Lockdowns are being eased in many countries, but from different starting points in terms of prevalence of the virus, and with different near-term trade-offs between protecting life and easing constraints on economic activity.

The pressure to ease is understandable. The IMF estimates $10tn has been spent so far on official support measures worldwide, and forecasts global GDP will contract by an unprecedented 4.9% in 2020.

However, the WHO director general, Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, recently insisted that there is an ‘urgent responsibility to do everything we can with the tools we have now to suppress transmission and save lives’, even as research into vaccines and therapeutics continues.

Focusing on suppressing and eliminating the virus as quickly as possible is not just the best strategy for saving life, it also makes most sense in terms of minimising the long-term economic damage from the pandemic.

The alternatives remain uncertain

Neither a vaccine nor improved treatment are currently sufficiently certain to be the focal point for an economic recovery strategy. Despite optimism about vaccine development, there is no certainty of a decisive outcome by a given date. And, even if a vaccine proved effective, manufacturing and distributing it to 8bn people will present an unprecedented set of logistical and economic challenges and take many months, if not years.

In the meantime, although substantial progress has been made in reducing loss of life among those made seriously ill by the virus - and who have access to advanced medical facilities - it remains highly dangerous for a significant proportion of the population - around 20% in advanced economies.

An alternative containment strategy based on gradually reducing the prevalence of the virus in the population by maintaining an “R” number (replication coefficient) just below one will be both economically costly and highly risky when compared with a decisive push to eliminate the virus quickly.

With an R number just below one it is true the virus may eventually disappear, but only over a lengthy period, during which economically damaging social distancing measures will have to stay in place, dragging out the impact on both demand and supply.

Wage support measures to limit ‘economic scarring’ will have to be maintained, and kickstarting the economy with a conventional fiscal stimulus will be difficult, if not impossible, especially when the ability - or willingness - of consumers to spend is still heavily constrained either by social distancing measures or a lack of confidence.

There is also a major risk when the R number is close to one that the virus could suddenly take off again, leading to a complete failure of the strategy.

Benefits of suppress and eliminate

A successful policy focused on suppressing and eliminating the virus offers much better prospects. First, the government can then protect the vast bulk of the economy within its territory, even if it means continuing travel restrictions for some time vis-a-vis countries that are less committed to or less successful in eliminating the virus.

Some sectors - particularly long-haul air transport - will be hard hit, but other critical high value or employment intensive sectors - such as domestic hospitality, leisure and the arts - will be able to make a substantial recovery. To put it bluntly, the authorities may have to hold back some sectors to save others. Such a strategy would also ensure an economy can participate sustainably in free travel zones with other countries.

Second, a drive to suppress and eliminate the virus in the shortest possible timeframe, and then maintain that status, will help authorities communicate clearly to the public the overarching framework guiding the application of social distancing measures, and the nature of the ‘new normal’ economy that can be expected to emerge over the medium to long-term.

Achieving such clarity will enhance the public’s trust in the government’s strategy and hence responsiveness to government instructions. It will also minimise unnecessary and costly adaptations by business and increase its ability to target new opportunities arising from the genuine long-term changes brought about by the crisis.

In addition, a suppress and eliminate strategy is the only sure way to address the disproportionate impact of the virus on ethnic minorities and the poor, and to put an end to the isolation of the millions who currently have to shield themselves.

We know that suppressing the virus almost completely within a given territory is possible because some countries have already done it - notably New Zealand, South Korea, and Taiwan. Some which started with a serious epidemic, such as China, Spain and Italy, have also managed to reach a point where almost complete elimination within their territory can be envisaged.

Renewed outbreaks are likely to happen, particularly while the virus remains in active circulation globally. But this does not invalidate the underlying suppress and eliminate strategy.

Key policies to suppress and eliminate the virus include: a rapid and decisive national lockdown to reduce the disease to levels low enough for test, trace and quarantine systems to identify and suppress local outbreaks; social distancing measures for a limited period or in a specific locality to limit spread while, as far as possible, minimising economic impact; and effective quarantine and track systems applied at borders to prevent the disease from being re-introduced by non-essential travellers and returning nationals.

The precise form of these policies is evolving rapidly as we learn more about the virus. For example, if there is a need today to stop a rapidly escalating epidemic in a given territory, it won’t necessarily mean adopting exactly the same package of lock down measures across the board as were applied three months ago. Several activities had to cease then simply because the virus was spreading so fast there was no time to put in place effective mitigation measures. This does not have to be repeated.

In addition, the benefits of the widespread use of face masks are now much better understood. As is the value of deploying a battery of measures, each one only partially effective on its own but, in combination, with a decisive impact. Financial support measures may need to be adjusted or extended to underpin local lockdowns and, at any given point, the authorities will need to work within an overall budget for relaxation measures and prioritise - getting pupils back in school may mean holding back easing of restrictions elsewhere.

Choosing an effective strategy inevitably means making tough choices. Delaying short-term recovery measures, even by a matter of weeks in whole economies or specific localities, can make a decisive difference to delivering a long-term sustainable economic outcome. The authorities may also be forced to hold back some economic sectors, possibly even leading to permanent damage, as the price of a general recovery. But if we are not ready to make these choices, the economy may become permanently stuck in a halfway house between lockdown and recovery.

When the resolution was passed by World Health Organization (WHO) member states at the World Health Assembly (WHA) in May requesting an evaluation ‘at the earliest appropriate moment’ of lessons learned from the WHO-coordinated international health response to COVID-19, it was generally thought the appropriate moment would be when the pandemic was on the wane.

Yet the Independent Panel for Pandemic Preparedness and Response has actually been established at a time when - as noted by WHO director-general Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus in his announcement of the panel - the pandemic is still accelerating.

In most of the world the virus is not under control, and cases have actually doubled in the last six weeks. So why now?

Emphasis on global solidarity

Throughout the pandemic so far, Dr Tedros has emphasised two main points – the need for urgent action by countries, and the imperative need for global solidarity. In announcing the panel, he said this is the ‘defining crisis of our age’ and that ‘we cannot defeat this pandemic as a divided world … the COVID-19 pandemic is a test of global solidarity and global leadership’.

He may well see establishing the panel now - when the pandemic still has a long way to run - as an opportunity to reinforce messages which have hitherto seemed to fall on deaf ears, notably saying ‘we are in the midst of the battle of our lives, and we have to do better’. And he has also said that we should learn lessons now that will be useful in the continuing fight against the pandemic.

Establishing both the membership of the panel and its terms of reference has been left largely in the hands of the co-chairs – distinguished ex-politicians Helen Clark of New Zealand and Ellen Johnson Sirleaf of Liberia. But they will have to construct the panel in close consultation with member states on the basis of their proposals for membership – a process that will likely be fraught by the divisive politics which have already so upset Dr Tedros.

In addition, embedded in the mandate from the WHA resolution is the phrase ‘WHO-coordinated international health response’ – negotiated language which is intentionally ambiguous and reveals an unresolved tension.

Does it mean the panel should principally focus on WHO’s performance, which is what several countries – including the US – want to see? Or should it give at least equal weight to the way countries have responded individually and collectively, as Dr Tedros and the WHO may want to see?

These different interpretations mean both the construction of the panel and its terms of reference could be highly contentious. Most countries, including China and the US but also others, will not want their responses to be subjected to independent investigation. Nor will they want to include panel members likely to be critical of their responses. This suggests the possibility that there will be political pressure to focus the enquiry principally on the performance of WHO rather than that of countries – an outcome Dr Tedros would not welcome.

It remains to be seen how the co-chairs will manage these highly political issues, and avoid the panel becoming an extension of ‘pandemic politics’ by other means. Can it come to definitive conclusions in the midst of a pandemic and, if so, how likely are they to be heeded?

It is also highly likely that several other reviews will be launched, wholly independently of oversight by WHO and its member states, as happened following the 2014 Ebola outbreak. This provides opportunities for a variety of perspectives on both the performance of WHO, and of individual countries.

Already, The Lancet has announced its own Commission on COVID-19 with a broad mandate covering both the health and economic responses to the pandemic. Both this and the Independent Panel for Pandemic Preparedness and Response are likely to be only the first of many COVID-19 reviews.

The World Bank estimates that the magnitude of internal migration is about two‐and‐a‐half times that of international migration. Within India, an estimated 40 million internal migrant workers, largely in the informal economy, were severely impacted by the government’s COVID-19 lockdown.

With transportation systems initially shut down, many had no recourse to travel options back to homes and villages, resulting in harrowing journeys home. Those who were able to make it home found, in some instances, villages refusing entry because of fears of transmission.

The shocking images of migrants forced to walk in desperation showed the enormity of the crisis as well as some of the challenges posed by an extended lockdown in India where so many people live hand to mouth and cannot afford not to work.

Migrant workers and the informal economy

The complete failure of the government to anticipate the needs of this group, and the subsequent distress caused, has made visible a large workforce who experience precarity of work and often live hand to mouth.

One key challenge is the lack of robust data on the scale of internal migration. While estimates abound, there is no proper data collection system in place to accurately record temporary, seasonal and circular migration patterns. However, it is estimated that more than 90% of working people in India are engaged in the informal economy, with states such as Uttar Pradesh and Bihar accounting for more than 80% of workers in this sector.

A recent government labour force survey estimated that more than 71% of people with a regular salary working in non-agricultural industries had no written job contract. Nearly half of workers are not eligible for social security benefits.

Daily-wage workers are particularly vulnerable, with limited or no access to social security and most living in poverty. Living hand to mouth, their loss of livelihoods has led to a lack of money to pay rents or pay for food. Women are impacted whether because of their gender, responsibilities as caregivers, or as members of disadvantaged castes and communities.

COVID-19 has massively impacted this group of workers. Stranded Workers Action Network found that 50% of workers had rations left for less than one day; 74% had less than half their daily wages remaining to survive for the rest of the lockdown period; and 89% had not been paid by their employers at all during the lockdown.

According to Supreme Court proceedings, relief camps are housing some 660,000 workers; some 2.2 million people also rely on emergency food supplies. Job losses, and home and food insecurity have left this group highly vulnerable.

In March 2020, in response to COVID-19, the Indian government instituted the Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Package (PMGKB), a $22.6 billion relief package. The World Bank announced $1 billion funding to accelerate social protection support, in part through the PMGKB.

This support would work alongside pre-existing initiatives such as the Public Distribution System (PDS), which covers 800 million people, and Direct Benefit Transfers (DBT). This cash injection could help address one of the key challenges facing India’s piecemeal and uneven social protection programmes – inadequate funding. India’s spending on public social protection excluding health is just 1.3% of the GDP.

However, there are still other challenges to overcome. One is how to ensure coordination and coverage within, and across, differing states. The second is how to transition multiple schemes into one integrated system that can be accessed anywhere within the country, particularly important when many workers are on the move. There is an urgent need for a comprehensive system, which is adaptive and flexible to needs and provides adequate social and income support.

Another coverage issue relates to the use of direct cash transfers (DCTs) to support people impacted by the loss of livelihoods, where funds are deposited within bank accounts. Such measures fail to consider the significant numbers of people who do not have access to banks and will not be able to access this support.

Wider impact on livelihoods and remittances

​There is a risk, with extended lockdown and risks of further waves of infection, that labour shortages could negatively impact the economy. There is a wider need to support re-entry back into the workforce and support livelihoods. National Survey Sample data shows that between 2007 and 2008, internal remittances amounted to US$10 billion. These domestic transfers financed over 30% of all household consumption in remittance-receiving households.

But future migration for work is likely to be severely impacted. As restrictions begin to ease, employers and businesses cannot necessarily rely on cheap available labour. Having faced destitution and hardship, many may wish to stay closer to families and local support networks.

As Irudaya Rajan notes in The New Humanitarian, it is likely ‘there will be a reduction in long-distance migration in India after this’, as many migrants will be wary of being stranded again. This would be hugely detrimental to stimulating the economy as reverse migration could push down wages and subsequently demand.

Another issue may be returning migrant workers, who have been working overseas, over half of whom work in the Gulf. It is unclear if, or when, migrants will be able to return to work, with the World Bank estimating that remittances from this group could fall by about 23%.

However, what is striking has been India’s support for this group - the Vande Bharat Mission has deployed flights and naval ships to help return migrant workers, especially vulnerable groups - in marked contrast to the lack of preparation and care for internal migrants.

One factor for this may be the volume of remittances these migrant workers bring to the Indian economy, but it overlooks the contribution of internal remittances, on which there is far less robust data.

But the current challenges can also be an opportunity. The scale of the migrant crisis has made visible an often-overlooked population of workers. With political will, and investment at federal and state levels, this could be an opportunity to transform livelihoods.

As thoughts will turn to how to stimulate economies and get people back to work, it is imperative that those in authority turn their minds to how to create a more just society, that invests in healthcare, and has a social protection system that supports the most vulnerable in society.

Migrants are not just objects of charity that need support. Internal migrants are key income generators that play a vital role in Indian society and should never be overlooked again.

This article was originally published in Routed Magazine.

Back in April, nervousness about external debts reached its peak when highly-respected economists Carmen Reinhart and Kenneth Rogoff suggested emerging economies with less than a AAA credit rating be offered a moratorium on all their external debt service payments.

Although such a proposal might make sense if emerging economies were actually facing any serious shortage of access to foreign exchange, it is a difficult case to make. What we should worry about is not the external debt of emerging economies, but rather the large increases in government debts denominated in their own currencies.

In the first six months of 2020, borrowers from emerging economies issued more than $400 billion of Eurobonds to international investors, up by one-fifth over the same period in 2019. Most of these bonds were sold by borrowers with relatively high credit ratings, but many of the poorest countries do not fear for their access to international capital markets - largely because the US Federal Reserve increased global supply of dollars to a point where their availability is beyond question.

Much of the panic about emerging economies’ external debt comes from ‘sticker shock’ - the bald fact that developing countries’ external debt rose by $4.1 trillion in the decade to 2018 generates much hand-wringing.

But the increase in gross external debt of developing countries looks a lot scarier than the net increase in debt, which sets off a country’s foreign assets - mostly foreign exchange reserves - against its liabilities. And it is net that counts.

At the end of 2018, foreign exchange reserves covered 70% of the external debt of low and middle income developing countries - much lower than a decade ago, when that coverage was above 100%. But in the 1980s and 1990s – two decades of financial instability largely because of excessive foreign debt – the coverage was 15%. By that measure, we are far from crisis territory.

Complacency about the external debt burden of developing countries is quite wrong. But, if complacency is misplaced, so is panic.

The debt growing most worryingly is the domestic debt of governments. There are large, systemically important emerging economies who will suffer eye-watering increases in public debt this year thanks to a combination of collapsing GDP and the fiscal effort needed to save lives.

In Brazil, public debt is rising from 75% GDP last year to a level that could top 100% in 2020. South African public debt is rising from just over 60% last year to something close to 80% GDP. These are truly unprecedented levels of debt.

So why worry about a government’s domestic debt? These are debts which are denominated in these countries’ own currency. So surely the central bank can just print the currency needed to repay their obligations if more conventional solutions – such as tax increases – will not work.

But it is one thing for the US Federal Reserve to increase supply of dollars on a massive scale, since the world is hungry for them - it is quite another thing if emerging economies do the same with their currencies which almost entirely lack the many attractions of the dollar. That remains the currency of the pre-eminent global superpower whose capital markets offer legal certainty and depth of liquidity. And other highly developed economies have a similar privilege.

And yet printing money – in effect, asking the central bank to finance budget deficits – does seem as though it could become a more attractive option for many emerging countries. Importantly, international fund managers have lost interest in buying bonds issued by emerging economy governments in their local currencies. Just a few years ago, foreign investors owned more than 40% of South Africa’s public debt. That has fallen sharply to 30% and is unlikely to rise.

Monetising budget deficits was once anathema, since it was routinely associated with uncontrolled rates of inflation - bad news not only for firms trying to decide whether to invest but also for the poor, who suffer disproportionately when inflation accelerates.

Right now there are emerging economies – such as Indonesia – whose central banks lend directly to the government, and the sky has not fallen in. The rupiah has been remarkably stable this year. However, there are other examples – Argentina, Turkey – where central bank financing of government deficits has been associated with uncomfortably high inflation rates.

This needs careful watching. The biggest risk is the accumulation of public debt threatening longer-term growth. If firms stop investing because they worry about the risks to the value of their currency as domestic public debt explodes, emerging economies will have a tough time growing their way out of these debts.

It could be this, rather than the external debt of emerging economies, that is the biggest risk to the post-coronavirus economic environment in the developing world.

Russia is one of the few countries in the region to have no legal definition of domestic violence and, as a result, there are no protective measures specific to domestic violence such as restraining orders or compulsory anger management training for abusers. In fact, the government has taken steps in recent years to remove any legal distinction between assault happening in one’s home, and elsewhere, with battery among family or household members for first-time offences decriminalized in 2017.

The Russian Ministry of Justice explicitly defended this position in its response to an enquiry into Russian domestic violence cases by the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) in November 2019. The ministry claimed existing legislation adequately protects citizens from domestic violence, ‘even though it has never been considered a separate offence’, reiterating that there is ‘no need’ for adopting specific legislation.

However, the four cases that led to the ECtHR’s enquiry demonstrate that current legislation is not sufficient. The most prominent case is that of Margarita Gracheva whose ex-husband severed her hands in 2017 despite her having made multiple complaints to the police ahead of the act being committed. If Russian legislation had mechanisms in place to isolate victims from their abusers, then Gracheva could have been protected by the law.

Instead, systemic impunity for abusers is supported by statements from people in power excusing domestic violence. The most recent of such statements came from the head of the Chechen Republic, Ramzan Kadyrov, in June 2020. When meeting with the family of a young woman allegedly murdered by her husband, Chechnya’s leader said, husbands beating their wives ‘happens’ and that the young woman should have tried harder to hold on to her marriage. These statements send clear signals to abusers that their actions are justified, and to the victims, that they won’t be protected if they were to come forward.

Similarly, to other parts of the world, civil society organizations in Russia have reported an increase in the number of cases of domestic violence during the COVID-19 pandemic. On a personal level, the pandemic has often exacerbated many of the factors that can lead to domestic violence such as stress, economic anxiety or social isolation.

On a systemic level, many of the provisions intended to protect victims of violence, which were already ineffective in Russia, have been worsened during the lockdown. Where police may not have rapidly responded to reports of domestic violence previously, under lockdown, they have become focused on  other priorities and, where shelters and support networks for the victims may have been scarce in the past, they have been further constrained.

Unsurprisingly, the strategy of the Russian state so far has been to deny that there is a problem of domestic violence, with the Ministry of Interior reporting that, according to their statistics, the number of domestic violence cases have gone down during the lockdown. Indeed, Chairwoman of the Federation Council, Valentina Matvienko, has said she does not believe lockdown has increased domestic violence because, on the contrary, families have been  ‘brought together’, reflecting wishful thinking at best and negligence at worst.

The pandemic has also been used as an excuse to postpone discussion of a federal law on domestic violence, drafted by civil society, that was submitted for review by the Duma last year. This bill would have introduced different types of domestic violence such as psychological and economic violence and transferred domestic violence offences from private to public prosecutions to make it easier for victims to seek justice.

The government’s disregard for domestic violence reflects, in part, the patriarchal mindsets of those in power but perhaps, more significantly, the Kremlin’s belief that conservative social groups constitute its main support base. This has been made evident by the politicization of Russia’s ‘traditional’ values in recent years which was vigorously deployed throughout the constitutional amendments campaign. While it is clear that the true purpose of amending the constitution has always been to allow Vladimir Putin to stay in power beyond 2024, amendments relating to this were absent from the government’s campaign. Instead, Russians were encouraged to vote by populist socially-conservative messages, hence why respect for traditional values has been added to the constitution.

Despite this, attitudes in Russian society are changing. A February 2020 survey by the Levada Centre showed that 61 per cent of Russians – and 74 per cent of Russian women – think domestic violence is a serious problem.

Moreover, the survey shows that women are much more aware of domestic violence than men – with every third woman in Russia admits being aware of domestic violence in their social circles while only every fifth man admits the same. This could be a sign that Russian men and women, on average, have a different understanding of what constitutes domestic violence. If so, adopting a law that defines domestic violence and holding a public awareness campaign is of paramount importance to eliminate any misunderstanding.

The difference could also be a sign that victims of domestic violence are more likely to confide in women hence making domestic violence less visible to men. This awareness gap perhaps explains the difference between men’s and women’s assessments of how serious the issue in Russia is.

The pandemic has provoked a new wave of discussions of domestic violence among Russia’s population with stories and statistics widely shared in the media and on the internet. As domestic violence becomes more visible, public perceptions are likely to shift further towards recognizing, and hopefully condemning, it. But, while legislation is crucial, the experience of other countries in the region, such as Armenia or Kazakhstan, shows that adopting laws on domestic violence is not enough. Measures are needed to ensure implementation of the law including training police officers and state officials and instituting disciplinary action for negligence of victims’ complaints.

Nevertheless, admitting there is a problem with domestic violence in Russia, and introducing laws, are an essential first step. The Russian government seems to have placed its bet on the support of conservative social groups but changing public opinion may prove this strategy unsustainable.

With all EU economies still reeling from COVID-19, the ongoing heated deliberations on the bloc’s next budget, which will determine the amount of money matching its priorities for the next seven years, have taken on an urgency rarely felt in Brussels.

Relying in part on an unprecedentedly large volume of jointly issued debt, the European Commission’s plan for a €750 billion coronavirus recovery instrument is embedded within a revamped proposal for the EU’s long-term budget, of €1.1 trillion for the 2021-27 period. 

Now the ball is in the member states’ court. All seem to agree that getting the EU budget right is crucial to fostering an economic recovery and ensuring the Union is on the right track towards its long-term pre-COVID objectives, from increasing its strategic autonomy to reaching climate neutrality by 2050. However, stark differences persist as to what that means in practice.

Most of the core divisions predate the pandemic’s outbreak. In a special European Council meeting in February, leaders failed to find common ground on the Union’s first post-Brexit budget. Net contributor countries, such as Austria, Denmark, Sweden and the Netherlands — the so-called ‘Frugal Four’— refused to agree to higher overall spending and instead advocated for cuts in the Common Agricultural Policy or cohesion funds, meeting the resistance of states like France and Portugal.

These early divisions foreshadowed the risk of a budget compromise that would leave little space for new policy priorities. The COVID-induced economic crisis has made a traditionally fraught political process even more difficult, putting the squeeze on what were previously priority areas of funding.

The Frugal Four agree on the need for the coronavirus recovery plan but vehemently oppose the volume of grants or the issuance of too much common debt in the proposed instrument, reflecting the unpopularity of these proposals with their domestic audiences. Hungary has also threatened to derail progress on the EU’s rescue plan if rule of law criteria are weaved into mechanisms for the allocation of EU funding.

As European leaders reconvene at the 17-18 July Council meeting, EU Council President Michel proposed a revised 'negotiating box' in preparation for the discussions. The document, which tries to bridge these intra-bloc divisions, bolts the demands for short-term recovery onto the EU’s longer-term ambitions. For instance, it sets an increased target of 30 per cent of funding to go toward climate-related projects, which is necessary for the Union’s green transformation. It also retains the link between the rule of law and EU funding — despite Budapest’s opposition — which is critical for the bloc’s internal accountability and transparency, and external credibility. Furthermore, it proposes a set of new mechanisms through which the EU can sustainably raise its own revenue, including a plastics levy as well as more controversial carbon border tax and digital levy.

Yet in several other critical ways, Michel’s proposals fall short. This is particularly true for some of the more ‘geopolitical’ goals of the Union, as previously expressed by Commission president Ursula von der Leyen, or the repeated calls by the Union’s high representative that the EU should learn to use the language of power.

For all the rhetoric around the EU’s need to boost its ability to act more autonomously in the field of security and defence, reductions in important thematic programmes in this domain could result in a critical loss of momentum, if confirmed. For instance, in Michel’s proposals, flagship defence initiatives such as the European defence fund and the military mobility plan are facing cuts of about 39 per cent and 74 per cent respectively (to some €7 billion for the former and €1.5 billion for the latter) compared with the initial Commission proposal of 2018.

Moreover, the tragic developments at the Greece-Turkey border in the beginning of the year might have brought migration back to the forefront of the EU’s attention, but the overall funding for migration and border management is also significantly lower compared to initial proposals. This serves as another example of a discrepancy between the figures on the table today and those that the EU commission had previously regarded as necessary to address the challenges the bloc faces.

Similarly, under the Council president’s latest proposal, the combined funding allocated for the EU’s external action (under the ‘Neighbourhood and the World’ heading) is lower than the figures in the Commission’s May announcements – from €118.2 billion to €113.9 billion overall. This represents an increase compared to the previous EU budget, but it is not in line with the elevated ambitions recognized by the Commission in May, which have only been made more compelling by the pandemic.

Brokering a deal in EU budget negotiations has always been a brutal affair, requiring sacrifices and compromise under the pressure of a ticking clock. 2020 was never likely to be an exception to this rule; but the pandemic has complicated the politics and raised the stakes.

The risk is that the budget negotiations lead to a compromise which, while delivering a historic coronavirus package, does not adequately support some of the key elements of the Union’s long-term agenda, especially its international ambitions.

The virus of violence

During quarantine, the greater economic vulnerability of Ukrainian women has locked many of them with abusive partners. The uncertainty of personal finances, health and security in confinement has exacerbated domestic violence against women, in certain cases aggravated by the perpetrator’s war-related post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

In pre- pandemic times, only one third of domestic violence victims, 78% of whom are women, reported the abuse. During the pandemic, the calls to domestic violence helplines increased by 50% in the Donbas war zone and by 35% in other regions of Ukraine.

However, more precise estimates are hard to make. This is largely because some fractions of Ukrainian society still see domestic violence as a private family matter, which will get little assistance from the police. Also, reporting from a small confinement place permanently shared with a perpetrator during the lockdown can trigger more abuse.

The COVID-19-tested legal framework

The spike in domestic violence during lockdown has intensified the debate about the inadequacy of Ukraine’s approach.

Ukraine adopted the law on domestic violence in 2017 and made such behaviour punishable under administrative and criminal law. Importantly, the law does not limit domestic violence to physical abuse, but recognizes its sexual, psychological and economic variations. Domestic violence is further not limited to a married couple or close family members, but can be perpetrated against a distant relative or a cohabiting partner.

The extended definition of rape now includes rape of a spouse or a family member as an aggravating circumstance. A special police unit has been designated to deal with domestic abuse cases. Police can now issue protection orders in prompt reaction to an offence and immediately distance a perpetrator from a victim.

The victim can also spend time in a shelter - a system which the Ukrainian government has promised to create. A special registry of domestic violence cases has been set up for the exclusive use by the designated law enforcement and social security authorities to help them be more holistically informed in building a response.

However important, the introduced legal and institutional infrastructure was slow in proving its efficiency pre-COVID-19. It is struggling even more to stand the test of the coronavirus.

Changing the established mindset takes time. 38% of Ukraine’s judges and 39% of prosecutors still struggle to see domestic violence not as a household issue. Even though the police are becoming more reactive to home abuse complaints, getting emergency protection orders is still difficult. The court restraining orders are more effective, however they require the unnecessarily protracted and humiliating procedures of proving one’s own victimhood to different state authorities.

In response to the challenges of coronavirus for women, the police spread information posters and created a special chat-bot about the available help. However, while the domestic violence helplines of La Strada and other human rights NGOs are busier than ever, the police statistics suggest that the lockdown has not catalyzed home abuse.

This could indicate a higher trust to non-state institutions and the inability of a considerable group of women to use more sophisticated communication means such as chat-bots when they cannot call the police in the presence of an abuser. This problem is exacerbated by a current  lack of shelters in rural areas, as most are located in urban settings. Overcrowded in ordinary times, the shelters’ capacity to accept survivors during the lockdown is further limited by the social distancing rules.

Istanbul Convention – The bigger picture

Ukraine failed to ratify the Council of Europe Convention on preventing and combating violence against women, better known as the Istanbul Convention, largely due to the opposition of religious organizations. Concerned that the treaty’s terms ‘gender’ and ‘sexual orientation’ would contribute to the promotion of same-sex relationships in Ukraine, they argued that Ukraine’s current legislation provides adequate protection against domestic violence. However, this is not the case.

The Istanbul Convention does not ‘promote’ same-sex relationships, it only mentions sexual orientation among the non-exhaustive list of prohibited discrimination grounds. Remarkably, Ukraine’s domestic violence law itself is against such discrimination.

The Convention defines ‘gender’ as the socially constructed roles a society attributes to women and men. Ukraine’s overcautiousness about the term is ironic at least in two dimensions.

First, the 2017 domestic violence law restates its aim to eliminate discriminating beliefs about the social roles of each ‘sex’. In doing so, the law supports the rationale of what the Istanbul Convention denotes as ‘gender’ without using the term itself.

Second,  it is exactly the constraints of the rigidly defined niches for both sexes in Ukraine that have substantially contributed to the intensified domestic violence, whether it be  war or  coronavirus-related. The lack of sustainable psychological support for traumatized veterans and the stigma of mental health struggles, especially among men, mars their reintegration to peaceful life. This often results in alcohol abuse or even suicide.

As the economic uncertainty of the war and the virus prevents some men from fully living up to their traditional socially - and self-imposed - breadwinner role, this increases the risk of problematic behaviour and domestic violence.

By diverting the focus of the debate  to the term ‘gender’ used in the Istanbul Convention, conservative groups have ignored the fact that it describes the priority already enshrined in Ukraine’s 2017 law - to eliminate discriminatory beliefs about the socially constructed roles of men and women. This has drawn away time and resources needed to protect those vulnerable to domestic abuse.

Ukraine has not addressed the pigeonholing of women and men into gendered stereotypes. This has harmed men while further victimizing women and children, especially during the lockdown. Ironically, this is leading to the undermining of the very traditional family values certain opponents of the Istanbul Convention appealed to.

Fortunately, Ukraine’s ever-vigilant civil society,  dismayed at the wave of the lockdown domestic violence, petitioned President Zelenskyy to ratify the Convention. With a new draft law on ratification, the ball is now in the parliament’s court. It remains to be seen whether Ukraine’s policymakers will be up to the task.            

While we must wait for the final reckoning of most successful national coronavirus responses, it does still appear those countries with memories of MERS and SARS - such as Singapore, Taiwan, Hong-Kong, and South Korea – led the way in being best prepared for COVID-19, with strong contract tracing and isolation measures.

Experience of previous outbreaks informed the containment strategies adopted by countries in East Asia in response to COVID-19. Vietnam reported its first case of COVID-19 in January but, over the following four months with rapid targeted testing, contact tracing and successful containment, only around 300 additional cases with no deaths were confirmed.

These countries learned to be flexible fast when new transmissions occurred, establishing quick lockdown measures targeted at key groups such as Singapore’s schools or South Korea’s night clubs and religious centres. In stark contrast, most European countries were overwhelmed by the pandemic despite enjoying world-class health systems, predictive models, scientific expertise, wealth, and resources.

Asia may have suffered first from coronavirus, but there is no ‘first mover advantage’ in dealing with a pandemic. The more resilient a society, the better placed it is to cope with a variety of risks and challenges. But to become resilient, a society needs to have faced setbacks and learned from them. And to remain resilient, it needs to stay aware of its own vulnerabilities and avoid complacency.

Prior experience of crises and disturbances, coupled with a ‘trial and error’ process of learning to deal with them, makes a society more resilient, whereas high levels of economic welfare and relative lack of recent crises leave some societies less prepared to face shocks. This is known as the ‘vulnerability paradox’.

Within Europe, it has actually been the Greek handling of COVID-19 that so far appears more successful than others. Greece is a country which has suffered a decade of austerity leading to a weakened healthcare system. And with one of Europe’s oldest populations, the Greek government was keenly aware of its own vulnerabilities. This prompted an early lockdown and a rapid increase in intensive care beds.

Although better state capacity and health system capability are clearly positives for mitigating disasters, citizens do tend to be less familiar with risk preparedness. This lack of experience can then breed complacency which threatens societies where risks are often complex, numerous, transboundary and inter-related.

Conversely, the absence of systemic resilience at a national level often puts the onus on family units or local communities – creating resilience as a necessary response to weak government capacity. There is little choice but to learn to look after yourself and your community.

However, although the vulnerability paradox helps explain why prior experience makes a system more resilient, societies need to stay aware of their own vulnerabilities and avoid complacency if they are to continually remain resilient.

Complacency coupled with a belief in the virtues of the free market has left some countries hit harder than others by the pandemic. In normal times, ‘just in time’ business models can be highly efficient compared to holding vast stocks. But it does not require hindsight to know that a global health crisis will see demand for protective equipment soar and these business models severely challenged.

Several societies have also witnessed a decline in trust towards institutions, especially politicians or the media. The deployment of science as justification for political decisions around coronavirus was presumably intended to help garner trust in those decisions. But when the science itself is inexact because of inadequate or emerging knowledge, this strategy is hardly fail-safe.

COVID-19 does provide an opportunity to rebuild trust by rethinking the relationship between the state and its citizens, to engage people more directly in a discussion about societal resilience with empowered citizens, and to rebuild a social contract between state and society in the context of recent significant changes and further potential threats.

It should also provide a salutary wake-up call to a range of ‘strongmen’ leaders prone to portraying issues rather simplistically. Although COVID-19 may be one of the few complex problems to which simplistic measures do apply - such as wearing a mask and using social distancing – these do not provide the whole solution.

Generally, declining trust in politicians reflects the ongoing inability of current politics to deal with a range of societal challenges. COVID-19 is certainly the most sudden and presents the biggest immediate economic shock of recent times, but it is just the latest in a long line of examples of political failure, such as conflict in the Middle East, climate change, terrorism, and cyber-attacks.

Along with the growth of automation and digitization which provide opportunities at the macro-level but threats at a more micro-level, what most of these issues have in common is that national responses are likely to fail. Restoring trust requires re-energized global governance, and this means compromise and humility – qualities which appear in short supply to many current politicians.

But, regardless of political will, building resilience to tackle ongoing or rapidly forthcoming challenges also rubs up against free market beliefs, because building resilience is a long-term investment and comes at a price. But by acknowledging vulnerabilities, avoiding complacency, implementing lessons from past experiences, and learning from others, policymakers will be better prepared for the next crisis.

Reconstructing societies through the prism of resilience creates fundamentally different outcomes to global challenges, and can build trust between elected representatives and the wider population. Accepting the vulnerability paradox and acknowledging that those generally less prone to disasters are actually less able to cope when change happens creates a powerful argument for this new approach.

Belarusian president Aliaksandr Lukashenka deserves sanctions. This election campaign in Belarus, which culminated in a vote on Sunday is the most brutal and dirty in its history. But, so far, the EU, the UK and the US have only issued familiar-sounding and futile appeals to the Belarusian authorities condemning their actions. Not imposing sanctions is a de facto licence to continue with repression.

Despite all this, the West is unlikely to impose significant sanctions afterwards. There are several questionable reasons for this. First, Western policymakers fear sanctions against Lukashenko will make him more likely to genuflect to Russia. However, relations with Russia have already deteriorated as Belarus accuses Russia of trying to interfere with its domestic affairs.

Sanctions serve as a wake-up call. The Belarusian authorities then might seek - once again - to repair relations with the West and reduce repression for greater assistance in any direct confrontation with Russia.

Second, the West is reluctant to implement sanctions because it has already invested somewhat in warming relations with Belarusian authorities. Punishing Lukashenko could mean burying the - admittedly modest - achievements of a Belarus-West dialogue that started in 2014 after the conflict in Ukraine began.

Even US secretary of state Mike Pompeo met with Lukashenko in Minsk this year, after which Belarus replaced a small but symbolic amount of Russian oil for American. All the same, the West has its conscience to answer to if dialogue is won but repressions continue.

The third reason why the West may not resort to targeted economic sanctions and visa restrictions is a latent concern whether such measures have any effect on democratization processes at all. They may be appropriate punishment, but there is little evidence they ever change the nature of a regime.

According to this logic, if the West imposes sanctions, the Belarusian authorities will continue to crack down with repression because they will have nothing to lose. That said, in previous years, the Belarusian authorities have released political prisoners in response to sticks and carrots brandished by the West. If Belarusian political prisoners did not have a price tag, the authorities would most likely keep everyone in jail.

To be fair, there are reasonable arguments in favour of and against sanctions. But if the West fails to impose them - be it through lack of political will or out of genuine concern about their effectiveness - at least it should focus on helping ordinary Belarusians withstand Lukashenko’s repressions. After the vote, arrested and jailed Belarusian citizens might lack money for lawyers and arbitrarily imposed fines.

If repression spreads further, independent media and human rights organizations will need funds to keep their structures running in the heat of the crackdown. Many entrepreneurs might lose their companies for openly supporting free elections. Thus, if the West will not sanction Lukashenko, it should at least show solidarity with these Belarusians in peril.

This article was originally published in The Telegraph.

In the aftermath of the devastating Beirut port explosion last week, it is not just the role of the Lebanese political class that has come under scrutiny, but that of their international peers too.

Sunday’s international donor conference led by the French president, Emmanuel Macron, raised €253m (£228m) in relief funds, but it also signalled an important change in rhetoric. For the first time, donors affirmed that relief funds would directly go to the Lebanese people, and that longer-term economic assistance would be dependent on Lebanon implementing structural reforms.

This affirmation came hot on the heels of growing international attention on rampant corruption among Lebanon’s ruling political class, which is widely blamed for the port explosion. It sends the message to Lebanon’s rulers that, while their country desperately needs foreign assistance to stand on its feet, no one can help Lebanon if it does not also help itself.

But the communique issued following the conference glossed over the international community’s own role in sustaining Lebanon’s corrupt political class over a period of decades. At the aid conference, Macron said that Lebanon’s future is at stake. What donors need to recognise is that this future is a shared responsibility for them and Lebanon’s leaders alike.

With Lebanon’s debt greater than 170% of its GDP, and with the port explosion costing an estimated $15bn of damage, Lebanon needs foreign assistance to prevent it becoming a failed state. But what it needs even more desperately are reforms that would counter the corruption and lack of accountability that led it to this sorry state of affairs in the first place.

It is Lebanon’s existing political system – a power-sharing pact between different sects rather than a system of governance on the basis of competence – that facilitates its leaders’ reckless behaviour.

The international community is partly responsible for sustaining this system through cascading patronage. For decades, Lebanese leaders grew accustomed to neglecting the national interest and eventually being bailed out by international assistance. Dollar deposits would land in the central bank from Gulf donors, loans would be offered by European countries and foreign aid packages would flow to Lebanese state institutions – only for the majority of this money to end up lining the pockets of the country’s rulers, who frequently overcame their political differences to share state resources between them. The Lebanese state came to exist as a shell in the eyes of its citizens.

Lebanon’s rulers benefited from citizens’ low expectations from the state and the lack of measures ensuring transparency and accountability in the country. They brokered a social contract that cast the leaders as patrons and the people as clients rather than citizens. Foreign powers were well aware of this dynamic but they often turned a blind eye to it, and even nurtured it, because they believed the Lebanese political system brought stability and predictability following the tumultuous civil war.

With time the leaders’ greed grew, and with that the economic situation worsened. Leaders who behaved as de facto local authorities, granting constituents civil service jobs or minor privileges, provided them less and less. There was some international recognition that this dynamic was becoming unsustainable – international donors pledged $11bn during the CEDRE conference of 2018 on condition that Lebanon implemented structural reforms.

And in the wake of Lebanon’s recent economic deterioration, the International Monetary Fund said in April that any discussion of a loan to Lebanon would be subject to more reforms. On both occasions, Lebanon’s rulers ignored the calls for reform, counting on foreign support eventually coming in unconditionally as it used to in the past. International donor follow-up was sluggish.

The port explosion needs to be a wake-up call for any international entity seeking a stable Lebanon. The blast is ultimately the result of the decades during which political classes in Lebanon and outside it fostered the country’s dysfunctional political system. No long-term assistance should flow into Lebanon without strong conditions on transparency and accountability in how this assistance would be employed.

Foreign support is not the problem per se, but rather when it is handed on a plate unconditionally, maintaining the patronage cascade, exacerbating the weakness of state institutions, and further impoverishing Lebanese citizens.

With Lebanon’s economy almost crumbling in the aftermath of the explosion, there is an opportunity for the international community to exert leverage over Lebanese leaders – whose personal wealth grew partially from legal and illegal transactions through the devastated port – so that necessary reforms are implemented. Such leverage would not remove Lebanon’s defective political system, but would pressure its leaders to accept at least some basic reforms.

But for Lebanon to really turn a new page, it needs a new social contract and a new political system based on fairness, transparency and accountability. This is a change that can only start from within Lebanon, but it also depends on the international community abandoning their tacit support of a disastrous political status quo.

This article was originally published in The Guardian.

For decades, the mantra of ‘economic diversification’ characterized attempts to reverse Nigeria’s dependence on oil with little real progress. Despite numerous reforms, international loans and restructuring programmes, 85 million Nigerians live in deteriorating conditions of poverty. The current coronavirus pandemic combined with mounting debt obligations and declining GDP gives new urgency to this issue.

The fall in international oil prices, which led government to slash its oil benchmark price from $57 to $30 a barrel and cut 20% of the capital budget, worsens these problems, but it is far from the only factor. Biomass, which drives household pollution and contributed to the death of 114,000 people in Nigeria in 2017, is the most dominant source of energy in Nigeria, amounting to more than 80% of the total energy mix, followed by fossil fuels (18%), and a negligible amount of renewable energy.

Although a diversified energy sector with a strong emphasis on renewables is known to reduce health and economic risks of combustion, there has been little emphasis on the role a diversified energy mix could play in ensuring sustainable development – even though the estimated potential of 427,000MW of solar power and photovoltaic generation means Nigeria has enormous renewable energy opportunities.

The global economy is also undergoing tectonic structural changes that will affect demand for Nigeria’s oil, leaving a fossil fuel-dependent economy more vulnerable. Improvements in global fuel efficiency, the ascent of electricity as a substitute for oil in the transport sector, and the falling prices of renewables and storage technologies all lead to a reduction in demand for fossil fuel products.

Creating structures for transition

This is not a ‘get out of oil’ prescription, and energy transition is complex. But it is inevitable. There are no universal strategies applicable to all countries; local contexts and political realities inform what is possible. Nigeria can take advantage of its abundant natural gas deposit as a ‘transition fuel’ to buy it time for putting the appropriate transition structures in place. The country has made progress in reducing the amount of gas flared, but much remains to be done for Nigeria to meet the 2030 global deadline to end flaring, after failing to meet its 2020 national target.

The first step to proper transition is to align Nigeria’s international obligations with its domestic policies and legislations - the distance between words and action must be bridged and the institutional capacity to implement raised. And, while they contain symbolic green gestures, the economic recovery and growth plan developed in response to the 2016 recession, and the post-COVID-19 economic sustainability plan, do not espouse green growth as a fundamental objective.

Nigeria must start looking inwards, investing its resources in designing and funding a green transition strategy. Its leadership role in floating Africa’s first Sovereign Green Bonds should be followed with non-debt funding options. Faced with a pandemic that has shattered the boundaries of what is politically possible, the Buhari government has overcome initial inertia to announce a halt in oil subsidy payments, although whether it will see through that policy is yet to be seen.

If it does, how it uses the savings will be significant. The money could provide support for Nigeria’s renewable sector to counteract the price disparity with fossil fuels and encourage rapid research and development. The Nigerian Ecological Fund — which is 3% of the Federation Account — should be reformed and expanded beyond its current scope of addressing ‘serious ecological problems’ to cover climate change with a strong emphasis on mitigation and resilience. That would increase Nigeria’s climate finance and minimize reliance on multilateral climate funds.

Beyond public investments in green infrastructure, the government can also incentivize the private sector to drive a green economy. As the largest purchaser of goods and services in the country, it can leverage purchasing power to green the procurement process. With the release of about $421 million to the Ministry of Works, the 2020 budgetary allocation for road projects has been fully disbursed to the Ministry, making procurement in the construction sector ripe for green reforms. The application of sustainable building techniques and materials could reduce Nigeria’s 17 million housing deficit and create more jobs.

But the task of greening the Nigerian economy is too important to be left to the federal government alone. It also requires mainstreaming climate change and sustainable development into the operations, governance, and budgets of government ministries, departments, and private entities at the sub-national and national levels.

There has been much focus on reviving agriculture, which is laudable, but agrarian practices have radically changed from the 1970s when the sector accounted for 57% of Nigeria’s GDP and generated 64.5% of export earnings. Beset by a loss of biodiversity, drought, and desertification, extreme weather events, rise in sea levels and variable rainfall, it is no longer smart for Nigeria to invest in this area without due regard for the significant climate risks. Any effort to revive agriculture and its export potential must be green-centred and integrate regenerative and climate-smart practices.

The right policy mix combined with aggressive funding can position the country as a renewable energy leader, both on the African continent and globally. And it will reap the benefits in technology development, foreign investment, decreased emissions, poverty reduction, and energy for the 80 million people currently without access to the national grid – all of which could ripple into millions of clean energy jobs in manufacturing and installation across the country.

The road to a green future must be paved with deliberate and consistent policies. Reforms hatched because oil prices have plunged should not be ditched when there is a boom. On the brink of a second recession in four years, Nigeria has learnt that the economic turmoil caused by COVID-19 is only the latest warning that pinning economic growth on a boom-bust market and the generosity of foreign donors and creditors is a failing strategy. There is another way and there is an opportunity for Nigeria to lead.

The virus of violence

According to the UN (para. 7) and the International Criminal Court (ICC, para. 279), conflict-related sexual violence (CRSV) is quite prevalent in hostilities-affected eastern Ukraine. Both sexes are subjected to sexualized torture, rape, forced nudity, prolonged detention in unsanitary conditions with members of the other sex and threats of sexual violence towards detainees or their relatives to force confessions. Men are castrated. Women additionally suffer from sexual slavery, enforced and survival prostitution, and other forms of sexual abuse. Women are more exposed to CRSV: in the hostilities-affected area, every third woman has experienced or witnessed CRSV as opposed to every fourth man.

COVID-19 has redirected funding priorities, affecting the availability of medical and psychological help for CRSV survivors worldwide. In Ukraine, the very reporting of such violence, stigmatized even before the pandemic, has been further undermined by the country-wide quarantine-induced restrictions on movement and the closure of checkpoints between the government-controlled and temporarily uncontrolled areas.

Addressing CRSV in Ukraine

The stigma of CRSV, the patchy domestic legislation, and the unpreparedness of the criminal justice system to deal with such cases prevent the authorities from properly helping those harmed in the ongoing Russia-Ukraine armed conflict.

CRSV is equally traumatizing yet different in nuance for men and women. Female victims often choose not to report the violence. Women avoid protracted proceedings likely to cause re-traumatization and the disclosure of their experience, which could be particularly excruciating in small communities where everybody knows everyone.

Men also struggle to provide their accounts of CRSV. Their suppressed pain and shame of genital mutilation and other CRSV result in sexual and other health disfunctions. Combined with the post-conflict mental health struggles, this has been shown to lead to increased domestic violence and even suicide.

The very investigation of CRSV in Ukraine is challenging. Certain tests and examinations need to be done straight after an assault, which in the context of detention and grey zones of hostilities is often impossible. Specialized medical and psychological support is lacking. Investigators and prosecutors are hardly trained to deal with CRSV to the point that they do not ask questions about it during the interviews. Burdened by trauma and stigma, survivors are inclined to report torture or inhuman treatment, but not the sexualized aspects thereof.

Seven years into the conflict, the state still has not criminalized the full spectrum of CRSV in its domestic law. Ukraine’s Criminal Code contains a brief list of the violations of the rules and customs of warfare in article 438. It prohibits the inhuman treatment of civilians and POWs but does not list any types of CRSV.

The article has an open-ended reference to Ukraine’s ratified international treaties, from which the responsibility for other armed conflict violations may be derived. For the more detailed norms on CRSV, Ukraine should refer at least to Geneva Convention IV protecting civilians and two additional protocols to the Geneva Conventions, to which it is a party.

However, the novelty of the war context for Ukrainian investigators, prosecutors and judges and their overcautiousness about the direct application of international conventions mean that in practice, observing the treaty or jurisprudential instruction on CRSV has been slow.

Use of the Criminal Code’s articles on sexual violence not related to an armed conflict is not viable. Such provisions fail to reflect the horrible variety and complexity of CRSV committed in hostilities. They also envisage lesser punishment than a war crime of sexual violence would entail. Cumulatively, this fails to account for the intention of a perpetrator, the gravity of the crime and the trauma of its victims.

The lack of public debate and state action on CRSV understates its magnitude. Ukraine should break its silence about CRSV in Donbas and make addressing this violence part of its actionable agenda - in law and in implementation.

Ukraine should incorporate all war crimes and crimes against humanity of CRSV in its domestic legislation; ensure a more gendered psychological and medical support for both sexes; establish rehabilitation and compensation programmes for CRSV survivors; create special victims and witness protection schemes; consider the different stigmatizing effects of CRSV on men and women in criminal proceedings and engage the professionals of the same sex as the victim; map CRSV in the bigger picture of other crimes in Donbas to better understand the motives of the perpetrators; submit more information about CRSV to the ICC and educate the public to destigmatize the CRSV survivors.

The drafters of Ukraine’s transitional justice roadmap should ensure that it highlights CRSV, adopts a gendered approach to it and endorses female participation as a crucial component of reconciliation and broader policymaking.

Embracive policymaking

Although ‘the discriminatory line almost inevitably hurts women,’ 'every gender discrimination is a two-edged sword’, Ruth Bader Ginsburg famously argued before the US Supreme Court. This could not be more relevant for Ukraine. The conflict - and lockdown-related violence has reverberated deeper within Ukrainian society, raising fundamental questions about the roles of both sexes and gender equality.

The failure to address CRSV and its different stigmas for both sexes mirrors the general lack of sustainable gender lenses in Ukraine's policymaking. It is no coincidence that a June 2020 proposal for gender parity in political parties coincided with another spike of sexist remarks by top officials. While women get access to more positions in the army, sexual harassment in the military is investigated slowly. Despite all the impressive female professionals, no woman made it to the first four-member consultative civic group in the Minsk process. Such lack of diversity sends an unfortunate message that women are not important for Ukraine’s peace process.

Ginsburg said, ‘women belong in all places where decisions are being made.’ CRSV against either sex won’t be addressed properly until both sexes contribute with their talents and their grievances to all pillars of Ukraine’s state governance and strategy. Ukraine should look to engage professional women - and there are plenty - to join its public service not just in numbers, but as the indispensable equal voices of a powerful choir.

The coup in Mali is not a putsch by disgruntled soldiers in a distant land. It is an extended European neighbourhood and matters to Britain. The UK already has three Chinook helicopters deployed in country and 250 British troops are scheduled to take up UN peacekeeping duties in December in what could be the ministry of defence’s most dangerous deployment since Afghanistan.

This coup was not unexpected as it followed months of mass protests against alleged corruption, a worsening economy, disputed legislative election results and deteriorating security in this West African country. Mali’s military is struggling to stop the insurgents, some of them now also affiliated with the ISIL (ISIS) armed group, despite UN, EU, French and regional military support.

The departure of Mali's President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita was met with jubilation by anti-government demonstrators in Bamako and the leaders of the military coup say they would enact a political transition and stage elections within a 'reasonable time'.

Coups, followed by transitional arrangements and then new elections, are not rare in this region and have happened before in Mali when Keita’s predecessor Amadou Toumani Toure was overthrown by the military in 2012. The current cycle of insecurity followed despite a significant military intervention by France to restore elected government and stop the spread of Islamic extremist insurgency.

This is a reminder of how fragile the Sahel regon is and the importance of seeking stability and state building in a region of spreading Islamic extremist insurgency and rapidly-eroding state legitimacy.

The regional bloc ECOWAS (Economic Community of West African States) has denounced the coup and ordered the closing of regional borders with Mali as well as the suspension of all financial flows between Mali and its 15 members states. What follows now will be negotiations over the transitional arrangements and the timetable for new elections.

This will not be straightforward. Although the opposition was united in their demand for Keita's resignation there is little consensus on what to do next, while the UN Security Council and ECOWAS are divided on how to respond beyond initial condemnation.

It is urgent that three UK cabinet ministers, led by the first secretary of state Dominic Raab, who are currently reviewing the UK’s Sahel strategy complete this and decide upon its future direction.

The UK government needs crystal clarity on its Mali objectives as the clock ticks down to the deployment of British troops there. Increasingly this UN duty looks to become more peacemaking than peacekeeping.

This article was originally published in The Telegraph.

Among the many unusual features of the pandemic-induced downturn is the disconnect between depressed real economies and buoyant financial markets. This is particularly evident in the US, where output fell 9.5% in the second quarter while the S&P 500 index rose by one-fifth.

This may suggest a huge financial bubble is in the making, or at least a highly optimistic view of a COVID-19 vaccine and treatments. Another possibility is that markets have a better grasp of the economic dynamics of a post-pandemic world than most nervous consumers and governments.

Certainly, markets have been helped by central bank largesse. In March, major central banks reacted forcefully to the possibility of a serious credit crunch with lending guarantees and bond purchases. Such liquidity interventions soothe troubled markets, but they also raise asset prices — potentially into bubble territory. This partly explains the markets’ strength. But it may not be the whole story.

A closer look at market performance suggests they may be on to something more interesting. Compare the US’s broad-based S&P 500 equity index with the tech-focused Nasdaq 100. Since the start of the year, the Nasdaq has risen 24% while the S&P is up just 5%. In the S&P itself, it has been the dramatic rise of the so-called Faang companies — Facebook, Amazon, Apple, Netflix and Google/Alphabet — that offset lesser performances by the other 495 companies. This sharp difference reflects two forces.

First, the COVID-19 crisis has had vastly different effects on different sectors. Lockdown brought a sudden increase in demand for the technology services that enable home learning (with school closures), homeworking (especially by office workers), home entertainment (instead of cinemas and theatres), home shopping (instead of physical shops), and home deliveries of almost everything else, including food. The Faang companies benefited disproportionally from this surge in demand as their production is scalable. Much of it could also be delivered by employees who themselves worked from home. The rise in their share prices reflects this.

Meanwhile, other sectors suffered massively. In the UK, the overall drop in gross domestic product of 20% in the second quarter was led by a fall of 87% in the accommodation and food services sector, which was severely affected by government restrictions. About one-quarter of the UK workforce, according to official figures, was also furloughed or temporarily off work without pay during lockdown. The fall in the share prices of hotels, restaurant franchises and airlines reflects such factors. 

The second driver of rising markets is that they are forward-looking while economic statistics reflect the past. For example, that UK GDP shrank during the second quarter is less interesting to a financial investor than the fact that during two months (May and June) GDP expanded by 2.4% and 8.7% respectively. In other words, output troughed in April but recovery began in May and accelerated in June as lockdown restrictions were eased. 

It is likely that rapid adaptations by companies and consumers to the pandemic-supercharged trends are already under way. In Britain, the share of retail sales (excluding fuel) made by ecommerce rose from around 7% in 2010 to 20% at the beginning of 2020 — it has since jumped to more than 30%. 

One-third of those officially working from home meanwhile say that they would like to do that permanently, according to the Centre for Economics and Business Research, and many large companies have offered their staff this choice.

Even in labour-intensive sectors such as healthcare and government services there has been a replacement of face-to-face delivery with digital booking and screen-based consultations.

Still, while this may help some companies in certain sectors, it does not imply a smooth recovery for the whole economy. Rather, it augurs a period of disruption as new companies, new business models and new job openings emerge. If the pandemic has ignited a Schumpeterian process of creative destruction, that is likely to continue whether or not effective vaccines and treatments ever come. 

Governments should ease the pain of this disruption with supportive fiscal and monetary policies, but they should not try to slow it down. The hopeful market message is that one lasting consequence of COVID-19 may be the rejuvenation of productivity growth that eventually spreads far beyond tech. 

This article was originally published in the Financial Times.

If sanctions imposed by the UN Security Council, the EU, or states unilaterally, are not sufficiently targeted, and do not include adequate safeguards for humanitarian action, they can adversely affect the very populations for whose well-being they were imposed in the first place.  This is not a new concern, but one brought starkly to the fore by their impact on responses to COVID-19.

The detrimental impact of sanctions, which can prevent the supply of medical or personal protective equipment (PPE), or the provision of technical support or training to local health authorities is evident. Sanctions can also affect remote learning if support cannot be provided to local education authorities, export licences cannot be obtained for the necessary equipment and software, or if the companies providing reliable internet coverage are designated under the sanctions.

A comparison of US and EU sanctions on Syria reveals key challenges, but also opportunities for improving current arrangements for the imposition and implementation of sanctions so as to minimize adverse consequences in Syria and more generally.

The US has imposed broad sanctions, such as restrictions on the provision of funds, goods or services – even charitable contributions – to the Syrian government, including the health and education ministries, now playing a central role in the COVID-19 response.

UN agencies are exempted from these restrictions. A general license authorizes NGOs to conduct activities to meet basic needs, but it excludes those involving the government. So NGOs wishing to provide medical devices, PPE, training or other support to ministry of health staff have to apply for a specific licence.

But procedures for applying for licences are complicated, and the approval process notoriously slow.  No accommodation has been made to facilitate the COVID-19 response: no interpretative guidance – that would be valuable for all NGOs – has been issued, and no procedures established for reviewing applications more quickly.  There is no statement of policy indicating the circumstances under which specific licences might be granted.

Transactions with designated entities other than the government, such as internet providers whose services are necessary for remote learning, remain prohibited, and regulations expressly preclude applying for specific licences.

US sanctions frequently have a broad scope, both in direct and indirect application.  NGOs registered in the US, and staff who are US nationals, are directly bound by them, and grant agreements between the US government and non-US NGOs require the latter to comply with US sanctions.

This leaves the non-US NGOs in a Catch-22 situation – as they are not ‘US persons’ they cannot apply for specific licenses, but if they operate without such licences they may be violating grant requirements. This lack of clarity contributes to banks’ unwillingness to provide services, and may lead NGOs to curtail their activities.  This situation is regrettable in Syria, where the US is the first donor to humanitarian action, and also arises in other contexts where the US has imposed similar sanctions.

The EU’s sanctions for Syria are far more targeted. Of relevance to the COVID-19 response, they do not include prohibitions on the provision of support to the government that could impede assistance in the medical field.  There are, however, restrictions on the provision of certain types of PPE or substances used for disinfection, and also on transactions with designated telecommunications providers that affect continuity of education during lockdowns.  Although not prohibited, these activities must be authorized by member states’ competent authorities. Similar concerns arise about the complexity and delays of the processes.

The EU sanctions framework is complex, so the recent European Commission Guidance Note on Syria providing official clarification of how it applies to humanitarian action is welcome.  Although the note only explains the existing rules rather than amending them to facilitate the COVID-19 response, it does include a number of important elements relevant not just to Syria, but to the interplay between sanctions and humanitarian action more broadly.

First, it notes that ‘in accordance with International Humanitarian Law where no other option is available, the provision of humanitarian aid should not be prevented by EU restrictive measures’.  This recognizes that humanitarian assistance takes priority over any inconsistent restrictions in sanctions, and it also applies both to UN sanctions and unilateral measures. It is a starting premise that is frequently overlooked in discussions of whether sanctions should include exceptions for humanitarian action.  Its reaffirmation is timely, and it must guide states in drawing up future sanctions.

Second, the note states that sanctions do not require the screening of final beneficiaries of humanitarian programmes.  This means that once someone has been identified as an individual in need on the basis of humanitarian principles, no further screening is required.  This is extremely important to COVID-19 responses as it reflects a foundational principle of IHL that, to the fullest extent practicable, everyone is entitled to the medical care required by their condition without distinction.

Third, while responsibility for the implementation of sanctions, including the granting of authorizations, lies with member states, the note nudges them to adopt a number of measures to expedite and streamline such processes.  These include the suggestion that states could issue a single authorization for the provision of humanitarian aid in response to the pandemic.

The European Commission is to be commended for this initiative, which should be replicated for other contexts where the COVID-19 response may be undermined by sanctions.  These include Gaza, where it would be important to highlight that the designation of Hamas under EU counterterrorism sanctions must not prevent the provision of assistance to relevant ministries.

Failing to draw a distinction between the designated political party and the structures of civil administration risks turning targeted financial sanctions into measures akin to comprehensive sanctions.

The pandemic should serve as a catalyst for improving the system for the adoption and implementation of sanctions by the UN, the EU and individual states, including the UK as it elaborates its sanctions policy post-Brexit. The principles are clear: without prejudicing the aims for which sanctions have been imposed, humanitarian needs must always be prioritized, and met.

Making the case

The recent election results in Belarus have triggered revolution in yet another post-Soviet country and Aliaksandr Lukashenka’s response has been devastatingly brutal. However, the Belarusian people’s resilience and Western sanctions – adopted on 14 August – have proved effective. As some of the 6,700 jailed protesters were released, accounts of horrific treatment by law enforcement emerged: overcrowded cells, no food, torture, forced confessions, severe beatings , and threats of rape.

With reports of mounting violence, Polish MEP Radosław Sikorski warned Lukashenka to expect not just sanctions but also the possible intervention of the International Criminal Court (ICC), an idea supported by the opposition-led Belarus’ National Salvation. While there are significant impediments to the Court’s involvement, the impact of such an initiative could be ground-breaking.

Legal framework

The ICC considers criminal responsibility of top civilian or military leaders for only the most serious atrocities - war crimes, genocide, crimes against humanity and, in certain cases, the crime of aggression. In the context of Belarus, the Court’s jurisdiction over crimes against humanity might be relevant. According to the Rome Statute, the ICC’s founding treaty, crimes against humanity include widespread or systematic abuses directed against a civilian population. Atrocities relevant to Belarus include arbitrary imprisonment, torture, inhuman treatment, sexual violence, and enforced disappearances.

The ICC is a last resort. It can intervene only if states are unable or unwilling to properly investigate and prosecute serious crimes themselves. Although Belarus’s Criminal Code punishes crimes against humanity, as Lukashenka himself is implicated, impartial trials in the country are impossible while he is still in power. Other countries may investigate specific atrocities in Belarus under the universal jurisdiction principle. Universal jurisdiction greenlights investigations into the most serious crimes regardless of where they are perpetrated. German, Swedish and French proceedings on Syria are illustrative examples of this. Protesters may also file individual complaints of abuse to UN bodies under the protocols of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women. The European Court of Human Rights is not an option for the protesters because Belarus is not a member of the Council of Europe.

As the UN mechanisms are yet to be triggered and there has not yet been any talk of universal jurisdiction proceedings, the question of recourse to the ICC remains. But as Belarus is not party to the Rome Statute, the only way to trigger the Court’s jurisdiction is a referral by the UN Security Council (UNSC). Even though it would be vetoed by Russia –  and, almost certainly, China – it could be worth pursuing.

The importance of symbolism

So far, the UNSC has referred to the ICC two situations in non-party states – Sudan and Libya. But for cases that do not end up being referred to the Court, the UNSC debates are as significant for what they manage to agree upon as they are for what they do not. Regarding Belarus, two impeded UNSC accountability initiatives are relevant: on Syria and MH17.

In 2014, Russia and China vetoed the referral of cases of violence in Syria to the ICC. In 2015, Russia was the only country to block the creation by the UNSC of a special tribunal to investigate Malaysian Airlines flight MH17, downed by a Russian missile over war-affected eastern Ukraine. In both cases, the vetoes delayed justice, but they did not prevent it. For Syria, special independent mechanisms to collect evidence for adjudication were developed. Although justice has yet to be done, except in states like Germany, the evidence is ready for any future court. For MH17, a proceeding at a domestic Dutch court became an alternative. Parallel to that, new evidence of Russia’s role in both Syria and the downing of MH17 emerged - contextualising its UNSC vetoes.

Russia’s stakes in the Belarusian elections are probably even higher: the victory of democracy in Belarus will deprive it of one of its closest and most dependent post-Soviet allies.

Even if Russia destroys any chance of Belarusian citizens using the ICC, the attempted ICC-Belarus discussion will not have been in vain. Russia’s opposition to the respective UNSC resolution would be a self-defeating validation of Lukashenka’s atrocities against his own people, unashamedly restated at one of the world’s top diplomatic negotiation tables. Similar to Syria and MH17, the UNSC would reconfirm its self-imposed impotency to defend basic human rights amid political conjuncture. This would bring more attention to the issue and catalyse action through other platforms, including the discussions across UN bodies and the consideration of Belarusians’ individual complaints of abuse, and could lead to tougher sanctions. It could also further make the case for universal jurisdiction proceedings in other countries.      

As the UK’s post-Brexit foreign policy takes shape, it is increasingly clear that joint cooperation with France and Germany will be of key importance. The current dispute with the US over imposing further sanctions on Iran shows that the UK values continuing strong cooperation with its European partners on key international issues, even at the cost of a major transatlantic dispute. Moreover, the recent first meeting of the German, French and British defence ministers in an E3 (European/EU 3) format signalled political commitment by all three partners to double down on joint diplomatic cooperation despite troubled UK-EU Brexit negotiations.

The UK working with France and Germany as part of the E3 has evolved in recent years from a shared approach to diplomacy on Iran’s nuclear programme to include a broader range of international security issues, such as the conflict in Syria and freedom of navigation in the South China Sea. E3 cooperation has so far been largely low-key, marked by close relationships and daily contacts between officials rather than high-profile summits between the leaders of the three countries. In the absence of any EU-UK negotiations on a future foreign, security and defence policy relationship, the E3 represents a key arrangement for aligning and mobilizing Europe’s ‘big three’ states. In a recent Chatham House research paper, we argue that Germany, France and the UK could and should maintain the E3 as a platform for flexible diplomatic coordination and crisis response, and expand its focus to address a new set of thematic, regional or multilateral topics. These could range from further cooperation on arms control to a reform agenda for multilateral institutions or a joint approach to the broader European neighbourhood.

The E3 countries have complementary reasons for wanting to make the format work. France and Germany recognize that the high degree of shared foreign and security policy interests with the UK require a pragmatic format for close cooperation, to provide insurance against an underdeveloped EU-UK relationship, help efficiently combine European forces and bring added value to the EU and NATO – but also to see the UK aligned with Europe on major international issues. Close foreign and security policy relationships with France and Germany will remain of interest to the UK as well, in order for it to keep playing an effective role in European security and to work with like-minded partners on key international issues.

Brexit presents both a major challenge for the E3 relationship and a major rationale for developing the format further. Neither France nor Germany see E3 cooperation as a substitute for a deal on a future EU-UK relationship or for the development of the EU’s own foreign, security and defence policy. Failure to reach a Brexit deal and a collapse of the EU-UK relationship into hostility and antagonism could make E3 cooperation politically difficult in the short term. In the longer term, were the UK and the EU to adopt very different foreign and security policies, E3 cooperation would also make less sense.

Even if an agreement is reached on the future EU-UK relationship by the end of this year, for France and Germany the challenge will be to reconcile their work with the UK through the E3 with their commitment to the EU. France and Germany have different rationales for favouring E3 cooperation. While France is more relaxed about its intergovernmental approach and prioritizes deliverables, Germany is worried about the perceived competition between the E3 and the EU. However, they both share the view that E3 cooperation should complement rather than undermine EU foreign, security and defence policy cooperation, while acting to bridge or smooth cooperation between the EU and the UK. If E3 cooperation were to conflict with broader EU policy by generating hostility from excluded member states (such as Poland or Italy) and therefore distract from building consensus for broader EU initiatives, such as post-COVID economic recovery, E3 cooperation may falter.

Another key factor for the E3 will be the evolution of transatlantic relations, and whether the next US administration presents Europe with the dilemma of choosing between broad alignment with the US or open confrontation, as in the case of the Iran nuclear deal’s ‘snapback’ mechanism. As a non-EU state, the UK may have more autonomy to set its own policies but it will not be able to escape a choice between either a broad alliance with European states or a more ambivalent and ad-hoc relationship with the continent, while also creating new formats for cooperation with other democracies such as the Five Eyes states. This type of diplomatic ‘venue shopping’ could create tensions with European partners, especially Germany and France who hope to anchor London into a broad European approach. The UK’s ongoing Integrated Security, Defence and Foreign Policy Review should provide clarity as to the UK’s future European ambitions and what that means for the E3.

Given the growing instability surrounding Europe, reinforced by an eventful summer 2020– with the Iran nuclear deal in limbo, renewed tensions between Turkey and Greece in the Mediterranean, protests in Belarus, increasing US-China rivalry and further instability in the Sahel – the E3 has recently been developing a more visible profile. By convening the first meeting of E3 defence ministers in August, Germany showed leadership and a commitment to the format despite its fears of hostility from other EU member states towards increased E3 cooperation. Officially widening E3 cooperation to include defence, while mostly symbolic for now, satisfies Berlin by marking a step towards institutionalization, appeases Paris by putting on the joint agenda issues such as the recent coup in Mali and the crisis in the Eastern Mediterranean, and shows some political commitment by London at a time of tense UK-EU Brexit negotiations.

France, the UK and Germany all agree that the E3 is a necessary cooperation format that needs to be developed further. Recent events seem to show willingness on the part of the three countries to make it work, both in spite of and because of upcoming Brexit tensions. Longer-term challenges – relating to intra-EU tensions over the role of the E3, the future EU-UK relationship and transatlantic divergences – are still to be addressed and managed for the format to reach its full potential. Nevertheless, in today’s uncertain strategic context for Europe, the E3 is establishing itself as a go-to format for cooperation for Europe’s ‘big three’.

The emergence of a multipolar global economy in which the US is no longer the main engine of growth has boosted the role of economic diplomacy, the setting of foreign economic policy. While the EU remains the world’s biggest economic bloc and the US is still an economic powerhouse, it is Asia – China in particular – which has created hundreds of millions of new middle-class consumers, helping to drive global economic growth.

This shift has ignited an era of competition between the US and China and, by implication, a debate about the merits of different political and legal systems. The difficulty for the rest of the world is how best to navigate this highly polarized climate – in recent history, only the Cold War comes close to having matched the adversarial dynamics of such a divided international community.

In conducting economic diplomacy, governments should consider their economic strengths, the importance of transparency, and how best to operate in a fragmented international system.

First, the setting of trade and investment policy should take into account developments in the global economy. One trend worth noting is the rising importance of services – in particular digital services – in international trade. The expanding cross-border trade in intangibles such as business services and data means the negotiation, definition and enforcement of standards to regulate these are of growing importance for the global economy, and for policymakers in many countries.

In contrast, negotiations around merchandise trade are likely to take a somewhat lower profile. Under the World Trade Organization (WTO), tariffs on manufactured goods have dropped significantly in any case – though there is still scope to lower them. Contemporary diplomacy, as well as disputes, around the lowering or raising of barriers to international trade will increasingly concern non-tariff measures applicable to services rather than those, such as tariffs, that traditionally apply to goods.

For service-based economies, it is vital free-trade agreements (FTAs) encompass regulations and standards for intangibles. But this is difficult in a multipolar global economy where the US, China and the EU all have different legal and regulatory systems, and raises the prospect of a fragmented global trading system divided into blocs of countries adhering to different standards.

A pluralistic or mini-multilateral approach to trade such as the stalled Trade in Services Agreement (TiSA) could help resolve elements of this division. TiSA was launched in 2013 by a group of advanced economies, not the entirety of the WTO, to further opening up global services trade. However, talks have been on hold since 2016 and, in the current climate, it is near impossible to conclude negotiations when the major economies do not come to the table and instead promote their own standards with their closest trading partners.

Second, policymakers should consider that, in an era of heightened trade tensions, any framework for economic diplomacy needs to be transparent if it is to be trusted and credible. Such a framework could centre on commercial openness and consistency with a country’s foreign and intelligence policy aims. For example, clearly spelling out how a country reviews prospective foreign investment and applying this consistently would demonstrate that all projects are treated equally without singling out any individual country. This would be an improvement over an ad hoc and less transparent approach .

A major challenge in creating a ‘principle-based’ economic diplomacy framework of this kind is reconciling competing policy aims. To this end, several key questions need answering. Should trade agreements encompass non-economic elements, such as foreign policy aims? Do concerns over national security mean that trade and investment agreements should favour allies? Could such a framework assess a trading or investment partner in terms of national security as well as potential economic benefit?

A country should also re-think how to undertake a wider international role when embarking on economic diplomacy. The inability of the major powers to set new global rules has had a detrimental impact on an international system under significant strain. The stalling of multilateral trade talks and urgency of international coordinated action on global public goods, such as health and the environment, shows there is a pressing need for a new approach to international relations.

Economic diplomacy could, and should, bolster the rules-based multilateral system. The challenge is engaging the major powers without whom widespread adoption of global policies and standards is less likely. Yet the chances of wider adoption might actually be better if a proposal does not come from either the US or China. This opens up the opportunity for other countries to be ‘honest brokers’ and potentially improve their own international standing.

In an era of increasing tension between great powers, economic diplomacy requires re-tooling. It should consider not just economic considerations, but also broader foreign policy aims, greater transparency, and a pluralistic approach to global rules to strengthen the multilateral system.