncertainty over the extent of Japan's own version of quantitative easing--for how long and how much? We're sure they would like to continue, but at what cost to Japan's purse? With interest rate expectations being adjusted upwards, it becomes more difficult to borrow money to speculate in stocks. In turn, the dollar is strengthening somewhat as some international investors reconsider their portfolio investments in Asia and head home.

[Cough...cough] Meanwhile, the blame game over smog is leading to a heated war of words between Singaporean and Malaysian officials [ahem...hem]. Amid the suffocating smog, Singapore's environment minister says Indonesia has "no right" to harm the health of his countrymen as the city-state's air quality has become the worst it's ever been, 1997 notwithstanding [choke...gasp!]:
"No country or corporation has the right to pollute the air at the expense of Singaporeans' health and well-being," Singapore's Environment and Water Resources Minister Vivian Balakrishnan said on his Facebook page.

Balakrishnan said Singapore had sent officials to an emergency haze meeting in the Indonesian capital, Jakarta. At 1:00 pm local time on Thursday, the city-state's pollution standards index (PSI) soared to a new high of 371, indicating air quality had deteriorated to "hazardous" levels, and exceeding the previous record set on Wednesday night.

A PSI reading above 300 indicates "hazardous" air, while a reading between 201 and 300 means "very unhealthy". The top PSI readings in Singapore over the past two days have exceeded the peak of 226 reached in 1997 when smog from Indonesian fires disrupted shipping and air travel across Southeast Asia.
OTOH, Indonesian officials think the (pampered?) Singaporeans to be a bunch of whingers--and worse.
Earlier on Thursday, Agung Laksono, the minister who is coordinating Indonesia's response to the haze crisis, accused Singapore of "behaving like a child" by complaining about severe haze from raging forest fires on Sumatra island that has cloaked the city-state. "Singapore should not be behaving like a child and making all this noise," he told reporters in Jakarta. Laksono was responding to Singapore's demands earlier on Thursday for "definitive" action by Indonesia to quell forest fires raging in Sumatra...
Agung Laksono said "It's not what Indonesians want, it's nature."
This being the IPE Zone, what's particularly interesting are Indonesian accusations that Singaporean firms in search of palm oil plantations may be responsible for these fires. What's more, even Singaporean authorities cannot discount this possibility altogether. Indonesian officials have thus tried to deflect blame by suggesting companies based in Singapore may be partly to blame for the fires. To which the Singaporean authorities say, (surprise!) prove it:
"It can easily last for several weeks and quite possibly longer until the dry season ends in Sumatra,"  [Singaporean PM] Lee Hsien Loong said on Thursday, warning of action if Singapore-linked companies were behind the burning. "On the scale of it, it's unlikely to be just small stakeholders slashing and burning."

Singapore has said it wants Indonesia to provide maps of land concessions so it can act against firms that allow slash-and-burn land clearing. The illegal burning of forest on Indonesia's Sumatra island, to the west of Singapore and Malaysia, to clear land for palm oil plantations is a chronic problem, particularly during the June to September dry season...
Indonesian officials have tried to deflect blame by suggesting companies based in Singapore may be partly to blame for the fires. Singapore has said it wants Indonesia to provide maps of land concessions so it can act against firms that allow slash-and-burn land clearing. The illegal burning of forest on Indonesia's Sumatra island, to the west of Singapore and Malaysia, to clear land for palm oil plantations is a chronic problem, particularly during the June to September dry season.
Let's just say this matter is not, ah, clearing up soon. So, on top of financial disturbances we have logistic ones as shipping, transportation and travel are adversely affected on a region-wide basis. Having rather bad memories of 1997, I honestly hope they can sort this issue once and for all to prevent future recurrences. Moreover, the simultaneous occurrence of financial and environmental volatility honestly disturbs me a lot given how much buck passing is happening:
"The slash-and-burn technique being used is the cheapest land-clearing method and it is not only used by local farmers, but also employees of palm oil investors including Singaporean and Malaysian companies,'' Hadi Daryanto, a senior official at Indonesia's Forestry Ministry, told Indonesian media. "We hope the governments of Malaysia and Singapore will tell their investors to adopt proper measures so we can solve this problem together.''
A few years back, LSE IDEAS hosted an event in Southeast Asia asking whether the region was up to the challenge of dealing with environmental issues. My erstwhile boss Munir Majid concluded, in so many words, no. It was thus with no small amount of disappointment that I find his words to be correct no matter how bad the truth hurts as Southeast Asia is once again being blanketed in unbreathable smog. Have the root causes of these fires been identified? No. Have sanctions been put into place to place to deter those responsible? No, for again we still aren't quite sure who the violators really are. Have Southeast Asian authorities been working together to deal with transboundary haze? No, they are bickering instead and trading barbs. Alas, read on to hear more of this sad story: Despite ASEAN coming up with an agreement to deal with transboundary haze pollution in 2002, let's say it hasn't quite worked as intended. 
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