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Category: Academic Analysis

  • MIL-OSI Global: How our bodies react when we use social media – and when we stop

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Niklas Ihssen, Associate Professor, Department of Psychology, Durham University

    shutterstock rawpixel.com/Shutterstock

    The typical adult in the UK spends nearly two hours on social media per day. And for younger users, this can easily be up to five hours. The likes of Instagram or TikTok seem to draw us into their ever-changing feeds and it’s difficult to tear ourselves away from these platforms.

    Now our latest study shows that even our body reflects a state of being glued to the screen when we are on social media.

    We asked 54 young adults to browse their Instagram on their phone for 15 minutes as they would normally do in their daily life. However, in our study we had attached electrodes to their chest and fingers that allowed us to record their heart rate and “skin conductance”, which is an indicator of sweating. Psychologists can use these physiological markers to infer subtle mental states and emotions. We also added a control condition where our participants read a news article on their phone, just before they logged onto Instagram.

    What we found was that, relative to the news reading condition, scrolling away on Instagram led to a marked slowing of participants’ heart rate while, at the same time, increasing their sweating response.

    From other research we know that such a pattern of bodily responses shows that someone’s attention is fully absorbed by a highly significant or emotional stimulus in their environment – it’s a state of simultaneous excitement and deep immersion into something very meaningful to us.

    Importantly, from the control condition we knew that it was not just being on the phone or reading that caused this bodily response. So there seems to be something special about social media that can easily engross us.

    The most intriguing effect in our study happened when we interrupted participants at the end of their Instagram stint and asked them to go back to reading another news article. Rather than snapping out of the excitement and returning to a calmer state, participants’ sweating response increased further, while heart rate also increased rather than slowed down further.

    Is it addiction?

    What was going on? What helped us interpret these effects were participants’ ratings of their emotions. We collected these before their social media bout and at the time we asked them to log off.

    Participants reported being stressed and anxious when they had to disconnect from their feed. They even reported having social media cravings at that moment. So it looked like the physiological response that we observed when participants had to log off reflected another form of arousal – but this time it was more negative and stress-related.

    Such bodily and psychological stress responses also occur when people with a substance addiction go through withdrawal during abstinence or after quitting “cold turkey”. So were these signs that we observed “withdrawal” from Instagram?

    The answer to this question is not straightforward. However, our study may give us some clues. After the experiment, we asked all participants to fill in a questionnaire assessing symptoms of “social media addiction”.

    While this concept is controversial and currently not recognised as a mental health disorder, the questionnaire told us something about how social media use can negatively affect someone’s daily life. This can even include their work or school results, or lead to conflict with their partners.

    Notably, we did not see any heart rate and sweating differences between participants who scored high or low on these addiction measures. That means, that all our participants showed a pattern of excited immersion during use and stress-related arousal when use was interrupted.

    We don’t think that this finding means that we are all addicted to social media though. Instead, we believe that social media offers very powerful rewards. And some of its features may indeed have an addictive dimension, such as the personalised short-video streams that trap us in an endless loop of entertaining content.

    Critically however, our previous study shows that it is primarily the social aspect of social media that drives most people to use it so intensively. This also means that – in contrast to drugs – social media taps into basic human needs: we all want to belong and to be liked.

    So if we recognise the existence of “social media addiction”, we might also need to recognise a “friendship addiction”. We should therefore exert caution with the term addiction in the context of social media – the risk is that normal behaviour could become “pathologised” and lead to stigma.

    And, as our previous research indicates, we may be just fine abstaining or cutting down from social media for a while without experiencing dramatic changes to our wellbeing (either positive or negative). The reason for this is that in contrast to drugs, we can satisfy our needs through other means – for instance, by talking to people.

    Niklas Ihssen does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. How our bodies react when we use social media – and when we stop – https://theconversation.com/how-our-bodies-react-when-we-use-social-media-and-when-we-stop-251291

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Police in Northern Ireland unlawfully spied on journalists – this is not how covert policing is meant to work

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Steve Christopher, Senior Lecturer in Criminal Justice (Police Programmes), De Montfort University

    At the end of last year, the Investigatory Powers Tribunal (an independent judiciary body) made a shocking landmark judgement. The tribunal found that the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) and the Metropolitan Police had unlawfully conducted surveillance into two investigative journalists.

    The PSNI was forced to pay £4,000 in damages to Barry McCaffrey and Trevor Birney, producers of No Stone Unturned, a 2017 documentary about alleged police collusion in the unsolved Loughinisland massacre in 1994.

    The two journalists were arrested in 2018 by the PSNI over leaked documents that appeared in the film. Their arrest was later ruled unlawful. Suspecting that this was one of multiple attempts by the police to identify their sources, McCaffrey and Birney brought a complaint. The tribunal’s subsequent investigation and ruling has revealed the extent of the surveillance on the pair, and drawn attention to more examples of surveillance on journalists. These are now being investigated by a review set up after the tribunal’s ruling.

    The PSNI admitted last year to making 823 applications for communications data for journalists and lawyers over 13 years. Additionally, more than 4,000 phone communications between 12 journalists were monitored by police over three months.

    The force also admitted employing covert tactics against 320 journalists while intercepting over 4,000 telephone calls and texts between McCaffrey, Birney and a dozen BBC journalists. This is espionage on an industrial scale.

    The treatment of the journalists has rightly raised concerns about press freedom. But as a senior detective who specialised in covert policing, and who now lectures criminal investigation students about the practice, I find this case extremely worrying for the future integrity of covert policing in the UK.

    Covert policing and human rights

    Covert policing refers to a combination of clandestine policing tactics used to
    lawfully access information and evidence that may not otherwise be obtainable. These tactics are an essential investigative tool in tackling contemporary organised and serious crime – they are not intended to police the 4th estate.

    Journalistic confidentiality is a privilege legally protected from covert policing, other than in exceptional circumstances. These privileges (along with legal and medical) are basic and sacrosanct, and cannot simply be ignored or trampled upon. Hence, the reason for the checks and balances in the process of authorising covert policing.

    With the advent of the UK Human Rights Act in 1998, an accountability framework was necessary for covert policing to satisfy the rights set out in the European convention on human rights.

    I was a member of various national working groups which worked tirelessly around the turn of the millennium to legitimise and regulate clandestine tactics through the introduction of the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act and its associated codes of practice.

    To comply with human rights, the deployment of covert policing must be justified, necessary, proportionate and lawful. Law enforcement agencies employing theses tactics are held accountable through oversight by the Investigatory Powers Tribunal.

    This framework has largely proved to be very effective and compliant with the relevant laws and human rights. Although there has been a rise in the number of complaints by private individuals to the IPT since 2017, less than 4% were actually found to have failed to comply with the framework.

    UK law enforcement and the public are still coming to terms with serious and systematic abuses by undercover police officers targeting campaigners over a period of 40 years. Against that backdrop, it is imperative that the deployment of covert policing by law enforcement agencies complies with the governance regime put in place.

    The tribunal found that in the case of Birney and McCaffrey, the former PSNI chief constable did not comply with the necessary legal requirements to authorise the surveillance operation. They said that the constable failed to “consider whether there was an overriding public interest justifying an interference with the integrity of a journalistic source”. Clearly, there is public interest in identifying who was responsible for the Loughinisland massacre, which is what the journalists were seeking to do with their documentary.

    Trust in police

    At the heart of this calamity lies public confidence and legitimacy in policing. The British public believes in press freedom to expose unacceptable behaviour, especially by public servants, and greatly dislikes the abuse of power by the police to prevent that.

    In this case, the police service has again overstepped the mark by its egregious conduct. And I am concerned that it is merely the tip of the iceberg. Given the collaboration between the PSNI and Met police reported in this case, it would be very surprising if such proactive “monitoring” of journalists was not underway in many forces.

    McCaffrey, Birney and others are right to call for a public inquiry to establish the extent of such covert operations by the police service. There is a clear and significant danger when the police extend their clandestine reach to unjustifiably and unnecessarily spy on journalists. A review of the extent of such operations across the UK would be in the interests of transparency and accountability. It would also go a long way to repairing the damage caused to public trust in the police and covert policing by this case.

    Steve Christopher does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Police in Northern Ireland unlawfully spied on journalists – this is not how covert policing is meant to work – https://theconversation.com/police-in-northern-ireland-unlawfully-spied-on-journalists-this-is-not-how-covert-policing-is-meant-to-work-247628

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: UK arts sector is getting a £270 million funding boost – but there are winners and losers

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Adam Behr, Senior Lecturer in Popular and Contemporary Music, Newcastle University

    “In any civilised community the arts … serious or comic, light or demanding, must occupy a central place. Their enjoyment should not be regarded as something remote from everyday life.” This was a central statement in the white paper (a statement of policy intent) issued 60 years ago by Jennie Lee, the UK’s first minister for the arts under Labour prime minister Harold Wilson in 1965.

    Outlining A Policy for the Arts – The First Steps was the first white paper for the arts (and the only one until 2016), and suggested that the arts should be publicly supported, also arguing for increased local and regional support besides national institutions.

    Many of Lee’s assertions still ring true today, not least that, “Today’s artists need more financial help, particularly in the early years before they have become established”. There were echoes of that 1965 statement of support for the arts in Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy’s recent announcement of a £270 million funding package. Indeed, the timing was no accident, Nandy explicitly referenced Lee’s “vision for accessibility in the arts”.

    This article is part of our State of the Arts series. These articles tackle the challenges of the arts and heritage industry – and celebrate the wins, too.

    It’s a broadly welcome intervention for a sector in straitened circumstances. A drop of more than 30% investment through local authorities in England since 2010, and of 21%, overall has left organisations struggling to maintain infrastructure, creating a drag on new developments. So an injection of government support for public assets like museums and libraries is a necessary step to stem the decline.

    Much, though, has changed since 1965. Absent from Lee’s communitarian account of governmental support for the arts is the language of economic return. The intervening decades have seen a sea change in the logics of arts funding.

    While the stated benefits of arts to society – and particularly education – remain salient, the emphasis has shifted over time from support to “investment”, with the arts and culture increasingly recognised and valued for, as Nandy puts it, “their growth potential to drive our economy forward”.

    This rhetorical and practical co-mingling of “culture” with the “creative industries” is a longitudinal shift. In political terms this was made clear by the 1997 rebranding of the Department for National Heritage (the first “culture” department, founded by Conservative prime minister John Major in 1992) as the Department for Media, Culture and Sport (DCMS) the last time Labour returned from a long spell in opposition.

    This defence of arts funding in “instrumental” terms (its economic return, or value in bumping up educational achievements) is a mixed blessing. On the one hand, there’s a risk of losing sight of culture’s intrinsic value as something worthy of support – art for art’s sake.

    At the same time, it has been accompanied by a move away from the more patrician conception of what merited state support. National institutions and the “high arts” were the main focus in the birth of the arts councils as part of the major overhaul of the role of the state – the postwar consensus – after the second world war.

    This points towards wider tensions in arts funding and the DCMS portfolio that derive from the evolving landscape since 1965. There was a strong emphasis in Lee’s paper, and in Nandy’s recent announcement, on buildings, infrastructure and established spaces. Vital as these are, the idea of what counts as culture has moved on and expanded since then.

    Even beyond their economic potential, the cultural value of practices more traditionally associated with commercial activity has become more central to the national conversation.

    Arts education has also become strategically important in both economic terms and in supporting widening access to opportunities across society, requiring a broad conception of “the arts”. The barriers between high art and popular culture have become porous, and this has a bearing on state support, especially when cultural activity overall is reeling from a pandemic and years of austerity.

    This is at the heart of those sectors left out of the current largesse. Drawing on both economic and cultural arguments Michael Kill, chief executive of the Night Time Industries Association, has noted the absence in Nandy’s proposal of live music venues, nightclubs and festivals.

    “The government has placed traditional and heritage culture at the forefront while completely ignoring the vital creative spaces that fuel innovation, inspire younger generations, and contribute significantly to our economy,” he wrote recently.

    DCMS funding is also a microcosm of any government spending in that it also comes with questions around opportunity cost (as the recent announcement about boosting the defence budget and immediate ramifications for foreign aid also make clear). Here too, the grassroots are a factor.

    Mark Davyd of the Music Venue Trust, for instance, has pointed out that his suggested “£20m to open 40 new grassroots music venues” was derided, but that there’s “£15m to build yet another hall for the National Railway Museum and £5m to build a poetry centre, and nobody thinks that £20m is funny.”

    Also rising rapidly up the agenda are concerns about the longer term impact of AI on creative careers, another area in which the DCMS – and the Department of Science Innovation and Technology – might see their plans for growth at odds with those in the creative industries and organisations.

    Artists are objecting to a suggested exception to copyright restrictions that would require them to actively “opt out” of their work being used to train AI models, and which benefit AI companies with the presumption that works can be used for that purpose.

    None of this is easy, especially after a long period of austerity in the arts, and a context of global uncertainty. But Nandy’s recent announcement of funding can only be seen as a holding action to halt the deterioration.

    To realise Jennie Lee’s vision, a more substantive, structural approach is needed, one that brings those activities at the grassroots, and at the margins of traditional views of “culture” under the umbrella of funding.

    Adam Behr has received funding from the Arts and Humanities Research Council and the British Academy.

    – ref. UK arts sector is getting a £270 million funding boost – but there are winners and losers – https://theconversation.com/uk-arts-sector-is-getting-a-270-million-funding-boost-but-there-are-winners-and-losers-251340

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Gaza ceasefire deal looks doomed as Israel blockades Strip and bars entry of humanitarian aid

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Scott Lucas, Professor of International Politics, Clinton Institute, University College Dublin

    When Israel signed a ceasefire deal with Hamas in Gaza on January 15, the agreement was structured in three phases. Phase one, a six-week period in which Hamas would release hostages in return for Israel releasing Palestinians detained in its jails, ended on March 1.

    The shaky deal has held for the full six weeks – just. At one point Hamas threatened to halt the exchange of hostages when it said Israel was breaching the terms of the deal. The Netanyahu government responded – with US backing – by threatening to end the ceasefire in mid-February, saying that Hamas was not living up to its side of the deal.

    The hostage releases have continued, although Israelis have been shocked and angered at the condition of some of the hostages after 17 months in captivity. Hamas has also taken advantage of the world’s gaze during hostage releases to stage large parades of its fully armed fighters.

    On March 1, as stage one of the deal was due to end, Benjamin Netanyahu ordered a full blockade of humanitarian aid entering Gaza. Middle East expert, Scott Lucas, answered our questions as to what is happening and how this situation may play out.

    Why has Israel decided to block humanitarian aid to Gaza?

    The Netanyahu government’s blocking of humanitarian aid to Gaza’s population is part of a scheme to avoid a phase two of the ceasefire, while putting pressure on Hamas to extend phase one.

    That would allow the Israeli government to pursue the return of the remaining 59 hostages, alive or dead, held by Hamas while avoiding the requirements of phase two – notably the withdrawal of the Israeli military from Gaza and the restoration of a Palestinian government in Gaza.

    Of course, those who will pay the cost are more than 2.2 million Gazans, around 90% of whom have been displaced amid 17 months of mass killing. But Israel’s leaders are counting on that causing little concern, or at least significant action, by the international community.

    Wasn’t the ceasefire deal dictated by a timetable?

    Phase one of the agreement only stipulated that discussions for a phase two to begin within 14 days of implementation, which would have been about the start of February.

    But the Netanyahu government reportedly sent mediators to Qatar without the authority to discuss phase two, only to ensure that hostage releases continued. The limit of its cooperation has been sending representatives to Egypt and conferring with Donald Trump’s Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff, with current discussions suggesting little prospect of agreeing phase two.

    What is driving Netanyahu’s decision-making right now?

    Netanyahu’s vow has been “absolute victory over Hamas”. But as there is no sign that Hamas is going to disband – or even that its leaders will leave the Gaza – there is zero chance of that happening in phase two.

    That assessment is compounded by pressure on Netanyahu from hard-right ministers and supporters, such as finance minister Bezalel Smotrich and former national security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir. Their powerful hard-right factions only accepted phase one if there was no follow-up and certainly no return to the aim of allowing Palestinian self-determination in Gaza.

    On the other side, Netanyahu faces families of hostages and their supporters, who say the priority must be the return of those held by Hamas. Thus the “solution”, proposed by the US and backed by the Israeli government is for a six-week extension until the end of Ramadan and Passover, or until April 20. Half the hostages would be released on day one of the extension and the remainder once a permanent ceasefire is agreed.

    Hamas is unlikely to agree to that provision, as the hostages are their only leverage in discussions for a lasting ceasefire and their continued place in Gaza. But Netanyahu can frame their refusal in such as way as to blame Hamas for not wanting a peaceful solution and as an excuse for resuming military operations.

    Where is the White House in all this?

    For now Netanyahu can count on US backing for the pressure on Hamas and the extension of phase one.

    Donald Trump’s ego trip was to claim credit for the phase one ceasefire. Since then, he and his officials have shown little interest in supporting a phase two. Instead, the US president has proposed what would amount to an ethnic cleansing of Gazans – removing and relocating them to other Arab countries to make way for his dream of a “Middle East Riviera” on the coast.

    He shared a bizarre AI-generated video with a vision of “Trump Gaza”, complete with a gilded, giant statue of him as he and Netanyahu sit topless and sip drinks on the beach amid bearded belly-dancers.

    Perhaps widespread Israeli military operations, and the consequent mass killing of civilians, would dent Trump’s “peacemaker” image. But it is likely that Israel could get US officials to back the “Blame Hamas” rationale. And, meanwhile, the administration is fine with the Israelis expanding their military presence and settlements in the West Bank.

    What about the Arab world?

    After more than a year of negotiations, the phase one settlement brought some relief to Egypt and Qatar, the chief sites of discussions. Jordan, always at risk of being unsettled by assaults on Palestinians, encouraged further talks. Gulf States, their plans for “normalisation” with Israel in tatters, could envisage a gradual return to the process.

    But all of this has foundered on the lack of possibility for phase two. Most Arab leaderships have no affection for Hamas, but with no clear Palestinian alternative, they have no appetite for contributing to the necessity security arrangements.

    So the easy option for now is to condemn the excesses of others, such as Trump’s ethnic cleansing whim or Netanyahu’s threat of renewed attacks. The tougher option is to envisage any untangling of the knot around Israeli occupation and Gaza governance.

    That may mean that, without giving an endorsement, most Arab States will be happy with the kicking of the can down the road in a phase one extension.

    Scott Lucas does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Gaza ceasefire deal looks doomed as Israel blockades Strip and bars entry of humanitarian aid – https://theconversation.com/gaza-ceasefire-deal-looks-doomed-as-israel-blockades-strip-and-bars-entry-of-humanitarian-aid-251280

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: The People’s Joker remixes familiar characters to create a new kind of comic book movie

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Alex Fitch, Lecturer and PhD Candidate in Comics and Architecture, University of Brighton

    The ultimate villain of DC Comics, the Joker, has been brought to screen many times. From Cesar Romero’s 1960s camp prankster in Batman: The Movie (1966), to Jack Nicholson’s villain-with-flare in Tim Burton’s iconic Batman (1989) and Heath Ledger’s wonderfully textured psychotic criminal in The Dark Knight (2008).

    Though he’s never the hero, the “crown prince of crime” usually dominates whatever film he’s in.

    Other versions of the character have been less well received. Critics disliked Jared Leto’s take in Suicide Squad (2016), calling the film “shallow”, and many fans loathed his gang-style tattoos and makeup.

    Joaquin Phoenix’s downtrodden schizophrenic Arthur Fleck in Joker (2019) was initially championed by audiences and critics. But the film felt disconnected from Joker’s history and more like a critique of poverty and social isolation than a comic book movie.

    Phoenix’s reappearance in sequel Joker: Folie à Deux (2024) was widely panned, due to an incoherent plot and unusual choice of the jukebox musical genre.

    This is the landscape that welcomes The People’s Joker, a parody film with an LGBTQ+ twist. Written by Vera Drew and Bri LeRose, and directed by and starring Drew in the lead role, it has just started a screening tour of the UK.

    Looking for something good? Cut through the noise with a carefully curated selection of the latest releases, live events and exhibitions, straight to your inbox every fortnight, on Fridays. Sign up here.

    Set in an alternate (unaffiliated and unofficial) DC universe, this semi-autobiographical dark comedy explores Drew’s real-life gender transition, using a fictional alter-ego, “Joker the Harlequin”. This character is used as a metaphor for the difficulties of transgender adolescence.

    The film is a re-imagining of Drew’s coming of age story. She moves to Gotham City, trying to launch a comedy act in a place where comedy has been outlawed. After a poor audition, she decides to create “anti comedy”, supported by a slew of recognisable Batman villains such as the Riddler, Mr Freeze and Poison Ivy.

    Alternate versions of famous characters

    As the film conjures provocative versions of familiar characters – both similar and radically different to previous incarnations seen on screen – The People’s Joker is well timed to compete with changes to the official cinematic superhero universes made by Marvel and DC.



    Read more:
    Multiverse films take characters to increasingly dark places – as Robert Downey Jr’s Doctor Doom casting shows

    These film universes have leant into multiverse storytelling, with different versions of the same characters (such as Tobey Maguire, Andrew Garfield and Tom Holland’s Spider-Men) leaving their respective universes to team-up or cause havoc.

    As such, it seems apt that The People’s Joker name-checks multiple versions of Batman characters, and includes them in the same film.

    The trailer for The People’s Joker.

    Drew’s character is a mix of both Harley Quinn and the Joker, while a former comic-book Robin, Jason Todd, becomes a Leto-style Joker. The film uses this opportunity to satirise Leto’s characterisation including the “damaged” forehead tattoo that annoyed fans.

    Drew dances to a song called Party Woman, a not-so-subtle reworking of Party Man by Prince, which soundtracked the arrival of Nicholson’s Joker in Batman (1989). The film also satirises Phoenix’s dance on a flight of steps in both of his Joker movies.

    Reimagining continuity

    The People’s Joker mines Batman comic lore and gleefully stirs it up. Todd announces: “Before I was Jason Todd my name was Carrie Kelley” (a young, female iteration of Robin who appeared in Frank Miller’s landmark graphic novel The Dark Knight Returns).

    Old speculation around the nature of Batman and Robin’s relationship is also referenced when Todd notes that after he transitioned, Batman made a pass at him.

    These name-checks and motifs are cleverly used and a perfect fit for their new context. Smylex (the Joker’s rictus grin inflicting poison) becomes a teen medication riffing on Ritalin, and metaphor for the repression of identity. This ironically also leads Drew to discover that she can use Smylex-induced humour to deflect attention from her secret identity and transition.

    A film starring two different versions of the Joker has a surprising precedent. DC Comics has run a storyline since 2016 that suggested Batman had actually come up against three different Jokers. All three then teamed up in a 2020 mini-series.

    This goes hand in hand with Joker: Folie à Deux, and the Gotham TV series which both suggest a new Joker will arrive when a previous one dies.

    A clip from The People’s Joker.

    The People’s Joker matches its anarchic content with stylistic surrealism: blurred backgrounds, extensive use of green screen, bargain basement makeup, periodic slips into animation or action figures, and CGI effects to create the rictus grins. These all give the film a hallucinogenic feel, culminating in an ending where Drew sails through the sky with fifth-dimensional imp Mister Mxyzptlk, floating between an infinite number of possible timelines.

    With various superhero franchises leaning into different media, continuities and multiverses, The People’s Joker follows in the tradition of previous re-imagingings of Batman.

    As many authorised comic book films are starting to feel like they’re retreading too familiar ground, hopefully the critical appreciation of this film will point towards stranger and more unique comic adaptations yet to come.

    Alex Fitch previously received funding from Design Star for PhD research.

    Julia Round does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. The People’s Joker remixes familiar characters to create a new kind of comic book movie – https://theconversation.com/the-peoples-joker-remixes-familiar-characters-to-create-a-new-kind-of-comic-book-movie-250693

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: ‘I’ve never paid myself’: why the reality for female entrepreneurs doesn’t always match the rhetoric

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Sarah Marks, Lecturer in HRM and Organisational Behaviour, Swansea University

    BongkarnGraphic/Shutterstock

    Inspiring stories of female entrepreneurs are a familiar part of International Women’s Day. Typically, these portraits follow a narrative arc of adversity, resilience, passion and success. The message is that women are skilled, resourceful and successful entrepreneurs.

    However, one thing you are unlikely to learn from these role model stories is how much (or perhaps more pertinently, how little) money the founder pays herself. While this partly reflects taboos on discussing money, it contributes to a gendered veil of silence regarding the very poor personal incomes of most women entrepreneurs.

    My research on female founders in the UK suggests that entrepreneurship rarely pays for women. It may also exacerbate gendered financial precarity, particularly as women get older. This hidden picture of women’s entrepreneurial poverty will form part of my submission to the UK government’s public inquiry into female entrepreneurship this spring.

    I spent two years interviewing more than 50 women in London from various backgrounds. They had established their enterprises in diverse sectors, with the hope of generating at least a living-wage income.

    But a self-sustaining income proved an elusive goal for most. Only four had matched or surpassed their former salary in employment. This was less than 8% of my sample. A further three managed to bring in about £2,000 a month – similar to a living-wage income in London at the time.

    Eight women paid themselves (sometimes) around £1,000 a month, despite working for their business full time. A similar number generated up to £100 a week. The rest – more than half the sample – took no income at all.

    While some were in early-stage entrepreneurship, many had been investing labour and resources into their venture for four or more years without generating pay for themselves. Some women were supported by partners or savings, others relied on state benefits, paid employment or drastically reduced their living standards.

    Lian, for example, moved into her business premises to slash her living costs. Lucy had not socialised for four years and Rebecca complained that her house was “falling apart”.

    Bleak about the future

    Coping on a low entrepreneurial income was not simply a question of foregoing discretionary spending. At 49, Rebecca admitted she often felt “really bleak about the lack of a pension”, while Lucy, 39, worried that she would end up “penniless in the gutter”. As few women were investing in a pension, the research suggests that, in the UK at least, women’s entrepreneurship could worsen both gender income gaps and long-term financial equality.

    Notably, most women had received support from enterprise programmes and business advisers. Four women took loans from the UK government’s Start-up Loan Company, which lends up to £25,000 at commercial rates, and targets non-traditional founders such as women and young people.

    However, three had returned to paid employment to service the loan, reducing the time they had to grow the business. This included Stacie, who said: “Forget my time, I’ve never paid myself. Never. Basically, the money that came in went straight back to the loan.” Stacie’s entrepreneurship journey had nonetheless been packaged into a celebratory success story on the Start-Up Loan’s website.



    Read more:
    How the gender pay gap evolves into a gender pension gap

    Analysing social patterns in household economic structures and women’s entrepreneurial income suggests two things.

    First, it is now relatively easy for women in the UK to borrow money to start a business. But it is very difficult for them to raise enough funds to develop an income-generating enterprise.

    Second, women who had salaried partners or family wealth could afford to invest their labour into growing their business. This gives them a substantial advantage over single women. Single mothers especially face a stark choice between investing their time in their business or in employment to meet household needs.

    While many male entrepreneurs also struggle to generate income, my research highlights specific gendered issues.

    Notably, gendered norms around social value mean women often disguise disappointment with low incomes and make a virtue out of non-financial rewards.

    Reflecting on the £100 a week she earned from her craft business, Maggie said: “I just love … talking to people and hearing about their lives and just having a good chat.” But having a good chat does not pay bills. Maggie, a widower, was anxious to grow the business to replace her former income of £38,000 a year and come off benefits.

    Second, fear of violating gendered norms may inhibit some women from pursuing profit. Most women were adamant they must not appear “greedy”.

    Greta, for example, had switched her for-profit business plan to a social value buy-one-give-one model because she feared that being seen as “profiteering” would derail her brand story. Yet, the extra costs of a social-value buiness model imposed serious constraints on her future income.

    The income disappointment of female entrepreneurs can be overlooked when their stories are repackaged into inspirational stories of innovation.
    Me dia/Shutterstock

    The income disappointment women revealed is not reflected in the public discourse. Lian, Stacie and many other non-earning interviewees were publicly hailed as successful, contented, female entrepreneurial role models at enterprise events as well as in digital and traditional media outlets.

    As Deanna remarked: “Founders are the new celebrities.” Such role model stories, devoid of any facts about income, feed a pernicious myth that entrepreneurship is a desirable, feasible and sustainable career for all women.

    But my research also indicates ways of approaching the hidden financial impact. We need much better evidence about incomes for women business owners – and we need to make this public. Conversations about what holds women back from talking about the income they need is important. Paying yourself a decent income is not greed.

    It should also be made clear that social value goals can harm income prospects.

    And, given the UK’s goals of financial equality, we should be honest and ask if encouraging women to open businesses is even the right thing to do.

    All research participants’ names have been changed.

    Sarah Marks received funding from the Economic and Social Research Council for this research.

    – ref. ‘I’ve never paid myself’: why the reality for female entrepreneurs doesn’t always match the rhetoric – https://theconversation.com/ive-never-paid-myself-why-the-reality-for-female-entrepreneurs-doesnt-always-match-the-rhetoric-249189

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: PKK leader’s call to disarm fuels hope for end to Kurdish conflict – but peace is not imminent

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Pinar Dinc, Associate Professor of Political Science, Department of Political Science & Researcher, Centre for Advanced Middle Eastern Studies, Lund University

    Abdullah Öcalan, the imprisoned leader of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ party (PKK), has called on the group to disarm and dissolve itself. In a letter read out by his political allies in Istanbul, Turkey, on February 27, he wrote: “I take on the historical responsibility for this call … All groups must lay down their arms and the PKK must dissolve itself.”

    Two days later, the PKK’s executive committee declared a ceasefire to its armed struggle against the Turkish state. The conflict, which began in 1984 with the aim of establishing an independent Kurdish state in response to state oppression, has claimed the lives of more than 40,000 people and displaced hundreds of thousands more.

    Öcalan has been imprisoned on an island south of Istanbul since 1999, when he was captured by Turkish security forces in Kenya. But he has remained the leader of the PKK throughout and has kept his strong personality cult among the Kurdish freedom movement.

    He was the force behind the PKK’s shift away from its separatist goals in the 2000s. He argued that the solution to the Kurdish question in the Middle East was for greater autonomy and Kurdish rights through the idea of “democratic confederalism”, built on the pillars of direct democracy rather than a nation-state model.

    In his letter, Öcalan repeated this argument. He blamed the past 200 years of capitalist modernity for the break up of the alliance between the Kurds and the Turks. And he highlighted the importance of a truly democratic society and political space for a lasting solution to the Kurdish struggle.

    Öcalan’s letter mainly addressed the Turkish public and international community, and is likely to have been “approved” by the Turkish state. As such, it was rather short, at times vague, and did not propose a detailed framework about the peace process between Turkey and the PKK.

    But after Öcalan’s letter was read out, Sırrı Süreyya Önder, a member of the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Equality and Democracy party (DEM), shared with journalists an additional remark Öcalan had made.

    Öcalan had apparently said: “Undoubtedly, in practice, the laying down of arms and the dissolution of the PKK require the recognition of democratic politics and a legal framework”. This point suggests that Öcalan’s call to disarm is merely the beginning of a long process to bring the conflict to a close.

    The PKK has announced that, in order for disarmament and dissolution to be put into practice, Öcalan needs to lead this congress personally. This indicates an expectation for Öcalan to gain some sort of freedom to communicate and direct the process.

    Support for dissolution

    Leading figures from several pro-Kurdish groups have welcomed the order for the PKK to disarm. This has included Mazloum Abdi, the commander of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), and Salih Muslim, the former co-chairperson of the Democratic Union party (PYD) in Syria.

    Öcalan’s call has also received support from the international community. This includes the US and UK, which alongside many other nations, recognise the PKK as a terrorist organisation. On February 27, US National Security Council spokesperson Brian Hughes told CNN that the announcement was “a significant development” that “we believe will help bring peace to this troubled region”.

    Perhaps most importantly, Öcalan’s announcement has been welcomed almost unanimously by political parties in Turkey. Only the ultra-nationalist Good and Victory parties oppose the call to dissolve the PKK, seeing any negotiations with the group as compromising national integrity.

    But, despite this important step towards peace, it remains difficult to see an imminent end to the Kurdish struggle in Turkey. The Justice and Development party (AKP) and the Nationalist Movement party, which have ruled Turkey together since 2023, have been continuing their oppression of the democratic sphere.

    They have replaced elected Kurdish mayors with government officials, while also imprisoning democratically elected Kurdish politicians. And people in the media, civil society and other democratic movements, such as the People’s Democratic Congress, have been criminalised and detained.

    At the same time, Turkey considers the SDF and other Kurdish organisations like the People’s Protection Units (YPG) and the PYD as offshoots of the PKK. It has supported its militia force in Syria, the Syrian National Army, to stop the Kurdish autonomous region on its border from achieving political status, seeing it as a direct threat to national security.

    Turkey’s president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, has warned the PKK of further action if the process of disarmament is stalled. In a post on X on March 1, Erdoğan wrote: “If the promises are not kept … such as delaying, deceiving, changing names … we will continue our operations, if necessary, until we eliminate the last terrorist”.

    This signals an expectation from the Turkish state that they want all of the groups they associate with the PKK, armed and non-armed, to also disband. However, Abdi has asserted that Öcalan’s call for the PKK to dissolve does not apply to the group he leads. “If there is peace in Turkey, that means there is no excuse to keep attacking us here in Syria”, Abdi said.

    The Syrian National Army has been launching attacks in northern Syria to capture territory from the SDF, with fighting particularly intense around the Tishreen Dam.

    The Turkey-backed SNA has been attacking SDF positions in northern Syria.
    Institute for the Study of War

    So far, the only positive approach from the Turkish government has been signalling a possible change in the constitutional definition of citizenship to go beyond ethnic criteria. This would be a first step towards a more pluralist and inclusive description of citizenship in Turkey, where people from several ethnic groups have lived for centuries.

    There are various concerns over the ways in which the dissolution process will be carried out. But the possibility of peace is valuable as it opens up democratic avenues for struggle. Resolving the Kurdish question, one of Turkey’s most pressing unresolved issues, will pave the way for progress in other areas such as democratisation and freedom of expression.

    Pinar Dinc is the principal investigator of the ECO-Syria project, which receives funding from the Strategic Research Area: The Middle East in the Contemporary World (MECW) at the Centre for Advanced Middle Eastern Studies, Lund University, Sweden.

    – ref. PKK leader’s call to disarm fuels hope for end to Kurdish conflict – but peace is not imminent – https://theconversation.com/pkk-leaders-call-to-disarm-fuels-hope-for-end-to-kurdish-conflict-but-peace-is-not-imminent-251281

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: How the risk of AI weapons could spiral out of control

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Akhil Bhardwaj, Associate Professor (Strategy and Organisation), School of Management, University of Bath

    marina.rodrigues/Shutterstock

    Sometimes AI isn’t as clever as we think it is. Researchers training an algorithm to identify skin cancer thought they had succeeded until they discovered that it was using the presence of a ruler to help it make predictions. Specifically, their data set consisted of images where a pathologist had put in a ruler to measure the size of malignant lesions.

    It extended this logic for predicting malignancies to all images beyond the data set, consequently identifying benign tissue as malignant if a ruler was in the image.

    The problem here is not that the AI algorithm made a mistake. Rather, the concern stems from how the AI “thinks”. No human pathologist would arrive at this conclusion.

    These cases of flawed “reasoning” abound – from HR algorithms that prefer to hire men because the data set is skewed in their favour to propagating racial disparities in medical treatment. Now that they know about these problems, researchers are scrambling to address them.

    Recently, Google decided to end its longstanding ban on developing AI weapons. This potentially encompasses the use of AI to develop arms, as well as AI in surveillance and weapons that could be deployed autonomously on the battlefield. The decision came days after parent company Alphabet experienced a 6% drop in its share price.

    This is not Google’s first foray into murky waters. It worked with the US Department of Defense on the use of its AI technology for Project Maven, which involved object recognition for drones.

    When news of this contract became public in 2018, it sparked backlash from employees who did not want the technology they developed to be used in wars. Ultimately, Google did not renew its contract, which was picked up by rival Palantir instead.

    The speed with which Google’s contract was renewed by a competitor led some to note the inevitability of these developments, and that it was perhaps better to be on the inside to shape the future.

    Such arguments, of course, presume that firms and researchers will be able to shape the future as they want to. But previous research has shown that this assumption is flawed for at least three reasons.

    The confidence trap

    First, human beings are susceptible to falling into what is known as a “confidence trap”. I have researched this phenomenon, whereby people assume that since previous risk-taking paid off, taking more risks in the future is warranted.

    In the context of AI, this may mean incrementally extending the use of an algorithm beyond its training data set. For example, a driverless car may be used on a route has not been covered in its training.

    This can throw up problems. There is now an abundance of data that driverless car AI can draw on, and yet mistakes still occur. Accidents like the Tesla car that drove into a £2.75 million jet when summoned by its owner in an unfamiliar setting, can still happen. For AI weapons, there isn’t even much data to begin with.



    Read more:
    Is Tesla’s sales slump down to Elon Musk?

    Second, AI can reason in ways that are alien to human understanding. This has led to the paperclip thought experiment, where AI is asked to produce as many paper clips as possible. It does so while consuming all resources – including those necessary for human survival.

    Of course, this seems trivial. After all, humans can lay out ethical guidelines. But the problem lies in being unable to anticipate how an AI algorithm might achieve what humans have asked of it and thus losing control. This might even include “cheating.” In a recent experiment, AI cheated to win chess games by modifying system files denoting positions of chess pieces, in effect enabling it to make illegal moves.

    But society may be willing to accept mistakes, as with civilian casualties caused by drone strikes directed by humans. This tendency is something known as the “banality of extremes” – humans normalise even the more extreme instances of evil as a cognitive mechanism to cope. The “alienness” of AI reasoning may simply provide more cover for doing so.

    Third, firms like Google that are associated with developing these weapons might be too big to fail. As a consequence, even when there are clear instances of AI going wrong, they are unlikely to be held responsible. This lack of accountability creates a hazard as it disincentivises learning and corrective actions.

    The “cosying up” of tech executives with US president Donald Trump only exacerbates the problem as it further dilutes accountability.

    Tech moguls like Elon Musk cosying up to the US president dilutes accountability.
    Joshua Sukoff/Shutterstock

    Rather than joining the race towards the development of AI weaponry, an alternative approach would be to work on a comprehensive ban on it’s development and use.

    Although this might seem unachievable, consider the threat of the hole in the ozone layer. This brought rapid unified action in the form of banning the CFCs that caused it. In fact, it took only two years for governments to agree on a global ban on the chemicals. This stands as a testament to what can be achieved in the face of a clear, immediate and well-recognised threat.

    Unlike climate change – which despite overwhelming evidence continues to have detractors – recognition of the threat of AI weapons is nearly universal and includes leading technology entrepreneurs and scientists.

    In fact, banning the use and development of certain types of weapons has precedent – countries have after all done the same for biological weapons. The problem lies in no country wanting another to have it before they do, and no business wanting to lose out in the process.

    In this sense, choosing to weaponise AI or disallowing it will mirror the wishes of humanity. The hope is that the better side of human nature will prevail.

    Akhil Bhardwaj does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. How the risk of AI weapons could spiral out of control – https://theconversation.com/how-the-risk-of-ai-weapons-could-spiral-out-of-control-251167

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Gifts from top 50 US philanthropists rebounded to $16B in 2024 − Mike Bloomberg; Reed Hastings and Patty Quillin; and Michael and Susan Dell lead the list of biggest givers

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By David Campbell, Professor of Public Administration, Binghamton University, State University of New York

    Mike Bloomberg speaks at the Global Renewables Summit in September 2024. Bryan Bedder/Getty Images for Bloomberg Philanthropies

    The 50 American individuals and couples who gave or pledged the most to charity in 2024 committed US$16.2 billion to foundations, universities, hospitals and more. That total was 33% above an inflation-adjusted $12.2 billion in 2023, according to the Chronicle of Philanthropy’s latest annual tally of these donations. Media mogul and former New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg led the list, followed by Netflix co-founder and chairman Reed Hastings, along with his wife, Patty Quillin. Businessman Michael Dell and his wife, Susan Dell, pledged the third most in 2024.

    Neither MacKenzie Scott nor Elon Musk, both of whom announced donations large enough to land them on this list, provided enough information for the Chronicle to include them. Musk didn’t name the nonprofits to which he gave stock, and Scott declined to confirm how much money she put into the donor-advised funds through which she gives. Known as DAFs, these funds are savings accounts reserved for charitable giving.

    The Conversation U.S. asked David Campbell, Lindsey McDougle and Susan Appe, three philanthropy scholars, to assess the significance of these gifts and to consider what they indicate about the state of charitable giving in the United States.

    What trends stand out overall?

    Appe: I think it’s good to see that eBay founder Pierre Omidyar, an Iranian-American entrepreneur born in France, with his wife Pam, are among the top 12 donors. Omidyar is the only foreign-born philanthropist on this list who reported giving to democracy promotion in the U.S. through his Democracy Fund. The Omidyars also funded the AI Collaborative, a group that promotes artificial intelligence governance based on democratic values, and their Omidyar Network, an organization promoting responsible technology.

    Given concerns about democratic backsliding around the world, which could arguably include President Donald Trump’s efforts to expand the executive branch’s power, I’m surprised not to see more top donors clearly funding democracy promotion.

    I study philanthropy by U.S. immigrants. They either give more or at the same rate as people born in the United States.

    Omidyar is one of seven immigrants among 2024’s top U.S. donors. The others are Herta Amir, who was born in what was then Czechoslovakia; Sergey Brin, a Russian immigrant; the Pagidipati family, which came from India; K. Lisa Yang, who was born in Singapore; Michele Kang, who immigrated from South Korea; and Joe Wen, a Taiwanese immigrant.

    In 2024, as in most years, many of these wealthy donors supported prestigious universities and large hospitals and stowed millions in their own foundations and donor-advised funds. Although it’s impossible to predict exactly what their foundations and DAFs will support in the future, history suggests that they’re unlikely to focus on addressing systemic issues such as economic inequality.

    McDougle: It doesn’t appear that any of these top 50 donors are Black or Latino. This lack of representation is undoubtedly a reflection of broader societal disparities and may influence how individuals from these groups perceive their own potential as philanthropists.

    Philanthropic capacity often correlates with wealth accumulation, and significant gaps in wealth between racial groups are likely to have a direct influence on who we see in the Philanthropy 50. Black families, for instance, possess just 15% of the wealth of white families, while Hispanic families have only about 22%. These wealth disparities likely prevent many Black and Latino Americans from having the wealth necessary to engage in large-scale philanthropy.

    This reality highlights the need for the nation’s leading philanthropists to fund initiatives that focus on addressing systemic barriers to economic equality. MacKenzie Scott has been doing this through the millions of dollars she has donated to support racial equity and economic mobility.

    Addressing these disparities also involves changing the narrative around who is considered a philanthropist. As I have argued before, underrepresented groups may not always see themselves as philanthropists, partly due to limited resources and the historical portrayal of philanthropy as the domain of the wealthy. But by redefining philanthropy to include a broader spectrum of giving, philanthropy can play a pivotal role in leveling the playing field and creating more opportunities for all.

    What surprises you about the biggest donors?

    Appe: The absence of Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison, Google co-founder Larry Page and former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer also stands out due to the presence of many other tech billionaires, including Mark Zuckerberg and Bill Gates, on this list.

    Campbell: In addition to Elon Musk, a South African immigrant, not making this list for the second year in a row – even though he is the richest person in the world – Jeff Bezos isn’t listed either. Few private citizens have sought to change American society more than they have – Musk most recently through his role in the so-called Department of Government Efficiency and Bezos through actions he takes as the owner of The Washington Post and the founder of Amazon, among other initiatives.

    I believe that it is worth asking why neither of these men, who rank among the wealthiest Americans, made the list this year. While Musk gave too little information to make the list, his previous giving choices raise questions about his commitment to philanthropy as a way to advance the public good. In 2022 and 2023, for example, his foundation gave away less money than required by law and supported organizations that benefit him and his interests, such as schools attended by his children.

    Bezos, by contrast, got a lot of attention in 2022 when he announced he would give away his fortune during his lifetime. Yet his giving has come in fits and starts since 2018, when he began to give away billions of dollars to support people experiencing homelessness, preschools for low-income children and efforts to fight climate change.

    Do you have concerns about the big gifts these donors provide?

    McDougle: The nonprofits receiving these large donations can end up in a precarious situation if that funding suddenly stops. When nonprofits rely too heavily on a few wealthy donors, they may be forced to make abrupt decisions like cutting crucial programs or laying off staff. Obviously, this underscores a core problem with overdependence on these types of major gifts: They can leave nonprofits in a bind and unable to sustain their operations without continued long-term support.

    This is particularly problematic if it affects a nonprofit’s ability to engage in long-term planning. As such, when focusing on the giving of the super rich, it is important to consider not just the immediate benefits of their generosity but also the potential instability it can create for the recipients if their gift is not managed strategically.

    Campbell: The total given by America’s top donors in 2024 was the sixth-highest in the past decade, after adjusting for inflation. I’d expected to see a larger amount, given that 2024 was the second straight year of stock market gains of 20% or more.

    In 2020, when the COVID-19 pandemic began, the top donors gave nearly twice as much to charity as they did this past year; and they gave close to $8 billion more than that in 2021. Why haven’t the wealthiest Americans sustained that level?

    Giant gifts to universities, museums and hospitals are surely making a meaningful difference in America and the world. But I wonder why these donors tend not to focus on the challenges facing those who have the least.

    One significant exception is the $1 billion Ruth Gottesman gave the Bronx-based Albert Einstein College of Medicine to allow the school to become tuition-free. Gottesman, a former faculty member at the school, chose to honor and support the many first-generation and low-income students trained there. Bloomberg, upping his commitment to ease the tuition burden at Johns Hopkins University, made a similar gift to the medical school at his alma mater and four medical schools at historically black colleges and universities.

    To be sure, some of these philanthropists use the foundations they or their relatives control to help meet the basic needs of Americans struggling to get by and address issues such as poverty, disease prevention and criminal justice reform. Melinda French Gates, Warren Buffett, and John and Laura Arnold all directed much of their giving in 2024 to those kinds of foundations.

    What do you expect or hope to see in 2025 and beyond?

    Appe: The Trump administration has frozen most U.S. foreign aid, endangering the lives of millions of the world’s poorest people. There are calls for the wealthiest philanthropists to help to fill this void. I hope some big donors respond with large gifts to UNICEF, the United Nations agency for children, and the WHO Foundation, which supports the World Health Organization.

    Top philanthropists have been slow to react so far. However, the MacArthur Foundation just announced plans to increase its giving over the next two years. MacArthur president John Palfrey said this is a response to what he called a “major crisis” brought on by the Trump administration’s spending cuts. I will observe whether other foundations or some of the wealthiest Americans follow suit.

    Still, philanthropy cannot fill all these gaps. The $60 billion in foreign aid cuts represent a sliver of the trillions the Trump administration wants to slice from the federal budget. If it succeeds, donors will have countless other priorities.

    Campbell: Events that took place during the first Trump administration, like the murder of George Floyd, the erosion of democratic norms and the separation of immigrant families, led philanthropists to embrace giving that addressed these issues, notably diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives. In the early days of the second Trump administration, prominent donors like Mark Zuckerberg have enthusiastically backtracked on their own DEI policies. I am now watching how other donors position themselves relative to the Trump administration’s objectives – as cheerleaders, combatants or something in between.

    The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and Arnold Ventures have provided funding for The Conversation U.S. in the past. The Gates foundation currently provides funding for The Conversation internationally.

    David Campbell receives grants from the Learning by Giving Foundation and the Conrad and Virginia Klee Foundation to support the experiential philanthropy course he teaches at Binghamton University. He also serves as the chair of the Klee Foundation board.

    Lindsey McDougle and Susan Appe do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Gifts from top 50 US philanthropists rebounded to $16B in 2024 − Mike Bloomberg; Reed Hastings and Patty Quillin; and Michael and Susan Dell lead the list of biggest givers – https://theconversation.com/gifts-from-top-50-us-philanthropists-rebounded-to-16b-in-2024-mike-bloomberg-reed-hastings-and-patty-quillin-and-michael-and-susan-dell-lead-the-list-of-biggest-givers-250577

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Tibet is one of the most linguistically diverse places in the world. This is in danger of extinction

    Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By Gerald Roche, Lecturer in Linguistics, La Trobe University

    Three days after he was released from prison in December, a Tibetan village leader named Gonpo Namgyal died. As his body was being prepared for traditional Tibetan funeral rites, marks were found indicating he had been brutally tortured in jail.

    His crime? Gonpo Namgyal had been part of a campaign to protect the Tibetan language in China.

    Gonpo Namgyal is the victim of a slow-moving conflict that has dragged on for nearly 75 years, since China invaded Tibet in the mid-20th century. Language has been central to that conflict.

    Tibetans have worked to protect the Tibetan language and resisted efforts to enforce Mandarin Chinese. Yet, Tibetan children are losing their language through enrolment in state boarding schools where they are being educated nearly exclusively in Mandarin Chinese. Tibetan is typically only taught a few times a week – not enough to sustain the language.

    My research, published in a new book in 2024, provides unique insights into the struggle of other minority languages in Tibet that receive far less attention.

    My research shows that language politics in Tibet are surprisingly complex and driven by subtle violence, perpetuated not only by Chinese authorities but also other Tibetans. I’ve also found that outsiders’ efforts to help are failing the minority languages at the highest risk of extinction.

    Tibetan culture under attack

    I lived in Ziling, the largest city on the Tibetan Plateau, from 2005 to 2013, teaching in a university, studying Tibetan and supporting local non-government organisations.

    Most of my research since then has focused on language politics in the Rebgong valley on the northeast Tibetan Plateau. From 2014 to 2018, I interviewed dozens of people, spoke informally with many others, and conducted hundreds of household surveys about language use.

    I also collected and analysed Tibetan language texts, including government policies, online essays, social media posts and even pop song lyrics.

    When I was in Ziling, Tibetans launched a massive protest movement against Chinese rule just before the Beijing Olympics in 2008. These protests led to harsh government crackdowns, including mass arrests, increased surveillance, and restrictions on freedom of movement and expressions of Tibetan identity. This was largely focused on language and religion.

    Years of unrest ensued, marked by more demonstrations and individual acts of sacrifice. Since 2009, more than 150 Tibetans have set themselves on fire to protest Chinese rule.

    Not just Tibetan under threat

    Tibet is a linguistically diverse place. In addition to Tibetan, about 60 other languages are spoken in the region. About 4% of Tibetans (around 250,000 people) speak a minority language.

    Government policy forces all Tibetans to learn and use Mandarin Chinese. Those who speak only Tibetan have a harder time finding work and are faced with discrimination and even violence from the dominant Han ethnic group.

    Meanwhile, support for Tibetan language education has slowly been whittled away: the government even recently banned students from having private Tibetan lessons or tutors on their school holidays.

    Linguistic minorities in Tibet all need to learn and use Mandarin. But many also need to learn Tibetan to communicate with other Tibetans: classmates, teachers, doctors, bureaucrats or bosses.

    In Rebgong, where I did my research, the locals speak a language they call Manegacha. Increasingly, this language is being replaced by Tibetan: about a third of all families that speak Manegacha are now teaching Tibetan to their children (who also must learn Mandarin).

    The government refuses to provide any opportunities to use and learn minority languages like Manegacha. It also tolerates constant discrimination and violence against Manegacha speakers by other Tibetans.

    These assimilationist state policies are causing linguistic diversity across Tibet to collapse. As these minority languages are lost, people’s mental and physical health suffers and their social connections and communal identities are destroyed.

    How do Manegacha communities resist and navigate language oppression?

    Why does this matter?

    Tibetan resistance to Chinese rule dates back to the People’s Liberation Army invasion in the early 1950s.

    When the Dalai Lama fled to India in 1959, that resistance movement went global. Governments around the world have continued to support Tibetan self-determination and combat Chinese misinformation about Tibet, such as the US Congress passage of the Resolve Tibet Act in 2024.

    Outside efforts to support the Tibetan struggle, however, are failing some of the most vulnerable people: those who speak minority languages.

    Manegacha speakers want to maintain their language. They resist the pressure to assimilate whenever they speak Manegacha to each other, post memes online in Manegacha or push back against the discrimination they face from other Tibetans.

    However, if Tibetans stop speaking Manegacha and other minority languages, this will contribute to the Chinese government’s efforts to erase Tibetan identity and culture.

    Even if the Tibetan language somehow survives in China, the loss of even one of Tibet’s minority languages would be a victory for the Communist Party in the conflict it started 75 years ago.

    Gerald Roche has received funding for this research from the Australian Research Council. He is also affiliated with the Linguistic Justice Foundation.

    – ref. Tibet is one of the most linguistically diverse places in the world. This is in danger of extinction – https://theconversation.com/tibet-is-one-of-the-most-linguistically-diverse-places-in-the-world-this-is-in-danger-of-extinction-246316

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Melting Antarctic ice will slow the world’s strongest ocean current – and the global consequences are profound

    Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By Taimoor Sohail, Postdoctoral Researcher, School of Geography, Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, The University of Melbourne

    Mongkolchon Akesin, Shutterstock

    Flowing clockwise around Antarctica, the Antarctic Circumpolar Current is the strongest ocean current on the planet. It’s five times stronger than the Gulf Stream and more than 100 times stronger than the Amazon River.

    It forms part of the global ocean “conveyor belt” connecting the Pacific, Atlantic, and Indian oceans. The system regulates Earth’s climate and pumps water, heat and nutrients around the globe.

    But fresh, cool water from melting Antarctic ice is diluting the salty water of the ocean, potentially disrupting the vital ocean current.

    Our new research suggests the Antarctic Circumpolar Current will be 20% slower by 2050 as the world warms, with far-reaching consequences for life on Earth.

    The Antarctic Circumpolar Current keeps Antarctica isolated from the rest of the global ocean, and connects the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian oceans.
    Sohail, T., et al (2025), Environmental Research Letters., CC BY

    Why should we care?

    The Antarctic Circumpolar Current is like a moat around the icy continent.

    The current helps to keep warm water at bay, protecting vulnerable ice sheets. It also acts as a barrier to invasive species such as southern bull kelp and any animals hitching a ride on these rafts, spreading them out as they drift towards the continent. It also plays a big part in regulating Earth’s climate.

    Unlike better known ocean currents – such as the Gulf Stream along the United States East Coast, the Kuroshio Current near Japan, and the Agulhas Current off the coast of South Africa – the Antarctic Circumpolar Current is not as well understood. This is partly due to its remote location, which makes obtaining direct measurements especially difficult.

    Understanding the influence of climate change

    Ocean currents respond to changes in temperature, salt levels, wind patterns and sea-ice extent. So the global ocean conveyor belt is vulnerable to climate change on multiple fronts.

    Previous research suggested one vital part of this conveyor belt could be headed for a catastrophic collapse.

    Theoretically, warming water around Antarctica should speed up the current. This is because density changes and winds around Antarctica dictate the strength of the current. Warm water is less dense (or heavy) and this should be enough to speed up the current. But observations to date indicate the strength of the current has remained relatively stable over recent decades.

    This stability persists despite melting of surrounding ice, a phenomenon that had not been fully explored in scientific discussions in the past.

    What we did

    Advances in ocean modelling allow a more thorough investigation of the potential future changes.

    We used Australia’s fastest supercomputer and climate simulator in Canberra to study the Antarctic Circumpolar Current. The underlying model, ACCESS-OM2-01, has been developed by Australian researchers from various universities as part of the Consortium for Ocean-Sea Ice Modelling in Australia.

    The model captures features others often miss, such as eddies. So it’s a far more accurate way to assess how the current’s strength and behaviour will change as the world warms. It picks up the intricate interactions between ice melting and ocean circulation.

    In this future projection, cold, fresh melt water from Antarctica migrates north, filling the deep ocean as it goes. This causes major changes to the density structure of the ocean. It counteracts the influence of ocean warming, leading to an overall slowdown in the current of as much as 20% by 2050.

    Far-reaching consequences

    The consequences of a weaker Antarctic Circumpolar Current are profound and far-reaching.

    As the main current that circulates nutrient-rich waters around Antarctica, it plays a crucial role in the Antarctic ecosystem.

    Weakening of the current could reduce biodiversity and decrease the productivity of fisheries that many coastal communities rely on. It could also aid the entry of invasive species such as southern bull kelp to Antarctica, disrupting local ecosystems and food webs.

    A weaker current may also allow more warm water to penetrate southwards, exacerbating the melting of Antarctic ice shelves and contributing to global sea-level rise. Faster ice melting could then lead to further weakening of the current, commencing a vicious spiral of current slowdown.

    This disruption could extend to global climate patterns, reducing the ocean’s ability to regulate climate change by absorbing excess heat and carbon in the atmosphere.

    Ocean currents around the world (NASA)

    Need to reduce emissions

    While our findings present a bleak prognosis for the Antarctic Circumpolar Current, the future is not predetermined. Concerted efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions could still limit melting around Antarctica.

    Establishing long-term studies in the Southern Ocean will be crucial for monitoring these changes accurately.

    With proactive and coordinated international actions, we have a chance to address and potentially avert the effects of climate change on our oceans.

    The authors thank Polar Climate Senior Researcher Dr Andreas Klocker, from the NORCE Norwegian Research Centre and Bjerknes Centre for Climate Research, for his contribution to this research, and Professor Matthew England from the University of New South Wales, who provided the outputs from the model simulation for this analysis.

    Taimoor Sohail receives funding from the Australian Research Council.

    Bishakhdatta Gayen receives funding from Australian Research Council (ARC). He works at University of Melbourne as ARC Future Fellow and Associate Professor. He is also A/Prof. at CAOS, Indian Institute of Science.

    – ref. Melting Antarctic ice will slow the world’s strongest ocean current – and the global consequences are profound – https://theconversation.com/melting-antarctic-ice-will-slow-the-worlds-strongest-ocean-current-and-the-global-consequences-are-profound-251053

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Another US funding cut threatens human rights in North Korea – and hands more power to a dictator

    Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By Danielle Chubb, Associate Professor of International Relations, Deakin University

    Shutterstock

    This week, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on human rights in North Korea issued an appeal to the international community. She expressed concern about the future of civil society work on North Korean human rights.

    The cause for alarm is a sudden freeze on the funds of the National Endowment for Democracy (NED)- a US nongovernmental organisation.

    One major beneficiary of funds from the NED are groups documenting and helping to stop human rights abuses in North Korea.

    The funding halt threatens to damage further the lives of people living under one of the world’s most egregious authoritarian regimes.

    What is the NED?

    The NED is a US institution with a long history in its foreign policy, described as a “bastion of Republican internationalism”. Established by an act of Congress, it was signed into law by President Ronald Reagan in 1983.

    With bipartisan support, the NED is squarely based on core Republican values of spreading democracy through the world. It supports the work of nongovernmental organisations in more than 100 countries every year.

    While it is unclear why Elon Musk, in his role in the Department of Government Efficiency, has suddenly taken aim at this institution, the consequences of cutting off funding overnight are easy to see.

    One result is the likely end of decades-long work on North Korean human rights.

    How this affects North Korea

    One of the groups hit hard by this funding freeze is the Citizens’ Alliance for North Korean Human Rights. The original single-issue North Korean human rights organisation, it’s now planning to shut its doors.

    Without NED funding, it says it cannot cover its running costs, such as paying the rent or staff salaries.

    It also can’t continue its important work investigating and documenting human rights abuses suffered by North Korean people.

    The Citizens’ Alliance is just one of many groups, most of which are based in South Korea, that rely on the NED for their work.

    The political environment in South Korea is uncertain and precarious for North Korean human rights activists. Despite efforts to diversify funding sources over many decades, there are few other options.

    I have studied this question in-depth and over two decades. It’s a problem that cannot be overcome overnight, or even in the medium term, as it’s so deeply embedded, both politically and socially.

    In the absence of funding opportunities in South Korea, Seoul-based groups must look abroad.

    Yet many of the international support schemes available exist to fund in-country democratisation and human rights efforts.

    The authoritarian regime in North Korea is so complete that no active, open civil society efforts can safely take place. The movement relies entirely on transnational activism and so doesn’t neatly fit into existing funding schemes.

    On top of this, the funding freeze comes at a particularly bad time, with South Korea in a state of political turmoil. In the wake of the President Yoon Suk-yeol’s impeachment following his declaration of martial law, it is unclear what the future of the limited number of existing initiatives will be.

    Putting North Korea in the spotlight

    For a long time, the plight of those suffering human rights abuses inside the secretive country was not well known to the outside world.

    For decades, civil society groups built coalitions, gathered information, wrote reports, compiled databases, held public awareness-raising events, and lobbied politicians at all different levels. They then succeeded in bringing about the 2014 UN Commission of Inquiry into North Korean Human Rights.

    This inquiry, chaired by Australia’s Michael Kirby, has been the definitive document on North Korean human rights for more than ten years.

    Its findings of gross violations of human rights inside the country have formed the evidentiary basis for international action on North Korean human rights. Examples of the report’s findings include:

    • the use of political prison camps, torture, executions and other sorts of arbitrary detention to suppress real or perceived political dissent

    • an almost complete denial of the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion and association

    • the use of access to food as a means of control over the population.

    Non-profit North Korean human rights groups remain at the centre of this work. Having succeeded in putting the issue squarely on the international agenda, they continue to press for greater attention on the human rights situation from the international community.

    The groups relying on NED funding do a wide range of work. They support North Koreans living in South Korea and elsewhere abroad. Some provide support to formally record human rights abuses, helping build a robust database of testimony from survivors.

    Others back in-country accounts from underground North Korean journalists, and more still do myriad other advocacy, support and accountability work.

    But now this work could all end more suddenly than anyone could have expected.

    More power to a dictator

    The Database Center for North Korean Human Rights has paused all but its most urgent programs and launched an appeal for donations. Executive Director Hannah Song has described the situation as a crisis of “a massive and sudden cut to funding that threatens the crucial work of those on the frontlines”.

    Sokeel Park, the leader of another nongovernmental group working in this space, described it as “by far the biggest crisis facing NGOs working on this issue since the start of the movement in the 1990s”.

    This is no exaggeration. The North Korean human rights movement has had an outsized effect on the international community’s awareness and understanding of how the North Korean government maintains order and represses dissent.

    So who wins out of this? North Korea’s Supreme Leader and dictator, Kim Jong-un.

    Back in 2018, US President Donald Trump’s State of the Union address centred on the human rights violations suffered by the North Korean people at the hands of the authoritarian regime. Trump declared:

    we need only look at the depraved character of the North Korean regime to understand the nature of the nuclear threat it could pose.

    Now, by effectively silencing the government’s most vocal critics, the Trump administration appears to be giving breathing room to one of the world’s most atrocious authoritarian regimes.

    Danielle Chubb does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Another US funding cut threatens human rights in North Korea – and hands more power to a dictator – https://theconversation.com/another-us-funding-cut-threatens-human-rights-in-north-korea-and-hands-more-power-to-a-dictator-251239

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Africa’s ‘sleeping’ language, |xam, has been written in stone at Oxford university

    Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Elleke Boehmer, Professor of World Literature in English, University of Oxford

    A response to the legacy of the imperialist and mining magnate Cecil John Rhodes is being written into the fabric of the refurbished Rhodes House at the University of Oxford in the UK.

    A statement “remembering and honouring the labour and suffering of those who worked to create this wealth” has been translated into the southern African language ǀxam and carved into the stone parapet of a new convention centre within the building.

    Rhodes studied towards a degree in law at Oxford from 1876, taking eight years to complete it as he kept having to return to South Africa to look after his mining interests. He set up the Rhodes Scholarship in his will, so that male graduates from around the empire might benefit from an Oxford education. Women were included from 1978.

    At the same time, his diamond mining enterprise rested on black land expropriation, which is why his legacy has been contested in recent years.

    ǀxam is now a sleeping language, meaning that it is no longer used by any group as a mother tongue. It was spoken until the early 1900s by descendants of the Khoesan peoples and Afrikaners of the Northern Cape. It was famously recorded by the linguists Wilhelm Bleek and Lucy Lloyd at the end of the 1800s in Cape Town, where a number of ǀxam men were incarcerated at the Breakwater prison, itself a symbol of colonial conflict.

    Khoekhoegowab and other languages of northern South Africa, southern Namibia and Botswana, still spoken today, share complicated histories with ǀxam. The language lives on in the work of several leading South African authors, like Antjie Krog and Sylvia Vollenhoven. It’s found in the motto on the South African coat-of-arms where it reads “diverse people unite” – and now in the Oxford inscription.

    We are scholars of literary and storytelling histories including those of Afrikaans and ǀxam. Rhodes House tasked us to find ways of translating the inscription into ǀxam, in consultation with speakers and teachers of related languages that are still used.

    With its marked click consonants like ! and ǀ, the ǀxam inscription brings an unmistakable African presence to the heart of Oxford. The carving signifies resistance to the takeover, control and possession of other lands and people that underpinned the colonial project.

    Latin meets ǀxam

    Built in a monumental style by British architect Herbert Baker, Rhodes House is the home of the prestigious Rhodes Scholarships and stands as a memorial to Rhodes’ memory. Baker worked extensively in South Africa, where he designed the Union Buildings, the seat of the country’s government.



    Read more:
    Rock art: how South Africa’s coat of arms got to feature an ancient San painting

    A line in Latin honouring Rhodes and acknowledging his love for Oxford runs along the top parapet of the building, at the rear. The new inscription appears in parallel lower down, but also closer to the viewer on the ground.

    It can be seen as being in dialogue with the Latin writing. Latin, too, is a sleeping language.

    How ǀxam came to be used

    The decision to sculpt words honouring those who worked to generate Rhodes’ wealth emerges from five years of legacy and inclusion conversations held across the worldwide Rhodes Scholar community.

    These rewarding but often tough exchanges were conducted in the awareness of important initiatives exploring histories of empire, like the #RhodesMustFall and #BlackLivesMatter movements.

    The wording was collectively chosen. Representatives from all generations emphasised the importance of recognising that the Rhodes legacy was built on southern African people’s suffering and labour.

    The idea arose at an early stage to use a southern African indigenous language that could not be immediately translated or decoded. As one of us, Boehmer, explains in her research, it is important that the experiences of people marginalised by history are voiced if at all possible in their own languages. That their labour is, literally, put in their own words.

    In this way, we question and resist ideas of frictionless cultural exchange around the world – exchange that is always dominated by the global north through the medium of English.

    The translation

    Translating the text that emerged out of the conversations we had was an exercise in balancing languages, worldviews, and even translators. Although ǀxam was recorded in the late 1800s, it is no longer spoken.

    Therefore, the lead translator, Staphorst, approached the new inscription as an opportunity to work with and highlight the various entanglements between the ǀxam recorded by Bleek and Lloyd, and other related languages.

    After Staphorst’s preliminary translation, South African linguist Menán du Plessis provided a retranslation based on her extensive work on compiling ǀxam’s first reference grammar.

    Staphorst revised and edited further in line with reflections on the links between ǀxam, on the one hand, and other southern African languages (Nǀuu, Khoekhoegowab and Afrikaans), on the other.

    The new inscription moves beyond the fixation on the so-called “extinct” nature of the language, and rather embodies a point where the various histories, cultures and languages of the Cape meet each other.

    We then worked together from October 2024 to develop and test the translation. This crucially included a visit to the Kalahari, a formative landscape of the Bushman peoples, and a consultation with Ouma Katrina Esau and her granddaughter, Claudia du Plessis. Both teach Nǀuu (Nǀhuki), a language related to ǀxam.

    Grappling with legacy

    It’s significant that the language is tied to the South African region whose history Rhodes profoundly shaped, and where he lived and died. Two stones bearing translations into English of both the Latin and the ǀxam messages will appear near to the inscriptions, so that viewers will be able to engage with the meaning and the symbolism of both.

    The ǀxam inscription was carved by UK stone mason Fergus Wessel, who works in response to a longstanding English Arts and Crafts tradition. The inscription’s handcrafted aspect responds to the saying’s reference to the difficult labour of southern African peoples that produced the Rhodes wealth.



    Read more:
    San and Khoe skeletons: how a South African university sought to restore dignity and redress the past

    At a time when educators and activists have grappled with the legacy of imperial figures like Rhodes, the new inscription is an effort to deal in the present with the colonial past and its legacies.

    The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Africa’s ‘sleeping’ language, |xam, has been written in stone at Oxford university – https://theconversation.com/africas-sleeping-language-xam-has-been-written-in-stone-at-oxford-university-250691

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Maps showing China’s growing influence in Africa distort reality – but some risks are real

    Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Brendon J. Cannon, Associate Professor, Khalifa University

    Global power dynamics in Africa are shifting, with China eclipsing the influence of the US and France. China has become Africa’s single largest trading partner.

    In response, media and policymakers in traditionally dominant states are increasingly using maps drenched in red or stamped with Chinese flags to depict Beijing’s expanding footprint. One map reproduced by a US congressional committee, for instance, showed Beijing’s influence and reach across the continent in red stripes.

    But these visuals oversimplify a complex reality. This is an issue I explore in a new study. For over a decade, I have researched the interactions of sub-Saharan Africa with other states like Turkey, Arab Gulf states, Japan and China.

    In a recent paper I explored the use of maps that have been created of Africa showing China’s projects across the continent. I argue that, by overlaying Chinese flags on maps depicting Africa and its 54 states, media and policymakers turn economic ties into a visual representation of foreign encroachment.

    This process is called securitisation – the framing of something as a threat, even if it’s not one.

    This visual securitisation not only heightens fears of dependency but also primes certain audiences – in the US, Japan and France, for instance – to view China’s presence as a direct challenge to their interests.

    Certain threats – like terrorist groups or nuclear weapons – are self-evident. China’s presence in many African states, however, is different: if it’s a threat, who is threatened and why? Do Chinese-built roads or railways – and the debt African states accrue for this infrastructure – constitute the threat?

    My research shows that the answer to these questions is: it depends.

    Portraying China’s presence in Africa with flags on maps can distort African states’ sovereignty and their power to make decisions based on national interests. This visual portrayal reduces these countries to arenas of global power competition. It fails to recognise them as strategic actors.

    China tops imports to African states

    On the other hand, my research shows that China’s role may not be entirely benign.

    My study focuses mostly on east Africa, to include the Horn of Africa. Much of Beijing’s engagement here remains primarily economic (as it does in west, central and southern Africa). However, China’s growing control over critical infrastructure and digital networks, and its pursuit of military footholds near strategic maritime routes, present real security concerns.

    Policymakers need to separate legitimate risks from exaggerated securitisation narratives. This would help them avoid the pitfalls of reactionary policies.

    Negative consequences

    Presenting China as a threat in Africa has three negative consequences.

    First, it erodes the idea and reality of African sovereignty and agency. Maps portraying Africa as overrun by China suggest that governments and civil society are mere bystanders unable to negotiate their own foreign and domestic agendas.

    The reality is that countries like Kenya actively engage with China to attract investments for development projects, and to balance their relations with other international actors like the US and Japan.

    The result of securitisation is that American or Japanese policymakers, for instance, have begun to view Africa through the lens of their strategic competition with China. This is evident in Washington’s foreign policy rhetoric, for example. This increasingly frames African states not just as partners but also as strategic battlegrounds in the growing US-China rivalry. The risk is that African countries may start being treated as passive players.

    Second, securitisation inflates the perception of China as a global security threat.

    The repeated use of maps with Chinese flags covering ports, railways and industrial zones creates an exaggerated image of unchecked expansion. These maps fail to show the host of other external states operating on the continent.

    The US, multiple European states, Japan, India, Russia, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates and South Korea all have significant interests in Africa. While China is by far the largest, most prominent external actor, with the widest reach throughout Africa, it’s been singled out because of the perceived threats its presence in Africa may pose to the west.

    Third, securitisation can lead to knee-jerk reactions to limit China’s presence rather than engage constructively with Beijing’s investments in Africa. These reactions can result in ill-advised attempts by China’s competitors to push projects that don’t correspond to the needs of African states. This partly explains Ethiopia’s strained relations with the west. Sanctions and aid cuts over the Tigray conflict fuelled a pivot toward China and Russia.

    The security risks

    Securitisation raises valid concerns, but my research also underscores genuine security risks related to China’s presence in Africa. These shouldn’t be overlooked.

    China’s growing role and embeddedness in Africa’s digital ecosystem presents a double-edged sword, for instance. Huawei and other Chinese companies have contributed to Africa’s telecommunications and digital transformation. But these investments also increase Beijing’s potential influence over data security, cyber governance and information flows. These give China the option to exploit networks for surveillance, intelligence gathering or political coercion.

    Chinese-funded, built or operated infrastructure, ports and military bases

    China’s expanding control over dual-use infrastructure is another concern. Chinese-operated ports in Djibouti, for instance, can be used for commercial and military purposes. They potentially grant Beijing a strategic foothold in key maritime corridors, such as the Red Sea. China could restrict access to these ports in times of conflict. Or use them to extend its naval footprint, similar to what it’s done in the South China Sea.

    It’s China’s pursuit of other military facilities beyond its bases in Djibouti that will have the most serious implications for African states’ sovereignty. This is part of a deliberate Chinese strategy to expand its global power projection and protect access to critical resources like oil and gas.

    Agreements on military facilities may end up undermining and even challenging African agency of action. The addition of Chinese ships and soldiers alongside the growing presence of US, European, Indian, Japanese and other regional naval forces could escalate tensions. It also risks entangling African states in power rivalries that aren’t in their national interests.

    China’s presence in Africa has been securitised through maps drenched in red and stamped with flags, framing its engagement as a looming threat rather than a complex geopolitical reality. However, the real challenge for African states is ensuring that China’s growing influence – especially in infrastructure, digital networks, and security – does not erode their sovereignty. Whether Beijing’s presence becomes an opportunity or a liability will depend on how effectively African governments assert their national interests in shaping these partnerships on their own terms.

    Brendon J. Cannon does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Maps showing China’s growing influence in Africa distort reality – but some risks are real – https://theconversation.com/maps-showing-chinas-growing-influence-in-africa-distort-reality-but-some-risks-are-real-249454

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Many more Denver teens have experienced homelessness than official counts show

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Matthew Westfall, Medical Resident in Internal Medicine, University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus

    Denver saw an increase in youth homelessness from 10% to 25% between 2017 and 2021, according to our study recently published in the peer-reviewed journal “Pediatrics.”

    We are two physicians whose clinical work and research focuses on the social causes of health and disease. In particular, we’ve seen firsthand how housing instability influences health outcomes.

    Homelessness takes many forms, including living on the street or in a car, motel or shelter, or staying temporarily with friends or family. This last scenario is known as “doubling up.”

    Our findings suggest that 1 in 4 Denver youth age 14 to 17 experienced some form of homelessness in 2021, and that the number of youth experiencing homelessness in Denver is many times greater than what traditional methods find.

    In our study, we used three data sources in what’s known as a multiple systems estimation approach. This approach has been used to count other difficult-to-measure groups of people, including those with substance use disorders or COVID-19. Rarely has it been applied to homelessness.

    Our study relied on data from the public school system, Colorado child protective services and the Metro Denver Homeless Initiative.

    We combined these datasets to avoid overlap between individuals and counted unique youth present in the data. We then used statistical modeling techniques to estimate those who are “unknown” – meaning not identified in the data. Together, these combined known counts and “unknown” estimates can give a more complete size of the total population.

    Among our findings, we noted that 75% to 83% of youth experiencing homelessness in Denver identified as Black/African American or Hispanic.

    Why it matters

    Homelessness is associated with myriad negative health outcomes. Among youth, the rate of death is 10 times higher for those experiencing homelessness compared with housed youth.

    To count people experiencing homelessness, states and homelessness service providers most often rely on point-in-time counts. In a point-in-time count, local service providers interview and record people experiencing homelessness on one night in January of each year. Typically, only people who are living on the streets or in shelters are counted.

    In January of each year, local service providers record people experiencing homelessness.
    Boston Globe/GettyImages

    Point-in-time counts are crucial for policy decisions around homelessness because they help local, state and national organizations and governments allocate resources.

    However, point-in-time counts may miss people living in motels, doubling up, those who experience homelessness at other times of the year beyond January, and others. Consequently, many experts and researchers recognize that these counts give incomplete data.

    Young people are especially undercounted because they frequently experience homelessness as doubling up. For example, the national point-in-time count from 2019-2020 identified 106,364 school-age children experiencing homelessness in the United States. However, estimates from the public schools suggest the actual number was closer to 1.3 million.

    Service providers and governments need new methods to count those experiencing homelessness. From Denver to Washington D.C., they cannot appropriately make decisions or adequately fund evidence-based interventions using incomplete numbers. We believe our methods can be an important piece of the toolbox to improve estimates and better inform policy.

    What’s next

    Even according to traditional point-in-time counts, homelessness continues to rise significantly across Colorado and nationally. Our results suggest many more youth, and likely persons from all walks of life, are experiencing homelessness than previously known.

    Our team is working to use this methodology at the state level in Colorado. We plan to expand our counts to include adults in order to improve estimates among racial and ethnic minorities, LGBTQ+ people and other at-risk communities.

    At the same time, our results demonstrate that multiple systems estimation can be an important tool in Colorado and nationally. Our team is optimistic that other researchers, service providers and governments will begin to use this method in their localities.

    We hope that with a better understanding of the scope of homelessness, legislators and service providers can implement more effective policies to address this hidden crisis.

    The Research Brief is a short take on interesting academic work.

    Joshua Barocas receives funding from the National Institute on Drug Abuse. He is affiliated with the Infectious Diseases Society of America.

    Matthew Westfall does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Many more Denver teens have experienced homelessness than official counts show – https://theconversation.com/many-more-denver-teens-have-experienced-homelessness-than-official-counts-show-249997

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: How the hidden epidemic of violence against nurses affects health care

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Jason Blomquist, Assistant Professor of Nursing, Boise State University

    Nurses in the United States face a high rate of burnout. Hirung via Getty Images

    “Violence is just part of the job. Every nurse and health care worker experiences it at some point.”

    Sentiments like this echo across American hospitals and health care facilities, capturing a disturbing and growing reality. Though Americans think of nursing as the most trusted profession, we often fail to see that it’s also one of the most dangerous.

    An alarming 8 in 10 nurses face violence at work. As a result, health care workers are more than four times as likely to be injured by workplace violence than workers in all other industries combined.

    Despite these staggering numbers, the full extent of this epidemic may not be fully understood because nurses and other health care workers chronically underreport violent encounters. The American Nurses Association estimates that only 20% to 60% of incidents are accounted for. Additionally, there is no agreed-upon definition for workplace violence or clear way of tracking it on a national level.

    As a practicing bedside nurse, I have experienced my fair share of workplace violence. As a professor of nursing, my research shows that violence has become a normalized but underreported part of working in health care and that it affects the care patients receive in pervasive ways.

    What really counts as workplace violence in health care?

    When people think about workplace violence, they often imagine dramatic physical assaults. Assaults do happen, but violence directed at workers can take many other forms, including verbal threats, intimidation, sexual aggression and bullying.

    What makes defining and measuring workplace violence especially difficult in health care settings is the range of people involved. Violence may stem from patients, their families, co-workers or even disgruntled members of the public.

    Nurses and health care staff work with people during incredibly stressful moments in their lives. Sometimes patients are experiencing medical conditions that may cause them to act out or be confused, such as dementia, delirium, psychosis or even postoperative reactions to anesthesia.

    Too often, nurses who are threatened or hurt at work do not report the event.

    Some health care organizations use vague definitions, such as “workplace violence is any violent act or threat of violence,” while nursing organizations advocate for tiered definitions delineating between perpetrator and intent.

    Although not all employees can recite their organization’s official definition of workplace violence, ask a nurse whether they have ever experienced a threatening situation at work and they will likely have stories at the ready. In my 14 years of nursing practice, nurses shared many different types of threatening encounters. They reported being screamed at by distraught visitors and having their hair and wrists grabbed by patients who are trying to bite or spit at them. I have personally experienced having objects thrown at me from across the room and being threatened with retribution by patients’ family members.

    Nurses also shared more extreme experiences in which they or their co-workers were injured in the course of trying to simply deliver care. Many described the emotional impact of watching a co-worker hurt badly enough to require medical attention.

    From my observations, it’s not just the major incidents but the countless small threats or insensitive behaviors that add up over a nurse’s career. These seemingly less-threatening events are much harder to document, and many nurses shrug them off, but the small infractions take a toll when they happen repeatedly.

    Breaking the culture of silence

    A culture of silence makes such incidents hard to track.

    The medical-surgical nursing unit at the hospital where I conducted my research has a healthy and supportive culture. Yet in my ongoing doctoral work, which will be published in May, of the 74% percent of staff that acknowledged experiencing workplace violence in the past year, only 30% reported the event.

    When nurses stay silent, whether from fear, futility or institutional pressure, violence becomes an accepted part of the job. Without accurate data, health care facilities don’t understand the true extent of the problem, can’t implement effective safety measures, and struggle to support their workers in meaningful ways.

    There are common themes as to why nurses underreport violence. Some nurses think reporting does not make a difference. Others find the lack of clarity in defining workplace violence or reporting policies demotivating and confusing.

    Nurses also report a lack of support from management, a fear of reprisal or a sense of shame when reporting. Commonly, many nurses simply find reporting tools to be too difficult and time-consuming to use.

    Nurses are the largest segment of the health care workforce in the U.S.
    Frazao Studio Latino via Getty Images

    The hidden costs to health care

    For health care workers, the consequences extend far beyond physical injuries.

    Workplace violence in all its forms contributes to anxiety, depression or PTSD, as well as job dissatisfaction. Dangerous workplace violence trends are a contributing factor in 55% of health care workers feeling burned out and 18% of newly licensed registered nurses leaving the profession within the first year.

    That is a huge problem, considering that the United States is projected to have 193,100 nursing job openings per year until 2032, yet will produce only roughly 177,400 new nurses in that time frame. This also has vast repercussions for patient care.

    During my nursing career, I observed my peers developing complex strategies to protect themselves while trying to provide compassionate care. Like me, they tended to carefully position themselves near doorways, maintained constant awareness of their surroundings and silently assessed each new interaction for potential risks.

    These invisible precautions reflect the far-reaching effects of health care violence. When nurses are hypervigilant about their safety, they have less emotional energy for patient care. When they’re rushing between rooms due to short staffing caused by violence-related turnover, they have less time for each patient. When they are worried about what the next patient encounter may bring, they are increasing their anxiety, fear and stress rather than focusing on delivering quality care.

    Creating safer health care together

    Each health care visit is a chance for patients and their families to improve nursing care for everyone.

    When you visit a hospital or clinic, try to understand the stress that health care workers are under and express your needs and concerns calmly. You never know what your nurse is dealing with in their interactions with other patients. They try to compartmentalize and give you their full attention, but they might also be experiencing a difficult and traumatic situation right next door.

    It also helps to share information that might be relevant to caring for your family member, such as whether their medical condition is causing them to act differently than normal. And you should speak up if you witness any forms of aggressive behavior. These actions might seem small, but they support health care staff and help prevent violence in health care settings.

    Nurses are trained to keep information private, to be problem-solvers and to bear the burden of the job, so they don’t always seek support. If you have a nurse or health care worker in your family or circle of friends, let them know you care. Supporting their safety validates their work and leads to better care for everyone.

    Jason Blomquist is affiliated with the American Nurses Association, Idaho chapter as a member of the board of directors. This affiliation has not influenced or overlapped with the work described in this article.

    – ref. How the hidden epidemic of violence against nurses affects health care – https://theconversation.com/how-the-hidden-epidemic-of-violence-against-nurses-affects-health-care-248083

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: How Trump’s second term might affect the market and your finances

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Art Durnev, Distinguished Chair in Finance, Professor of Finance, University of Richmond

    Ever since Donald Trump returned to the White House in January, stock market expectations have been volatile – driven in part by a healthy dose of motivated reasoning.

    At first, markets surged on hopes of lower taxes and deregulation. But this enthusiasm soon faded as announcements about tariffs and stricter immigration policies dampened sentiment. Underscoring that point, on March 3, the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell more than 600 points after Trump said that tariffs he had been threatening for weeks would indeed be imposed on Canada and Mexico the following day.

    In all of these cases, investors weren’t just reacting to economic fundamentals. They were projecting their own assumptions onto them, helping shape market reality.

    Financial forecasting is notoriously tricky, and it’s not easy to separate meaningful data from mere “noise.” But it’s still worth asking: Are American investors ready for a new period of economic and financial turbulence? Will Trump fuel another Wall Street rally? Or will uncertainty drag markets down?

    As an economics expert with two decades of experience studying politics and finance, I believe that presidential rhetoric and policies can create uncertainty – and that uncertainty affects the market. Specifically, stock prices tend to rise when companies expect higher profitability and fall when uncertainty outweighs the gains.

    Trump’s dramatic policy shifts are already sending mixed signals to the markets. And what happens in the next four years could reshape America’s financial future. Today, more than 60% of Americans are tied to the stock market through retirement and investment accounts, which means the repercussions will go far beyond Wall Street.

    How do presidents affect the stock market?

    Presidential elections have a well-documented impact on financial markets.

    Stocks tend to rally in the weeks leading up to the vote, but risk jumps by about 15% as investors brace for uncertainty. This uncertainty hits some companies harder than others, especially those in politically sensitive industries. Businesses that spend big on lobbying and companies affected by trade or climate policies suffer the most.

    Many analysts, particularly those in business or finance, may assume that stock markets would do better under Republican administrations, as their purportedly pro-business, market-friendly policies are bound to improve returns. But history suggests otherwise: Over the past 70 years, markets have delivered 9% higher returns under Democratic than Republican presidencies.

    Does that mean Democrats are better at managing the economy? Not necessarily. Research suggests that timing is key. Democrats tend to take office during economic downturns, inheriting markets that are primed for recovery – essentially, to use the parlance of markets, they “buy low.” Following the 2008 financial crisis, for instance, the stock market saw significant gains as the economy gradually recovered under the Obama administration.

    Republicans, on the other hand, often inherit strong economies with limited upside, as they tend to assume office during periods of economic growth. This leaves less room for gains, especially when the market is already stable.

    Trump, uncertainty and the markets

    Markets love stability and predictability. Yet when political shifts introduce volatility, investor confidence – and ultimately stock valuations – can be shaken. Fewer privately held businesses are willing to go public during election years, for example. This suggests that political uncertainty constrains business decisions. Companies that rely heavily on government contracts and international trade are especially susceptible to this effect.

    Trump’s policies have already created significant uncertainty, which directly impacts market stability and performance. The recent announcements of tariffs on goods from Canada, Mexico and China led to big market swings, particularly in industries reliant on global supply chains such as tech and manufacturing. Trump temporarily postponed the new tariffs on Mexico and Canada, but the new tariffs on China went into effect as planned – an inconsistency that itself worsened uncertainty. If Trump continues down this path, U.S. companies relying on international trade will be faced with greater uncertainty in an already volatile market.

    Immigration is another area in which Trump’s policies could cause uncertainty. Any moves that target illegal immigration or limit foreign workers are likely to hurt industries such as agriculture and tech that rely heavily on workers from abroad. Though some sectors may see benefits from reduced competition, the overall impact on the economy could be to increase market unpredictability.

    Besides the president’s policy agenda, another big factor influencing the stock market is the unpredictability of Trump’s statements and actions. A single social media post can send shock waves through industries such as tech, pharma and defense. Similarly, unexpected shifts in policy can lead to rapid stock price declines.

    With the beginning of the second Trump term, many Americans – especially those nearing retirement age – are watching closely as the president’s policy agenda takes shape. What it all means for their lives, and how it will affect investments, market stability and broader economic trends, is an open question.

    But for investors weighing risk and reward, understanding the interplay between uncertainty, economic policy and market dynamics is essential. A second Trump term has the potential for significant shifts – not just for Wall Street but for the economy as a whole.

    Art Durnev does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. How Trump’s second term might affect the market and your finances – https://theconversation.com/how-trumps-second-term-might-affect-the-market-and-your-finances-248519

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Chairman of the Joint Chiefs advises the president on use of America’s military power

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Dwight Stirling, Lecturer in Law, University of Southern California

    In February 2025, Air Force Gen. Charles Q. Brown, center, was fired as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff by President Donald Trump. Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

    The dismissal of Gen. Charles Q. Brown as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff was startling, if not unexpected, at the beginning of President Donald Trump’s second term.

    Trump had appointed Brown to lead the Air Force in 2020, and in 2023, former President Joe Biden elevated him to the chairmanship. Both Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth had signaled that Brown’s ouster was a key part of their overhaul of the Department of Defense, one of several firings of senior officials associated with the Biden administration.

    Retired Lt. Gen. Dan Caine has been named as President Donald Trump’s pick for chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
    U.S. Air Force via AP

    To replace Brown, Trump has nominated Dan Caine, a retired Air Force general. The abrupt firing of a respected incumbent in favor of a replacement within Trump’s orbit has triggered concerns about politicizing the military.

    The controversy has brought attention to the vital, yet not widely understood, role of the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. What exactly does the chairman do? What powers does he or she have? How has the job changed over time? And what makes someone effective in the role?

    The president’s principal military adviser

    The chairman is the United States’ highest-ranking military officer. A four-star general or admiral who reports directly to the president, the chairman presides over the Joint Chiefs of Staff, a council comprised of senior members of the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps, Space Force and the National Guard.

    The chairman’s job is to distill the collective wisdom of the council and then advise the president on the best use of the nation’s military force.

    While outranking all other military personnel, the chairman possesses no command authority. An adviser rather than a decision-maker, the chairman helps the president understand the armed forces’ options and capabilities during military crises. Operating outside the chain of command, which runs from the president to the defense secretary to combatant commanders, the chairman’s power stems not from leading troops in battle, but from having the ear of the leader of the free world.

    Defense Secretary Louis A. Johnson swears in General of the Army Omar N. Bradley as the nation’s first chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Aug. 16, 1949.
    U.S. Department of Defense

    Created in 1949, the chairman position was designed to solve a quintessentially American problem. In a nation where civilian control over the military is a first principle, what is the best way for presidents to receive the considered wisdom of the military forces they command?

    Since George Washington’s time, this problem has vexed Congress, the branch of government the Constitution designates “to make rules for … land and naval forces.”

    If military officials have too much sway in the White House, the president can veer toward authoritarianism, seeing troops and tanks as the answer to matters better solved politically.

    But if the officer corps’ voice is too weak, complex battlefield operations – and the strategic planning that precedes it – are likely to be botched, as happened in Vietnam.

    Tension with the service secretaries

    In its original form, the chairman position was little more than a first among equals. Devoid of a staff, the position’s day-to-day power was outstripped by the civilian secretaries heading each military branch, more firmly entrenched leaders who were heavily invested in the existing divisions.

    From what had become a centuries-old bureaucratic turf war, the Army and Navy secretaries knew how to “divvy things up,” as a 1985 Senate report put it. Relentless infighting undermined the chairman’s ability to get all the players on the same page and could lead to a disaster like the the 1983 bombing of the Marine barracks in Beirut by militants.

    Adm. William Crowe was the 11th chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, serving in that post from 1985 to 1989.
    U.S. Navy

    In an interview about the failures in the aftermath of the Beirut attack, Adm. William Crowe, the chairman at the time, said: “I could only operate through the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marine component commanders, who stood between me and the forces in the field. Component commanders reported to their own service chiefs … and could use this channel to outflank the unified commander.”

    The Goldwater-Nichols Act, passed in 1986, strengthened the chairman’s position significantly. The law said it aimed “to improve the military advice provided to the President” and more efficiently use military resources. The chairman received the coveted responsibility of personally advising the president and defense secretary on military matters. In practical terms, the chairman became the third-most important military figure, behind only the two officials he advised.

    For their part, the service secretaries were relegated to the less prestigious role of training and equipping their respective troops. Their determination to preserve an antiquated model of military administration made them less relevant in an era of “jointness” and unified commands.

    Army Gen. Colin Powell, center, served as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff from 1989 to 1993, and later served as secretary of state.
    Wally McNamee/CORBIS/Corbis via Getty Images

    The qualities of an effective chairman

    Immense in scale and scope, the chairman position by law must be held by a four-star officer with a significant amount of prior seasoning, including experience in one or more of the senior-most positions of the military. This requirement can be waived when it is in the “national interest” to do so, a provision Trump invoked when nominating Caine.

    Broad experience helps chairmen identify counterproductive gamesmanship. In the buildup to the Gulf War, the Air Force chief of staff publicly bragged about the superior effectiveness of air power. Army Gen. Colin Powell, the chairman at the time, responded by advising Defense Secretary Dick Cheney to immediately fire the Air Force chief. Keen to such maneuvers, Powell wanted to send a message that the days of inter-service rivalries and airing of grievances were over: Only a unified mindset would be tolerated.

    Frank, apolitical guidance is also important. The chairman’s four-year term is intentionally staggered against the president’s term so that a single chairman advises two presidents. Adm. Mike Mullen was appointed by President George W. Bush and then worked under President Barack Obama for nearly three years. Gen. Joseph Dunford, an Obama appointee, counseled Trump at the start of his first term.

    Trump broke from this tradition by dismissing Brown less than two years into the term to which President Joe Biden appointed him. He selected Caine, a general whom Trump said told him the Islamic State group could be “totally finished in one week.”

    The new chairman’s challenge will be to balance his independent judgment against telling the president what he wants to hear.

    Dwight Stirling does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Chairman of the Joint Chiefs advises the president on use of America’s military power – https://theconversation.com/chairman-of-the-joint-chiefs-advises-the-president-on-use-of-americas-military-power-251108

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Pepfar funding to fight HIV/Aids has saved 26 million lives since 2003: how cutting it will hurt Africa

    Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Eric Friedman, Researcher, Georgetown University

    The US President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief has been a cornerstone of global HIV/Aids prevention, care and treatment for over two decades. Pepfar has enjoyed broad bipartisan support in the US, but its future is now uncertain. Public health scholars Eric A. Friedman, Sarah A. Wetter and Lawrence O. Gostin explain Pepfar’s history and impacts, as well as what may lie ahead.

    The early years

    Many people today have forgotten the sheer devastation that the Aids pandemic wrought on the African continent, first spreading widely in east Africa in the 1980s. By the end of the 20th century, life expectancy in the region had decreased from 64 to 47 years.

    Millions of children were infected and many grew up as orphans, with HIV taking the life of one or both of their parents. Children, especially girls, were taken out of school to nurse sick relatives or because school fees were unaffordable.

    Underfunded health systems were near collapse, as were the economies of many African countries.

    Infection rates in several countries on the continent topped 30% of their adult populations.

    These devastating figures persisted despite the discovery of highly effective antiretroviral therapies in the 1990s. These drugs rapidly became widely available in rich countries, beginning in 1996, leading to an 84% decline in death rates over four years.

    But cost kept the drugs out of reach for African countries.

    Only about 100,000 of the 20 million people infected with HIV in Africa were accessing drug treatment in 2003.

    The turnaround

    A major breakthrough came when US president George W Bush proposed a bold global initiative, Pepfar, in his 2003 State of the Union Address. Pepfar would dedicate US$15 billion over five years with the goals of preventing 7 million new infections, treating 2 million people, and caring for another 10 million infected with HIV or orphaned by the disease.

    By 2005, more than 800,000 people were being treated for HIV in Africa – an eightfold increase from only two years prior. Under Pepfar, the costs of antiretroviral treatment per person per year in low- and middle-income countries fell from US$1,200 in 2003 to just US$58 in 2023.

    Pepfar maintained bipartisan support throughout both Democratic and Republican-led administrations and Congresses. Through 2018, it had been reauthorised three times, each for five years.

    The programme has lived up to its promise. The investment of over US$110 billion since being launched has been transformative, with sub-Saharan Africa benefiting the most.

    Globally, Pepfar has saved 26 million lives and prevented nearly 8 million babies from being born with HIV. In 2024, more than 20 million people were receiving HIV treatment through Pepfar, which was also supporting well over 6 million orphans, vulnerable children and their caregivers, and enabled nearly 84 million people to be tested for HIV that year.

    Its importance extends beyond Aids. The programme directly supports more than 340,000 health workers, a tremendous contribution in Africa especially, given severe health worker shortages in much of the continent.

    Pepfar-supported health services integrate HIV services with tuberculosis care, treatment and prevention. And since 2019, Pepfar has been part of a partnership for screening and treating women with HIV for cervical cancer, focused on 12 high-burden countries in sub-Saharan Africa.

    But the past two years have been ones of political discord and major disruption.

    Troubles begin

    The trouble began in May 2023, with Pepfar due for a five-year reauthorisation.

    A key member of Congress, along with organisations against abortion, raised concerns that Pepfar was supporting abortions, even though there was no such evidence at the time. In fact, by law Pepfar is prohibited from supporting abortions.

    House Republicans sought to include abortion restrictions in the Pepfar reauthorisation. But Congress passed a reauthorisation bill without abortion provisions in March 2024, to last until 25 March 2025.

    Ever since then, the threats posed to a five-year Pepfar reauthorisation have grown.

    The Trump effect

    In January, Pepfar reported to Congress that its own investigators had found that four nurses in Mozambique had used Pepfar funding to perform abortions (which are legal in Mozambique), 21 in all. Pepfar officials froze funds to the four nurses and required staff to attest to understanding that they were prohibited from providing abortion as part of US-funded health services.

    Days later Pepfar, along with most other US foreign assistance programmes, suffered a severe blow. President Donald Trump signed an executive order pausing all further disbursements and new obligations of foreign assistance funds for 90 days, pending a sweeping review.

    Four days later, secretary of state Marco Rubio issued a directive that went even further, also requiring organisations to stop work, even those that had already received funds needed to operate.

    By 27 January, virtually all US foreign assistance programmes had come to a halt, including Pepfar programmes.

    Following an outcry, Rubio issued a waiver for lifesaving humanitarian assistance on 28 January. With confusion over what was covered, including whether the waiver encompassed HIV medicines, he issued another waiver on 1 February, covering Pepfar treatment and care programmes, including prevention of and treatment for TB and other opportunistic infections, as well as prevention of mother-to-child transmission programmes.

    But organisations receiving US foreign assistance funds needed to get individual approval to resume, and the administration had put much of USAid’s staff on administrative leave. USAid (along with the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) has a central role in administering Pepfar. Many others, including contractors embedded in USAid operations, have been furloughed or fired.

    Very few people existed to process requests to resume work. Furthermore, USAid’s payment system appeared not to be working.

    The decisions of the Trump administration are being challenged in court in the US on the grounds that they are illegal and unconstitutional because they are usurping Congress’s power to determine how the US government spends funds, among other violations of the law.

    Nonetheless, as of this writing, despite a court order to resume funding, it remains entirely frozen, and most programmes are still shut down. The day after the court ordered the government to pay nearly US$2 billion it owes organisations for work already done, the administration revealed that it had terminated the vast majority of foreign assistance awards, including some for Pepfar. Details have not been made public. Meanwhile, the US Supreme Court put a short-term pause on the lower court’s order to immediately pay the money already owed.

    The impact

    The impact has been immediate. People on HIV treatment could not pick up additional medicine, leading to treatment interruption. Pepfar-funded health services had to turn away patients. Health workers supported by Pepfar, among them 40,000 in Kenya, could no longer be paid.

    Many organisations that relied on Pepfar funds also had to lay off staff. Community groups have been affected and many have suspended their services entirely.

    It remains unclear what the future holds – how severe the cuts will be, and to what programmes. In the near term, much depends on the courts and whether the administration implements court orders, as it has yet to do. In the longer term, Congress could seek to resume Pepfar to its former strength, though this would mean acting against the administration’s wishes. Even then, it is not clear whether the administration would spend the money allocated, and the damage already done to Pepfar programmes and trust in the US government will not be repaired quickly.

    Pepfar is currently funded at US$7.5 billion annually. It accounts for over 10% of all US foreign assistance and over half of US global health assistance.

    The separate Pepfar waiver suggests the deepest support for Pepfar is for HIV treatment programmes, as well as others meant to be protected under the waiver. Barring vast cuts to foreign assistance and Pepfar, these programmes are most likely to be at least spared, though the administration has terminated even some grants that had been covered by the waiver.

    Other Pepfar programmes, particularly with respect to HIV prevention, are most vulnerable.

    Rethinking priorities

    The vulnerability of different African countries to Pepfar cuts varies widely. Some fund most of their own HIV programmes. South Africa’s HIV programmes are 74% domestically funded, with the balance coming from Pepfar (17%) and the Global Fund (7%).

    But Pepfar funding accounts for about 90% of all HIV funding in Tanzania and Côte d’Ivoire, and more than half of HIV medicines purchased for the Democratic Republic of Congo, Mozambique and Zambia are purchased by the US.

    If there are significant Pepfar funding cuts, it is doubtful that other wealthy countries will be able to compensate. And because the US, through Pepfar, is the largest contributor to the Global Fund, it is unlikely that the Global Fund could fill the gap either.

    Under these circumstances, unless countries increase their domestic HIV spending, the dramatic progress in combating HIV/Aids in Africa could begin to become undone.
    The conversation in Africa must focus on ending reliance on foreign assistance and developing resilient financing mechanisms to continue the fight to end Aids.

    Lawrence O. Gostin is Director of the WHO Collaborating Center on Global Health Law

    Eric Friedman and Sarah Wetter do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Pepfar funding to fight HIV/Aids has saved 26 million lives since 2003: how cutting it will hurt Africa – https://theconversation.com/pepfar-funding-to-fight-hiv-aids-has-saved-26-million-lives-since-2003-how-cutting-it-will-hurt-africa-250413

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Life after school for young South Africans: six insights into what lies ahead

    Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Gabrielle Wills, Senior researcher at Research on Socio-Economic Policy, Stellenbosch University

    Matric exams are a crucial moment in a young person’s educational journey. Fani Mahuntsi/Gallo Images via Getty Images

    At the dawn of democracy in 1994, South Africa faced a sobering reality. Fewer than a third of 25- to 34-year-olds had achieved at least a matric (12 years of schooling completed) or equivalent qualification.

    Thirty years on, the proportion of individuals in this age group that had completed their schooling had almost doubled to 57%. This figure will be further bolstered by the record-breaking results in the National Senior Certificate (matric) examinations in recent years. South Africa’s school completion rates are now high and comparable to other middle-income countries.

    But this good news is tempered by very high youth unemployment and a faltering economy. What are the prospects for young South Africans once they’ve matriculated?

    I have aimed to answer this question in my new study. By using the Quarterly Labour Force Survey – a nationally representative, household-based sample survey – and other data sources, I have developed six insights that tell us what the post-matric landscape is like today. For the purposes of the study I defined recent matriculants as 15-24-year-olds with 12 years of completed schooling.

    This study highlights how increasingly larger proportions of recent matriculants find they have limited opportunities. The rising number of youth leaving school with a matric, especially in recent years, is not being met with enough opportunities beyond school, whether in work or in post-school education and training.

    Conditions in South Africa’s labour market must improve and further expansion in quality post-school education and training is required for the country to realise the benefits of rising educational attainment and progress for national development.

    1. Less chance of employment

    The graph below illustrates a brutal truth: ten years ago finding a job was easier for matriculants than it will be for the matric class who finished school in 2024. Between 2014 and 2018 about 4 of every 10 recent matriculants who were economically active (including discouraged work seekers) were employed. By the start of 2024 this figure was closer to 3 of every 10.

    Percent of South African youth employed by qualification level.
    Dr Gabrielle Wills, CC BY-NC-ND

    The likelihood of youth with a matric having a job at the start of 2024 roughly resembled the chances of youth without a matric having a job eight to ten years ago.

    With more learners progressing to matric, especially due to more lenient progression policy during and just after the COVID-19 pandemic, changes in the composition of the matric group could be driving some of the declines in this group’s employment prospects. But there has been a deterioration in the labour market for all youth over the past decade. Employment prospects have even declined for youth with a post-school qualification.

    2. Not in employment, education or training

    Proportionally fewer recent matriculants are going on to work or further study.

    Before the COVID-19 pandemic (2014-2019), around 44%-45% of recent matriculants were classified as “not in employment, education or training” (NEET). The NEET rate among recent matriculants peaked at 55% in early 2022 and remained high at 49.8% at the start of 2024.

    Stated differently, one of every two recent matriculants was not engaged in work or studies in the first quarter of last year. That’s 1.78 million individuals. Coupled with the rising numbers of youth getting a matric, this implies that the number of recent matriculants who were not working or studying rose by half a million from the start of 2015 to the start of 2024.

    Among all 15-24-year-olds, the NEET rate rose from 32% in the first quarter of 2014 to 35% in the first quarter of 2024. Even larger increases in the NEET rate occurred among 25-34-year-olds, rising from 45% to 52% over the same period.

    This is a worry. But it doesn’t mean the matric qualification has no value.

    3. A matric still provides an advantage

    In early 2024, nearly half of matriculants aged 15-24 were classified as not in employment, education or training. Almost 8 out of 10 of their peers who had dropped out of school were NEET. In short, you’re still more likely to get a job or further your studies with a matric certificate than without one.

    4. A hard road

    The road to opportunity beyond school is harder than it was a decade ago.

    Among NEET matriculants aged 15-24 at the start of 2014, 27% searched for work for more than a year. By early 2024, this figure had risen to 32%.

    It’s even worse for 25-34-year-old NEETs who hold a matric qualification. The percentage searching for work for over a year rose from 37% at the start of 2014 to 50% in early 2024.

    The longer young people remain disconnected from employment, education or training, the greater the toll on their mental health. NEET status is associated with worse mental health, particularly among young men.

    5. Post-school education and training

    The government has made ambitious plans to expand opportunities for young people to study further. But enrolments in post-school education and training are not growing sufficiently to match the rising tide in school completion or to absorb youth who cannot find jobs. And, with projected declines in real per student spending on post-school education as South Africa tries to address escalating national debt servicing costs, this situation is unlikely to improve anytime soon.

    The country is not keeping pace with tertiary enrolment rates in other developing nations like Brazil, Indonesia or China. For instance, 2021 estimates from the World Bank identify South Africa’s tertiary enrolment rate at 25%, compared to 41% in Indonesia, 57% in Brazil and 67% in China.

    6. Location matters

    Where someone lives in South Africa influences their chances for upward mobility. These inequalities are reflected in varying youth NEET rates across provinces. For instance, a third of recent matriculants in the Western Cape were not in employment, education or training in 2023/2024. That figure more than doubles in the North West province to 67%.

    How to help

    Two things are needed: improving labour market conditions and expanding post-school education and training opportunities.

    This is unlikely without improved economic growth.

    All of this may sound hopeless. But there are things that ordinary South Africans can do, too:

    • keep encouraging young people in your orbit to complete their schooling

    • where possible, spur them on to obtain a post-school qualification

    • use your social networks to connect youth to work experience opportunities, and help with CVs, referral letters and references.

    Young people must also adopt a practical, pragmatic and entrepreneurial mindset. They need to seize every opportunity available to them, whether in the labour market or post-school education.

    Gabrielle Wills is a senior researcher with Research on Socio-Economic Policy at Stellenbosch University. This research for the COVID-Generation project was made possible by financial support from Allan and Gill Gray Philanthropies. The findings and conclusions contained within are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect positions or policies of Allan & Gill Gray Philanthropies.

    – ref. Life after school for young South Africans: six insights into what lies ahead – https://theconversation.com/life-after-school-for-young-south-africans-six-insights-into-what-lies-ahead-249031

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-Evening Report: Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek has been taken to court over 11 threatened species. Here’s why

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Euan Ritchie, Professor in Wildlife Ecology and Conservation, School of Life & Environmental Sciences, Deakin University

    Carnaby’s Black Cockatoo Imogen Warren/Shutterstock

    What do the Australian lungfish, ghost bat, sandhill dunnart and southern and central greater gliders have in common? They’re all threatened species that need a formal “recovery plan” – but do not have one.

    Today, environmental group the Wilderness Society launched a case in the Federal Court against Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek, arguing she and successive environment ministers have failed to meet their legal obligations to create threatened species recovery plans.

    Other species forming the basis of the case are Baudin’s cockatoo, the Australian grayling, Carnaby’s black cockatoo, red goshawk, forest red-tailed black cockatoo and the Tasmanian wedge-tailed eagle.

    Many other species and ecological communities also don’t have recovery plans. If successful, the case would set a precedent compelling future environment ministers to meet their legal obligations and improve Australia’s dire conservation record. This is a significant moment for conservation in Australia – testing how accountable environment ministers are in preventing species extinctions.

    Why do recovery plans matter?

    Threatened species recovery plans lay out very clearly why species or ecological communities are in trouble and the actions necessary to save them. Once a plan is in place, it can directly benefit the species by tackling threats and safeguarding habitat.

    Proposals such as a new farm, suburb or mining project can be assessed by the environment minister and rejected if they are inconsistent with recovery plans and place threatened species at increased risk of extinction. Recovery plans have helped dozens of species come back from the brink.

    Under Australia’s national environmental laws, the environment minister must decide whether a recovery plan is required for a species or ecological community listed as threatened.

    If a plan is ordered, it must typically be created within three years. But a 2022 Auditor-General’s report found just 2% of plans met this timeframe.

    Recovery is possible, but plans are vital

    Successive governments have failed to keep up with creating and implementing recovery plans in a timely manner. The perennial and chronic lack of funding for conservation means there’s little capacity to do the vital but time-consuming work of planning and recovery.

    As a result, the federal government has increasingly shifted to offering conservation advices in place of recovery plans. Conservation advices can be produced and updated faster than recovery plans. This is useful if, say, a new threat emerges and needs a rapid response.

    But there’s a key legal difference. When the environment minister is considering a project such as land clearing for new farmland or a mine, they need only consider any conservation advice in place. When a recovery plan is in place, the minister is legally obliged not to approve actions which are contrary to its objectives and would make the plight of a species or ecological community worse.

    A conservation advice can be thought of more like a fact sheet without the same legal weight or accountability that recovery plans have.

    In March 2022, the Morrison government scrapped recovery plans for 176 threatened species and habitats, despite thousands of submissions arguing against this.

    After the Albanese government took power in May 2022, it pledged to end “wilful neglect” of the environment and to introduce stronger environmental laws. Sadly, this commitment has not been honoured.

    The range of northern Australia’s ghost bats has shrunk significantly.
    Ken Griffiths/Shutterstock

    Why do we need recovery plans?

    Australia’s species protection record is unenviable. Since European colonisation, more than 100 species have been driven to extinction and more than 2,000 species and ecological communities are listed at risk of suffering the same fate.

    For a species to be considered threatened, its population has to have shrunk. The severity of the decline and hence its extinction risk will determine how it’s categorised, from vulnerable through to critically endangered. Recovery plans lay out the research required to actually recover these species, meaning helping their populations to grow out of the danger zone.

    A key role for these plans is to coordinate planning and action between relevant interest groups and agencies. This is especially important for species found across state and territory borders, such as the southern greater glider and the migratory swift parrot. The greater glider should have had a recovery plan in place since 2016, but does not.

    Are individual plans still worthwhile?

    Faced with so many species in need of protection and limited funding, prominent figures including former Environment Minister Peter Garrett have argued we should focus our efforts on protecting ecosystems rather than single species to make the best use of scarce funds.

    But there is a deeper issue. Australia is one of the wealthiest nations in the world. It has the capacity to greatly increase conservation spending without impoverishing humans, and should do so for the benefit of the economy, culture and our health and wellbeing.

    That’s not to say ecosystem protection isn’t worthwhile. After all, ecosystems are made up of species and their interactions with each other and their environment. You cannot have healthy species without healthy ecosystems and vice versa.

    But if we focus only on protecting large expanses of wetland, forest and grasslands, we risk overlooking a key issue. Two species in the same ecosystem can be very differently affected by a specific threat (predation by foxes, for instance). Some species can even have conflicting management needs. For some species, invasive species are the biggest threat, while climate change and intensified fire regimes threaten others the most.

    The sandhill dunnart is one of 11 species listed in the court case.
    Kristian Bell/Shutterstock

    Extinction is a choice

    As Australia’s natural world continues to deteriorate, climate change deepens and worsening wildlife woes abound, these issues will no doubt be front of mind for many in the upcoming federal election.

    It can be easy to see these trends as inevitable. But they are not – the collapse of nature is a choice. We have what we need for success, including traditional, ecological and conservation knowledge. What’s sorely needed is political will.

    There were once fewer than 50 northern hairy-nosed wombats alive. Today, that number exceeds 400. When supported, conservation can succeed.

    Almost all Australians want their government to do more to save our species. Let us hope whoever forms the next government takes up that challenge – even if it takes court cases to prompt action.

    Euan Ritchie receives funding from the Australian Research Council and the Department of Energy, Environment, and Climate Action. Euan is a Councillor within the Biodiversity Council, a member of the Ecological Society of Australia and the Australian Mammal Society, and President of the Australian Mammal Society.

    – ref. Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek has been taken to court over 11 threatened species. Here’s why – https://theconversation.com/environment-minister-tanya-plibersek-has-been-taken-to-court-over-11-threatened-species-heres-why-219231

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-Evening Report: Tech companies’ proposed new safety codes won’t protect all kids online

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Toby Murray, Professor of Cybersecurity, School of Computing and Information Systems, The University of Melbourne

    Ludovic Toinel/Unsplash

    In July last year, Australia’s eSafety Commissioner, Julie Inman Grant, directed tech companies to develop codes of practice to keep children safe from online porn and harmful content. Now, after seven months, the industry has submitted draft codes to eSafety for approval.

    eSafety is currently assessing the draft codes.

    Assuming Grant approves the new codes, what can we expect the future to look like for children and teens online? And how effective will the proposed codes be at protecting children?

    A coordinated approach

    The codes submitted for approval were developed by a group of industry associations.

    They cover social media platforms such as Facebook and Snapchat. But they also cover internet service providers, search engines such as Google, online messaging services such as WhatsApp, online gaming platforms, as well as the manufacturers of the computers, mobile phones and software we use to access online services.

    The codes will also cover online app stores such as those operated by Apple and Google. However, app store codes aren’t expected to be released until late March.

    As well as covering a range of companies, the codes also cover a range of harms. They aim to protect kids not only from online pornography but also content that promotes self-harm, eating disorders, suicide and violence.

    Given the difficulty of protecting kids from this kind of content, this coordinated approach is absolutely essential.

    If the draft codes are approved, companies will have six months to implement the proposed safety measures. They will face fines of up to A$50 million for non-compliance.

    What’s in store?

    The draft codes are broken up across different parts of the tech ecosystem. The requirements they place on individual tech platforms depend on the danger harmful content on each platform poses to children.

    Large social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram and X (formerly Twitter) are likely to be categorised among the most dangerous. That’s because it’s possible for users to access extremely harmful content such as child sexual abuse or terrorist material on these platforms. Plus, these platforms serve millions of people and also allow users to create public profiles, maintain “friend” lists, and share content widely.

    According to the draft codes, these platforms will need to implement the most stringent safety measures. These include using age-assurance measures to prevent children under the minimum age allowed to access the service from doing so, having an appropriately resourced trust and safety team, and using automated systems to detect and remove child abuse and pro-terror material.

    On the other hand, less risky platforms won’t be subject to any requirements under the draft codes. These include online platforms that allow only limited communication within a specific group of people and without social media features such as friends lists and public profiles. Platforms for communication within a primary school such as Compass would be among the least risky.

    Online search engines such as Google and Bing – which provide access to adult and self-harm content, but are legitimately used by children – will be required to implement appropriate measures to prevent children accessing that content.

    This may include enabling safe-search features and establishing child-user accounts. These accounts would include features that automatically blur harmful content and filter such content from search results and recommendation algorithms

    The codes also cover emerging harmful technology, such as deepfake porn apps powered by generative artificial intelligence. Like traditional porn sites, these will be required to implement age-assurance technology to prevent children using these services.

    What about age assurance?

    The codes specifically define what age-assurance measures are considered “appropriate”.

    Importantly, just because an age-checking system can be bypassed doesn’t disqualify it. Instead, age assurance measures must include “reasonable steps” to ensure someone is of age, while balancing privacy concerns.

    Requiring users to self-declare their age is not appropriate. So expect to see porn sites do away with click-through dialogs asking visitors to declare they are really adults.

    Instead, sites will have a range of options for assuring their users’ ages, including photo ID, estimating age based on facial images or video, having a parent attest to a child’s age, leveraging credit card checks, or AI-based methods for age inference.

    Different measures are likely to be used by different companies and systems.

    For example, Apple has already announced a range of new child safety measures that appear to align with many parts of the draft codes. These include making it easier for parents to set up child safety features on kids’ iPads and iPhones, using a parent’s payment information to ensure they can safely attest to their child’s age, as well as app store integration of child safety features to enable app developers to make their apps safer for children.

    On the other hand, adult sites and apps are likely to adopt age-assurance mechanisms that users perceive to be more private. For paying subscribers, they are likely to leverage the credit information already stored to assure the users’ age.

    Non-subscribers may instead be required to submit to a facial scan or other AI-based methods to estimate their age.

    Publicly available data on state-of-the-art systems for age estimation from facial images suggests the best systems have an average error of 3.7 years.

    Whether eSafety will agree such technology is “appropriate” remains to be seen. However, if it is adopted, there is a real risk many teens will remain able to access online porn and harmful deepfake apps despite these new codes.

    Toby Murray receives funding from Google. He is director of the Defence Science Institute, which receives funding from Victorian and Tasmanian state governments, and from the Commonwealth Department of Defence.

    – ref. Tech companies’ proposed new safety codes won’t protect all kids online – https://theconversation.com/tech-companies-proposed-new-safety-codes-wont-protect-all-kids-online-251266

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-Evening Report: The US and UK have decimated their aid spending. Australia has a unique opportunity to help fill the vacuum

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Melissa Conley Tyler, Honorary Fellow, Asia Institute, The University of Melbourne

    Hard on the heels of Donald Trump’s dismantling of USAID, the United Kingdom has ripped more than A$12 billion (£6 billion) from its foreign assistance budget.

    The double hit from two of the globe’s biggest contributors to international development has been branded a betrayal of poorer countries that will cost lives.

    What does this mean for Australia as we head towards the federal election?

    Australia is different

    Australia’s aid context is strikingly different.

    International development is deeply integrated in the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) and can’t easily be pulled apart. There is no separate aid agency to target.

    Recent experience also reminds us why it is unwise to cut overseas assistance. When the Abbott government made major cuts to development spending, other actors including China quickly filled the vacuum throughout the Pacific.

    Most importantly, more than 20 of Australia’s regional neighbours are developing countries. This means an adequate overseas aid budget is non-negotiable if we want to exert influence throughout the region.

    At a minimum, both the Labor Party and the Coalition should commit to maintaining current levels of development assistance.

    If you want to see how every dollar of Australia’s overseas aid is being spent, you can visit the transparency portal on the DFAT website. The portal outlines each investment, which includes peace building in Sri Lanka, countering people trafficking in Vietnam, preventing foot and mouth disease in Indonesia, and disaster preparedness across the Pacific.

    This is cost-effective spending: dealing with the aftermath of a crisis is massively more expensive than the relatively small outlays needed to prevent them from happening in the first place. By way of contrast, the budget for defence is $48 billion each year compared to less than $5 billion for preventive spending on development.

    New opportunities

    Initial reaction to the severe foreign aid cuts focused on how China and Russia could benefit from the void left by Washington and London. But it is now being recognised that their shortsightedness may provide a golden geopolitical opportunity for Australia.

    It is an opportunity that could be seized upon by whoever wins the election.

    Think back to the Boxing Day tsunami, when John Howard’s response transformed the relationship with Indonesia and led to the formation of the Quad grouping.

    When the US withdrew from the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement in 2017, Japan stepped up and showed the leadership needed to conclude negotiations. With Australia’s support, the deal went ahead and is now one of the largest free-trade agreements in the world. Major achievements can still be made even without the involvement of the US.

    We are now faced with a similar moment. While Australia cannot compete with the scale of US and UK international development, there is much it can do across the region and throughout the broader global system.

    What Australia can do

    If Australia was to think big, it would announce that it will elevate funding for overseas aid from its current level of 0.68% of the federal budget to 1% over the next two to three years.

    This would generate positive worldwide coverage and differentiate Australia for a relatively small investment. John Howard, Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard were all able to keep the international development budget at more than 1%, so it’s not impossible.

    There is a perception that a much larger slice of the budget pie currently goes to development assistance. The average Australian believes we spend 14% of the budget helping out our neighbours. In reality the outlay is less than 70 cents per $100.

    Even a smaller increase for emergency funding could be very meaningful. The impact of the US 90-day pause on foreign assistance has been immediate, with charities and contractors left with no income and forced to let staff go and shutter offices. There is a real risk some international aid charities won’t survive the freeze. Emergency funding is needed to stave off collapse and stop the loss of specialist skills.

    At the global level, Australia could help to maintain the essential humanitarian work of organisations like the World Food Programme, UNAIDS, UNHCR and the World Health Organisation, which may face existential funding crises.

    Australia’s national interest

    Australia’s security, stability and prosperity depend on both the region and cultivating wider relationships.

    We could use this moment to partner with critical countries in the Pacific and South East Asia to preserve the programs most at risk. Australia could also build deeper relationships with other donors like Japan, South Korea, India, Indonesia, Canada, and EU members and institutions.

    There are many competing priorities in the budget process, so foreign aid is never an easy sell. But there will be international praise for Australian leadership, including from the US and the UK, if Australian aid helps maintain Western presence in key geopolitical arenas. It would be a diplomatic win and very much in Australia’s interest.

    Now is the time for Australia to announce the steps it will take to preserve and even increase development aid as one of the key tools of statecraft to create a world that Australians want to live in.

    Melissa Conley Tyler is Executive Director at the Asia-Pacific Development, Diplomacy & Defence Dialogue (AP4D), an initiative funded by the foreign affairs and defence portfolios and hosted by the Australian Council for International Development..

    – ref. The US and UK have decimated their aid spending. Australia has a unique opportunity to help fill the vacuum – https://theconversation.com/the-us-and-uk-have-decimated-their-aid-spending-australia-has-a-unique-opportunity-to-help-fill-the-vacuum-251156

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-Evening Report: Billionaire entrepreneurs can make for bold businesses but often with fewer checks and balances

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Claire Wright, Lecturer, University of Technology Sydney, University of Technology Sydney

    Richard White, head of WiseTech Global, is the latest of a small number of charismatic business founders to have captured the public and corporate imagination.

    The businessman is synonymous with one of Australia’s most successful technology companies, worth more than A$32 billion. He has a public image of being a prodigy entrepreneur, committed to innovative software for the logistics industry.

    Mixing pleasure with business

    Last October, White stepped down as chief executive amid a series of allegations about his personal and professional life.

    While WiseTech’s board held an independent investigation, White was retained as a full-time consultant. The review later cleared him of wrongdoing.

    But last week, further allegations threw the board into disarray. Trading was halted and four independent directors – including the chair – resigned citing “intractable differences” and “differing views around the ongoing role of … Richard White”.

    Allegations against White included financially supporting two women in return for sexual favours. He was also accused of selling millions of dollars worth of shares during a blackout period. White has strongly denied any wrongdoing.

    Claims like this would normally end a corporate leader’s career. But by Wednesday, White had been promoted. He currently holds 37% of WiseTech stock, and is the executive chair.

    Although the market is divided, most industry experts are relieved the founder will retain control. Many believe White to be the only person who can successfully run the company.

    WiseTech’s challenge now lies with ensuring appropriate governance, given White’s ownership and management of the company and his role on the board.

    Normally, company directors protect shareholders by independently overseeing management. While executive directors like White are common, they are usually in the minority. Close ties between the board and management can present a conflict of interest for shareholders.

    Charismatic business moguls

    Charismatic entrepreneurs like Richard White are unusual. They are often found in family companies, such as those headed by Rupert Murdoch (News Corp), the late Kerry Packer (Consolidated Press) and Gina Rinehart (Hancock Prospecting).

    Although such entrepreneurs help maintain a long-term, intergenerational vision for a company, their unrestricted power has presented some unique challenges.

    There has often been opaque succession planning, with the family head remaining at the helm long after a standard retirement age.

    This has fostered bitter rivalries among descendants. The current Murdoch succession feud is such an example.

    Corporate raiders and the 1980s

    The 1980s corporate environment reminds us of the risks WiseTech faces by integrating its ownership, management and governance functions. The decade was typified by high-profile “corporate raiders”, who created businesses by acquiring minority but controlling interest (more than 15%, less than 50%) in an array of unrelated companies.

    Acquiring companies with dated management, underperforming assets and undervalued stock, raiders argued shareholders would benefit through transferable management skills and unrelated diversification.

    For example, in January 1986, Ron Brierley’s Industrial Equity bid for a minority holding of North Broken Hill. It argued that demerging the income streams of silver, lead and zinc mining would eliminate superfluous costs and deliver a more flexible risk profile.

    Following a takeover, corporate raiders appointed insiders to the board of the target company, potentially removing a level of accountability. They replaced genuinely independent directors with executives from elsewhere in the business. The ownership structure meant existing directors could do little to prevent this.

    Raising the risk levels

    Once they were appointed, raiders reportedly “harangued” remaining independent board members to support risky activities that redirected resources to the dominant company.

    With their critical mass of board votes, most raiders ignored promised operational improvements. Instead, profit was increasingly derived from share trades and cross-dividends.

    For example, after AdSteam, the logistics and industrial conglomerate, took over David Jones Ltd, half the dividend paid by the retailer in a given year went to AdSteam, as investment income. This income then allowed AdSteam to pay a higher dividend to their major shareholder, David Jones.

    Although the market rewarded this in the short term, it increased the companies’ debt load, and diminished their capacity to operate their core businesses.

    Lack of accountability

    The public image of corporate raiders in the 80s encouraged passivity from shareholders, financial media and auditors.

    Journalists actively supported corporate raiding. Business Review Weekly argued the Elders-IXL merger was “a victory for the smart, fast-moving, MBA-style business breed over the entrenched traditionalist”.

    The public mythology of corporate raiders continued, even after the group structures began to falter in the late 80s.

    When Bond Corp was questioned about its expansionary operations following the October 1987 crash, reporters were satisfied with vague statements about the company’s “solid cash flow” to see it through difficult times.

    However, AdSteam was ultimately described as a “humiliation” for the accounting profession, with the untangling of records beyond virtually everyone.

    As late as 1989 the media acknowledged the “complexity” of Adsteam’s intersecting shareholding, yet believed the leadership team’s accounting was sound.

    Conflicts of interest were catastrophic for diversified business groups. The October 1987 global stock market crash prompted foreign banks to withdraw from Australia, local banks to tighten credit and higher interest rates.

    This triggered a collapse in stock prices. Investment income, once the source of extraordinary profits, was soon responsible for the downward spiral of balance sheets. Bond announced a $1 billion loss in October 1989, the largest in Australia’s history. Elders-IXL was restructured as the Foster’s Group in 1990. Bell Group and AdSteam collapsed in 1991.

    What now for WiseTech?

    WiseTech appears to have returned to business as usual. White’s image as the only person capable of running the business remains strong. However, this case highlights the potential risks associated with a person’s position as major shareholder and executive chair.

    Claire Wright does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Billionaire entrepreneurs can make for bold businesses but often with fewer checks and balances – https://theconversation.com/billionaire-entrepreneurs-can-make-for-bold-businesses-but-often-with-fewer-checks-and-balances-250927

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-OSI Global: How satellites and AI help firefighters battle wildfires today

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By John W. Daily, Research Professor in Thermo Fluid Sciences, University of Colorado Boulder

    The wind and terrain can quickly change how a fire, like this one near Los Angeles in January 2025, behaves. AP Photo/Marcio Jose Sanchez

    When wildfires break out, fire crews count on fire-spotting technology and computer models to help them understand the rapidly changing environment.

    That technology has evolved over the years, yet some techniques are very similar to those used over 100 years ago.

    I have spent several decades studying combustion, including wildfire behavior and the technology used to track fires and predict where wildfires might turn. Here’s a quick tour of the key technologies used today.

    Spotting fires faster

    First, the fire must be discovered.

    Often wildfires are reported by people seeing smoke. That hasn’t changed, but other ways fires are spotted have evolved.

    In the early part of the 20th century, the newly established U.S. Forest Service built fire lookout towers around the country. The towers were topped by cabins with windows on all four walls and provided living space for the fire lookouts. The system was motivated by the Great Fire of 1910 that burned 3 million acres in Washington, Idaho and Montana and killed 87 people.

    Before satellites, fire crews watched for smoke from fire towers across the national forests.
    K. D. Swan, U.S. Forest Service

    Today, cameras watch over many high-risk areas. California has more than 1,100 cameras watching for signs of smoke. Artificial intelligence systems continuously analyze the images to provide data for firefighters to quickly respond. AI is a way to train a computer program to recognize repetitive patterns: smoke plumes in the case of fire.

    NOAA satellites paired with AI data analysis also generate alerts but over a wider area. They can detect heat signatures, map fire perimeters and burned areas, and track smoke and pollutants to assess air quality and health risks.

    Forecasting fire behavior

    Once a fire is spotted, one immediate task for firefighting teams is to estimate how the fire is going to behave so they can deploy their limited firefighting resources most effectively.

    Fire managers have seen many fires and have a sense of the risks their regions face. Today, they also have computer simulations that combine data about the terrain, the materials burning and the weather to help predict how a fire is likely to spread.

    Fuel models

    Fuel models are based on the ecosystem involved, using fire history and laboratory testing. In Southern California, for example, much of the wildland fuel is chaparral, a type of shrubland with dense, rocky soil and highly flammable plants in a Mediterranean climate. Chaparral is one of the fastest-burning fuel types, and fires can spread quickly in that terrain.

    For human-made structures, things are a bit more complex. The materials a house is made of – if it has wood siding, for example – and the environment around it, such as how close it is to trees or wooden fences, play an important role in how likely it is to burn and how it burns.

    How scientists study fire behavior in a lab.

    Weather and terrain

    Terrain is also important because it influences local winds and because fire tends to run faster uphill than down. Terrain data is well known thanks to satellite imagery and can easily be incorporated into computer codes.

    Weather plays another critical role in fire behavior. Fires need oxygen to burn, and the windier it is, the more oxygen is available to the fire. High winds also tend to generate embers from burning vegetation that can be blown up to 5 miles in the highest winds, starting spot fires that can quickly spread.

    Today, large computer simulations can forecast the weather. There are global models that cover the entire Earth and local models that cover smaller areas but with better resolution that provides greater detail.

    Both provide real-time data on the weather for creating fire behavior simulations.

    Modeling how flames spread

    Flame-spread models can then estimate the likely movement of a fire.

    Scientists build these models by studying past fires and conducting laboratory experiments, combined with mathematical models that incorporate the physics of fire. With local terrain, fuel and real-time weather information, these simulations can help fire managers predict a fire’s likely behavior.

    Examples of how computer modeling can forecast a fire’s spread. American Physical Society.

    Advanced modeling can account for fuel details such as ground-level plant growth and tree canopies, including amount of cover, tree height and tree density. These models can estimate when a fire will reach the tree canopy and how that will affect the fire’s spread.

    Forecasting helps, but wind can change fast

    All these tools are made available to firefighters in computer applications and can help fire crews as they respond to wildfires.

    However, wind can rapidly change speed or direction, and new fires can start in unexpected places, meaning fire managers know they have to be prepared for many possible scenarios – not just the likely outcomes they see on their computer screens.

    Ultimately, during a fire, firefighting strategy is based on human judgment informed by experience, as well as science and technology.

    John W. Daily receives funding from the Department of Defense for wildland fire research. He is affiliated with the Combustion Institute and the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics. He is a Fellow of both organizations.

    – ref. How satellites and AI help firefighters battle wildfires today – https://theconversation.com/how-satellites-and-ai-help-firefighters-battle-wildfires-today-248420

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-Evening Report: NSW has finally struck a school funding deal. What does this mean for schools and students?

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Stewart Riddle, Professor, School of Education, University of Southern Queensland

    The federal government and NSW government have announced a new funding deal for the state’s public schools.

    This will see the Commonwealth contribution jump from 20% to 25% of the schooling resource standard (on which school funding is based) by 2034. The NSW government will contribute the rest.

    This follows more than a year of negotiations between federal Labor and the states and territories to lock in a new agreement, after the previous one expired at the end of 2024. Queensland is now the only state or territory without an agreement.

    Th NSW deal will result in an additional A$4.8 billion in federal funding to NSW public schools over ten years. But the extra funding comes with conditions.

    As Prime Minister Anthony Albanese says,

    This is not a blank cheque; [it] ties funding to reforms that will help students catch up, keep up and finish school.

    Why has this taken so long?

    The first state to sign on was Western Australia in January last year, but many other states have taken longer to agree.

    Some, like NSW pushed for a 5% funding increase, when the Albanese government was initially only offering a 2.5% boost.

    The federal government finally agreed to a 5% increase for South Australia and Victoria in January, in a sign the school “funding wars” were about to see some peace.



    Read more:
    Schools agreement provides NSW $4.8 billion extra for public schools over a decade

    What’s in the new agreement?

    The new funding is part of the Better and and Fairer Schools Agreement. Under this agreement, states and territories must agree to specific education reforms to qualify for the federal funding. These include:

    • Year 1 phonics and early years numeracy checks

    • an emphasis on “explicit teaching” (where teachers show students what to do and how to do it)

    • providing intensive support for students

    • support for student and teacher wellbeing

    • improving teacher recruitment and retention.

    The specific actions required by each state and territory are outlined in their bilateral agreements with the federal government.

    The new money will take time to arrive

    The federal and NSW governments have billed their deal as a means to “fully and fairly fund New South Wales public schools”. Or, as Education Minister Jason Clare noted, “this is big”.

    But while the extra funding is welcome news for NSW public schools, the results of the agreed reforms will not be felt for some time. Underfunded schools will continue to be underfunded for years to come.

    This is because the extra funding will gradually kick in from 2026 to 2034. So many students who currently attend underfunded public schools will not see the benefits of the increased funding during their time at school.

    Keep in mind, talk of “fully funding” schools dates back to David Gonski’s 2011 report, which called for equitable funding for Australia’s education system.



    Read more:
    How a Cold War satellite and Robert Menzies changed the way Australian schools are funded

    What about the reforms?

    The federal government is placing considerable emphasis on its bid to lift wellbeing, teaching and learning standards as part of the new agreement. But the last agreement with states made little difference to schools.

    The National School Reform Agreement (which expired at the end of 2024) aimed to improved academic outcomes, especially for children from disadvantaged backgrounds and improve school attendance. But there were few positive gains around its goals.

    In 2022, a scathing Productivity Commission’s review of the agreement found:

    The [reform agreement’s] initiatives have done little, so far, to improve student outcomes.

    The new bilateral agreements contain more specific targets for each state and territory. However, this does not mean promises will be kept. Our 2024 research has shown how various education ministers make national schooling reform promises, which are then lost as the political cycle moves on.

    once agreements are endorsed and ratified, the ongoing commitment to the enactment of agreed education reforms can be ‘forgotten’.

    Our research has also shown how school reform also becomes stuck in the process of moving between national, state and school levels. That is, the policy intention (or reform agreement) rarely plays out the way it is intended in schools.

    What now?

    Does this mean the new agreement will also fail to produce “better and fairer” outcomes for some of Australia’s most marginalised and disenfranchised students?

    We need to be careful that real schooling reform – of which fair and full funding to every Australian schools is an important element – is not lost to the short-term political games of the election cycle.

    While the Coalition has been critical of the time taken to reach an agreement, it says it will honour the funding commitments if elected.

    So assuming Queensland signs onto the new agreement before the federal election, perhaps the promise of the original Gonski reforms will finally be realised, even if it is two decades later.

    Stewart Riddle receives funding from the Australian Research Council (LP210100098).

    – ref. NSW has finally struck a school funding deal. What does this mean for schools and students? – https://theconversation.com/nsw-has-finally-struck-a-school-funding-deal-what-does-this-mean-for-schools-and-students-251271

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Rain on wildfire burn scars can trigger destructive debris flows − a geologist explains how

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Jen Pierce, Professor of Geosciences, Boise State University

    A debris flow channel in a severely burned watershed in Idaho. Amirhossein Montazeri/Boise State University, CC BY-ND

    As the Los Angeles area cleaning up from devastating wildfires, city officials and emergency managers are worried about what could come next.

    Rain on burned hillslopes can trigger dangerous floods and debris flows. Those debris flows can move with the speed of a freight train, picking up or destroying anything in their path. They can move tons of sediment during a single storm, as Montecito, just up the coast from Los Angeles, saw in 2018.

    What causes debris flows, sometimes called mudflows, and why are they so common and dangerous after a fire? I am a geologist whose research focuses on pyrogeomorphology, which is how fire affects the land. Here’s what we know.

    How debris flows begin

    When severe fires burn hillslopes, the high heat from the fires, sometimes exceeding 1,000 degrees Fahrenheit (538 degrees Celsius), completely destroys trees, shrubs, grass and structures, leaving behind a moonscape of gray ash. Not only that, the heat of the fire actually burns and damages the soil, creating a water-repellent, or hydrophobic, layer.

    What once was a vegetated hillslope, with leaves and trees to intercept rain and spongy soils to absorb water, is transformed into a barren landscape covered with ash, and burned soil where water cannot soak in.

    Illustrations show how fire can change the soil and landscape.
    National Weather Service

    When rain does fall on a burned area like this, water mixes with the ash, rocks and sediment to form a slurry. This slurry of debris then pours downhill in small gullies called rills, which then converge to form bigger and bigger rills, creating a torrent of sediment, water and debris rushing downhill. All this debris and water can transform small streams and usually dry gullies into a danger zone.

    Because the concentration of sediment is so high, especially when there is a large amount of ash and clay, debris flows behave more like a slurry of wet cement than a normal stream. This fluid can pick up and move large boulders, cars, trees and other debris rapidly downhill.

    A firefighter walks through knee-deep mud while checking for victims after a debris flow hit Montecito, Calif., in January 2018.
    Wally Skalij/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images

    In January 2018, a few weeks after the Thomas fire burned through the hills above Montecito, a storm triggered debris flows that killed 23 people and damaged at least 400 homes.

    What controls size and timing of debris flows

    The geography of the land, burn severity, storm intensity and soil characteristics all play important roles in if, when and where debris flows occur.

    Fire and debris flow scientists with the U.S. Geological Survey use these variables to create models to predict the likelihood and possible hazards from postfire debris flows. They are already developing maps to help residents, emergency managers and city officials prepare and predict postfire debris flows in 2025 burn areas in Los Angeles.

    The U.S. Geological Survey modeled debris flow risks after the Palisades Fire near Los Angeles. The map shows some of the highest-risk areas if hit by 15 minutes of rain falling at just under 1 inch (24 millimeters) per hour.
    USGS

    Some of the triggers of debris flows are literally part of the landscape.

    For example, the slope angle in a watershed and the amount of clay in the soil are important. Watersheds with gentle slopes – generally less than about 23 degrees – and a lack of clay and silt-sized particles are unlikely to produce debris flows.

    Other key factors that contribute to postfire debris flows relate to the proportion of the watershed that is severely burned and the intensity and duration of the rainstorm event.

    Early important research in the field of pyrogeomorphology demonstrated that while large, intense storms are more likely to cause large, intense debris flows, even small rainstorms can produce debris flows in burned areas.

    Debris flows are becoming more common

    A whopping 21.8 million Americans live within 3 miles of where a fire burned during the past two decades, and that population more than doubled from 2000 to 2019. A recent study from central and northern California indicates that nearly all the observed increases in area burned by wildfires in recent decades are due to human-caused climate change.

    The warming climate is also increasing the likelihood of more extreme downpours. The amount of moisture the atmosphere can hold increases by about 7% per degree Celsius of warming, leading to more intense downpours, particularly from ocean storms. In California, scientists project increases in rainfall intensity of 18% will result in an overall 110% increase in the probability of major debris flows.

    Jon Frye, of Santa Barbara Public Works, shows what happened in the January 2018 Montecito debris flow and why the risks to downslope communities would continue for several years. Source: County of Santa Barbara, 2018.

    Studies using models of fire, climate and erosion rates estimate that the amount of sediment flowing downhill after fires will increase by more than 10% in nine out of every 10 watersheds in the western U.S.

    Even without rain, debris on fire-damaged slopes can be unstable. A small slide in Pacific Palisades shortly after a fire burned through the area split a home in two. A phenomenon called “dry ravel” is a dominant form of hillslope erosion following wildfires in chaparral environments in Southern California

    Preparing for debris flow risks

    Research on charcoal pieces from ancient debris flows has shown fires and erosion have shaped Earth’s landscape for at least thousands of years. However, the rising risk of wildfires near populated areas and the potential for increasingly intense downpours mean a greater risk of damaging and potentially deadly debris flows.

    As their populations expand, community planners need to be aware of those risks and prepare.

    This article, originally published Jan. 23, 2025, has been updated with a flash flood watch issued.

    Jen Pierce receives funding from the National Science Foundation and is the chair of the Quaternary Geology and Geomorphology division of the Geological Society of America.

    – ref. Rain on wildfire burn scars can trigger destructive debris flows − a geologist explains how – https://theconversation.com/rain-on-wildfire-burn-scars-can-trigger-destructive-debris-flows-a-geologist-explains-how-247770

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-Evening Report: Who is Sean Baker, the indie filmmaker behind Oscar sweeper Anora?

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Duncan Caillard, Postdoctoral Research Fellow, School of Communication Studies, Auckland University of Technology

    Director Sean Baker has made history by becoming the first person to win four Academy Awards in the same night for the same film – Anora – taking home prizes for original screenplay, film editing, directing and best picture.

    Anora centres on Ani (Mikey Madison), a Brooklyn sex worker entangled with Ivan (Mark Eydelshteyn), the immature son of a Russian oligarch. After Ivan disappears, Ani searches through New York with his handler Toros (Karren Karagulian) to find him.

    Baker’s Oscars sweep capped off a string of wins over the past year, but surprised many pundits who expected three-and-a-half hour epic The Brutalist to take home the top prize.

    He’s made the 97th Academy Awards one for the history books. So who is Sean Baker?

    An indie film lifer

    Baker has been a fixture of the international film festival circuit for more than a decade. His films are carefully researched character studies, often focused on sex workers, immigrants and low-income communities.

    Baker maintains creative control by working with ultra-low budgets, often serving as writer, director and editor simultaneously. He often casts new or non-professional actors and prefers to shoot on location with natural light.

    His breakout film Tangerine (2015) followed two transgender African American sex workers in Los Angeles. Tangerine grapples with the complicated lives of its characters but also celebrates their humour and friendships. The film was a technical milestone: shot entirely on the iPhone 5S by cinematographer Radium Cheung. The total estimated budget was just US$100,000.

    Baker’s next film, The Florida Project (2017), was a portrait of low-income children living in cheap motels near Walt Disney World. The film playfully frames its characters’ difficult childhoods as colourful and ecstatic, drawing an outstanding performance from six-year-old star Brooklynn Prince in her first film appearance.

    Red Rocket (2021) centred on a retired porn star returning to his Texas home town, but struggled at the box office amid the COVID pandemic.

    Baker’s film budgets have increased gradually over time, but have still remained very small by Hollywood standards. The Florida Project was produced on a measly budget of US$2 million, while Anora cost just US$6 million. For context, the production of last year’s best picture winner Oppenheimer (2023) cost Universal Pictures about US$100 million (before marketing costs).

    The high price of creative freedom

    Anora premiered at the Cannes Film Festival in May 2024, where it won the coveted Palme d’Or.

    The Palme d’Or is widely considered the most prestigious award in international art cinema – and has launched previous Oscar winners such as Parasite (2019), The Zone of Interest (2023) and Anatomy of a Fall (2023). These awards play an important role in marketing and financing films outside the studio system.

    The realities of independent filmmaking are harsher than the glittering appearance of awards season. Independent filmmakers are often precariously employed and earn modest incomes from their work.

    In a speech delivered at the Director’s Guild of America Awards earlier this month, Baker laid out the financial difficulties associated with working as an indie director:

    It’s just simply not enough to get by on in today’s world, especially if one is is trying to support a family. I personally do not have children, but I know for a fact that if I did, I would not be able to make the movies that I make.

    Fellow nominee Brady Corbet, who made The Brutalist with about US$10 million, faced similar challenges, saying in an interview with Vanity Fair that he had made nothing from his two previous films.

    Little films on the big screen

    Anora has arrived during a time of great upheaval in Hollywood. Studios and streaming giants are adjusting their business models to maximise profits.

    Meanwhile, the industry is still recovering from strikes in 2023 by the Writers Guild of America and The Screen Actors Guild–American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, which shut down productions for months.

    Hollywood has often turned to independent filmmakers in such moments of crisis. In the 1970s, independent filmmakers such as John Cassavetes, Roger Corman, George Lucas and David Lynch disrupted an industry that was stagnating after its Golden Age.

    Today, distributors such as Neon (which distributed Anora) and A24 specialise in marketing independent films through careful awards campaigns and viral marketing strategies.

    Baker’s win underscores the role of independent films — less constrained by commercial expectations — in shaping the industry’s future. By taking greater creative risks, his style of intimate filmmaking is a breath of fresh air in Hollywood’s stuffy, franchise-driven business model.

    Duncan Caillard does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Who is Sean Baker, the indie filmmaker behind Oscar sweeper Anora? – https://theconversation.com/who-is-sean-baker-the-indie-filmmaker-behind-oscar-sweeper-anora-251272

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-Evening Report: NZ hopes to store carbon in marine ecosystems – but some are so degraded they’re already a source of emissions

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Simon Francis Thrush, Director of the Institute of Marine Science, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau

    Shutterstock/Danita Delimont

    For New Zealand, a country with an underwater territory 14 times its landmass, marine ecosystems present a significant opportunity to investigate carbon storage options.

    Prompted by a 2023 report from the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment, the government recognised the need to focus on the oceans in addressing climate change.

    In its emissions reduction plan for 2026-2030, it highlights the potential to harness marine habitats as carbon sinks and to count this towards the country’s efforts to slow climate change.

    Several blue-carbon studies report on stocks of carbon in sediments and mangrove, saltmarshes and kelp forests. This tells us how much carbon is stored in these ecosystems – but very little about how carbon flows through them and the factors that influence whether it is stored or emitted.

    Research shows seagrass meadows, mangroves, saltmarshes and kelp forests are significant carbon stores.
    Shutterstock/Daniel Poloha

    This is important. Marine ecosystems can be both sinks or sources of carbon. If we don’t understand how organic material is transformed or how carbon dioxide (CO₂) is either taken up by plants or emitted into the atmosphere, we will likely make poor decisions about nature-based solutions.

    To address this, we have invited researchers from the Scandinavian research partnership CoastClim – an innovative project linking seafloor biodiversity and climate – to bring their unique set of instrumentation to New Zealand to explore patterns in greenhouse gas emissions from the seafloor.

    The measurements we made this summer are tracking emissions of methane and CO₂ from seafloor sediments in the upper reaches of several harbours (Waitemata, Mahurangi and Whangateau) in the Auckland region.

    We found CO₂ concentrations were up to eight times higher than atmospheric levels in more disturbed and polluted parts of these harbours. Methane concentrations were up to 30 times higher. This shows that degraded habitats are indeed transformed into net emitters of greenhouse gases.

    Paying attention to land-coast connections

    There has been concern about the health of the Firth of Thames, at the back of the Hauraki Gulf, because the area drains a large catchment with intensive agriculture.

    We found this region is a significant source of greenhouse gases.

    Our sampling on the open coast revealed high draw-down of CO₂ in healthy patches of kelp. But this effect was reversed in areas where New Zealand’s endemic sea urchin, kina, has grazed off the kelp. These regions are known as kina barrens and they dominate many non-protected reefs.

    Kina, New Zealand’s endemic sea urchin, grazes on kelp and can turn the seafloor into a source of emissions.
    Wikimedia Commons/Shaun Lee, CC BY

    Our data highlight an important finding relevant to how we manage marine ecosystems and address both the biodiversity and climate crises. As we stress and degrade these ecosystems, they have less capacity to process carbon in ways that store it or move it into food webs. The system fails in its self-regulation and transforms into a net source of greenhouse gases.

    We argue that we have to manage these ecosystems in an integrative fashion, considering the long-term stores of carbon and the time it takes to build them up, along with the many processes that move carbon from one part of the ecosystem to another.

    Considering the dynamics of marine carbon and restoring or protecting coastal ecosystems are good options for addressing multiple challenges. We shouldn’t just be looking for good places to bank carbon but also those where good management can reduce seafloor disturbance and therefore limit the release of greenhouse gases.

    Considering climate and biodiversity

    This project highlights the importance of considering both biodiversity and climate together. If we manage one ignorant of the other, we risk failure because biodiversity matters to how we address climate change.

    This holistic understanding of the stock and flows of carbon (long-term sequestration and carbon in living organisms) is necessary if we are to identify viable long-term carbon stores. It is also crucial to assessing how the stresses we put on the marine environment can turn an ecosystem from a carbon sink to a source.

    Working with our Scandinavian colleagues also confirmed our earlier research. For a number of years, we have been studying how different stressors – including sediment disturbance, nutrient flows from land and microplastic pollution affect the way nitrogen, carbon and oxygen are processed in coastal sediments.

    These processes have implications for the release of greenhouse gases. But until now, we have not been able to test some connections and close the loop on some of our ideas.

    As with most interventions to natural ecosystems, we are better off accepting they are complex, and that any supposed “silver bullet” solutions can have unintended consequences.

    Simon Francis Thrush receives funding from currently from MBIE and the Auckland Foundation.

    – ref. NZ hopes to store carbon in marine ecosystems – but some are so degraded they’re already a source of emissions – https://theconversation.com/nz-hopes-to-store-carbon-in-marine-ecosystems-but-some-are-so-degraded-theyre-already-a-source-of-emissions-248875

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-Evening Report: Another US funding cut threatens human rights in North Korea – and hands more power to a dictator

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Danielle Chubb, Associate Professor of International Relations, Deakin University

    Shutterstock

    This week, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on human rights in North Korea issued an appeal to the international community. She expressed concern about the future of civil society work on North Korean human rights.

    The cause for alarm is a sudden freeze on the funds of the National Endowment for Democracy (NED)- a US nongovernmental organisation.

    One major beneficiary of funds from the NED are groups documenting and helping to stop human rights abuses in North Korea.

    The funding halt threatens to damage further the lives of people living under one of the world’s most egregious authoritarian regimes.

    What is the NED?

    The NED is a US institution with a long history in its foreign policy, described as a “bastion of Republican internationalism”. Established by an act of Congress, it was signed into law by President Ronald Reagan in 1983.

    With bipartisan support, the NED is squarely based on core Republican values of spreading democracy through the world. It supports the work of nongovernmental organisations in more than 100 countries every year.

    While it is unclear why Elon Musk, in his role in the Department of Government Efficiency, has suddenly taken aim at this institution, the consequences of cutting off funding overnight are easy to see.

    One result is the likely end of decades-long work on North Korean human rights.

    How this affects North Korea

    One of the groups hit hard by this funding freeze is the Citizens’ Alliance for North Korean Human Rights. The original single-issue North Korean human rights organisation, it’s now planning to shut its doors.

    Without NED funding, it says it cannot cover its running costs, such as paying the rent or staff salaries.

    It also can’t continue its important work investigating and documenting human rights abuses suffered by North Korean people.

    The Citizens’ Alliance is just one of many groups, most of which are based in South Korea, that rely on the NED for their work.

    The political environment in South Korea is uncertain and precarious for North Korean human rights activists. Despite efforts to diversify funding sources over many decades, there are few other options.

    I have studied this question in-depth and over two decades. It’s a problem that cannot be overcome overnight, or even in the medium term, as it’s so deeply embedded, both politically and socially.

    In the absence of funding opportunities in South Korea, Seoul-based groups must look abroad.

    Yet many of the international support schemes available exist to fund in-country democratisation and human rights efforts.

    The authoritarian regime in North Korea is so complete that no active, open civil society efforts can safely take place. The movement relies entirely on transnational activism and so doesn’t neatly fit into existing funding schemes.

    On top of this, the funding freeze comes at a particularly bad time, with South Korea in a state of political turmoil. In the wake of the President Yoon Suk-yeol’s impeachment following his declaration of martial law, it is unclear what the future of the limited number of existing initiatives will be.

    Putting North Korea in the spotlight

    For a long time, the plight of those suffering human rights abuses inside the secretive country was not well known to the outside world.

    For decades, civil society groups built coalitions, gathered information, wrote reports, compiled databases, held public awareness-raising events, and lobbied politicians at all different levels. They then succeeded in bringing about the 2014 UN Commission of Inquiry into North Korean Human Rights.

    This inquiry, chaired by Australia’s Michael Kirby, has been the definitive document on North Korean human rights for more than ten years.

    Its findings of gross violations of human rights inside the country have formed the evidentiary basis for international action on North Korean human rights. Examples of the report’s findings include:

    • the use of political prison camps, torture, executions and other sorts of arbitrary detention to suppress real or perceived political dissent

    • an almost complete denial of the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion and association

    • the use of access to food as a means of control over the population.

    Non-profit North Korean human rights groups remain at the centre of this work. Having succeeded in putting the issue squarely on the international agenda, they continue to press for greater attention on the human rights situation from the international community.

    The groups relying on NED funding do a wide range of work. They support North Koreans living in South Korea and elsewhere abroad. Some provide support to formally record human rights abuses, helping build a robust database of testimony from survivors.

    Others back in-country accounts from underground North Korean journalists, and more still do myriad other advocacy, support and accountability work.

    But now this work could all end more suddenly than anyone could have expected.

    More power to a dictator

    The Database Center for North Korean Human Rights has paused all but its most urgent programs and launched an appeal for donations. Executive Director Hannah Song has described the situation as a crisis of “a massive and sudden cut to funding that threatens the crucial work of those on the frontlines”.

    Sokeel Park, the leader of another nongovernmental group working in this space, described it as “by far the biggest crisis facing NGOs working on this issue since the start of the movement in the 1990s”.

    This is no exaggeration. The North Korean human rights movement has had an outsized effect on the international community’s awareness and understanding of how the North Korean government maintains order and represses dissent.

    So who wins out of this? North Korea’s Supreme Leader and dictator, Kim Jong-un.

    Back in 2018, US President Donald Trump’s State of the Union address centred on the human rights violations suffered by the North Korean people at the hands of the authoritarian regime. Trump declared:

    we need only look at the depraved character of the North Korean regime to understand the nature of the nuclear threat it could pose.

    Now, by effectively silencing the government’s most vocal critics, the Trump administration appears to be giving breathing room to one of the world’s most atrocious authoritarian regimes.

    Danielle Chubb does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Another US funding cut threatens human rights in North Korea – and hands more power to a dictator – https://theconversation.com/another-us-funding-cut-threatens-human-rights-in-north-korea-and-hands-more-power-to-a-dictator-251239

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –