[LINK] “A Star Pupil Flunks Out”

At Transitions Online, Martin Ehl writes about the problems associated with formerly Yugoslavian Slovenia’s well-managed, self-guided transition to capitalist independence. Was not enough changed?

After the declaration of independence in 1991, various formations composed of former communists who were careful about words such as privatization and foreign investment took turns governing the country. Yugoslavia’s socialist legacy had a lot to do with that, but so did the concerns of a small nation, which had, for the first time, its own country and feared that outsiders would again steamroll over its history, culture, and economy – this time not militarily, but economically. Sometime in 1998, for example, I first heard the story of how the Slovenians were preventing foreign speculation by requiring that money into and out of the country could legally be transferred through only one state-controlled account.

A right-wing government took power only in 2000, with its banner wielded mainly by former dissident Janez Jansa, who is known for seeing plots everywhere. He himself was accused of secret arms purchases during the dissolution of Yugoslavia. This year, his government fell not because of economic problems, although they played a role, but because of suspicions of corruption among ministers and the prime minister.

Slovenia’s shining image shows up in rankings of countries’ living standards and development. When we dig deeper into these indices, however, we can see the residue of the state-directed approach to the economy and the socialist attitude to the state as the hand that distributes full handfuls. For example, the Prosperity Index, compiled by London’s Legatum Institute, puts Slovenia at 24th of 142 countries. But the worst evaluated of the eight categories is the economy, while the best is the educational system.

It’s similar with the Catch-up Index, compiled by the Open Society Institute in Sofia, which judges whether and how quickly the former Eastern bloc countries are catching up with Western Europe. Of the four categories assessed Slovenia fared a shade better in quality of life than in democracy, governance, or the economy. It looks as if the Slovenians live well but have relied too much on their economic model working forever and even being able to grumble about their government, which, however, still controls most of the economy through state-owned banks and companies.

Just as Slovenians have a problem with privatization and opening up their economy to foreign investors, so it is in other areas. For example, a history-related time bomb has been ticking in Slovenian society, considered taboo all the way up until Jansa’s governments that ruled after 2000. During World War II, certainly not all Slovenes stood on the side of Tito’s partisans. Slovenia was divided during the war among the three occupying powers, and only much later Jansa and others began to talk about the massacres of tens of thousands of people from the so-called Slovene Home Guard – namely the units on the side of the Italians, Germans, and Hungarians, whom the allies in 1945 handed over to Tito’s units along with the remnants of the Croatian Ustasha and Serb forces loyal to the exiled Western governments.

[BLOG] Some Wednesday links

• Bag News Notes takes a look at the politi8cal iconography surrounding Chinese first lady, and patriotic singer, Peng Liuang.
• BCer in Toronto Jeff Jedras doesn’t like suggestion like the one made by Liberal leadership candidate Joyce Murray that, in order to bring down Harper, the NDP and Liberals should consider not running candidates in ridings where one party or another might break through against Conservatives. He favours a distinctly Liberal vision (which is?).
• Beyond the Beyond’s Bruce Sterling notes the recent finding that up to a third of American counties have declining populations.
• Daniel Drezner suggests that Europeans were never as strongly wedding to multilateralism as many, including Europeans, alleged.
• Eastern Approaches notes the failure of European Union-mediated talks between Kosova and Serbia, a consequence of Serbian resentment at the loss of Kosova.
• Geocurrents’ Martin Lewis maps global cell phone usage, which maps poorly with GDP per capita or wealth. Eastern European countries often have higher rates of cell phone ownership per person than western Europeans, for instance.
• Joe. My. God notes that the Irish Roman Catholic Church has threatened to respond to a legalization of same-sex marriage in that country by no longer solemnizing marriages, forcing couples to engage in a separate state ceremony. (This could backfire.)
• Personal Reflections’ Jim Belshaw argues that his home region of New England, in coastal eastern Australia, is an important political bellweather for his country.
• At the Planetary Science Blog, Marc Rayman writes about how his team is preparing for the Dawn probe’s upcoming encounter with Ceres in two years.
• Torontoist notes the happy news that Toronto sex shop Come As You Are has avoided closing down thanks to a successful online promotional campaign.
• Window on Eurasia’s Paul Goble notes various sources claiming that the 900 thousand ethnic Russians of Uzbekistan are increasingly unhappy living in a country where the Russian language is dropping out of general usage, the Russian colonial past in Uzbekistan is being criticized, and the only thing keeping many from leaving for Russia is a lack of means.

[BLOG] Some Friday links

• Bad Astronomy’s Phil Plait notes the discovery that the supermassive black hole at the center of galaxy NGC 1365 is rotating at nearly the speed of light. What does it mean?
• BlogTO features vintage photos of Queen Street East.
• Crasstalk’s TS posts a followup to the spreading scandals besetting the Canadian Senate. Oh, but for a unicameral federal legislature!
• Daniel Drezner notes that despite a consensus among economists that financial austerity isn’t working, politicians remain attached to the idea.
• Eastern Approaches had a couple of posts recently touching on Germany’s relationship with its eastern neighbours, one noting a historic address to the Bavarian state parliament by the Czech prime minister expressing regret for the post-Second World War expulsion of the Sudeten Germans, the second observing Germany’s critical role in managing the European integration of the Balkans.
• Geocurrents’ Martin Lewis notes that well-governed Ghana still sees ethnic splits reproducing themselves in electoral politics.
• At the New APPS Blog, John Protevi finds fault with Foucault’s sympathetic treatment of a 19th century Frenchman charged with sexual irregularities. What of the man’s partner (or victim)?
• Joshua Foust frames Kazakhstan’s foreign policy initiatives in the context of an economically prosperous country trying to translate wealth to power.
• Towleroad features a map of New York City showing where different non-English geotagged tweets were made. Spanish predominates over other languages, unsurprisingly, although English tweets outnumbered non-English tweets by thirty to one.

[LINK] “The most Catholic country in Europe? Croatia and the Catholic church”

As Croatia is set to become the 28th member-state of the European Union, Alex Sakalis’ Open Democracy essay describing the role of that other transnational institution in post-Second World War Croatia, the Roman Catholic Church. In Sakalis’ telling, the Roman Catholic Church in Croatia has definitely capitalized on its historical status as institutional guardian of Croat national identity, to the exclusion of alternative narratives as described below (or, for that matter, as demonstrated by the protests against sex education). How long this will continue to be viable is another question: Ireland, Spain, Portugal all ended up opting for secularization, after all.

One of the first actions of the Church was to attempt to reclaim land and property that had been nationalised during the communist period. This was part of a broader policy of privatisation that Tudjman enacted and which is blamed for much of the corruption and inequality that plagues Croatia today. Some notable church figures, such as Cardinal Bozanić, the Archbishop of Zagreb, criticised this swathe of privatisation measures as being harmful to the social renewal of the country. However, that has not prevented the church from asking for over €100 million-worth of nationalised land property to be returned to their ownership. A 2004 report estimated that the Catholic church received a stipend of around 180 million kuna per year from the state budget. The best paid Catholic clerics could earn up to 9,000 kuna a year (compare to the average of 10,000 kuna a Croatian doctor would earn in 2004), plus additional earnings from various pastoral services. Ordinary parish priests receive around 4,000 kuna. While these sums are not colossal, they do make being a cleric one of the more economically viable professions in Croatia. Overall, the results of privatisation and state privileges are clear to see – in 2005, the Catholic church was ranked among the five wealthiest entities in Croatia, comparable to oil and communications corporations.

Following the visit of Pope John Paul II to Croatia in 1998, the government and the Holy See signed a treaty which regulated issues between state and church. One of the most controversial parts was the introduction of the Catholic catechism into schools, effectively requiring the Croatian taxpayer to fund the Catholic church, regardless of their beliefs. The Law on Religious Communities, passed in 2002, went some way to rectifying the situation, although the Catholic church continues to be criticised for overtly trying to influence politics and society, with the BTI Development Index accusing it of trying to “incorporate its norms and values into a secular state.”

The role of the Catholic church in Croatia today is more than just that of a religious institution. It is, as the eminent Croat historian Vjekoslav Perica writes, an institution whose “agendas of spiritual awakening and nation-construction have required a suitable past that glorifies success and emphasises Croatia’s western European character and its suffering at the hands of godless communism”. This has consequently involved much amnesia about infamous episodes in its history, such as that of the Ustaše.

The reimagining of history has been an important part of the Church’s development in post-communist Yugoslavia as they have sought to balance the stigma of the Ustaše regime with the suffering of the church under communism. Archbishop Stepinac is no longer a controversial churchman but a blessed martyr (with a Cardinal Stepinac Day celebrated in many schools), and the red star is on a par with the swastika in terms of offensiveness.

Coupled with this has been the systematic defacement and removal of numerous anti-fascist monuments that were erected during the communist era. Around 3,000 of these memorials in Croatia have been vandalised or removed by local authorities, with little or no attempt made to restore them. Many of these monuments were of artistic or historical value, commemorating the mass murder of Serbs and Jews by the Ustaše, or the Croat anti-fascists who died during the liberation of their land. Their place has been taken by memorials to Ustaše criminals such as Mile Budak (a monument to him in Lika was later taken down to facilitate EU accession negotiations). At the centre of all this has been the Catholic church, which has welcomed the removal of partisan monuments and tacitly supported the erection of monuments and instituted debates which revise Croatia’s WW2 history.

[BLOG] Some Wednesday links

• In a recent essay, Paul Belshaw writes about the often overlooked diversity of the different groups which contributed to the founding of modern Australia, whether Aborigines, the peoples of the British Isles, or Germans.
• The Burgh Diaspora notes that, attracted by a prosperous economy back home, many Brazilian immigrants in New England are returning.
• Eastern Approaches notes a controversial event in Kosovo: the publication of a book memorializing the dead of that disputed country.
• At A Fistful of Euros, Edward Hugh argues that despite export success, domestic demand in Spain has collapsed sufficiently to make economic recovery impossible.
• Geocurrents maps the strong regional identities of South Korea as expressed in the vote in last year’s presidential election.
• Sociology, the Global Sociology Blog suggests, is the science of “slow violence”, of bad things happening so quietly over such a long stretch of time as to obscure their existence (or the responsibility for said).
• Language Hat links approvingly to an essayist writing about the role of women in introducing language change, like “vocal fry”.
• Lawyers, Guns and Money’s Erik Loomis writes more about the desperation of New England cod fishers. It looks so familiar.
• Peter Rukavina found the first use of the word “Internet” in Prince Edward Island’s legislative assembly (April 1996, in a speech by Premier Catherine Callbeck about the province’s new website).
• Concerns about the intrusion of the Latin alphabet into Cyrillic-using areas of the former Soviet Union are present at Window on Eurasia, whether we’re talking of the spread of Latin script and local norms generally in Belarus or concerns by Kazakh writers that switching that language’s script from Cyrillic to Latin could cut off Kazakh users from their language’s extensive past.

[BRIEF NOTE] On the risks of British departure from the European Union

British Prime Minister David Cameron has done it.

Prime Minister David Cameron said Wednesday he will offer British citizens a vote on whether to leave the European Union if his party wins the next election, a move which could trigger alarm among fellow member states.

He acknowledged that public disillusionment with the EU is “at an all-time high,” using a long-awaited speech in central London to say that the terms of Britain’s membership in the bloc should be revised and the country’s citizens should have a say.

Cameron proposed Wednesday that his Conservative Party renegotiate the U.K.’s relationship with the European Union if it wins the next general election, expected in 2015.

“Once that new settlement has been negotiated, we will give the British people a referendum with a very simple in or out choice to stay in the EU on these new terms. Or come out altogether,” Cameron said. “It will be an in-out referendum.”

[. . .] Cameron stressed that his first priority is renegotiating the EU treaty — not leaving the bloc.

“I say to our European partners, frustrated as some of them no doubt are by Britain’s attitude: work with us on this,” he said.

Much of the criticism directed at Cameron has accused him of trying an “a la carte” approach to membership in the bloc and seeking to play by some but not all of its rules.

Speaking as a Canadian familiar with Québec’s intermittent flirtation with the idea of separatism, I’ve a few things to point out.

• Much of British history towards political Europe is ill-informed. One thing that frequently comes up in Euroskeptic discourse is a hostility towards the European Court of Human Rights, a supranational legal institution associated not with the European Union but with the entirely separate Council of Europe. Too much critical detail goes unnoticed, or unknown.
• Much like Québec separatists who confidently assume that after a “Oui” majority in a referendum the province could negotiate whatever arrangement it would like with a rump Canada, even a nominally pro-European Union politician like David Cameron seems to be making the mistake of assuming that a threat of separation will lead Britain’s European partners to make whatever changes the British government might want. I’m very skeptical of this. Perhaps more likely is a complete breakdown of the federation–in their own ways, the Soviet Union, Czechoslovakia, and Yugoslavia came apart when this brinkmanship occurred.
• Many British Euroskeptics also seem to believe that, if the United Kingdom left the European Union, not only the United States but the entire Commonwealth would welcome the erstwhile founder of the Anglo-Saxon world. I can speak only for Canada, but there is no body of radically pro-Commonwealth sentiment in Canada. Canadian identity is no longer bound up with the Commonwealth in the way it was a half-century ago. If anything, British departure from the European Union would make the United Kingdom a less desirable partner relative to other European countries of a similar size.
• British departure from the European Union would be a catastrophe for the country. Unless a non-EU United Kingdom follows the lead of Switzerland and Norway in accepting European Union regulations while lacking any voice in formulating them, the United Kingdom will be outside of the various markets. What will happen to, among other things, Britain’s financial sector? (Frankfurt and Dublin will do nicely.)
• I can’t help but wonder what the consequences for Scotland might be if Britain departed. Could we get a Scottish separatism invigorated by the desire to remain in, or return to, the European Union?

Thoughts?

[BLOG] Some Tuesday links

• Centauri Dreams’ Paul Gilster writes about the likely abundance of Earth-like planets in Earth-like orbits.
• Daniel Drezner writes (1, 2) about how ad hoc coalitions of world powers are able to deal relatively decisively in some matters of global affairs.
• At The Dragon’s Tales, Will Baird notes that Titan’s hydrocarbon lakes appear to have floating ice.
• Eastern Approaches notes the toxicity that disputes over war memorials in the Balkans, noting an Albanian memorial in southern Serbia.
• False Steps’ Paul Drye notes one rocket technology that, if adequately developed, could have let the Soviet Union reach the moon.
• At A Fistful of Euros, Alexander Harrowell notes that the United States does not want the United Kingdom to leave the European Union.
• Marginal Revolution asks questions about the geographical, historical, and other factors that let free cities survive.
• The Signal’s Bill LeFurgy compares digital archivists’ work to that of paleontologists. Nice analogy.
• Yorkshire Ranter Alexander Harrowell notes that conservative British pundits in the United States are a much smaller and more unrepresentative minority than is often believed.
• Window on Eurasia notes that Soviet-era apologia for the deadly assault on the Vilnius radio station in 1991 is being used in modern Russia.

[BLOG] Some Wednesday links

• Beyond the Beyond’s Bruce Sterling links to a review of a book highlighting the prominent role played by the nearly one million Chinese migrants in Africa.
• James Bow examines the Southridge Mall, a mall in Iowa’s Des Moines that engaged in a suicidally bad redesign.
• Centauri Dreams’ Paul Gilster summarizes a recent study by astronomers of the different layers of the atmosphere of brown dwarf 2MASSJ22282889-431026.
• Daniel Drezner is skeptical of the idea that American military deployments abroad give the United States an economic edge, pointing to the example of South Korea.
• Eastern Approaches examines the political mood in Serbia, finding an odd optimism that–if unsatisfied–could turn badly on the incumbents.
• The Global Sociology Blog shares a chart showing the relationships, ideological and even dynastic, between the most powerful factions in China.
• Razib Khan at GNXP deconstructs the myth of “Mitochondrial Eve” as the only woman who left descendants.
• The Planetary Society Blog’s Emily Lakdawalla sums up the ongoing American Astronomical Society conference. Plenty of news about exoplanets!
• The Signal describes the efforts of oral historian Doug Boyd to come up with a suitable file format for oral histories.
• Torontoist highlights the Sherlock Holmes collection of the Toronto Reference Library.

[URBAN NOTE] “New York, a graveyard for languages”

The BBC has an interesting article by Mark Turin describing how the cosmopolis of New York City is a refuge for many dying languages, thanks to its status as a destination for migrants from around the world.

(Gottscheerish, the German dialect spoken in the former language island of Gottschee in southern Slovenia; the background to that is described in Michael Manske’s 2004 post at The Glory of Carniola.)

Home to around 800 different languages, New York is a delight for linguists, but also provides a rich hunting ground for those trying to document languages threatened with extinction.

[. . .] New York is not just a city where many languages live, it is also a place where languages go to die, the final destination for the last speakers of some of the planet’s most critically endangered speech forms.

[. . .]

A recent Census Bureau report notes that in the United States, the number of people speaking a language other than English at home increased by 140% over the last 30 years, with at least 303 languages recorded in this category.

Originally home to the indigenous Lenape people, then settled by the Dutch, conquered by the English and populated by waves of migrants from every country ever since, the five boroughs that make up the Big Apple – The Bronx, Brooklyn, Manhattan, Queens, and Staten Island – are home to every major world language, but also countless vanishing voices, many of which have just a few remaining speakers.

No longer do aspiring field linguists have to trek halfway across the world to collect data on Zaghawa or Livonian, they can just take the Number 7 train a few stops where they will find speakers of some of the 800 languages that experts believe are spoken in New York.

[. . .]

Recognising what a unique opportunity New York provided, two linguists and a performance poet – Daniel Kaufman, Juliette Blevins and Bob Holman – set up the Endangered Language Alliance, an urban initiative for endangered language research and conservation.

“This is the city with the highest linguistic density in the world and that is mostly because the city draws large numbers of immigrants in almost equal parts from all over the globe – that is unique to New York,” says Kaufman.

Several languages have been uttered for the very last time in New York, he says.

“There are these communities that are completely gone in their homeland. One of them, the Gottscheers, is a community of Germanic people who were living in Slovenia, and they were isolated from the rest of the Germanic populations.

“They were surrounded by Slavic speakers for several hundreds of years so they really have their own variety [of language] which is now unintelligible to other German speakers.”

The last speakers of this language have ended up in Queens, he says, and this has happened to many other communities.

[BLOG] Some Friday links

• Centauri Dreams’ Paul Gilster notes the theories that planets orbiting younger stars, on account of their greater abundances of heavy elements, will be warmer than older planets like Earth, extending habitable zones deeper into planetary systems than previously believed.
• Daniel Drezner is unimpressed by American skills at empire-building; even the surfeit of Americans involved in the reconstruction of Kosovo arguably plays to the Kosovars’ benefit more than to the United States.
• Will Baird at The Dragon’s Tale notes that a recent Australian study of fossils of multicellular fossils from more than a half-billion years ago, the Ediacaran age, aren’t ancestral to modern land-dwellers.
• The Global Sociology Blog notes the ways in which privilege can couch itself as neutrality, i.e. heterosexuality as normal and queerness as not.
• Lawyers, Guns and Money broke for me the news that the Syrian government is using Scud missiles against rebels, inaccurate though they may be. Is this a sign of desperation?
• Marginal Revolution notes that educated East Asian women tend not to marry, perhaps reflecting the choice forced on them between careers and traditional families.
• At Open the Future, Jamais Cascio considers the ethical questions connected with sexbots.
• The Population Reference Blog notes the changing American population: aging, slower-growing, more diverse.
• Torontoist reports on a forum in Toronto on the need to repair high-rise apartment towers.
• The Volokh Conspiracy shares the old argument that the commercial exploitation of resources in space requires private property rights, first.
• Window on Eurasia notes that at least economically, China is replacing Russia as a partner for post-Soviet Central Asia.