I disavow any clairvoyant powers. I’m not the one in my family who seesghosts. I don’t have winning gambling streaks. I simply believe with the poetThomas Campbell that “coming events cast their shadows before.” The FannieMae and Freddie Mac disaster was visible in the distance some time previously,just as a tidal wave can be predicted by a suddenly very wide beach covered withgasping fish. It wasn’t a case of “whether,” but of “when.” That I happened to hit the very large nail so exactly with my insignificant little hammer was a caseof dumb luck, not clairvoyance.

The subprime mortgage craze was not alone in its actions-have-consequences effects. As early as 2003, just before the onset of the Iraq war—ina piece written for The Nation, called “Letter to America”—I’d wagged my premonitory finger at the possibility of a great big black hole of war debt, a holethat duly appeared. The United States has not been the first country to come togrief over excessive military expenses. That Iknew this came not from clairvoyance but frommy long-standing interest in military historyand its effects on the life of nations. It was thesame interest that led to The Handmaid’s Tale,largely assumed to be feminist in nature, but infact a study of the form a dictatorship wouldlikely take, should one arise in the UnitedStates. The basics of dictatorships don’t vary alot, it seems; and they almost always includereproductive dictatorship of one kind or another.(More babies, fewer babies, who must have or

The Dark Side ofGlobalization

W hen Ron Deibert decided theMunk Centre’s Citizen Labwas ready to reveal its explo-

sive discovery of a malicious cyberspynetwork, he contacted a reporter-friendat The New York Times. John Markoff,the newspaper’s senior technologyreporter, broke the news in a front-pagestory on March 29, setting off a frenzyof news coverage worldwide. SaysDeibert: “We knew this was a signifi-cant story, but we had no idea it was thisbig. On Monday morning, it was thebiggest story anywhere in the world.”

Camera crews and reportersdescended on the Munk Centre tointerview Professor Deibert, Directorof the Citizen Lab, and fellowresearchers Nart Villeneuve and Greg Walton from the Citizen Lab, and Rafal Rohozinski from SecDevGroup, an Ottawa-based consultancy.The team members related how, after a 10-month investigation, they hadidentified a cybernetwork of more than 1,200 infected computers in 103

Technology andGlobalization

COVER STORY BY MARGARET ATWOOD

Recently, as a fundraiser for a magazine called The Walrus, I wrote out five areas of prediction, rolled the pages up, sealed them with sealingwax, and put them into a crystal bottle. The predictions were auctioned

off, fetching a pleasing $8,000. The crystal bottle/ball was an allusion to my supposed clairvoyance, which

had enabled me to publish a book called PAYBACK: Debt and the Shadow Sideof Wealth at the exact moment that the fallout from the Freddie Mac and FannieMae mortgage meltdown was causing havoc in the world’s financial markets.“How did you know?” people began asking, while at the same time requestinginvestment tips and market clues. When would the worst be over? What wouldcome next? Was there hope?

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MUNK CENTRE MONITORVIEWS, NEWS, PEOPLE AND EVENTS FROM THE MUNK CENTRE

SPRING 2009

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EDITORIAL MISSIONA forum to extend and enhance the contribution of the Munk Centre forInternational Studies to public debate on important international issues and contribute to public education.

STAY UP TO DATEFor weekly listings of Munk Centreevents subscribe at listserv@listserv.utoronto.ca: subscribe MCIS-L First Name Last Name. Or contactjanet.hyer@utoronto.ca

Continued on page 6

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VIEW FROM THE DIRECTOR

JANICE GROSS STEIN

Identity and Globalization

In the face of the most severe recessionin living memory, globalization is inretreat. At least for the moment, world

trade has shrunk, exports have declined,and global credit markets have contracted.Loans were “securitized,” and the distancegrew between lenders and borrowers, whono longer knew one another. It was thisfading of identity that created the condi-tions for the bubble in real estate and thecredit markets. At the core of the “GreatRecession” is a crisis of identity.

But scholars at the Munk Centre arethinking forward, beyond the puncturing ofthe bubbles and the shrinking of global markets to new ways of protecting identity.The Citizen Lab at the Munk Centre is shin-ing a spotlight on the dark side of global-ization, on the deviant activities that theconnectivity of the global communicationstructure makes possible. Margaret Atwoodcame to the Munk Centre to speak about thebright side of globalization, about the kindsof innovation global society will need as itemerges from recession and works toward asustainable future of regrowth. And DavidWolfe, Co-Director of the Program onGlobalization and Regional InnovationSystems at the Munk Centre, writes aboutthe importance of place in innovation.

Ron Deibert and his colleagues at theCitizen Lab captured worldwide attentionwhen they released their discovery that aserver located on a remote island in Chinahad penetrated government institutionsaround the world and was monitoring emailtraffic and confidential communication.Those who perpetrated the “cybercrime”were able to turn on cameras in the compromised computers without theknowledge of the owners and “watch” aswell as “listen” to the traffic.

What the Citizen Lab discoveredthrough its innovative technology is indeedthe dark side of globalization. Privacy canbe invaded, confidentiality can be compro-mised, and identity can be stolen throughthe same processes of communication thatenable connectivity and globalization. TheWorld Wide Web that simultaneously

Continued on page 2

While Atwood disavows her clairvoyant powers, she agrees with the observation: “coming events cast their shadows before.”

Margaret Atwood

Cyberwarriors: Villeneuve (left), Walton,and Deibert

Jenn

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Rob

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UPFRONT

allows us to shrink distance and to speedup communication also enables sophisti-cated cybercrime.

Deibert and his colleagues argue thatthe freedom of the Web must be defendedagainst cybercriminals, that we must beginto think hard about a new “arms control”regime for cyberspace. Just as governmentsprotect the privacy of citizens in other areasof their lives, so governments must put inplace new policies and procedures to protect themselves and their citizens incyberspace. Canada could mobilize otherlike-minded countries committed to freedomof speech and to the privacy of their citizensto press for a new arms control regime.

Margaret Atwood writes eloquently inthis issue about the need for innovation thatcan sustain our economy and society whenwe emerge from the global recession. Long-distance shipping of food, for example,which leaves a large carbon footprint,makes little sense in a world that should be focused on sustainability. Technologiesthat shrink distance, that make travel lessnecessary, will become more important assustainability becomes important. The“long pen,” which Margaret Atwood haschampioned, does precisely that. In ananonymous world, where identity can easily be compromised—as the Citizen Labdemonstrated so brilliantly—the LongPentransmits the unique signature of each individual across distance. The theft ofidentity, the compromise of who we are, is what is most at risk as globalizationaccelerates and deepens. The LongPenexemplifies the kind of innovation that weneed to protect identity in a tightly connect-ed sustainable society and economy.

David Wolfe, reporting on a decade ofresearch, writes about the importance of clus-ters in the dynamic of innovation. Innovativefirms tend to be located in close proximity toone another, he argues, clustered together.Even as globalization deepened, the “local”grew as an important site for innovation.Where we are and who we are matters.

There is much to learn from the historyof the last several years. Historians, econo-mists, and regulators will be pouring overthe books to design the regulations that willprevent this kind of crisis from happeningagain. That certainly is important work. Butit is only part of the challenge. Ron Deibertat the Citizen Lab, Margaret Atwood, andDavid Wolfe are each pointing the way forward. Building the sustainable economyof the future will require technological and social innovation to safeguard identityas technology and financial instrumentsbecome increasingly sophisticated.

CITIZEN LAB RESEARCH SPARKS GLOBAL COVERAGETHE POWER OF WORDS

Published seasonally and distributed to

international opinion leaders by the

Munk Centre for International Studies.

Director: Janice Gross Stein

Executive Director: Margaret McKone

Munk Centre for International Studies

University of Toronto

1 Devonshire Place

Toronto, Ontario, Canada, M5S 3K7

Phone: 416-946-8900

Email: munk.centre@utoronto.ca

Website: www.utoronto.ca/mcis/

NEED A SOURCE?

Munk Centre scholars can be contacted forfurther comment on issues raised in thisedition at munk.centre@utoronto.ca.Commentators in this issue:Randall Hansen, Acting Director of the Centrefor European, Russian, and Eurasian Studies

Adèle Hurley, Director of the Program on Water Issues

Ralph Pentland, Acting Chair of the Canadian Water Issues Council

Janice Gross Stein, Director of the MunkCentre for International StudiesDavid A. Wolfe, Co-Director of the Program onGlobalization and Regional Innovation Systems

MUNK CENTRE MONITOR

Director of Editorial Janice Stein

Managing Editor Margaret McKone

Art Director Lawrence Finn

Assistant Editor Janet Hyer

Information Systems Sean Willett

Contributing Photographer Nicolett Jakab

Contributing Writer Michael Benedict

Editorial Board: Janice Gross Stein, Robert Bothwell,

Elspeth Brown, Jeffrey Kopstein,

Louis W. Pauly, Joseph Wong

2

Continued from page 1

VIEW FROM THE DIRECTOR

Janice Gross Stein, Director of the MunkCentre for International Studies, is anacknowledged expert on conflict resolutionand international relations, with an emphasison the Middle East. A Fellow of the TrudeauFoundation, Professor Stein has served onmany international advisory panels, includingthe Working Group on Middle EastNegotiations at the United States Institute ofPeace. Professor Stein is the coauthor of We All Lost the Cold War (1994), The Cult of Efficiency (2001), and The UnexpectedWar: Canada in Kandahar (2007).

countries worldwide. Almost all of thenetwork’s control servers were trackedto China. “High-value targets” includ-ed Indonesia’s Ministry of ForeignAffairs, the Indian Embassy inKuwait, and a NATO computer. Othertargets included a dozen infected com-puters traced to Canada.

The investigation began after theCitizen Lab was invited by the DalaiLama to determine whether the comput-er system at his headquarters was compromised. Walton determined that itwas infected with so-called “malware”that allowed a mysterious outside entityto not only spy on the computer, but also extract data from it. Researcherswatched someone, somewhere, extract acopy of a document detailing the negoti-ating positions of the Dalai Lama’senvoy. “What we were witnessing wasan international crime taking place,”Deibert told The Globe and Mail.

With the activity recorded, in some1.2-gigabytes of raw data, the teambegan investigative work in Toronto.The researchers knew there was a back-bone behind the malicious software onthe Dalai Lama’s office computers, butthey couldn’t pinpoint it. In March,Villeneuve came across a line of codethat appeared to begin with numbers

that signified a date. He put the code inGoogle and was led to a U.S.-basedserver, then to three more in China.

The ImplicationsWhile the Chinese government wasquick to brand suggestions of a Chinesespy ring as a pack of lies, Deibert iscareful not to allege that the Chinesegovernment is behind the cyberspy network, saying he simply does nothave hard evidence to support that conclusion. It could also be the work of so-called “patriotic hackers” in China.

Six years ago, Deibert wrote aGlobe and Mail column on the chal-lenges to Internet freedom in which heasked, “Has the time come for cyber-arms control?” Reluctantly, he nowsays the answer is definitely yes.

Canada can take a leadership role inthis new area of arms control, accordingto Deibert and his fellow researchers.This is a natural role for Canada, hesays, because of its past leadership inarms control and historical experiencewith telecommunications. For its part,the Munk Centre is already on the cutting edge of this emerging field,both in technological terms and in theorizing about how these technolo-gies impact on world politics.

Concludes Deibert: “Cyberspace

has become an object of geopoliticalcontestations among states and non-stateactors. Tools to do harm can be down-loaded for free and used by anyone. We need to rein this in without undulyrestricting the freedom of the Internet.”He adds: “The Internet is both a wonderful and frightening thing.”

The press conference is available athttp://hosting.epresence.tv/munk

The GhostNet report is available athttp://www.infowar-monitor.net/ghostnet

Continued from page 1

Spotlight on Citizen Lab: camera crews and reporters descended on the Munk Centre for the GhostNet news conference.

This Just In….Right on the heels of their GhostNetdiscovery, Ron Deibert and his teamat Citizen Lab won a prestigiousBritish award for promoting interna-tional freedom of expression througha revolutionary Internet software pro-gram, called psiphon. The program,which allows Internet access in coun-tries where censorship is imposed,garnered The Economist New MediaAward at the Index on CensorshipPress Freedom Awards in London.Judges lauded the program, whichturns a regular home computer into a personal, encrypted server, capableof retrieving and displaying Webpages anywhere.

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3 SPRING 2009

Apacked audience was on hand atthe Munk Centre on March 31for the presentation of the 19th

annual Gelber Prize, awarded for theyear’s best book on international affairs.The 2009 prize was presented toProfessor Sir Lawrence Freedman for AChoice of Enemies: America Confrontsthe Middle East, which the Gelber Prizejury selected unanimously as the winnerfrom about 120 entries and five finalists.

The evening’s host, Janice GrossStein, Director of the Munk Centre,described the winning book as a wonder-ful read. “The prose is sharp and lucidbut the thinking behind it is deep.” NoahRubin, chair of the Lionel Gelber PrizeBoard, said: “If you were to selectonly one book to understand the turmoil and confusion of events inthe Middle East over the past 30 years, this is a perfect choice.”

In A Choice of Enemies, Freedman, a Professor of War Studies at King’s College, London and a distinguished military historian,provides a sweeping narrative of the last three decades of U.S. foreign policy and contemporary history in the Middle East. The book provides fresh insight into the complexity and motivationsof U.S. foreign policy choices—and missed opportunities—for a succession of presidents as they coped with events in the region, from Iran and Afghanistan toLebanon, Iraq, and Israel. The Financial Times has described the book as “a linkednarrative of all the problems confronting the U.S.” that gives “an unrivalled sense ofall the pressures and trade-offs facing American Presidents.”

Commenting on the book’s title, Freedman said: “I was struck by how the UnitedStates had managed to find itself in conflict at the same time with Iraq, Iran, and al Qaeda, all of which were antagonistic to one another. The more I looked back overthe three decades the more appropriate the title seemed.”

Freedman’s book supplies a context to recent events and warns against easyassumptions: neoconservatives, supporters of Israel, and the hawks are not the only orthe principal reasons for the failure to develop a viable foreign policy in the MiddleEast. Decisions were made amidst a complexity of considerations. “The United Stateshas had to choose whom to oppose and whom to support, and then how, with whatconditions, and to what degree, to oppose and to support. Such fateful commitmentscould depend on quite singular combinations of circumstances.”

In his lecture, Freedman drew insights from the book to provide a context for present policy. The three-decade period, he noted was characterized by “a constantsurge for a reasonable regional order,” which was not realized. One reason: the region’s“tendency to fragmentation, and a lack of deep economic relationships between

CENTRE EVENTS

THE 2009 GELBER PRIZE WINNER: A CHOICE OF ENEMIES

THE 2009 GELBER PRIZE FINALISTS

DESCENT INTO CHAOSThe United States and theFailure of Nation Buildingin Pakistan, Afghanistan,

and Central AsiaAhmed Rashid

With an extraordinarily intimate understandingof regional politics, Ahmed Rashid exposes

the miscalculations, dissimulations, and failures of will that are brewing further

instability in a volatile part of the world.

Viking

THE POST-AMERICANWORLD

Fareed ZakariaFareed Zakaria lucidly argues

that the era of theAmerican hegemonic superpower

is over, but the stageis set for a reinvigorated

United States to play a morecreative role in a

competitive world of newlyrising powers.

W.W. Norton

RIVALSHow the Power Struggle

Between China, India and JapanWill Shape Our Next Decade

Bill EmmottA clear-eyed, provocative look at

the three rising economicand political powers of Asia and thebalance of power that could make

their continued rise a source of good – or ill – in the immediate future.

Harcourt

McMAFIAA Journey Throughthe Global Criminal

UnderworldMisha Glenny

Journalist Misha Glenny creates a sharply reported, finely drawn tour ofthe new centres of the criminal trade

in weapons, drugs, women, and illicit cash,which offer daunting challenges to

human rights and international stability.

Knopf

2009

LIONEL GELBE

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PR

IZEW I N N E R

states” that could offset it.The U.S. has made mistakes, he said,

but it is not the only power to do so,adding “The Middle East is the grave-yard of foreign policy.” As for U.S. mis-steps, Freedman noted that when theBush administration included Iran in the“axis of evil” after much equivocation,another viable option was closed—apolicy of encouraging the growing coun-terrevolutionary forces in the country.

The U.S. is hampered in the region,he said, because it is “an external power,whose motives are suspect and has a reputation for a short attention span.”For the U.S. and other major powers,“The Middle East has pushed to the forethe inherent tension in foreign policy—the tension between staying true to prin-ciples while at the same time dealingwith regional and local complexities.” In that regard, U.S. policy has been “hindered by a tendency of presidents tocast issues in terms of good and evil.” InWashington, he writes, “Justifications

for action tend to be stated starkly and urgently. The malign and dangerous features ofenemies tend to be talked up, as do the exemplary and deserving qualities offriends…Washington politics is intolerant of nuance and ambiguity.”

As a result, “A conversation with the United States is presented as a major prize initself, something for which the other side should be prepared to pay a heavy politicalprice.” Better to keep lines of communication open. “A conversation with Iran, to takean obvious instance, may end in bad temper, but until it is tried it is hard to know. Thekey point is to reduce the symbolic significance of the fact of conversation and presentit as no more than normal diplomacy.”

On an encouraging note, Freedman observed that the Obama administration hasbegun diplomatic contacts with both Iran and Syria.

In Freedman’s view: “For Americans, the challenge is to revive their diplomaticskills, learning how to work with the local political grain without losing a sense of purpose and principle, pushing parties to cooperation, supporting social and economic along with political reform, and encouraging a positive engagement withthe rest of the world.”

The Gelber Prize was founded in 1989 by diplomat and historian Lionel Gelber andis presented annually by the Gelber Foundation in partnership with the Munk Centreand Foreign Policy magazine. The Economist magazine has described the Gelber Prizeas the world’s most important award for non-fiction.

From left: BarbaraMcDougall, LawrenceWright, Judith Gelber

Noah Rubin (left) presents the prize toFreedman.

4

INSIGHTS

SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY AND INNOVATION IN A GLOBAL ERA

The increasing salience of knowledge and innovation in theglobal economy is focusing

attention on the innovative capacity ofnational economies. Whether they areleft behind, or prosper by developingand enhancing that capacity, is a pivotal challenge of the 21st century.Innovation and technical progress are generated by a complex set of structures that produce, distribute, and apply various kinds of knowledge.The degree of complementarity or fitbetween the various institutions thatperform this role—whether corpora-tions, universities, or governments—iscentral, as is the effectiveness withwhich they respond to rapid technolog-ical changes around the globe.

The extent of this challenge is accentuated by the combined effects ofglobalization and rapid technologicalchange in the world economy. The trend towards globalization and the ease with which data and information is transmitted among firms has fosteredthe view that national and regional differences account for little in theemerging information technology paradigm—popularized by the formereditor of The Economist in the familiarphrase about the “death of distance.”

The extent and nature of globaliza-tion can be gauged in several ways.One dimension refers to the growingintegration of markets and productionstrategies, which facilitates the designand production of goods for global,rather than simply national, markets.The globalization of world markets isno longer limited to financing, produc-tion, or sales, but includes the ever-greater internationalization of researchand the acquisition of knowledge. Thesourcing of components on a globalbasis, and the increasing reliance on thenegotiation of strategic alliances withother firms for R&D, production, ormarketing of goods further contributesto the integration of national economiesinto a global one. As researchers in theInnovation Systems Research Networkhave demonstrated, the most innovativeCanadian firms, in industries such asaerospace and information technology,are integrated into dense global supplychains that provide key components oftheir final products. The critical factorsthat anchor those firms in their domes-tic locations are the quality of the locallabour force educated and trained in ouruniversities and colleges, as well as thelocal R&D capabilities.

This reflects growing linkagebetween the globalization of technolo-gy and the increasing importance ofR&D and knowledge in the new para-digm. The rise of information technolo-gy and global telecommunication net-works enables firms to organize andcoordinate their R&D and their acquisi-tion of technical knowledge on a globalbasis. It reflects one element of thegrowing reliance on strategic alliancesby multinational firms. Companies thatcompete on a global basis are establish-ing their own research activities in key

R&D centres and building strategicalliances with both university researchcentres and other firms that possesscomplementary knowledge and skillsof economic development.

This perspective, which focuses on the technological dimension ofinformation and communication tech-nologies, rather than the organizationaland learning dimensions associatedwith them, tends to emphasize the leveling effect of the technologies andaccentuates the trend towards conver-gence, thus reducing the significance ofnational and regional differences inlocational decisions. Techno-globalismrefers to the fact that more and more,multinational corporations are exploit-ing technology globally and gainingaccess to new technology through thediffusion of R&D and increased collab-oration. Despite this trend, national dif-ferences among the leading industrialcountries, and regional specificitieswithin them, remain significant and thespecific character of the home base iscrucial for the innovativeness ofdomestic firms. The geography of pro-duction in the new economy is markedby a “paradoxical consequence of globalization”—the simultaneousgrowth in importance of the locality asa site for innovation. As the informationand communication networks createdby digital technologies integrate theeconomies of the globe ever more tightly, they simultaneously increasethe relevance of space and proximityfor the innovation process.

A recent report from the NationalResearch Council of the NationalAcademies in the United States highlights the continuing relevance ofthe national scale of government in a globalizing world.

Recognizing that a capacity to inno-vate and commercialize new high-tech-nology products is increasingly a partof the international competition foreconomic leadership, governmentsaround the world have taken activesteps to strengthen their national inno-vation systems. These steps underscorethe belief that the rising costs and risksassociated with new potentially high-payoff technologies, and the growingglobal dispersal of technical expertise,require national R&D programs to sup-port new and existing high technologyfirms within their borders.

Governments play a central role incoordinating the elements of the nation-al innovation system, especially withrespect to striking a balance betweenthe operation of the science system,which is not profit oriented and is moti-vated by the search for new discoveries,and the world of technology, which isdriven by the profit motive and oper-ates with a shorter time horizon. Inmost countries, government is a prima-ry funder of the science system, with itsshare ranging from a low of 20 percentto more than 50 percent of research anddevelopment expenditures. (In Canada,the share is 24 percent.) A key taskinvolves ensuring the appropriate mix

of skills and resources between the twosectors; but solutions to this challengevary considerably, as no two countriesenjoy the same mix of innovativeresources in the different elements thatconstitute their innovation systems. Thedegree of connectedness between com-ponents of the system and the ease with which applicable knowledge, scientificdiscoveries, and the highly skilledresources to staff the innovation system flow across the different elements of the system is critical for theeffectiveness of its operation.

The national innovation systems in the U.S. and other countries haveexperienced a shift in recent decadesthat includes greater reliance by estab-lished firms on external sources ofR&D through research consortia andcollaboration with focused technologyfirms; the global outsourcing of R&Dby domestic firms in foreign countries,including China and India; and theproliferation of university-industrycollaboration and research centres. Inthe key sector of information and communication technologies, thegrowth of complex supply networksamong firms and the shift to a more“open model” of innovation has givenrise to a wide range of more collabora-tive relationships. What occurs in thekey locales of the more industrializedeconomies are the core interactionsbetween lead firms and key suppliersthat resist easy codification, such asdesign, development of prototypes,and determining the validity of manu-facturing processes.

The spreading impact of the global-ization of R&D and the interpenetrationof national innovation systems has led,in turn, to a new preoccupation by gov-ernments with refocusing science, tech-nology, and innovation policies onactivities that will maintain a strongdomestic innovative capacity. Thehighly influential U.S. report, RisingAbove the Gathering Storm, called fordramatic improvements in K-12 sci-ence and mathematics education, anenhanced commitment to long-termbasic research, recruitment and reten-tion of the best scientists and engineers,and tax and other policy changes tosupport innovation in manufacturing.The report has sparked key initiatives inthe U.S., most recently in the recoverypackage and budget proposals initiatedby President Obama. These initiativesare matched by parallel moves in abroad cross-section of other industrialcountries, from Japan, Germany, andFinland to India and China. These ini-tiatives signify the growing importanceof science, technology, and innovationpolicies, as governments view theircontribution as essential to maintainnational competitiveness and sustainedeconomic growth. The challenge forCanada is to ensure that our federalpolicies keep abreast of these develop-ments in other countries and that ournational policies are grounded in thediverse regional and local contexts thatdistinguish our economy.

David A. Wolfe

Co-Director, Program on

Globalization and Regional Innovation

Systems at the Munk Centre and

CIBC Scholar in Residence for

2008–2009 at the Conference Board

of Canada

The new president must deal with increasing misery in places left out of the post-1945 system, as representedby the United Nations (above).

5 SPRING 2009

INSIGHTS

KEEPING WATER IN ITS NATURAL RIVER BASINS: A SOUND WATER POLICY

In September of 2007, a number ofleading water experts from Canadaand the United States met at the

Munk Centre for International Studiesto talk about Water, Energy, and NorthAmerican Integration. At the confer-ence, the host—the Munk Centre’sProgram on Water Issues—argued thatthe pressure to allow bulk trade inCanada’s water, evident since the signing of the North American FreeTrade Agreement in 1993, hadincreased with the establishment in2005 of the Canada/U.S./MexicoSecurity and Prosperity Partnership.Canada’s freshwater resources were de facto “on the table” for bulk trade,as existing legislation did not protectthem from being traded. The way toprotect Canada’s freshwater resourcesrests on a simple, yet powerful three-pillared foundation of water policy:

• keep water within its natural riverbasins;

• treat it with respect; and• use it efficiently.While elegant and simple, those

three pillars have provided much-need-ed clarity to the ensuing public debateover water issues in Canada, which hasonly grown in urgency in the face of alegislative vacuum at the federal andprovincial levels of government.

Most discussions of water policytend to focus on the second and thirdpillars. Treating water with respect isnormally couched in terms of protect-ing water quality and aquatic habitats;using it efficiently embraces thenotions of water conservation anddemand management. These are clearly very important objectives. Butthe basic laws of nature suggest that

the first pillar—keeping water withinits own natural drainage areas—is anecessary prerequisite to the other two.If we want to continue to receive theunique (and free) ecosystem servicesprovided by water—services thatinclude the supply of water for domes-tic, agricultural, and industrial use, theassimilation of waste, the ameliorationof flooding, and the provision of habitat—nature has to be regarded as

a legitimate water customer in its own right. The words of the Interna-tional Joint Commission in its 2000Reference on the Great Lakes ring truefor all Canadian water basins: “TheGreat Lakes Basin is an integrated andfragile ecosystem. Its surface andgroundwater resources are part of a single hydrologic system and should be dealt with as a unified whole in ways that take into account water quantity, water quality, and ecosystemintegrity.” We protect water by leavingit in and using it within its natural basin.

The popular myth of abundancenotwithstanding, the fact is thatCanada does not have an overabun-dance of water. We have about 7 per-cent of the world’s renewable watersupply, which is much less than eitherBrazil or Russia, and about the same asthe United States. This 7 percent of theworld’s renewable water supply meetsthe ecological needs of about the sameproportion of the world’s landmass, sofrom an ecological perspective, wehave no water to spare. Large parts ofCanada such as the Prairies and theOkanagan Valley are semi-arid, andmany of the lakes and aquifers that wetreat as bottomless reservoirs arerenewed at an extremely slow rate, sothat in many cases, we are actuallydraining them for generations to come.

Following the September 2007meeting at the Munk Centre, theCanadian Water Issues Council(CWIC), a project of the Munk Centre’sProgram on Water Issues, decided todraft a Model Act that could be used toprotect Canada’s water by keeping it inits natural basins. CWIC is a group ofconcerned academics and citizens thatmeets from time to time in a universitysetting to conduct research on waterpolicy issues. By December 2007,CWIC had developed A Model Act forPreserving Canada’s Waters, and thereport was released at a Munk Centreconference in February of 2008.

The proposed act is conceptuallyvery simple. It would prohibit removalsof water from Canada’s five majordrainage basins, with minor and well-defined exceptions. It would reconcileboth national and provincial interests. It provides for minimum national standards, yet recognizes the strongdesirability of provincial action. It doesso by allowing provincial governmentsto put in place legal regimes that provide protection equivalent to that set out in the federal regime. Wherefederal-provincial equivalency agree-ments are in place, the federal act and regulations would be inoperativeand the provincial regime would have primacy.

Why are these three pillars andespecially the first one so important atthis point in history? While we don’tknow what the exact effects of climatechange will be, we do know that it willalter water budgets (how much watercomes into, how much leaves, and how

much is stored in a watershed). Areassuch as the Prairies, already water-short, will likely become dryer anddryer. River flows and lake levels willbe altered, even in the relatively water-rich and economically critical GreatLakes Basin. And in response toincreasingly integrated continental andglobal economies, continued urbaniza-tion and the extraction of energy andother resources will destroy manywatercourses and lead to unpredictableinterjurisdictional conflicts over water allocation. Given social and economic pressures, North Americansmay even make the ultimate ecologicalerror of moving large amounts of waterover long distances from one water-shed to another, resulting in significanteconomic losses and ecologicalimpacts in donor regions.

We simply cannot allow thosethings to happen. We need leadershipfrom our federal and provincial governments to move the policy agen-da forward to ensure the sustainabilityof Canada’s freshwater resources.

There are few public policy objec-tives that command greater consensusin Canada than the principle that weshould not permit the bulk removal ofwater from its natural basins. It is aprinciple that is agreed to by all majorpolitical parties and is supported by thegreat majority of ordinary Canadians.While Canadians may disagree onwhether or not our water resources areadequately protected by existing laws,they do not in general disagree with theproposition that Canada’s waterresources should be protected.

We were pleased that the currentfederal government promised a newwater strategy in its Speech from theThrone in the fall of 2007, but disap-pointed that nothing substantive hasyet emerged. We were also pleased thattwo subsequent Throne Speechespledged to move ahead with legislationto implement what we are calling thefirst pillar of water policy—a prohibi-tion on bulk water removals fromCanada’s water basins—and look forward to its tabling and passage.

It is predicted that for much of theworld, access to enough clean waterwill be the environmental issue of the21st century. Here in Canada, strongaction today will enable us to avoidserious water stresses 25 years fromnow. With wise stewardship, we willsee a Canadian society living in harmony with its aquatic environment—a situation in which water remains inits natural river basins and in whichwater demand and availability are balanced through effective protection,conservation, and supply management.Achieving this requires a legal regimethat recognizes that governments havea fiduciary duty to preserve water and its related renewable resources forthe use and enjoyment of the entirepopulation, including future genera-tions of Canadians.

Ralph Pentland

Acting Chair, Canadian Water

Issues Council (CWIC) and

primary author of the 1987

Canadian Federal Water Policy

Adèle Hurley

Director, Program on Water Issues

at the Munk Centre

“It is predicted that for much of the world,access to enough clean water will be the environmental issueof the 21st century.

6

CENTRE EVENTS

TECHNOLOGY AND GLOBALIZATION

not have them; thus, who gets thegirls.) I was credited with clairvoyanceon that score, too, but none wasinvolved. It was just another case oflooking at the far-off tidal wave, andspeculating—although in a satiric way,dystopias being always a darkly jocularcommentary on the present—whatmight be around the corner of one of the paths we were currently following.

Back to my predictions in a bottle. I divided them into five areas of future trends: Energy, Clothing, The Laundry, Connections andCommunications, and Health andReligion. Each was linked to the others. But every thread of speculationI followed led inevitably to three mainlengths of rope: energy, fresh water,and communications. These havealways been the lengths of rope thathuman societies have hanged them-selves with, or else used for a climb to safety. The first two are essentialsfor human life, if by “energy”we mean also “maintaining a viabletemperature.”

The third is essential to the complexstructures—local, national, and global—we’ve built up over the last five hundred years. These structuresare using up a lot of the first twoessentials, but without them—asthings now stand—we’d collapse into chaos. Picture what would happen if all oil and the products made from it were suddenly to disappear from the planet.Transportation, including the trans-portation of food, would freeze, allcomputer systems would crash, aswould all communications systemswith their plastic parts. Public orderwould swiftly break down, and we’d find ourselves in the midst of the worst kind of all-against-all socialcatastrophe.

Now stretch that “suddenly” overthe next twenty-five to fifty years:again, it’s not a question of “whether”

but of “when.” The Oil Patch itselfknows this. And although we canmake oil from any carbon-based form,including garbage and plastic bags, the quantities made that way would in no way feed our present habits.Therefore oil is not an infinitelyrenewable resource, and the no-oiltidal wave is coming. The good newsis: but not tomorrow.

The other good news is that the current economic recession has

slowed down the Train to Oblivionwe’ve been traveling on. Why“oblivion”? Because for the first timein human history our methods of satisfying our very long list of wantsand desires is colliding decisivelywith viability on this planet. We’vebecome so speedy and efficient thatwe can chew up raw materials muchmore rapidly than we can replacethem, and this in return has allowed us to multiply exponentially—a multiplication of both people andtechnologies that has already led usto a period of greatly diminishedavailable resources. We’ve fuelledthis growth on the cheap energy supplied in the nineteenth century by

coal and steam and in the twentiethby oil, but both of these methodshave drawbacks that will eventuallymake human life extremely precari-ous, if not impossible, and that areonly now becoming apparent to thepopulation at large; in addition towhich, they will eventually run out.

Still, thanks to the downturn, wehave a breathing space—to regroup, to restructure, to consider. The once-immutable truths about the nature ofthe financial world have popped likebubbles; the ground has shifted every-where. If we’re smart, we’ll examinethat new ground carefully, and buildon it. We have to. We can’t go back to hunting and gathering—there aretoo many of us. The accumulation ofour technologies has painted us into a corner from which we canescape only by the invention of new technologies, and necessity of the kind we now face is the mother of all inventions. But what sorts ofinventions will these be?

Thinking backwards from scarcityabout what kinds of shortages our necessary inventions must work toease, we come once again to water:thus a cheap, solar-powered, mass-quantity desalination device is sure to appear, and a device—alreadyinvented—that uses low amounts ofenergy to pull water from the air.Meters that measure water use in the

home will find a ready market, as willunderground leak-detection tools—since conservation is the cheapest road

to sufficiency. This rule applies to ener-gy as well: as the price of conventionalenergy climbs and we realize that hugeamounts of energy are wasted throughleaky buildings, retrofitting and re-skinning—so much cheaper than biggeneration plants of any kind—willbecome major industries. So will therenting out of flat roof and vertical wallspace for energy generation: the verticalspaces becoming usable as solar fabric(already invented) is used to sheathbuildings, turning them from energy liabilities to energy generators.

Transportation and communicationwill similarly change. Trains will beback; so will airships, which providehuge cargo lift for a relatively smallenergy expenditure. Ways of avoidingthe costs of shipping things havealready begun to appear, the print-on-demand machine for publishing beingone example. Our carefree airplanehabits of the late twentieth and earlytwenty-first century will be forced to change; we’ll get used to travelling

more slowly, and travelling less. Theconsequences of this will not alwaysbe pleasant, especially for countriesthat depend on large tourist flows.

Given that future, “virtual” travel—putting yourself there without actually being there—will becomemuch more normal. Who will be thefirst to set up a “virtual tourist” business: you in your home, yourguide at your destination of choiceholding a video device and walkingyou through the streets, describing the history and art and ambiance,showing it to you onscreen? Thedeluxe version would provide littlebottles of local smells, and the oddlocal food item, as well as—say— a street musician playing local tunesoutside your window. This sounds fanciful, but wait for it.

Human inventiveness is boundless.Canadian inventiveness is prettyboundless, too—we’re a nation of people like my Uncle Fred, whoinvented a bean-threshing machinewhen he was a teenager because hedidn’t want to thresh the beans byhand. But our political movers andshakers have been slow to recognize

not only the grim realities we willshortly face on a global level but the absolute necessity of encouragingpractical and productive solutions. In Canada, they’ve depended far toolong on the wealth generated by natural resources, not by human ones. They’ve been too cautious, toolazy. Maybe someone should whisperin their ears: “A lotta jobs in buildingretrofits! A lotta money in energy conservation! Lower taxes! A lottavotes!”

Such solutions are not hard tounderstand. The price of not under-standing the problems, however, willbe steep indeed.

Margaret Atwood is an author, essayist, and innovator. Her latestwork is PAYBACK: Debt and theShadow Side of Wealth, The CBCMassey Lectures 2008. She is the primary inventor of the LongPen, the world’s first and only remote,accurate, fully biometric pen-on-paper handwriting device—first usedin book signings, but now being seen as a remote solution for the execution of heritage documents inthe judiciary, in government, and in business.

Continued from page 1

“Oil is not an infinitely renewable resource.”

“Trains will be back; so will airships.”

“Virtual travel willbecome much more normal.”

Coming soon, roof-top farming. Above, a two-acre green, “living” roof spans 12 buildings atthe California Academy of Sciences.

as many civilians as possible. DuringGaza, whatever people would like tobelieve, Israel sought to minimize civilian casualties.

How does one explain this con-trast? With reference, I submit, to theways in which technology, morality,and constructions of victimhood combine to create normative judgmentsthat have at best a loose connectionwith empirical reality.

Firstly, for the left above all,Palestinians have been constructed asthe perfect victims: an innocent, peace-loving people driven out of their homesand mercilessly persecuted by thevicious Israelis. There is, of course, akernel of truth to this narrative, but a competing narrative—about repeatedrefusals of reasonable offers from theIsraeli state, about Palestinians throw-ing their lot in with terrorists who wishto destroy Israel, and about their votingfor anti-Semitic murderers—is struc-tured out of the discussions. For equalnumbers of people, the Germans—allGermans, including children, women(who were largely excluded from themachinations of war), and very oldmen—are the perfect perpetrators,enthusiastic orchestrators of conquest,genocide, and mass sterilization. Thereis also a kernel of truth to this narrative,but another competing narrative—aboutHitler having only minority support,about opposition from within the mili-tary and within society, and about theessential innocence of large numbers ofGermans (above all children) is alsostructured out of the discussion.

These constructions are necessarybecause moral certainty depends onclear, not blurry, categories: perpetuatorvs. victim, good vs. evil, invader vs.conquered, and criminal vs. innocent.There are, to be sure, pure moral cate-gories, just as there are pure victims; theJews of Germany are an outstandingexample. In many, if not most, areas ofhistory, as of life, distinctions are fine,choices tortured, and moral vs. immoralmatters are cast in grey rather thanblack and white. And we should neverforget that power plays a basic and eternal role in defining matters of principle—witness the York Universitystudents who invoked “free speech”principles to defend Israeli ApartheidWeek, but swept them aside when thematter was student support for pro-lifegroups. Fine distinctions, gradations,complexities, and indeed contradictionsare the basis of history and of politics,but they provide little support for thesimplistic slogans—“don’t bomb Iran,”“boycott Israel”—that are the stuff ofpolitical activism.

But there is something more funda-mental than this: rhetoric and languageneed not only to be crafted and spoken;they also need to be conveyed. And

The CERES Insights pageprovides analysis by scholars fromthe Centre for European, Russian,and Eurasian Studies on issuesof concern to the region.In this issue, Randall Hansen, author of Fire and Fury: The Allied Bombing of Germany, 1942–1945,discusses the forces that shape our understanding of human suffering.

Randall Hansen

Canada Research Chair in Immigration

and Governance in the Department of

Political Science and Acting Director,

Centre for European, Russian, and

Eurasian Studies at the Munk Centre

it is here that technology comes in.Whatever else the Internet has broughtus, it has created a world in whichinstant messaging, the split-second dis-semination of ideas, arguments, and,above all, opinions is possible. Claims,including outrageous ones, are not sub-ject to editorial review; they are instant-ly flashed around the world. The result isthat public interventions are no longersubject to reflection; they go from mindto keyboard to posting with lightingspeed. They are inevitably a simplified ifnot vulgar interpretation of inevitablycomplex social and political issues. Suchvenues have always existed—for exam-ple, the British tabloid presses—but theInternet has vastly widened both accessand output. The results can be energiz-ing, but they are often depressing. Booksare attacked without being read, abuseand insult are passed off as debate, andappealing but simplistic one-liners substitute for sustained thought andargument. It cannot be any other way.Morning blogs, instant messaging, andpolitical chat rooms depend on it. TheWeb is therefore both a reflection and a cause of a decline in nuanced debate.

This might be worth the price ifknowledge and attention wereincreased. They are, sadly, not. Theattention of bloggers is no less blink-ered and one-sided than the activistsfeeding them empty slogans. In NoamChomsky’s paranoid world, urban pressbarons in New York and elsewhere weresystematically diverting attention fromAmerican imperialism and all its awful human consequences. Today,such barons have far less power andinfluence than they once had. Yet, theattention of the Web world remains as blinkered as ever, perhaps more so.During the weeks when Israel invadedGaza, the Sri Lankan military surround-ed the Tamil Tigers and, with them,300,000 civilians who inevitably suffered terrible agonies. With theexception of a brave article by Bob Raeand limited interventions in The Globeand Mail, we heard almost nothingabout it. One will search hard to find the Sri Lankan version of images thatappeared on the Israeli Apartheid WeekWebsite—a cartoon Sri Lankan fighterfiring, to Arabic rap music, on a cartoonSri Lankan boy. Even more egregiously,in the Congo, forces for a decade have abducted, drugged, and forced into battle tens of thousands of childsoldiers. Civilians have been deliberate-ly raped, tortured, and murdered. Bothsets of heinous acts have received a fraction of the attention devoted toIsrael. Technology has bequeathed us aworld in which information is deliveredinstantly. It is, however, also one inwhich moral interest is driven at bestloosely and selectively by the nature andextent of human suffering.

INSIGHTS

CENTRE FOR EUROPEAN, RUSSIAN, AND EURASIAN STUDIES

AUN human rights investigator,Richard Falk, who helpfully

urged us in 1979 to “trustKhomeini” as he was offering the worlda model of “humane governance,” haslet the press know that the 2008–2009Israeli incursion into the Gaza strip was a “war crime” of the “gravest magnitude.” Shortly before Falk sharedthis wisdom, I published an article in theNational Post in which I provocativelysuggested that the area (not precision)bombing of Germany during World WarII was a war crime. Reactions fromacross the globe were vitriolic; one irateblogger called me a charlatan, revision-ist, and post-modernist. I took greatexception to the last.

These reactions echo a broadertrend: a great willingness to defineIsrael’s behavior—in Gaza within thelast year, or in Lebanon in 2006—as a war crime, and a great reluctance to describe Allied action—in this case,the deliberate bombing of civilians— as a war crime. It is worth recalling the facts: during World War II, Alliedbombing killed 593,000 people, includ-ing over 400,000 civilians, 100,000refugees, and almost 30,000 POWs and forced labourers. During the Israeli incursion—over a much shorterperiod, of course—1,200 people werekilled, of which between 300 (if we believe the Israelis) and 900 (if webelieve Hamas) were civilians. Manypeople are all too glad to believeHamas. There is another important difference between the two wars:

intention. During World War II, theBritish and the Canadians, although notthe Americans, made every effort tomaximize civilian casualties. ThoseBritish commanders responsible for the air war wanted to defeat Germanyby destroying as many cities and killing

7 SPRING 2009

Israeli precision bombing in Gaza: conflicting narratives of victimhood.

8

CENTRE EVENTS

LONGPEN: THE FUTURE AT YOUR FINGERTIPS

Acclaimed author MargaretAtwood brought futuristic

musings and a futuristicdevice to a Munk Centre event inMarch. The audience was inspired by both. In a lecture titled “Innovationfor Regrowth” Atwood described theworld as being in “a corner it can onlyescape by invention.”

When the author of TheHandmaid’s Tale, among 35 books,speculates about the future, people pay attention. Rather than painting apicture of coming bleakness, Atwoodstressed the need to address the challenges we face through invention.“For everything to stay the same,everything has to change,” she noted.“How can we turn the negatives intopositives?”

While Atwood’s predictions span a range of issues (see Cover Story),during the lecture, she focused on acentral question—how we will adjustto a world without oil? “It is notwhether but when—the oil industryknows this.” She speculated on theinventions that will flow as a result.“Fly over Toronto and you see blackflat rooftops,” she said. “These couldbecome bimolecular farmlands, usedfor agriculture like blueberries…

Vertical structures will be coveredwith solar fabric to generate energy…We will have clothing that heats thebody, cools it, and recharges in thesun, as opposed to heating and coolingsystems for large blocks of air…Tables will have warmers underneathand chairs will also.” Transportationand communications will be trans-formed. “Instead of shipping anobject, we will transport informationto make the object.” Much like StarTrek, “the Internet will be used totransmit wave forms to create originalobjects.”

Devices, she said, “will translateintent into object.” On that score, thefuture is here. To illustrate her point,Atwood demonstrated her successfulinvention, the LongPen. It is theworld’s first and only remote, accu-rate, fully biometric pen-on-paperhandwriting device—first used inbook signings, but now being seen as a remote solution for the execution ofheritage documents in the judiciary, ingovernment, and in business. For theaudience, seeing was believing. Eachvolunteer’s signature, written on ahand-held screen (think FedEx), wasproduced by LongPen on paper withperfect fidelity.

“AMERICA NO LONGER RULES THE WORLD”

W hile in Rome recently tohelp prepare for July’s G8summit, U.S. international

relations expert Parag Khanna deliv-ered a blunt message to the Italian foreign minister. Khanna, a BarackObama foreign policy adviser andDirector of the Washington-basedGlobal Governance Initiative,became frustrated with the clubbyattitude of the Italians and other G8planners. “They were consideringinviting Egypt, but not Saudi Arabia,because its values didn’t jell withthose of the West,” Khanna confidedto a Munk Centre audience on theeve of Obama’s inauguration.

“I couldn’t believe what I was hear-ing,” Khanna added, “because Egyptrepresents a lumbering, teetering, on-the-verge-of-revolution society, whileSaudi Arabia represents half of theMiddle East economy and is playing asignificant role in emerging marketsand as an international arbiter.

“I told the foreign minister, ‘Do yourealize that Saudi Arabia is immenselymore powerful and important than youare? And that they will form whateveralliances they want?…They are notwaiting for your invitation.’

“This is the sort of message the G8leaders need to hear.”

Khanna views today’s world ashaving multiple sources of legitima-cy. Among them are religion, busi-nesses, and NGOs, as well as the traditional nation-state. “America nolonger rules the world,” he says.

This new world order with multiple and overlapping layers ofauthority looks a lot like a very old world, Khanna says. He calls it “neo-medievalism.”

Khanna’s The Second World:Empires and Influence in the NewGlobal Order (2008) argues that contemporary geopolitics is being driven by the world’s three imperialpowers—the United States, theEuropean Union, and China— competing for the natural resourcesof second world economies, coun-tries such as Brazil, Azerbaijan,Libya, Vietnam, and Malaysia, whichare struggling to enter the first world or avoid falling into the third.

In this construct, Khanna says apotential source of global stability isthe emerging and increasingly popularG20, which may be poised to replacethe G8 as a source of internationalauthority. The G20, representing morethan 80 percent of the world’s econo-my, began in 1999 as a loose organiza-tion of finance ministers. In November,

Nations are becoming anachronistic,given their emphasis on the nation-state amid the new emerging powerbases of neo-medievalism.

Says Khanna: “In the future, author-ity will be based more on results, ratherthan on political systems such as

democracy. Such authority could bevested in Bill Gates, it could go to a NGO, a multinational; it could beanyone. The decisive question will be,‘Who is delivering the goods?’”

In a demonstration, the LongPen (above left) produced the signatures of audience memberswith perfect fidelity. Steve Coll

Devices, predicted Atwood (above right), “will translate intent into object.”

it held its first leaders’ meeting to grapple with the global financial crisis.The success of that session led to the G20 leaders’ meeting in London inApril, which reached broad agreementon remedial measures.

Still, the power of the G20 is limit-

ed. “The G20 is not a legal body,” saysKhanna. “It is merely a consultativeforum. It provides legitimacy, but notlegality.” At the same time, Khannasays legal bodies such as the United

Who’s in charge here? G20 leaders at the April summit.

SPRING 20099

CENTRE EVENTS

PUTTING SCIENCE INTO PRACTICE OBAMA WATCH—MIXED REVIEWS

W hen Reuters phoned, SueHorton, then dealing with a part-time faculty strike at

Wilfrid Laurier University, wonderedwhy an international news agencywould be interested in labour unrest at a Canadian university. She soon had to take off her administrator hat as Vice President Academic, and put on her economist hat—anumber of reporters were calling tointerview her regarding a report sheco-authored for the CopenhagenConsensus. The organization’s eminent panel of award-winningeconomists (most of whom are Nobellaureates) had ranked all five of herrecommendations for combating malnutrition among children in its top10 priorities. One recommendation—micronutrients for malnourishedchildren—was deemed the top inter-national development priority. Hortonrelated the anecdote while speaking

in the CIS Development Seminarseries at the Munk Centre inFebruary.

The Copenhagen Consensus, begunin 2004 by Danish business professorBjorn Lomborg, has been described as an economist’s Olympics. It is a priority-setting exercise for develop-ment objectives that employs cost-benefit analysis to issues ranging from “air pollution” and “womenand development,” to “malnutritionand hunger.” Horton and her two colleagues—Harold Alderman of theWorld Bank and Juan A. Rivera of the Mexican National Institute ofPublic Health—were invited to reporton hunger. They focused on sub-Saharan Africa and South Asian,where three-quarters of the world’smalnourished children live.

They made the following recom-mendations: micronutrient supple-ments for children (vitamin A and zinc supplements for children withdiarrhoea); micronutrient fortification(iron and salt iodization); biofortifica-

tion; deworming and other nutritionprograms at school; and community-based nutrition promotion. Hortonconfessed that she deliberately picked things that she knew had attractive cost-benefit ratios. Shenoted that these recommendations will not solve all the malnutrition andhunger issues; indeed, she expectedthat they could solve no more thanone-quarter of the problem. Whenasked why the focus on quick fixes,she replied that “you have to keep kids alive while you’re working on thelonger-term solutions.”

The Horton team’s recommenda-tions are gaining traction thanks to the work of Bjorn Lomborg. Since the Copenhagen panel finished itsdeliberations, he has taken its find-ings global, addressing a World Bank summit in November. The World Bank is now developing a plan for nutrition.

Sprinkles Canada is a leader in developing easy-to-usemicronutrients. The Hospitalfor Sick Children’s Dr. StanleyZlotkin, a Senior Fellow at the Munk Centre, is the drivingforce behind Sprinkles—sachets containing a blend ofmicronutrients in powder form,which are easily sprinkled onto foods prepared in thehome. For local adaptation, he forms clusters of civil society groups, governmentbodies, and international organizations such as UN agencies. Sprinkles programsare currently in place in 15 countries worldwide, from Bangladesh to Vietnam.

Afew months into his four-yearterm, Barack Obama received

mixed marks from a MunkCentre panel in April. All four partici-pants showed admiration for Obamathe person, but not all praised his leadership. “He reminds me of theman in the Stephen Leacock poem,”said Globe and Mail columnistMargaret Wente. “The one who got onhis horse—and ‘rode madly off in alldirections.’”

Both Wente and Munk CentreDirector Janice Stein worried thatObama was tackling too many prob-lems—health care, education, andenergy, along with Afghanistan—much too quickly. And Stein criticizedhim for not thinking outside the box in these “discontinuous times.”

Explained Stein: “In the past, wehad a sense that tomorrow would look like today, and that even in a crisis, the world would revert to thefamiliar. But tomorrow is no longer a baseline for the day after. What bothers me is that most of Obama’sstrategies and solutions are continuousand linear—and that’s not goodenough any more. Old solutions won’t work and public patience is not infinite.”

American history professor RonPruessen expressed fears that the magnitude of the “staggeringly difficult” challenges facing Obama might overwhelm his presidency.“Sometimes, there are events that defy anyone’s control,” Pruessen told some 60 people at the ObamaWatch Roundtable. “American presi-dents, particularly, don’t appreciatethat there might be problems that are simply not soluble—not even by them.”

Pruessen, who drew a number ofpositive parallels between Obama and Franklin Roosevelt’s Depression-era presidency, also worried thatObama might be harmed by his own personality. “He has a powerfulego with a messianic streak, and those same characteristics undid many good things initiated byWoodrow Wilson.”

Political scientist Richard Iton notedthat Obama has a mixed record so far,as he makes the difficult transitionfrom the campaign trail to governing.Iton reviewed the “bumps” that haveoccurred for the Obama administra-tion, including the tax problems ofsome of his nominees for office, andthe challenges of continuing his post-partisan, post-racial style of politics.

Still, any criticism and caution wasmixed with very positive feelingstowards the 44th U.S. President. “Idesperately want him to succeed, and I wish I could say, ‘So far, so good’,”said Stein. “But I can’t.”

Roméo Dallaire

Roméo Dallaire

Roméo Dallaire

Janice Gross Stein

Richard Iton

Ron Pruessen

Margaret Wente

Before and after: two Bangladeshi children (on the left), suffer from malnutrition, whereas thechild at right has profited from a nutrition program.

10

STUDENT LIFE

Halbert ExchangeFellow Todd Lane

Munk Centre graduate studentTodd Lane has the HalbertExchange Program to thank

for a terrific opportunity in the comingyear. The MA candidate at the Centrefor European, Russian, and EurasianStudies will be traveling to Israel toconduct research at the HebrewUniversity of Jerusalem with a scholarship from a Halbert program.

Todd intends to study the TefenIndustrial Park, located in Israel, justsouth of the Lebanese border. It is abusiness-incubator model that isdesigned to help encourage entrepre-neurship and promote manufacture for

export. Todd is interested in its potential for application elsewhere,particularly in Russia and Ukraine: “Isaw an opportunity to examine theapplications of this model outside ofthe Middle East, specifically in theCrimea. The Halbert graduate fellowship will allow me to meet withhigh-level Israeli academics, interviewPalestinian authorities, and visit thenumerous industrial parks which aremodelled on Tefen.”

What’s the appeal of Tefen? Toddpoints to the model’s green, export-based philosophy and focus on technical education. The model wouldallow states that lack substantial oil,natural gas, or coal reserves to engagein a form of industrialization whilebuilding human capital, he says. Healso points to the peace dividend: “Inaddition, this model seems to promotethe building of infrastructure whichends up giving greater return over thelife of the investment while promotingregional cooperation and globaliza-tion.” He adds: “I believe these benefits could create sustainable economic prosperity within a varietyof contexts, from post-conflict statesto post-communist states.”

Todd is going on a new exchangewith the Hebrew University ofJerusalem made possible by the Ralphand Roz Halbert InternationalRelations Fund. As Todd’s researchproject demonstrates, the benefits canflow to society at large as well as tothe scholarship recipient.

The 24-hour train to Shenzhenarrived on time. I met with members of the Shenzhen government’s ProjectEvaluation Department. Several had participated in the now-lapsedexchange program between the govern-ment and the University of Toronto.

I delivered a presentation on mediacoverage of the 2008 elections in bothCanada and the U.S. My audienceindulged me in my chatter aboutCanada. The ensuing questionsfocused, almost exclusively, on theU.S. Canada was an afterthought.

Tibet was occasionally a topic of discussion. The Chinese don’t under-stand why many in the West support there-establishment of a feudal theocracy. Iwas left wondering how we would reactif China bestowed honorary citizenshipon a separatist premier of Quebec.

The Pearl River delta was in theprocess of shutting factory doors andshedding millions of jobs during myvisit. But the response from my hosts in Shenzhen was one more of resolvethan trepidation.

Beijing’s economic stimulus pack-age amounts to some $700 billion to bespent on road and rail links, nuclearpower plants, bridges, hospitals, andschools. It’s a wealth-creating package.North America, meanwhile, is spendingtrillions of dollars creating nothing,while bailing out many. Where wouldyou want to do business?

My studies at the Munk Centreprompted and informed my visit. Theexperience reinforced many of the conclusions I made in my final paperon the major determinants of Chineseforeign policy.

I flew back to Toronto in the compa-ny of a U.S. businessman. He referred toChina as “a gold mine,” the greatestbusiness opportunity in generations. TheAmericans get it. The Europeans, theAustralians, the Japanese get it. They aretying much of their future wealth, andtheir countries’ emergence from theglobal recession, to engagement withChina. Apart from the notable excep-tions of Bombardier, Manulife, and afew others, there is precious littleCanadian purchase in the MiddleKingdom. It is an opportunity lost.

Aboard the Chinese Express

by S.W. McLuskie

W hy doesn’t your prime minis-ter like us?” said Ning. I hadjust arrived in Shanghai and

was catching up with an old friend. Ningand I had met at the Munk Centre in2002. We were both pursuing a Master’sDegree in Asia-Pacific Studies. Six yearslater, I was on the ground in the country

that had been a focus of my studies. I had visited the Asia-Pacific region

on several occasions. But this was myfirst visit to China. I had agreed todeliver lectures in Hong Kong andShenzhen in my capacity as a producerand senior writer for CBC News. Theseopportunities arose through contactsmade during my studies. The sessionsproved to be mutually enlightening butit was Ning’s observation that wouldecho throughout my trip.

I was delivered into Shanghai fromPudong airport aboard a German-built,magnetic levitation train that toppedout at 430 kilometres an hour. It was a fitting analogy to the velocity ofChina’s transformation. The country is, perhaps, the greatest developmentproject in history.

The streets of China’s major citiesare awash with the logos of westerncommerce. The startling skylines aredue, in part, to some of the most innov-ative minds in Western architecture. AFrench firm is responsible for Beijing’sNational Grand Theatre. The Museumof Contemporary Art in Shenzhen wasan Austrian project.

The road and rail infrastructure isequally remarkable. The new BeijingSouth railway station is British-designed. Urban subway systems areleading edge. Beijing’s ring-road gridallows traffic to flow—in rush hour—in a city of 12 million people.

I had occasion to meet the Frenchproprietor of three Beijing bistros. Iwondered if he missed Paris. “No,” hesaid. “This place is lightning.Everything’s happening here.”

Todd Lane: investigating a model industrial park.

Grad Students Ask the Right Questions

Fresh Perspectives: Munk Centre graduate students (pictured above) organized a successfulconference in April that focused on a largely overlooked aspect of the world financial crisis: theimpact on developing countries and the international institutions designed to assist them.Entitled “Crisis in Development? Institutions, Policy and the Reality of the Global FinancialCrisis,” this year’s annual grad student conference explored the effect of the financial crisis onthe already tumultuous development environment.

An impressive roster of speakers joined in panel discussions of such topics as the role thatsupranational institutions, including the World Bank and IMF, should play in the global finan-cial markets; the impact of the capital freeze in developed countries on their ability to provideaid to developing states that are dependent on aid to meet their basic needs; and the role of theEuropean Union, the world’s largest economy.

The Munk Centre Graduate Student Conference is an annual collaboration between threeseparate Master’s programs administered out of the Centre: International Relations (MAIR),European, Russian, and Eurasian Studies (MA ERES), and Asia-Pacific Studies (MAPS).Students from all three programs work together to plan, develop, execute, and manage a majorconference dealing with pertinent issues in global development. Their partner on this project isthe World Bank Group.

In the fast lane: more resolve than trepidation.

S.W

. McL

uski

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SPRING 200911

One of Anne-Emanuelle Birn’s goals as the Canada Research Chair in International Health is tohelp the international health system respond moreefficiently to local needs and, by extension, helpCanada fulfill its health promotion and researchpromises to the world. Not only has her Chair beenrenewed for 2008–13, but she was awarded a 2007–08 Fulbright Scholarship to France (only one suchgrant is given annually). Professor Birn was a visitingscholar at the prestigious Institut National d’EtudesDémographiques and the Centre de RechercheMédecine, Sciences, Santé et Societé in Paris.

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The relationship between militarism and geographicalknowledge in the United States fascinates historicalgeographer Matthew Farish. In collaboration with P. Whitney Lackenbauer of St. Jerome’s Universityand Canadian International Council Fellow, he is currently working on a history of the Distant EarlyWarning (DEW) Line, the radar chain constructedfrom Alaska to Greenland in the 1950s as part of the continental defence network. Professor Farish is the recipient of the American GeographicalSociety’s McColl Family Fellowship for 2009, whichwill cover research travel to Iqaluit and Hall Beach,Nunavut, later this year.

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It’s been a rewarding year for Lisa Forman: she was appointed Associate Director of the CollaborativeDoctoral Program in Global Health at the Universityof Toronto; received an advance contract from the University of Toronto Press to publish her disser-tation, which explored the role of human rights in increasing access to AIDS medicines, using SouthAfrica as a case study; and was awarded a $20,000grant from the Canadian Institutes of Health Researchto conduct a workshop in global health and policy.

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Comparative Program on Health and Society Funders and Advisory Board Members MargretHovanec (Director and Co-Founder of the LupinaFoundation) and Peter Warrian (Senior ResearchFellow at the Munk Centre, Managing Director and Co-Founder of the Lupina Foundation) wereboth awarded honorary doctorates from RegisCollege in November 2008. They were selected on the basis of their contributions to society, culture,and the Catholic Church.

Thomas Lahusen received the Best Directing award for his film The Province of Lost Film, whichhe describes as Cinema Paradiso Soviet style, at the Second Issyk-Kul International Film Festival of the Shanghai Organization of Cooperation,Kyrgyzstan, October 2008. Professor Lahusen isspending the spring in Kyrgyzstan and China, work-ing on two new documentary film projects.

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The Asian Institute’s Lynette Ong took advantage of her An Wang Postdoctoral Fellowship at HarvardUniversity for 2008–09 to work on completing abook manuscript on the political economy of creditand uneven development in China.

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For the second year in a row, the Shaughnessy Cohen Prize for Political Writing by a Canadian went to a Munk Centre scholar. This year’s winner is Senior Fellow James Orbinski (left) for his An Imperfect Offering: Humanitarian Action in theTwenty-First Century. Paul Sparkes, executive vice-president of corporate affairs at CTVglobemedia,presented the prize to Dr. Orbinski at the annualPolitics & the Pen dinner on March 4. The award is one of many recognitions for his book and his documentary film, Triage: Dr. James Orbinski’sHumanitarian Dilemma.

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Hard work pays off. Tina Park — a recipient of the 2008 Robert H. Catherwood Scholarship — is in her final year of completing a BA in internationalrelations. In her first year as an undergraduate, Tina joined the G8 Research Group as a complianceanalyst and participated in the Civil Society/Expanded Dialogue Unit and Communications Team,and she served as chair of the Home Team for the

2008 Hokkaido Summit. Tina has been involved with the International Relations Society since herfirst year, serving as the co-president in her third and fourth years. Tina is also involved with the North Korea Research Group and on the executive of the University of Toronto’s chapter of Journalistsfor Human Rights. The Catherwood Scholarship isawarded to students interested in international affairs, in particular the issues, institutions, and members of the G8 Summit.

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Janice Gross Stein, director of the Munk Centre, was awarded an honorary doctor of laws degree from McMaster University during its 2008 fall convocation ceremonies.

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Thomas Tieku, who heads up New College’sAfrican Studies Program, is the recipient of the2008–09 Arts and Science Students’ Union RanjiniGhosh Award for excellence in teaching.

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Shafique Virani’s The Ismailis in the Middle Ages:A History of Survival, A Search for Salvation, pub-lished by Oxford University Press in 2007, has beenwell received internationally, with awards fromUNESCO and the Islamic Educational, Scientific andCultural Organization (ISESCO), the £10,000 BookPrize of the British Society for Middle EasternStudies, and the C= 6000 Farabi International Award,Iran’s highest honour in the humanities. For theFarabi Award, Professor Virani was flown to Iran asa guest of state, met with the President and other dignitaries, and was given a guided tour ofmany parts of the country. He delivered a lecture at the Institute for Social and Cultural Studies inTehran, gave the Dr. Jamal Karim Rad Memorial lecture to the judiciary in Qazvin, and was on nation-al radio and television.

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David Wolfe and Meric Gertler, Co-Directors of the Program on Globalization and ResearchInnovation Systems (PROGRIS), were awarded the 2008 Carolyn Tuohy Impact on Public PolicyAward, which recognizes excellence in teaching,research, and, particularly, the impact of the recipients’ scholarship on public policy. The goal of the research undertaken by Professors Gertler and Wolfe in PROGRIS is to investigate how theinteraction of firms and regional institutions inCanada and other countries facilitates, or impedes,the process of innovation and social learning that is critical for success in the new global economy. As well, Professor Gertler has been appointed Deanof the Faculty of Arts and Science for 2008–14.

ACCOLADES AND AWARDS

MUNK CENTRE SCHOLARS IN THE SPOTLIGHT

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Anne-Emanuelle Birn, Yogan Pillay, andTimothy Holtz, Textbook of InternationalHealth: Global Health in a Dynamic World,3rd edition, Oxford University Press, 2009.

Peter Blanchard, Under the Flags of Freedom:Slave Soldiers and the Wars of Independencein Spanish South America, University ofPittsburgh Press, 2008.

Richard Day and Daniel Gaido, eds. and trans.,Witness to Permanent Revolution: TheDocumentary Record, Brill, 2009.

Scott Eddie, Landownership in EasternGermany before the Great War: A QuantitativeAnalysis, Oxford University Press, 2008.

Peter I. Hajnal, Gruppa vos’mi i gruppa dvad-tsati: evoliutsiia, rol’ i dokumentatsiia, Logos,2008. Russian edition of The G8 System andthe G20: Evolution, Role and Documentation.

Randall Hansen, Fire and Fury: The AlliedBombing of Germany, 1942–1945, DoubledayCanada, 2008.

Rob King, The Fun Factory: The KeystoneFilm Company and the Emergence of MassCulture, University of California Press, 2009.

Rob King, Richard Abel, and GiorgioBertellini, eds., Early Cinema and the“National”, Indiana University Press, 2008.

Thomas Lahusen and Peter H. Solomon, Jr.,eds., What Is Soviet Now? Identities, Legacies,Memories, LITVerlag, 2008.

Andrij Makuch, ed., The Holodomor of1932–33. Papers from the 75th-AnniversaryConference on the Ukrainian Famine-Genocide. University of Toronto, November 1,2007. Special issue of The Harriman Review,vol. 16, no. 2 (2008).

James Orbinski, An Imperfect Offering:Humanitarian Action in the Twenty-FirstCentury, Doubleday Canada, 2008.

Louis Pauly and William D. Coleman, eds.,Global Ordering: Institutions and Autonomy in a Changing World, University of BritishColumbia Press, 2009.

David Rayside, Queer Inclusions, ContinentalDivisions: Public Recognition of SexualDiversity in Canada and the United States,University of Toronto Press, 2008.

Jeffrey Reitz et al., Multiculturalism andSocial Cohesion: Potentials and Challenges of Diversity, Springer, 2009.

James Retallack, ed., Imperial Germany1871–1918, Oxford University Press, 2008.

N.N. Shneidman, Double Vision: The Jew inPost-Soviet Russian Literature, Mosaic Press,2008.

Leah Shumka and Cecilia Benoit, Genderingthe Health Determinants Framework: Why Girls’ and Women’s Health Matters,Women’s Health Research Network, 2009.

Pedro Henríquez Ureña, Versos. Edited with a Prologue by Néstor Rodriguez, UniversidadIberoamericana, 2008.

David A. Wolfe, ed., Embedded Clusters in theGlobal Economy. Special issue of EuropeanPlanning Studies, vol. 17, no. 2 (2009).

Joseph Wong and Edward Friedman, eds.,Political Transitions in Dominant PartySystems: Learning to Lose, Routledge, 2008.

CENTRE BOOKS

RECENT BOOKS BY MUNK CENTRE SCHOLARS

SPRING 2009