Just some thoughts on Grass’s poem: First, thanks to the Guardian who translated the poem from German I could actually read it. I’m not sure whether any media in Israel did that (this is the only Hebrew translation I’ve managed to find) and, as technical as might be, it’s an important starting point when considering the public debate on the issue. It is indeed an unfortunately recurring pattern that a public debate is either uninformed or informed by selective (often digested) fragments from secondary sources. Media outlets’ decision not to translate the poem, somehow similar to the Danish Mohammed cartoons crisis, is most likely meant to avoid being accused of the same ‘anti-Semitism verdict’ that Grass’s own verses had anticipated.
I’ve been trying to follow the coverage by Israeli media, and got the impression that the common reactions in Israel follow the knee-jerk, defensive-aggressive reactions that often have to do more with the irrelevant form (be it the timing or Grass’s personal background) than the actual issues he brings up in the poem. I’m in no capacity to evaluate the artistic, lyrical features of the poem but given the simplicity of the arguments and the personal angle I can certainly see why some people considered it naive, amateurish, cliché-laden (at least in Spiegel) and even pathetic (for example, in Haaretz).
I do have some reservations – mainly in regard to several unnecessary exaggerations (‘those of us / who survive will at best be footnotes’ or ‘a first strike / that could destroy an Iranian people’). But I can appreciate his frankness, and mostly the bottom line that after all, the situation in the Middle East boils down to what are in fact obvious immoralities fueled by chronic distrust and fatal myopia. Indeed, all of this has already been said, but if this is indeed merely old news, how come it still causes such a stir? Two of 972 Magazine’s commentators, Yossi Gurvitz and Larry Derfner, untangled the poem’s assertions and came to similar conclusions. Maariv’s Shay Golden concluded [H] that he agrees with most of Grass’s arguments, but maintained the Nobel laureate and former Wafen-SS soldier has no moral right of expressing such opinion.
A German colleague, thanks to whom this post was born, protested the supposedly biased coverage of the row by the German major media. However, I personally don’t believe in objectivity, and I think media – in Germany, in Israel and elsewhere – are not only allowed but actually expected, to take a stance on various issues, basically the same way Grass or anyone else is. But, if indeed German media have been attacking Grass’s very right to freedom of expression, as I’m told (and as Golden argued), I think this is a reason for concern, not least because it challenges their own right.
And surely, the fact that he had indeed anticipated much of the criticism he eventually received might hint that attention is indeed diverted to form over the actual matter.
Like Grass I believe that Germany (and also the EU) should be seriously asking itself how does it see its role in the Middle East. Exporting arms to any of the parties involved isn’t, in my view, conducive to promoting a peaceful, dialogue-based (and consequently sustainable) solution, and is only likely to be undermining other, positive contributions that the EU is making through other initiatives.
The world cannot afford considering criticism of Israeli policies as breaking a taboo. The automatic (over-)reaction that delegitimizes any criticism merely for being one, blocks any chance of dealing with what might in fact be an inconvenient truth, as Gideon Levy writes – and regardless of a person’s or a nation’s history. In that sense it might be that Grass’s poem has had little to any impact on Israel and the region (if it was intended to directly do so), but might have actually contributed to highlighting a certain, dominant worldview in Germany (for example, in Spiegel Online and Die Welt). And that can certainly be considered an achievement in itself.
This post originally intended to open with announcing myself a climate skeptic. More accurately, a climate solution skeptic. In notes written at the heat of the moment after I’ve been following the conclusion of the recent UN climate change summit at Durban from a distance, I’ve penned down my frustration with what I saw, heard and read. And also, as media reports have been among my main sources of information on the happenings at the conference, I realized, what’s no less disturbing is not only the largely scarce media coverage but also its essentially compromising attitude.
Clearly, the achievement made at the CoP-17 should have been made years earlier. The so-called roadmap agreed on identifies 2015 as the deadline for negotiating and adopting a new legal framework for global climate action. Though, that’s in fact six years later than the deadline set by the Bali Action Plan for essentially that same goal.
Indeed, multilateral processes of this kind require a lot of patience and are only likely to be a piecemeal puzzle. But the critical lack of sense of urgency, as has been stressed by countless scientists and activists alike, is threatening not only the process itself but future generations’ livelihoods.
Speaking at the Informal Stocktaking Session on behalf of the Alliance of Small Island States, Grenada’s environment minister Karl Hood decided to bring things back to the basics: “Why are we here? What is the purpose of all of this?” he asked (00:29:26). “If we believe that climate change is really a problem and if we believe that we need to bring the temperature to the level of two degrees and under, the things that we have decided to do wouldn’t get us there.”
Once again, a handful but significant number of countries were provoking the option of a broader agreement. But the impassioned plea from India’s environment minister might actually be a positive sign: the use of the already worn-out rhetoric about the rights – in practice, priority – for development is tantamount to climate skepticism since this approach disregards climate change impacts on India, and presumes that development would benefit Indians to the point of overshadowing the price they will pay in failing to address the effects of climate change in their country.
And indeed, even in the future it will be rather easy to claim that development should be prioritized over emission cuts – or that the two are necessary contradictory. That’s, after all, the ‘problem’ with climate change: on one hand, it’s a gradual process, rather than an overnight transformation, that allows us to prepare a response – that is the essence of the UNFCCC process. On the other hand, the same long, gradual process which entails a high degree of uncertainty about, not only its tipping points, but also in regard to the ability to attribute single so-called natural catastrophe events to climate change.
If anything, the Durban summit is perpetuating a fatal procrastination. Ultimately, no one will be held accountable since, personally, those taking the decisions at the CoP plenary (much like those individuals responsible for the highest greenhouse gas emitting operations) are practically the most resilient to the impacts of climate change. Or that’s what they think.
Over two years ago, a couple of months before the then much anticipated Copenhagen summit, I’ve heard Rajendra Pachauri at the 3rd World Climate Conference reiterating the IPCC’s plea for global action. “if we want to stabilize temperature increase to between 2 to 2.40C then global emissions will have to peak no later than 2015″, he told the plenary.
Though, with Durban’s deadline for global treaty on addressing climate change currently set for that same year, the chances of escaping the consequences of a world further warming seem worse than ever.
The climate negotiations, it seems, crystallize a disturbingly dominant position where representatives of some countries see a contradiction between national and global interests. Or, as ‘bright environmentalist’ Alex Steffen twitted: “Divergence on Durban meaning is whether it’s judged by diplomatic ‘realism’ or planetary need: by former, solid win; by latter, disaster.”
And the more policymakers are failing to reach a global, fair and truly legally binding climate agreement, the more the balance between mitigation efforts and adaptation measures shifts to the latter. It isn’t unlikely, then, that some countries have chosen this strategic path.
Nevertheless (and certainly expectedly), the way the outcomes of the Durban conference have been communicated made for a classic example of spin doctoring. The way a success has been presented is in fact a rephrasing of preventing a collapse of the process. The guiding presumption is that ‘avoiding failure’ equals ‘success’. Yet, achievements should be checked against the initial goals. And clearly negotiators in Durban cannot say that they’ve prevented a failure in real terms of climate change impacts. Agreeing on some thing is hardly a success. Juggling words at wee hours – replacing “legal outcome” and “legal instrument” with “with legal force” – is a pathetic attempt to simply get over with the current debate, not a “breakthrough in international community’s response to climate change”.
Moreover, the recurring expression of hope for getting everyone onboard might suggest that this is just as ambitious as this process can actually get.
And if there’s one thing that can ensure that no progress is made, it is public disengagement. Although providing no direct guarantees, close public and media scrutiny of the climate negotiations process is much more likely to make decision makers more accountable towards both their national and global constituencies.
Indeed several dedicated media – Mother Jones, The Guardian, BBC to name a few – have been keeping a close look, constantly questioning the process and those invovled. Yet, apart from these valuable dispatches, the dominant lack of interest on the part of most media and journalists about the very occurrence of the climate conference, or the ongoing talks to begin with, mostly reflects ignorance regarding the significances and implications of climate change. Be it lack of awareness or ‘climate fatigue’, the absence of proper media coverage has not only manifested itself in being limited but also in being uncritical and hardly analytic.
The 2009 Copenhagen summit has already been made into a scapegoat for anything climate, also in terms of newsworthiness. Journalists – and the expectations they pumped in the run-up to the CoP-15 – have already been blamed for its failure. Though, had it not been for media’s attention to that landmark event, it isn’t unlikely that even with the exact same (and indeed poor) results it would have been subjected to the same spin treatment and ultimately hailed as a success.
Here’s just one example: in an unprecedented step, possibly in part thanks to the media buzz surround the Copenhagen summit, the US had pledged there to cut 17 percent of its greenhouse gas emissions by 2020 below 2005 levels. However, if it wasn’t for the intense media coverage at the time, this move could have been celebrated as a breakthrough. Instead, this declaration has been put into its right proportions: translating these figures into the common baseline year of 1990 media reports showed that it actually means roughly 4 percent, and that it’s even less than, not only other developed countries’ pledged cuts, but also less than the American commitment in the Kyoto Protocols that it had signed but never ratified.
But it is indeed about proportions. A single instance of concentrated media coverage is not enough for a sustained effect on the now 17 year long negotiations process. Reporting on climate politics and climate-related issues cannot be viewed as a luxury confined to a handful of dedicated media. Rather, much like a medical treatment, healing also involves media therapy (read: news coverage with an analytic approach) on a regular basis.
