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  • MIL-OSI Global: Here’s how to create a more nature-literate society

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Seirian Sumner, Professor of Behavioural Ecology, UCL

    stuartjames worcs/Shutterstock

    Spring is the time of year when my friends remember what a strange job I have, because a stripy insect has just appeared in their kitchen and they are panicking. “It’s huge!” one squeals. “Help! What do I do? I swear it’s that murder hornet I saw on social media.”

    I explain to my friend that this is a common wasp queen, freshly emerged from hibernation. She’s lost 40% of her body weight and needs sugar. She will soon build a nest – using wood from my friend’s garden fence – lay eggs and rear them to adulthood by feeding them caterpillars, flies, aphids and spiders. If she survives, she might lay 10,000 eggs through the summer producing 10,000 worker wasps that will hunt more of these so-called pests and pollinate plants in my friend’s garden.

    By now, my friend is offering the wasp some honey. As he watches her feed and fly away, he is contemplating the benefits that this single insect will bring to his garden this summer.

    My friend is not unusual: like many people, he lacks the words to describe nature and knowledge to name it. Without such nature literacy, is it any wonder that many people don’t know how to care for the natural world or why we should bother?

    Humans are more disconnected from nature than ever, partly because technology means we have fewer reasons to spend time in nature – this is what ecologists call the “extinction of experience”. Fewer than half of UK adults feel highly connected with nature; most children can’t identify stinging nettles, bumblebees or robins. People don’t understand what the term natural history means or why it matters.

    I witnessed this recently while lecturing. In a class survey, my bioscience students summed up natural history as: “old Victorian gentlemen”, “museums”, “dinosaurs” and “old-fashioned”. They also rated natural history as not relevant or of little relevance to their degree programmes, with only a few people rating it as quite or very important.

    We weren’t always like this. Natural history is the study of nature: it is the oldest science. Natural selection ensured that early humans were brilliant naturalists, in order to find food and not become food. Nature inspired some of our most influential scientists, from Aristotle to Charles Darwin.

    Non-biologists were also deeply influenced by nature. In the words of physicist Albert Einstein: “Look deep into nature, and then you will understand everything better.” English mathematician Isaac Newton considered himself “a natural philosopher” – only the nature-curious would bother watching an apple fall.

    Having the language to name and describe nature is a gateway to curiosity-driven innovation, creativity and discovery. This matters because our food, health and wellbeing, innovations and creativity depend on observation, curiosity and understanding of the natural world. From termite-mound inspired air-conditioning technology to burr-mimicking Velcro, and ant-led town planning.

    Without noticing how nature has solved problems and without the ability to name, recognise and share the source with others in order to replicate the observations, none of these breakthroughs would have happened. Where will our next innovations come from, if we’ve lost the inclination and ability to notice, name and know nature?

    Knowledge about nature also makes us more pro-environmental and more likely to make planet-friendly decisions. This is critical as we continue to exceed planetary boundaries, driving climate change and nature loss. As things stand, our continuing divorce from nature means that the next generation are ill equipped for the future. Nature literacy helps us reconnect and make the right decisions.

    Growing nature literacy

    Becoming a nature-literate society starts with three key steps.

    1. Notice. Relearn how to be deliciously distracted by nature, curious about the ordinary, and redevelop the sense of awe and wonder that has inspired science, innovation and the arts for centuries.

    2. Name. Embrace the joys of learning to name nature. Can you tell a beech tree from an oak? A bee-fly from a bumble-bee? By being able to name something, we develop a connection with it and crave knowledge about it – be it for wasps or weeds.

    3. Nurture. With names and knowledge come care, responsibility and the determination to take action to protect nature, such that future generations have the biodiversity needed for future learning and inspiration.

    Have you ever seen an elephant hawkmoth caterpillar?
    Simon T May/Shutterstock

    Noticing and naming nature means we’re more likely to nurture it. Sharing our nature knowledge with others helps nudge the nature literacy agenda from below the boots of old Victorian gentlemen and into the 21st century. Even when that bit of nature involves gorgeous wasps.



    Read more:
    A new natural history GCSE is welcome – but climate change needs to be part of the whole curriculum

    And after 11 years of campaigning, environmentalist and author Mary Colwell has nudged nature literacy on to the agenda of the UK government with the approval of an examination-level qualification for secondary school children – the natural history GCSE. This is an important first step forward in shifting the baseline of nature literacy among the next generation in the UK.

    But nature literacy needs to become much more embedded across society. Nature-based jobs are the future. In industry and academia, tech startups and government, frontline roles are now focusing on “green” or “nature-based” jobs to deliver the nature-based solutions needed for a sustainable future. Demands for these jobs is booming, but the the lack of necessary nature-literacy skills is well-recognised. A recent report identified biodiversity knowledge as the most important technical skill identified by nature-based solutions employers globally.

    We need to shift cultural norms and societal expectations so that nature literacy is taught and valued by everyone – not just ecologists. Government and educators owe the future of our planet a nature-literate workforce.

    Don’t have time to read about climate change as much as you’d like?

    Get a weekly roundup in your inbox instead. Every Wednesday, The Conversation’s environment editor writes Imagine, a short email that goes a little deeper into just one climate issue. Join the 40,000+ readers who’ve subscribed so far.

    Seirian Sumner receives funding from the UK government’s Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) and the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC). She is a Trustee and Fellow of the Royal Entomological Society, and author of the book ‘Endless Forms: Why We Should Love Wasps’

    – ref. Here’s how to create a more nature-literate society – https://theconversation.com/heres-how-to-create-a-more-nature-literate-society-253373

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: The hidden power of marathon Senate speeches: What history tells us about Cory Booker’s 25-hour oration

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Charlie Hunt, Assistant Professor of Political Science, Boise State University

    Sen. Cory Booker walks toward reporters after delivering a record-setting 25-hour speech for the U.S. Senate at the Capitol on April 1, 2025, in Washington, D.C. Win McNamee/Getty Images

    Democratic U.S. Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey made history on April 1, 2025, when he stood on the Senate floor and spoke for 25 hours and five minutes, delivering the longest floor speech in the history of the U.S. Senate.

    Booker’s speech detailed his concerns about President Donald Trump’s new executive orders, other policies and approach to government in his second term.

    “I rise tonight because silence at this moment of national crisis would be a betrayal of some of the greatest heroes of our nation. Because at stake in this moment is nothing less than everything that we brag about, that we talk about, that makes us special,” Booker said.

    Although Booker’s speech was not technically a filibuster, meaning a prolonged action at the Senate in order to delay or stop a vote on a legislative action, it was clearly a monumental physical achievement. Booker stood, wearing a black suit, for the entirety of his speech and did not pause to take bathroom or meal breaks.

    What does the subject matter of Booker’s speech, as well as his style of giving it, say about its potential effectiveness? Could it succeed where filibusters have failed?

    Many other long Senate speeches in history offer a variety of useful historical hints about the political significance of Booker’s record-breaking speech.

    U.S. Sen. Strom Thurmond of South Carolina is kissed by his wife after talking for 24 hours and 18 minutes in opposition to the Civil Rights Act in August 1957.
    Bettmann/Contributor/Getty Images

    Booker’s speech was a wide-ranging protest

    One unusual element of Booker’s oration is that it was not focused on just one narrow issue.

    Most of the lengthiest filibusters from across Senate history are focused on bills that cover important but specific issues. In 1953, Sen. Wayne Morse of Oregon, for example, set a record for the longest filibuster when he spoke for 22 hours and 26 minutes. Morse protested a bill involving the transfer of land and oil rights between coastal states and the federal government. The bill passed, despite Morse’s filibuster.

    Sen. Strom Thurmond, the South Carolina politician who broke Morse’s record just four years later, infamously – and unsuccessfully – protested the Civil Rights Act of 1957 with a 24-hour, 18-minute speech.

    Booker’s speech came in the midst of a vote to confirm Matthew Whitaker as the U.S. ambassador to NATO. Whitaker was confirmed shortly after Booker’s speech concluded.

    Booker and the procession of Senate colleagues who asked him questions referenced this and other appointments in their remarks. But Booker largely used the speech to build a much bigger case against the Trump administration, most notably that the administration had wrested from Congress much of its constitutionally mandated budgetary authority by extensively cutting federal staff, grants and spending without congressional approval.

    “These are not normal times in America,” Booker said toward the beginning of his address, “and they should not be treated as such in the United States Senate.”

    The rules and culture of the Senate have always been more lax when it comes to what congressional experts call “germaneness” – in other words, how relevant a Senator’s action is to whatever is being debated.

    For example, the Senate often allows nongermane amendments, meaning those that have little or nothing to do with the bill being debated. Booker leveraged that Senate tradition to make a larger point about what he called an ongoing “crisis” in American democracy.

    Booker stuck to the issues

    Booker may have covered a wide variety of areas in his speech, ranging from proposed Republican cuts to Medicaid to mass firings of federal workers, but there’s no question that he stayed focused on his critique of the Trump administration – a difficult task to stick to for 25 straight hours.

    Booker’s predecessors in the pursuit of Thurmond’s record have demonstrated this difficulty in keeping a marathon speech focused.

    For example, Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas diverted from his argument when he gave a 21-hour, 19-minute speech protesting President Obama’s signature piece of legislation, the Affordable Care Act, in 2013.

    Cruz, who still serves with Booker in the Senate, took the opportunity to tell his young daughters a bedtime story on the Senate floor, reading aloud from Dr. Seuss’ children’s book “Green Eggs and Ham.”

    Louisiana Sen. Huey Long, meanwhile, shared recipes for southern fried oysters during his 1937 protest of the federal appointments process.

    Booker, on the other hand, almost uniformly kept his focus on his grievances against the Trump administration and used only notes designed to reinforce his central argument that Trump is not leading in the best interest of the country.

    According to an April 1 press release from Booker’s office, the senator drew from over 1,000 pages of prepared material assembled by his Senate aides, including stories from more than 200 Americans who had written to Booker protesting Trump’s actions.

    In many instances, Booker also spoke extemporaneously about the administration’s actions. At other times, his fellow senators broke in for a lengthy question, but even these kept the conversation, and Booker’s attention, focused on taking Trump — and occasionally Elon Musk – to task.

    In all instances, Booker used his speech to rally the public.

    “My voice is inadequate. My efforts today are inadequate to stop what they are trying to do,” he said at one point. “But we the people are powerful, and we are strong.”

    Sen. Cory Booker speaks on the Senate floor on April 1, 2025.
    Senate Television/Associated Press

    Lasting effects

    Of course, with few tangible results to show for lengthy Senate speeches, people might be tempted to view these long orations as little more than trivia or political theater.

    On some occasions, filibusters have made a legislative impact. Sen. Alfonse D’Amato of New York, for example, filibustered a budget bill in 1986 for nearly 23½ hours to protest an amendment that would have killed funding for a jet trainer plane manufactured in his state. His filibuster didn’t stop the bill entirely, but he did secure a concession that prolonged the project’s life.

    For the most part, however, lengthy filibusters throughout history have been largely fruitless efforts legislatively. Even so, the symbolism of these speeches, including Booker’s, can have effects on politics and representation that last beyond the legislation the senator is protesting.

    It’s difficult to know yet just how effective Booker’s efforts will be in motivating an anti-Trump coalition to stand up to the administration, either in Congress or among voters.

    But politically speaking, Booker’s timing was fortuitous – on April 2, the same evening Booker wrapped up his address, liberals secured a crucial Wisconsin Supreme Court seat in a high-turnout election, when Judge Susan Crawford beat Judge Brad Schimel. Schimel is a Trump supporter and received nearly US$20 million in donations from organizations supported by Musk.

    Democratic politicians also outperformed expectations in two special elections to the U.S. House in Florida, though they lost the races.

    Taken together with Booker’s herculean effort, these events could serve as a catalyst for Trump’s opponents to strike back in the coming months.

    The symbolic significance of Booker’s achievement has also not gone unnoticed. Booker, who is Black and reflected on ancestors who were both enslaved or enslavers in his speech, was himself mindful of the historical relevance.

    “To be candid, Strom Thurmond’s record always just really irked me,” Booker said after his speech in an interview with MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow.

    “The longest speech on our great Senate floor was someone who was trying to stop people like me from being in the Senate.”

    If nothing else, Booker took that record from Thurmond and made it his own.

    Charlie Hunt 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. The hidden power of marathon Senate speeches: What history tells us about Cory Booker’s 25-hour oration – https://theconversation.com/the-hidden-power-of-marathon-senate-speeches-what-history-tells-us-about-cory-bookers-25-hour-oration-253695

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Consumers are boycotting US goods around the world. Should Trump be worried?

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Alan Bradshaw, Professor of Marketing, Royal Holloway University of London

    US alcohol has been removed from sale in the Canadian province of British Columbia. lenic/Shutterstock

    As politicians around the world scramble to respond to US “liberation day” tariffs, consumers have also begun flexing their muscles. “Boycott USA” messages and searches have been trending on social media and search engines, with users sharing advice on brands and products to avoid.

    Even before Donald Trump announced across-the-board tariffs, there had been protests and attacks on the president’s golf courses in Doonbeg in Ireland and Turnberry in Scotland in response to other policies. And in Canada, shoppers avoided US goods after Trump announced he could take over his northern neighbour.

    His close ally Elon Musk has seen protests at Tesla showrooms across Europe, Australia and New Zealand. New cars have been set on fire as part of the “Tesla take-down”, while Tesla sales have been on a deep downward trend. This has been especially noticeable in European countries where electric vehicles sales have been high, and in Australia.

    This targeting of Trump and Musk’s brands are part of wider boycotts of US goods as consumers look for ways to express their anger at the US administration.

    Denmark’s biggest retailer, Salling Group, has given the price label of all European products a black star, making it easy for customers to avoid US goods.

    Canadian shoppers are turning US products upside down in retail outlets so it’s easier for fellow shoppers to spot and avoid them. Canadian consumers can also download the Maple Scan app that checks barcodes to see if their grocery purchases are actually Canadian or have parent companies from the USA.

    Who owns what?

    The issue of ostensibly Canadian brands being owned by US capital illustrates the complexity of consumer boycotts – it can be difficult to identify which brands are American and which are not.

    In the UK, for example, many consumers would be surprised to learn how many famous British brands are actually American-owned – for example, Cadbury, Waterstones and Boots. So entwined are global economies that attempts by consumers to boycott US brands may also damage their local economies.

    This complexity is also present in Danish and Canadian Facebook groups that are dedicated to boycotting US goods. Consumers exchange tips on how to swap alternatives for American products.

    The fact that Facebook is a US-based company only demonstrates how deeply embedded consumer culture is in US technologies. European businesses often depend on American operating systems and cloud storage while consumers rely on US-owned social media platforms for communication.

    Even when consumers succeed in weeding out American products, if they pay using Visa, Mastercard or Apple Pay, a percentage of the price will nonetheless be rerouted to the US. If a touch payment is made with Worldpay, the percentage could be even greater.

    These American financial services show just how embedded US businesses are in retail in ways that consumers may not appreciate. In practice, an absolute boycott of US business is almost unimaginable.

    All-American brands

    But American branding is not always subtle. In addition to brands directly connected to the US administration – such as the Trump golf courses and Tesla – many other companies have always been flamboyantly American. Coca-Cola, Starbucks and Budweiser are just some examples where their American identities and proudly on show.

    As such, it’s possible that consumers will increasingly avoid blatantly American brands. They may be less concerned about the complexities and contradictions of a more comprehensive boycott.

    Consumer actions where the goal is political change are known as “proxy boycotts” because no particular company is the ultimate target. Rather, the brands and firms are targeted by consumers as a means to an end.

    Do boycotts work?

    A classic example of a proxy boycott took aim at French goods, particularly wine, in the mid-1990s. This was in response to president Jacques Chirac’s decision to conduct nuclear tests in the Pacific. The large-scale consumer boycotts contributed to France’s decision to abandon its nuclear tests in 1996.

    In Britain, for example, French wines in all categories lost market share as demand fell during the boycott. At the time, it cost the French wine sector £23 million (about £46 million today).

    These boycotts are a reminder that the interplay between corporations, brands and consumer culture are inevitably embedded in politics. The current political impasse demonstrates that consumers can participate in politics, not just with their votes, but also with their buying power.

    Trump clearly wants to demonstrate American strength. The “liberation day” tariffs, which were higher than most observers expected, bear this out. But many US corporations will now be worrying about how consumers in the US and around the world might respond. Trump could see a mass mobilisation of consumer power in ways that will give the president something to think about.

    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. Consumers are boycotting US goods around the world. Should Trump be worried? – https://theconversation.com/consumers-are-boycotting-us-goods-around-the-world-should-trump-be-worried-253389

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: AI is automating our jobs – but values need to change if we are to be liberated by it

    Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By Robert Muggah, Richard von Weizsäcker Fellow na Bosch Academy e Co-fundador, Instituto Igarapé

    Artificial intelligence may be the most significant disruptor in the history of mankind. Google’s CEO Sundar Pichai famously described AI as “more profound than the invention of fire or electricity”. OpenAI’s CEO Sam Altman claims it has the power to cure most diseases, solve climate change, provide personalized education to the world, and lead to other “astounding triumphs”.

    AI will undoubtedly help solve vast problems, while generating vast fortunes for technology companies and investors. However, the rapid spread of generative AI and machine learning will also automate vast swathes of the global workforce, eviscerating white-collar and blue-collar jobs alike. And while millions of new jobs will surely be created, it is not clear what happens when potentially billions more are lost.

    The Insights section is committed to high-quality longform journalism. Our editors work with academics from many different backgrounds who are tackling a wide range of societal and scientific challenges.

    Amid the breathless promises of productivity gains from AI, there are rising concerns that the political, social and economic fallout from mass labour displacement will deepen inequality, strain public safety nets, and contribute to social unrest.

    A 2023 survey in 31 countries found that over half of all respondents felt “nervous” about the impacts of AI on their daily lives and believed it will negatively impact their jobs. Concerns are also mounting about the ways in which AI is being weaponized and could hasten everything from geopolitical fragmentation to nuclear exchanges. While experts are sounding the alarm, it is increasingly clear that governments, businesses and societies are unprepared for the AI revolution.

    The coming AI upheaval

    The idea that machines would one day replace human labour is hardly new. It features in novels, films and countless economic reports stretching back over centuries. In 2013, Carl-Benedikt Frey and Michael Osborne of the University of Oxford attempted to quantify the human costs, estimating that “47% of total US employment is in the high risk category, meaning that associated occupations are potentially automatable”. Their study triggered a global debate about the far-reaching consequences of automation not just for manufacturing jobs, but also service and knowledge-based work.

    Fast forward to today, and AI capabilities are advancing faster than almost anyone expected. In November 2022, OpenAI launched ChatGPT, which dramatically accelerated the AI race. By 2023, Goldman Sachs projected that “roughly two-thirds of current jobs are exposed to some degree of AI automation” and that up to 300 million jobs worldwide could be displaced or significantly altered by AI.

    A more detailed McKinsey analysis estimated that “Gen AI and other technologies have the potential to automate work activities that absorb up to 70% of employees’ time today”. Brookings found that “more than 30% of all workers could see at least 50% of their occupation’s tasks disrupted by generative AI”. Although the methodologies and estimates differ, all of these studies point to a common outcome: AI will profoundly upset the world of work.

    While it is tempting to compare the impacts of AI automation to past industrial revolutions, it is also short-sighted. AI is arguably more transformative than the combustion engine or Internet because it represents a fundamental shift in how decisions are made and tasks are performed. It is not just a new tool or source of power, but a system that can learn, adapt, and make independent decisions across virtually all sectors of the economy and aspects of human life. Precisely because AI has these capabilities, scales exponentially, and is not confined by geography, it is already starting to outperform humans. It signals the advent of a post-human intelligence era.

    Goldman Sachs estimates that 46% of administrative work and 44% of legal tasks could be automated within the next decade. In finance and legal sectors, tasks such as contract analysis, fraud detection, and financial advising are increasingly handled by AI systems that can process data faster and more accurately than humans. Financial institutions are rapidly deploying AI to reduce costs and increase efficiency, with many entry-level roles set to disappear. Global banks could cut as many as 200,000 jobs in the next three to five years on account of AI.

    Ironically, coding and software engineering jobs are among the most vulnerable to the spreading of AI. While there are expectations that AI will increase productivity and streamline routine tasks with many programmers and non-programmers likely to benefit, some coders confess that they are becoming overly reliant on AI suggestions (which undermines problem-solving skills).

    Anthropic, one of the leading developers of generative AI systems, recently launched an Economic Index based on millions of anonymised uses of its Claude chatbot. It reveals massive adoption of AI in software engineering: “37.2% of queries sent to Claude were in this category, covering tasks like software modification, code debugging, and network troubleshooting”.

    AI is also outperforming humans in a growing array of medical imaging and diagnosis roles. While doctors may not be replaced outright, support roles are particularly vulnerable and medical professionals are getting anxious. Analysts insist that high-skilled jobs are not at risk even as AI-driven diagnostic tools and patient management systems are steadily being deployed in hospitals and clinics worldwide.

    Meanwhile, the creative sectors also face significant disruption as AI-generated writing and synthetic media improve. The demand for human journalists, copywriters, and designers is already falling just as AI-generated content (including so-called “slop”: the growing amount of low-quality text, audio and video flooding social media) expands. And in education, AI tutoring systems, adaptive learning platforms, and automated grading could reduce the need for human teachers, not only in remote learning environments.

    Arguably the most dramatic impact of AI in the coming years will be in the manufacturing sector. Recent videos from China offer a glimpse into a future of factories that run 24/7 and are nearly entirely automated (except a handful in supervising roles). Most tasks are performed by AI-powered robots and technologies designed to handle production and, increasingly, support functions.

    Unlike humans, robots do not need light to operate in these “dark factories”. CapGemini describes them as places “where raw materials enter, and finished products leave, with little or no human intervention”. Re-read that sentence. The implications are profound and dizzying: efficiency gains (capital) that come at the cost of human livelihoods (labor) and rapid downward spiral for the latter if no safeguards are put in place.

    Some have confidently argued that, as with past technological shifts, AI-driven job losses will be offset by new opportunities. AI enthusiasts add that it will mostly handle repetitive or boring tasks, freeing humans for more creative work — like giving doctors more time with patients, teachers more time to engage with students, lawyers more time to concentrate on client relationships, or architects more time to focus on innovative design. But this historical comfort overlooks AI’s radical novelty: for the first time, we’re confronted with a technology that is not just a tool but an autonomous agent, capable of making decisions and directly shaping reality. The question is not just what we can do with AI, but what AI might do to us.

    AI will certainly save time. Machine learning already interprets scans faster and cheaper than doctors. But the idea that this will give professionals more time for creative or human-centered work is less convincing. Already doctors are not short on technology; they are short on time because healthcare systems prioritise efficiency and cost-cutting over “time with patients”. The rise of technology in healthcare has coincided with doctors spending less time with patients, not more, as hospitals and insurers push for higher throughput and lower costs. AI may make diagnosis quicker, but there is little reason to think it will loosen the grip of a system designed to maximise output rather than human connection.

    Nor is there much reason to expect AI to liberate office workers for more creative tasks. Technology tends to reinforce the values of the system into which it is introduced. If those values are cost reduction and higher productivity, AI will be deployed to automate tasks and consolidate work, not to create breathing room. Workflows will be redesigned for speed and efficiency, not for creativity or reflection. Unless there is a deliberate shift in priorities — a move to value human input over raw output — AI is more likely to tighten the screws than to loosen them. That shift seems unlikely anytime soon.

    AI’s uneven impacts

    AI’s impact on employment will not be felt equally around the world. It will impact different countries differently. Disparities in political systems, economic development levels, labour market structures and access to AI infrastructure (including energy) are shaping how regions are preparing for and are likely to experience AI-driven disruption. Smaller, wealthier countries are potentially in a better position to manage the scale and speed of job displacement. Some lower-income societies may be cushioned by the disruption owing to limited market penetration of AI services altogether. Meanwhile, high and medium income countries may experience social turbulence and potentially unrest as a result of rapid and unpredictable automation.

    The United States, the current leader in AI development, faces significant exposure to AI-driven disruption, particularly in services. A 2023 study found that highly educated workers in professional and technical roles are most vulnerable to displacement. Knowledge-based industries such as finance, legal services, and customer support are already shedding entry-level jobs as AI automates routine tasks.

    Technology companies have begun shrinking their workforces, using that also as signals to both government and business. Over 95,000 workers at tech companies lost their jobs in 2024. Despite its AI edge, America’s service-heavy economy leaves it highly exposed to automation’s downsides.

    Asia stands at the forefront of AI-driven automation in manufacturing and services. It is not just China, but countries like South Korea that are deploying AI in so-called “smart factories” and logistics with fully automated production facilities becoming increasingly common. India and the Philippines, major hubs for outsourced IT and customer service, face pressure as AI threatens to replace human labour in these sectors. Japan, with its shrinking workforce, sees AI more as a solution than a threat. But the broader region’s exposure to automation reflects its deep reliance on manufacturing and outsourcing, making it highly vulnerable to AI-driven job displacement in a geopolitically turbulent world.

    Europe is taking early regulatory steps to manage AI’s labour market impact. The EU’s AI Act aims to regulate high-risk AI applications, including those affecting employment. Yet in Eastern Europe, where manufacturing and low-cost labour underpin economic competitiveness, automation is already cutting into job security. Poland and Hungary, for example, are seeing a rise in automated production lines. Western Europe’s knowledge-based economies face risks similar to those in America, particularly in finance and professional services.

    Oil-rich Gulf states are investing heavily in AI as part of diversification efforts away from a dependence on hydrocarbons. Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Qatar are building AI hubs and integrating AI into government services and logistics. The UAE even has a Minister of State for AI. But with high youth unemployment and a reliance on foreign labour, these countries face risks if AI reduces demand for low-skill jobs, potentially worsening inequality.

    In Latin America, automation threatens to disrupt manufacturing and agriculture, but also sectors like mining, logistics, and customer service. As many as 2-5% of all jobs in the region are at risk, according to the International Labor Organization and World Bank. And it is not just young people in the formal service sectors, but also human labour in mining operations, logistics and warehouse workers. Call centers in Mexico and Colombia face pressure as AI-powered customer service bots reduce demand for human agents. And AI-driven crop monitoring, automated irrigation, and robotic harvesting threaten to replace farm labourers, particularly in Brazil and Argentina. Yet the region’s large informal labour market may cushion some of the shock.

    While most Africans are optimistic about the transformative potential of AI, adoption remains low due to limited infrastructure and investment. However, the continent’s rapidly growing digital economy could see AI play a transformative role in financial services, logistics, and agriculture. A recent assessment suggests AI could boost productivity and access to services, but without careful management, it risks widening inequality. As in Latin America, low wages and high levels of informal employment reduce the financial incentive to automate. Ironically, weaker economic incentives for automation may shield these economies from the worst of AI’s labour disruption.

    No one is prepared

    The scale and speed of recent AI developments have taken many governments and businesses by surprise. To be sure, some are proactively taking steps to prepare workforces for the transformation. Hundreds of AI laws, regulations, guidelines, and standards have emerged in recent years, though few of them are legally binding. One exception is the EU’s AI Act, which seeks to establish a comprehensive legal framework for AI deployment, addressing risks such as job displacement and ethical concerns. China and South Korea have also developed national AI strategies with an emphasis on industrial policy and technological self-sufficiency, aiming to lead in AI and automation while boosting their manufacturing sectors.

    Notwithstanding recent attempts to increase oversight over AI, the US has adopted an increasingly laissez-faire approach, prioritising innovation by reducing regulatory barriers. This “minimal regulation” stance, however, raises concerns about the potential societal costs of rapid AI adoption, including widespread job displacement, the deepening of inequality and undermining of democracy.

    Other countries, particularly in the Global South, have largely remained on the sidelines of AI regulation, lacking the awareness, capabilities or infrastructure to tackle these issues comprehensively. As such, the global regulatory landscape remains fragmented, with significant disparities in how countries are preparing for the workforce impacts of automation.

    Businesses are under pressure to adopt AI as fast and deeply as possible, for fear of losing competitiveness. That’s, at least, the hyperbolic narrative that AI companies have succeeded in putting forward. And it’s working: a recent poll of 1,000 executives found that 58% of businesses are adopting AI due to competitive pressure and 70% say that advances in technology are occurring faster than their workforce can incorporate them.

    Another new survey suggests that over 40% of global employers planned to reduce their workforce as AI reshapes the labour market. Lost in the rush to adopt AI is a serious reflection on workforce transition. Financial institutions, consulting firms, universities and nonprofit groups have sounded alarms about the economic impact of AI but have provided few solutions other than workforce up-skilling and Universal Basic Income (UBI). Governments and businesses are wrestling with a basic challenge: how to manage the benefits of AI while protecting workers from displacement.

    AI-driven automation is no longer a future prospect; it is already reshaping labour markets. As automation reduces human workforces, it will also diminish the power of unions and collective bargaining furthering entering capital over labour. Whether AI fosters widespread prosperity or deepens inequality and social unrest depends not just on the imperatives of tech company CEOs and shareholders, but on the proactive decisions made by policymakers, business leaders, union representatives, and workers in the coming years.

    The key question is not if AI will disrupt labour markets — this is inevitable — but how societies will manage the upheaval and what kinds of “new bargains” will be made to address its negative externalities. It is worth recalling that while the last three industrial revolutions created more jobs than they destroyed, the transitions were long and painful. This time, the pace of change will be faster and more profound, demanding swift and enlightened action.

    At a minimum, governments must prepare their societies to develop a new social contract, prioritise retraining programs, bolster social safety nets, and explore UBI to help workers displaced by automation. They should also proactively foster new industries to absorb the displaced workforce. Businesses, in turn, will need to rethink workforce strategies and adopt human-centric AI deployment models that prioritise collaboration between humans and machines, rather than substitution of the former by the latter.

    The promise of AI is immense, from boosting productivity to creating new economic opportunities and indeed helping solving big collective problems. Yet, without a focused and coordinated effort, the technology is unlikely to develop in ways that benefit society at large.

    Dr. Robert Muggah is the co-founder of the Igarapé Institute, an independent think and do tank that develops research, solutions and partnerships to address global public, digital and climate security challenges. Dr. Muggah is also a principal of the SecDev Group, and an advisor to the United Nations, the IMF and the World Bank. An advisor to AI start-ups and a climate tech venture firms, Dr. Muggah has experience developing new technologies and testing AI systems for security and governance. He also coordinated a global task force on predictive analytics and AI in the Global South since in 2023.

    Bruno Giussani não presta consultoria, trabalha, possui ações ou recebe financiamento de qualquer empresa ou organização que poderia se beneficiar com a publicação deste artigo e não revelou nenhum vínculo relevante além de seu cargo acadêmico.

    – ref. AI is automating our jobs – but values need to change if we are to be liberated by it – https://theconversation.com/ai-is-automating-our-jobs-but-values-need-to-change-if-we-are-to-be-liberated-by-it-253806

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: What politicians could actually do about the issues raised in Adolescence

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Robert Lawson, Associate Professor in Sociolinguistics, Birmingham City University

    Mounir Taha/Shutterstock

    Netflix hit Adolescence has ignited conversations across the UK about contemporary masculinity, online radicalisation and violence against women and girls. It has also raised questions about the interventions needed at home, in schools and by the government to counter the seductive power of harmful content on social media.

    The series suggests the key to solving some of these issues is parents and teachers understanding the “manosphere”. This is a collection of websites, influencers and communities where men talk about “men’s issues”. But, as I’ve explored in my research, anti-women and anti-feminist sentiment also prevails.

    In an interview about the series, Adolescence writer Jack Thorne says:

    Jamie is not a simple product of the ‘manosphere’. He is a product of parents that didn’t see, a school that couldn’t care and a brain that didn’t stop him. Put 3,000 kids in the same situation and they wouldn’t do what he did. Yet spend any time on forums on 4chan or Reddit, spend any time on most social media platforms and you end up, quite quickly, in some dark spaces. Parents can try to regulate this, schools can stop mobile phone access but more needs to be done.

    Successive UK governments have attempted to counter online misogyny and violence against women and girls through legislation and public education schemes. But what would really work?

    Adolescence attaches much importance to language and emojis used by teens to obscure meaning, though there is undoubtedly some creative license behind the depictions of the emojis used to mean “incel” (involuntary celibate).

    But focusing on “slang parents and teachers need to know” is misguided. Every generation finds ways of talking about their lives in coded ways. And teen language is frequently tied to moral panics about what it potentially hides. Research has shown that regular, open and supportive conversations between parents and children are much more important.

    The role of schools

    The prime minister has suggested that Adolescence should be shown in schools. And Netflix has made the series available to secondary schools across the UK.

    In December 2024, education minister Bridget Phillipson announced new teaching guidance about incel culture and online misogyny. She argued that it was “vital to recognise the signs of these dangerous ideas as early as possible”.

    It’s encouraging to see the government take these issues seriously, but there are pitfalls. Teachers are under substantial pressure, struggling with workload and staffing. How many have the capacity to lead meaningful and supportive discussions, especially with limited training on these topics?

    Some research suggests that female teachers encounter explicit misogyny in their classrooms. This makes it even more difficult to facilitate conversations about gender and violence. Sessions on countering misogyny also pose the danger of alienating boys, making them feel like they are being vilified for the actions of other men and boys.



    Read more:
    Adolescence in schools: TV show’s portrayal of one boyhood may do more harm than good when used as a teaching tool

    Ultimately, interventions to reduce gender-based violence and misogyny need a “whole-school” approach that integrates gender equality across the curriculum, rather than isolating it within relationships, sex and health education (RSHE) classes. This content could also be covered in initial teacher training courses.

    Researchers have developed resources to challenge dangerous gender norms for use in schools, community groups and other forums. These include toolkits from Dublin City University, University of Liverpool and the MascNet research network, which focus on improving critical thinking, unpacking dominant ideas of masculinity and reflecting on different ways of being a man.

    My own work on A-level English curricula also offers suggestions. Improving digital literacy is key to helping young men identify the mechanisms of manipulation in the content they consume and resist the siren call of manosphere influences. This can encourage young men to rethink their assumptions about gender politics and masculinity, with the ultimate aim of reducing gender-based violence.

    Other discussions have focused on recruiting more male teachers and the importance of models of masculinity based on caring, empathy and emotional vulnerability. Again, these are appealing solutions, but the evidence that male role models improve outcomes for young people is mixed.

    Perhaps the trickiest debate concerns the regulation of media and technology. Adolescence writer Thorne has backed the UK following Australia’s approach to ban social media for under-16s, and some argue the government should ban smartphones for teenagers entirely. Experts say that such bans could do more harm than good.

    The UK’s new online safety laws may go some way to holding social media companies to account for moderating illegal or harmful content and algorithms through fines. This covers intimate image abuse, cyberflashing and some other forms of online misogyny, but there are likely to be gaps when it comes to male supremacist and manosphere content.

    And there are serious concerns about how the law will affect free speech and undermine privacy online.

    Investing in youth

    The problem with many of these strategies is that they fail to acknowledge the material reality of many young boys’ lives. There have been significant cuts over the past 20 years to youth provision, from clubs and community centres to mental health support.

    Boys’ prospects in terms of educational attainment and secure employment lag behind girls’. These inequalities become even more pronounced across regions and social classes, and won’t be solved by banning social media.

    Add to this disconnected communities and a potent combination of insecurity, precarity and frustrated expectation, it is no surprise that many young men find solace in an online world which gives them validation, belonging and a sense of community.



    Read more:
    Blaming absent dads for the crisis of masculinity is too simplistic – many men want to be more involved

    Thankfully, a number of organisations offer better solutions. Charities like Beyond Equality, the Manhood Academy, AndysManClub and Progressive Masculinity have provided outreach, mentoring and mental health provision for boys and young men across the UK for years.

    Similarly, the S.M.I.L.E-ing Boys Project supports boys from black, Asian and minority ethnic communities to develop their emotional intelligence, with positive outcomes in terms of navigating relationships and interpersonal conflict. Government investment would help these organisations reach more young men, alongside improving access for underserved communities.

    Adolescence has started some important conversations among parents, teens and politicians. But to make a difference in how young men navigate the world, how they deal with rejection, and how they negotiate the difficulties that life throws at them, these conversations need to be backed up with investment and concrete action.

    Robert Lawson is a Research Fellow in the Institute for Research on Male Supremacism.

    – ref. What politicians could actually do about the issues raised in Adolescence – https://theconversation.com/what-politicians-could-actually-do-about-the-issues-raised-in-adolescence-252978

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: More than just chips: Chinese threats and Trump tariffs could disrupt lots of ‘made in Taiwan’ imports − disappointing US builders, cyclists and golfers alike

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Jay L. Zagorsky, Associate Professor Questrom School of Business, Boston University

    A cargo ship and containers are seen at the Port of Keelung in Taiwan on April 3, 2025. I-HWA CHENG/AFP via Getty Images

    What would the United States stand to lose economically if its current access to the Taiwanese market were upended or totally restricted?

    This seemingly theoretical question about the longtime U.S. trading partner has taken on more relevance in the past several weeks. First, longtime fears about a potential Chinese invasion of the island – which Beijing claims as its own – were magnified as China increased military pressure by sending patrols, firing live ammunition nearby, practicing blockading the island and even publicly revealing the existence of new barges that might be used in an invasion. If China uses force, Taiwan’s manufacturing capacity could be destroyed.

    Then on April 2, 2025, President Donald Trump announced a new 32% tariff on imports from Taipei, excluding semiconductors. Taiwan described the new tariffs, part of a radical upending of U.S. trade practices, as “deeply unreasonable.” They could also be deeply painful to U.S. consumers given the outsize role Taiwan imports play.

    The U.S. State Department calls Taiwan an important U.S. partner in “semiconductors and other critical supply chains.” But as I learned studying trade data and visiting the small but thriving island last fall, the U.S. depends on Taiwan for more than just sophisticated computer chips. In 2024, Taiwanese products constituted 3.6% of all U.S. imports.

    Overall trade figures

    Trade figures are known in detail because almost every government carefully tracks the contents of all shipping containers, cargo flights and bulk deliveries that legally leave and enter their borders. These figures are published online and broken down into very fine detail using a system called the Harmonized Tariff Schedule, or HTS. The HTS shows the tax or duty that must be paid for each kind of item and from every kind of country.

    In 2024, the U.S. exported US$1.7 trillion worth of goods to the world. Since few of us can conceptualize trillions, that is about $5,000 for every man, woman and child in the U.S.

    For its part, Taiwan in 2024 exported about that same amount per resident of the island just to the U.S., $5,000 – or about $90 billion overall. The U.S. is Taiwan’s second-biggest trading partner, after mainland China. Looking at their total exports, Taiwan shipped to the entire world about $20,000 worth of items for every resident.

    The vital technology component

    Not surprisingly, Taiwan’s biggest exports to the U.S. are computers, chips and other electronic hardware such as power supplies. These computer chips are so important that they were specifically excluded from the new tariffs.

    However, $90 billion of exports dramatically underestimates the amount of Taiwanese electronics that end up in U.S. hands. For example, the main chip inside all Apple iPhones is Taiwanese. However, these chips are sent from Taiwan to mainland Chinese factories where the phones are assembled. When these iPhones are exported from mainland China, the value of the chips inside the phone is not counted as U.S. imports from Taiwan. Instead, the whole phone is counted as an import from mainland China and slapped with a tariff.

    The building industry

    But while high-technology equipment often gets the headlines, imports from Taiwan are far broader – and the U.S. would face several economic shocks if Taiwan suddenly stopped exporting.

    First, the U.S. building industry could grind to a halt because Taiwan is a major producer of drywall screws. Though small and cheap, that’s a very significant product, given the prominence of drywall in the interior walls of almost every house, office and factory.

    Microchip and Taiwanese flag displayed on a phone screen.
    Jakub Porzycki/NurPhoto via Getty Images

    Overall, the U.S. uses a massive amount of drywall for new construction and remodeling. In 2024, the country consumed about 28 billion square feet of wallboard. That amount is enough to cover almost the state of Rhode Island.

    To hang drywall, every 100 square feet of the sheets needs about 125 screws. And the vast majority came last year from Taiwan. The U.S. imported over two-thirds of a billion dollars’ worth of the screws; the screws weighed over half a billion pounds.

    While the U.S. does make screws, domestic screw manufacturers primarily focus on high-value parts such as screws needed for airplanes, rocket ships and other performance vehicles, not lower-value screws whose wholesale cost is slightly more than a dollar a pound.

    Beyond screws, Taiwan is a major producer of tools. For example, approximately two-thirds of all socket wrenches, band saws, blowtorches, air compressors and grinders imported into the U.S. come from that island. Losing access to tools is not as crucial as losing access to the screws because many tools last a long time. But finding new suppliers is not trivial.

    The other basket of imports

    Finally, Taiwan is also a big U.S. supplier of sports goods.

    The country is a major producer of bicycles, with manufacturers such as Giant. In 2024, the U.S. imported from Taiwan over a quarter of a billion dollars in just bike parts, which U.S. manufacturers such as Specialized and Trek use when assembling bikes.

    Moreover, Taiwan controls a few key parts of the bike market. For example, over half of all bicycle crank sets, derailleurs and brake parts came from Taiwan. Without these products it is impossible to pedal, shift and even stop a bike.

    Taiwan is also one of the world’s leading suppliers of golf clubs, with the U.S. in 2024 importing about a quarter of a billion dollars’ worth of clubs from the island. To go along with the clubs, Taiwan also sent half a billion golf balls. Given that about 25 million people play on golf courses in the U.S. each year, that works out to 20 balls per player in just 2024.

    Finally, the island sent over a third of a million lacrosse sticks last year, which is almost one new stick for every member of the USA Lacrosse federation.

    All together, the data shows that not just Silicon Valley should be worried about geopolitical factors that disrupt imports from Taiwan. Taiwan might be a small island, but as the story of David and Goliath reminds us, size and impact are not related.

    Jay L. Zagorsky 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. More than just chips: Chinese threats and Trump tariffs could disrupt lots of ‘made in Taiwan’ imports − disappointing US builders, cyclists and golfers alike – https://theconversation.com/more-than-just-chips-chinese-threats-and-trump-tariffs-could-disrupt-lots-of-made-in-taiwan-imports-disappointing-us-builders-cyclists-and-golfers-alike-253729

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Abolition wasn’t fueled by just moral or economic concerns – the booming whaling industry also helped sink slavery

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Topher L. McDougal, Professor of Economic Development & Peacebuilding, University of San Diego

    An engraving of whalers at sea attacking a whale with a harpoon from 1820. Kean Collection/Getty Images

    Historians have long debated whether the end of slavery in the United States was primarily driven by moral campaigns or economic changes. But what if both perspectives are looking at only part of the puzzle?

    We are experts in economic development and social movements. Our new research uncovers what we believe to be a surprising and overlooked factor in the decline of slavery in the U.S. – the rise of the whaling industry.

    Starting around 1650, whaling expanded along the Northeast coast of the British American colonies. Whaling expeditions killed whales and brought back to port valuable animal products like oil, used for lamps and other items, and whalebone, used for products ranging from corsets to combs.

    Whalers also brought spermaceti, a waxy substance that comes from a sperm whale’s head and is used to produce candles and lubricants for precision machinery like watches and clocks.

    At its peak, in the 1850s, the American whaling industry alone employed 50,000 to 70,000 workers who worked on an estimated 700 to 800 ships.

    In the decades before cheap oil helped many industries truly take off, whaling played an important, but often overlooked, role in laying the groundwork for the antislavery movement.

    Black sailors made up perhaps 20% to 30% of whaling crews. Of these sailors, some were enslaved and used their hard-won earnings to buy their freedom. Some of these sailors went on to finance abolitionist efforts. Others built houses of worship.

    The whaling industry that produced oil to illuminate 19th-century lamps also added fuel to the fire of the antislavery movement. The city motto of New Bedford, Massachusetts – lucem diffundo, or “I diffuse light” in Latin – referred to the candles and lamps the whaling industry lit, as well as the moral clarity some whalers aspired to promote.

    Three Black whalers stand on a wharf in New Bedford, Mass., in an 1880 drawing.
    Smith Collection/Gado/Getty Images

    The missing link between whaling and abolition

    Slavery in the American colonies began in 1619 with a small enslaved population that grew to about 500,000 by the American Revolution in 1775. As slavery became institutionalized in law and American culture, the number of enslaved people grew, primarily in the South, to as many as 4 million in the years leading up to the Civil War in 1861.

    The first half of the 1800s saw a surge of abolitionist activism, rooted in early Quaker efforts and Indigenous wisdom. Abolitionism reshaped American politics into a fuller democracy, linking Black resistance, feminist struggles and labor rights to the broader fight for democracy and human rights.

    The decline and eventual abolition of slavery has been portrayed as the result of tireless activism and moral persuasion by early Quaker advocates like Benjamin Lay who considered slavery one of the worst sins. Abolitionists like Frederick Douglass would later go on to advocate for the Civil War to force a moral reckoning on the South.

    The result was an antislavery moral high ground from which the United Kingdom, and later the U.S., could measure other countries and monitor the high seas.

    Another common explanation for the end of slavery is the economic argument that slavery declined as fossil fuel-powered machinery replaced enslaved labor on farms and even in factories.

    Our research challenges this binary by showing that before steam engines transformed industry, whaling played an overlooked role in challenging the proposition that slavery was America’s most economically profitable form of labor organization at the time.

    Increased whaling, decreased slavery

    We analyzed data from U.S. Census records and the logbooks of American whaling voyages from 1790 to 1840 – systematized in a dataset maintained by the Mystic Seaport Museum and New Bedford Whaling Museum.

    This data came from well before the 1859 discovery and exploitation of oil in Pennsylvania.

    The results were striking: When the whaling industry brought back more oil, bone and spermaceti to specific ports, the proportion of enslaved people in the corresponding states declined.

    Statistically speaking, we saw a nearly perfect 1-to-1 inverse relationship between whaling and slavery.

    When whaling products went up 1%, slavery proportions went down by almost the same amount in that state in the following years. What’s more, we mapped these findings geographically and discovered that the more whaling occurred, the more widely decreases in slavery occurred in nearby states.

    In other words, our statistics suggest that increases in whaling led to decreases in slavery, and this effect diffused across state lines.

    Why whaling mattered

    Whaling was the first global industry in the colonies that eventually became the U.S.

    Whaling hubs like the Massachusetts towns of Nantucket and New Bedford and the island of Martha’s Vineyard became some of the wealthiest communities in the country.

    Whaling was also one of the few industries where Black Americans, both free and formerly enslaved, could make money and become wealthy. Individuals of all backgrounds could rise through the whaling industry ranks based on skill rather than birth.

    It also required a risk-embracing and entrepreneurial mindset, as immortalized in a song that the writer Herman Melville has the crew sing in the 1851 book Moby-Dick: “So, be cheery, my lads! may your hearts never fail! / While the bold harpooner is striking the whale!”

    By contrast, the plantation economy relied on rigid racial hierarchies and hereditary enslavement.

    Prince Boston was one example of an enslaved whaler, who, in 1773 at the age of 23, won the right in the local Nantucket court to purchase his own freedom from his owner, who lived locally, with the money he earned on a harpoon crew.

    This watershed moment saw the court make a precedent that was probably illegal at the time, but which supported and defended both the whaling industry as well as the aspirations of the people needed to make it thrive. Prince Boston’s free-born nephew, Absolom Boston, become the first Black whaling captain in 1822 – one of approximately 50 Black and Native captains in the American whaling industry throughout its history.

    Financing the fight against slavery

    The economic power generated by whaling helped fund the abolitionist movement in tangible ways.

    Wealthy Quaker merchants in whaling towns, like Martha’s Vineyard, were some of the earliest and most fervent supporters of abolition.

    Elihu Coleman, a Nantucket Quaker, wrote one of the first antislavery pamphlets in America in 1733. Douglass, the famed abolitionist and formerly enslaved man from Maryland, found refuge in New Bedford, a whaling town with a strong antislavery tradition.

    Whaling profits financed the construction of meeting houses and schools for free Black communities in these towns. The African Baptist Society in Nantucket, for example, was built by Black whalers who had achieved financial independence through their trade.

    Whalers cut pieces from a small whale on Long Island, N.Y., in 1900.
    Bettmann/Contributor/Getty Images

    Whaling’s vital role in ending slavery

    As an industry, whaling provided a meritocratic career path before fossil fuel mechanization made slavery obsolete. While industrialization eventually made enslaved labor less profitable by the mid- and late-1800s, whaling had already eroded slavery’s economic and social foundations decades earlier.

    Of course, whaling itself was not a morally pure endeavor. It was dangerous and devastating to whale populations. The American whaling industry killed perhaps 32,000 whales over the 74 years between 1835 and 1909. The global harvest of whales was many times greater. The U.S. officially outlawed whaling in 1971.

    Yet, whaling’s role in funding abolition and providing economic opportunities for free Black Americans is undeniable. It was, in many ways, a bridge between the world of forced labor and the energy-driven economy of the modern age.

    The authors 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. Abolition wasn’t fueled by just moral or economic concerns – the booming whaling industry also helped sink slavery – https://theconversation.com/abolition-wasnt-fueled-by-just-moral-or-economic-concerns-the-booming-whaling-industry-also-helped-sink-slavery-250980

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Florida is home to about 341,000 immigrants from Venezuela and Haiti who may soon lose residency, work permits

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Mercedes Vigon, Associate professor of Journalism, Florida International University

    An activist protests the lifting of TPS status for Venezuelans in Doral, Fla. AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell

    Florida leads the nation in the number of immigrants with Temporary Protected Status, or TPS.

    Soon after taking office, the Trump administration moved to scale back protections for the largest groups of these immigrants – those from Haiti and Venezuela.

    TPS applies to immigrants from designated countries that the Department of Homeland Security considers dangerous due to armed conflicts, environmental disasters, epidemics or other conditions. There are currently 17 countries on the list. The most recent country added was Lebanon on Oct. 16, 2024.

    According to a federal report published in December 2024, nearly a third of the roughly 1.1 million TPS recipients live in Florida. Of those, 59% are Venezuelan and 35% are Haitian, with the other 6% coming from other TPS nations.

    I’m a professor of investigative journalism at Florida International University in Miami. For the past 24 years, I’ve worked with students to report how various waves of immigrants have integrated into Florida, and also on the impact of historical immigration crackdowns on the state’s workforce.

    Because so many TPS recipients live here, ending TPS may affect Florida more than any other state – but it is still hard to say if and when that will happen.

    Uncertain TPS expiration dates

    Temporary Protected Status allows beneficiaries to stay and work in the U.S. for a designated period, typically ranging from six to 18 months. This time period can be extended if conditions in the affected country remain unstable. It does not provide a permanent legal pathway to stay in the United States.

    President Joe Biden’s administration created two TPS designations for Venezuelans – one in 2021 and a second in 2023.

    In early February 2025, Trump’s Homeland Security director, Kristi Noem, rolled back extensions of TPS for Venezuelans that the outgoing Biden administration had issued on Jan. 17, 2025. Then, two days later, she issued a termination notice that canceled TPS for 2023 Venezuelan recipients altogether.

    Noem’s orders meant that almost 250,000 Venezuelans covered by the 2023 designation were expected to lose their residence and work permits on April 7, 2025. Another 256,000 Venezuelans who requested their TPS under the earlier designation were expected to lose their protections on Sept. 10, 2025.

    But Venezuelans got some breathing room on March 31, when U.S. District Judge Edward Chen blocked the change in their immigration status, writing that Noem’s decision “smacks of racism.” As a result, they will keep their TPS protections while the case moves through the courts.

    Noem has said that having Venezuelans in the country “is contrary to the national interest” and accused them without proof of gang affiliations.

    The judge’s ruling doesn’t affect the more than 520,000 Haitian immigrants nationwide expected to lose their TPS protection on Aug. 3, 2025.

    The expiration of TPS potentially affects 341,000 immigrants in Florida. But it doesn’t mean all of these people will leave the country. TPS rules allow immigrants to apply for a change of immigration status, and some will apply for asylum or student visas. Others will go underground.

    Local economic effects

    These policies won’t just affect Venezuelan and Haitian TPS holders personally. It will likely cause some big waves in the Florida economy.

    The non-profit American Immigration Council, an immigrant advocacy group, estimates that 95% of TPS holders in Florida age 16 and older are currently employed.

    They paid approximately US$485.9 million in local and Florida state taxes, according to the same report.

    Although the public often associates immigrants with work in the construction, agricultural and meatpacking industries, most are employed in education and health care.

    Fewer home health aides

    Immigrants account for 64% of all home health aides in Florida, according to the American Immigration Council.

    Nationwide, 1 in 4 direct care workers are immigrants, according to a policy brief from PHI, an advocacy group for elder care and disability service workers.

    Not all of these workers are TPS holders, but an estimated 7% of foreign-born caregivers are from Haiti. Additionally, the research from PHI suggests that the actual percentage of home health aides who are immigrants is likely higher, as many immigrant workers in this sector operate in the “gray market.” These workers receive direct payment from the people they work for, which makes their employment hard to track.

    PHI projects that the long-term care sector in the U.S. will need to fill 9.3 million new direct care job openings by 2031 due to the country’s aging population.

    School staff a concern

    The public school system is another area where the sudden loss of TPS recipients will likely be deeply felt.

    Miami-Dade County Public Schools, the third-largest school district in the country, is experiencing an ongoing shortage of teachers and staff. The district had nearly 700 education and support positions unfilled in August 2024, according to a district-by-district count done by the Florida Education Association.

    “It is not only teachers,” an administrator told me in March 2025, explaining that the vacancies are also among registrars, custodians, paraprofessionals and other roles. These “high stakes” education jobs, as he described them to me, are difficult for Miami-Dade County schools to fill.

    The Miami-Dade school district doesn’t report on the nationality of its employees – or their immigration status. But unfilled positions in the school district dropped after an influx of Venezuelans and Haitians in 2019, the administrator told me.

    Losing these workers would likely mean South Florida’s persistent education and home health care labor shortages would worsen – making it increasingly difficult for families with school-age children, the elderly and individuals with special needs to access affordable essential services.

    Mercedes Vigon 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. Florida is home to about 341,000 immigrants from Venezuela and Haiti who may soon lose residency, work permits – https://theconversation.com/florida-is-home-to-about-341-000-immigrants-from-venezuela-and-haiti-who-may-soon-lose-residency-work-permits-251791

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: The Trump administration says Tren de Aragua is a terrorist group – but it’s really a transnational criminal organization. Here’s why the label matters.

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Ernesto Castañeda, Professor, and Director, Center for Latin American and Latino Studies, American University

    Venezuelan immigrants, whom the Trump White House says are members of the Tren de Aragua gang, arrive in El Salvador on March 31, 2025. El Salvador Press Presidency Office/Anadolu via Getty Images

    The U.S. State Department declared on Feb. 20, 2025, that the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua, as well as some Mexican drug cartels, are now considered foreign terrorist organizations.

    Is the new label warranted?

    Tren de Aragua is at the center of a controversial immigration case that the Supreme Court is going to consider.

    The Trump administration is using the 1798 Alien Enemies Act to justify deporting more than 100 of the 238 Venezuelan and Salvadoran male immigrants it sent to a prison in El Salvador on March 15. The administration says that these immigrants are members of gangs such as Tren de Aragua and are foreign enemies, so they can be sent away with just an order from the White House.

    The administration uses a checklist of items, including physical markers like tattoos, to determine these individuals’ association with Tren de Aragua. Although in reality, the Tren de Aragua gang members do not use any specific tattoos.

    Family members and lawyers representing some of the Venezuelan immigrants say that they are not actually associated with the gang, and that some of them were living in the U.S. legally.

    I am an expert on immigration, and I think it is important to understand why classifying Tren de Aragua as a foreign terrorist organization has sparked debate among observers.

    One important reason is that Tren de Aragua is primarily a profit-driven group, not an ideological one – placing the organization more firmly in the transnational organized crime category rather than a political terrorist group.

    Venezuelan immigrants deported from the U.S. arrived in El Salvador in March 2025.
    El Salvador Press Presidency Office/Anadolu via Getty Images

    Understanding Tren de Aragua

    Tren de Aragua originated as a small prison gang in the early 2000s within Tocorón prison in Venezuela’s state of Aragua, located near the country’s capital, Caracas.

    Over the past 25 years, Tren de Aragua has expanded rapidly across South and Central America, and evolved into a transnational criminal organization under the leadership of Hector Guerrero Flores. Also known as Niño Guerrero, Flores is a 41-year-old Venezuelan who first served time in Tocorón prison in 2010 for killing a police officer before he escaped for the first time in 2012. His current location is not known.

    Flores is wanted by the U.S. and Colombia for various crimes related to expanding the group’s criminal network throughout South and Central America.

    Today, an estimated 5,000 people are affiliated with Tren de Aragua, which is mainly focused on human trafficking and other crimes targeting migrants. The gang has also been linked to other criminal organizations in Latin America and is involved with extortion, kidnapping, money laundering and drug smuggling. The number of active members in the United States is in the low hundreds, and clearly the great majority of Venezuelans here are not members.

    Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem arrives at the presidential palace in San Salvador, El Salvador, to discuss the deportation of Venezuelan immigrants to the country on March 26, 2025.
    Alex Brandon-Pool/Getty Images

    Different end goals

    Tren de Aragua has expanded in part because of its ability to exploit weak governance within the state of Aragua, and eventually across Venezuela, which faces political instability and a weak economy. An expansion beyond Venezuela has allowed the gang to connect with other transnational criminal networks.

    Most accepted definitions of terrorism say it is a kind of violence, usually used against civilians, motivated by political and ideological beliefs and goals. Tren de Aragua does not fit that definition. It does not have a political ideology and therefore is not an actual terrorist organization.

    The U.S. government considers a foreign terrorist organization a foreign group that engages in terrorist activity, or plans to do so, in a way that threatens the security of U.S. nationals or the country more broadly.

    Tren de Aragua is among the eight groups that the State Department first classified as foreign terrorist organizations in the first few months of 2025 after Donald Trump’s inauguration. The other new groups put on the list primarily include Latin American drug trafficking organizations, like the Mexican Sinaloa cartel.

    While transnational criminal organizations and foreign terrorist organizations both engage in violence and illicit activities, their end goals are different.

    Foreign terrorist organizations such as al-Qaida and the Islamic State group seek political, religious or ideological change – or all three – as they try to use violence to reshape the political landscape of their regions.

    Terrorist groups and transnational criminal organizations are not the same

    Tren de Aragua, as well as other transnational criminal groups like MS-13 – which originated in Los Angeles but now operates throughout the Americas – and the Sinaloa cartel, carry out illegal, violent activities across borders in order to make money.

    These groups do not have political or ideological motives beyond creating conditions to maximize their own profits. They do not aim to take political power in the U.S. or elsewhere, or try to remake society in their own image. That is beyond their purview and capabilities.

    Properly distinguishing between terrorist organizations and transnational criminal organizations is crucial for devising effective policies and responses to their violence. Mislabeling these groups can lead to inappropriate responses such as putting aside civil liberties, due process and human rights.

    Incorrectly classifying Tren de Aragua and other criminal groups as terrorist organizations could shift U.S. foreign policy and resources toward counterterrorism efforts and away from decreasing the power and violence exercised by organized crime and drug cartels in many parts of Latin America.

    However, the way in which many Venezuelans and other immigrants have been deported from the country over the past few months without passing through immigration court seems to indicate that the main rationale for the talk about alien enemies and these terrorist designations is to aid in the goal of mass deportations, rather than to fight domestic or international terrorism.

    If the U.S. truly wants to curb undocumented immigration and reduce drug and human trafficking, then I believe that it should ensure that its classification of these organizations is accurate and aligned with its actual objectives.

    Melissa Vasquez, a graduate student at American University studying international affairs and the Northern Triangle in Central America, contributed to this piece.

    Ernesto Castañeda 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. The Trump administration says Tren de Aragua is a terrorist group – but it’s really a transnational criminal organization. Here’s why the label matters. – https://theconversation.com/the-trump-administration-says-tren-de-aragua-is-a-terrorist-group-but-its-really-a-transnational-criminal-organization-heres-why-the-label-matters-252793

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Life-size sculptures uncovered in Pompeii show that ancient women didn’t just have to be wives to make a difference

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Emily Hauser, Senior Lecturer in Classics, University of Exeter

    Visitors to the site of Pompeii, the ancient Roman town buried (and so preserved for thousands of years) by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79AD, don’t often think to look beyond the city walls. And it’s easy to understand why: there’s plenty on offer within this monumentally well-preserved town, from jewel-like wall paintings of myths and legends like Helen of Troy, to the majestic amphitheatre and sumptuously stuccoed baths.

    But step outside the gates for a moment, and you’re in a very different – yet no less important – world.

    For the ancient Romans, the roads and paths leading into and out of cities were crucial: not just for getting places, but as a very real kind of “memory lane”. Tombs lined these ancient byways – some simply bearing inscriptions to the memories of loved ones lost, others, more grand, accommodating space for friends and family to feast in remembrance of the dead.

    Some of the tombs even address the passerby directly, as if its occupant could speak again, and pass on what they’ve learned. Take one Pompeiian example, set up by the freedman Publius Vesonius Phileros, which opens with ineffable politeness: “Stranger, wait a while if it’s no trouble, and learn what not to do.”

    Going into Pompeii, and leaving it, was about being reminded of ways of living and ways of dying – as well as an invitation to tip your hat to those who trod the path before you, and to learn from their example.

    Which is why the recent discovery of a monumental tomb crowned by life-size sculptures of a woman and man, just outside the gates on the east side of the town, isn’t just a fascinating find in and of itself. It’s also a reminder to stop, and to remember the people who once lived and died in this bustling Italian town.

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    The tomb’s main feature is a large wall, peppered with niches where cremated remains would have been placed, and surmounted by the astonishing relief sculpture of the woman and man. They’re standing side by side, but not touching.

    I rather like that she’s slightly taller than him, standing at 1.77m, while he’s 1.75m. She’s draped in a modest tunic, cloak and veil (symbols of Roman womanhood), and boasts a pronounced crescent-moon-shaped pendant at her neck called a lunula, that (through the age-old link with lunar cycles) tells a story about female fertility and birth. He, meanwhile, is dressed in the quintessentially Roman toga that instantly identifies him as a proud male citizen of Rome.

    Who do the statues depict?

    The status quo in archaeology, when a woman and a man are presented next to each other in tombs and burials like this, has always been to assume that she’s his wife. Yet here, there’s an unmissable clue that there’s more going on. That’s because, in her right hand, she’s holding a laurel branch – which was used by priestesses to waft the smoke of incense and herbs in religious rituals.

    Priestesses, in the Roman world, held unusual levels of power for women – and it’s been suggested that this woman might have been a priestess of the goddess Ceres (Roman equivalent of Demeter).

    So this high-status priestess is shown alongside a man. The inclusion of the symbols of her status (as priestess) alongside his (as a togatus, or “toga-wearing man”), shows that she’s there in her own right, as a contributing member of Pompeiian society. She might be his mother; she might even have been more important than him (which would explain why she’s taller). Without an inscription, we don’t know for sure. The point is: a woman doesn’t have to be a wife to be standing next to a man.

    What’s fascinating is this isn’t unique to Pompeii. In my new book, Mythica, which looks at the women not of Rome but of Bronze age Greece, I’ve found that new discoveries in archaeology are overturning the assumptions that used to be made about a woman’s place in society, and the value of their roles, all the time.

    One fascinating example is a royal burial in Late Bronze Age Mycenae: a woman and a man who’d been buried together in the royal necropolis, around 1700 years before the eruption of Mount Vesuvius decimated Pompeii. As is typical, this woman was immediately labelled, by the archaeologists who uncovered her, as the man’s wife. But then DNA analysis came into the picture.

    As recently as 2008, both skeletons were sampled for DNA – and came up with the game-changing result that they were, in fact, brother and sister. She’d been buried here as a member of a royal family by birth, not by marriage, in other words. She was there on her own terms.

    From golden Mycenae to the ash-blasted ruins of Pompeii: the remains from the ancient world are telling us a different story from the one we always thought. A woman didn’t have to be a wife to make a difference.

    So I think it’s worth listening to the advice of our friend Publius. Let’s look at the burials of the past, and learn.

    Emily Hauser 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. Life-size sculptures uncovered in Pompeii show that ancient women didn’t just have to be wives to make a difference – https://theconversation.com/life-size-sculptures-uncovered-in-pompeii-show-that-ancient-women-didnt-just-have-to-be-wives-to-make-a-difference-253863

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Peers elevated to the House of Lords after a career in the House of Commons are often merely being rewarded for loyalty – new study

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Stephen Holden Bates, Senior Lecturer in Political Science, University of Birmingham

    CC BY-NC-ND

    House of Lords reform is being debated once again with the passage of the bill to end hereditary peerages. But far more wide-reaching reform is needed. Our research reveals potential flaws in the appointments system. Far from being a representative chamber filled with those from all walks of life, we found evidence to suggest that the House of Lords contains a large constituency of former MPs – who are often there as a reward for their partisan loyalty.

    Since the introduction of life peers in 1958 and especially since the removal of all except 92 hereditary peers in 1999, former MPs have become an increasingly important constituency in the House of Lords. They make up about a third of the approximate 1,600 life peers who have been created since 1958. The others have largely been appointed because of their specialist skills or life experiences or, apparently, because of how much money they donated to political parties.

    The Lords is getting more and more crowded.
    House of Lords/Flickr, CC BY-NC-ND

    At present, around a fifth of all peers and coming up to a quarter of life peers sat at one time or another in the House of Commons. And nearly a fifth of all MPs who sat in and subsequently left the Commons between 1979 and 2019 went on to become a peer at some point afterwards.

    These ex-MPs became peers having been nominated in a dissolution honours list prior to a general election, a resignation honours list when a prime minister departed from office, or a political list, which is used to top up the strengths of the three main parties in the chamber. A handful have been appointed as a government minister and therefore needed a seat in parliament.

    Becoming a peer is an attractive option for many ex-MPs. Not only do they become part of the titled nobility, but they also have membership of the House of Lords for life, access to a generous allowances system, and the ability to maintain (and expand) outside interests.

    Our research shows that MPs who become peers are whiter and older than those MPs who don’t make it to the upper chamber. They are more likely to be heterosexual and a member of the aristocracy. They are also more likely to be the child or grandchild of a former MP and to have been educated at a public school, attended university – in particular, Oxford or Cambridge – and have studied PPE (philosophy, politics and economics) at Oxford. They are less likely to have a PhD but also less likely to have had a manual occupation as their first career.

    We also found that serving on the front bench as an MP and resisting the temptation to rebel against your party makes you more likely to be elevated to the House of Lords after serving in the House of Commons.

    For elevated MPs who had served on the frontbench in the House of Commons, their length of frontbench tenure and whether or not they became a minister were the most important indicators of them later becoming a peer. But time served is not necessarily an indicator of excellence. As former MP Rory Stewart has argued, promotion to the frontbench “has nothing to do with expertise. It’s about loyalty and defending the indefensible”. To the extent that experience matters then, it can be said to be more in the sense of direct personal participation rather than accumulated knowledge.

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    For those MPs who had remained backbenchers throughout their time in the Commons, their loyalty was the strongest indicator of their chances of becoming a peer. There is also some evidence, albeit weak, that familial links for backbenchers and aristocratic links for frontbenchers increase the likelihood of receiving a peerage. There are different pathways from the House of Commons into the House of Lords and some MPs appear to find it easier than others to travel along them.

    Our results suggest that for ex-MPs, almost certainly the largest sub-group in the House of Lords, elevation to the peerage is not based on merit alone. Loyalty and, to a lesser extent, nepotism also appear to matter and help to win you a ticket to the Lords.

    Fresh impetus for reform

    Overall, we believe our findings call into question the continued use of appointments to the Lords that are wholly based on the patronage of party leaders.

    The work of parliament is not enhanced by elevating ex-MPs who are in the upper chamber for reasons other than merit or expertise. Neither is it enhanced in the lower chamber through dangling the possibility of elevation to the peerage to encourage loyalty. Both of these sub-optimal situations are only made possible by the House of Lords’ size, which allows for a substantial number of MPs to be elevated in the first place, and it being entirely appointed.

    Every upper chamber in the world except the House of Lords is smaller than the lower chamber of its parliament. And a sizable majority of these upper chambers use elections, either direct or indirect, as the principal mode of designation of members.

    If we truly want to enhance the work of parliament, perhaps it is finally time for the UK to iron out some of its idiosyncratic constitutional kinks and fit in more with the crowd.

    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. Peers elevated to the House of Lords after a career in the House of Commons are often merely being rewarded for loyalty – new study – https://theconversation.com/peers-elevated-to-the-house-of-lords-after-a-career-in-the-house-of-commons-are-often-merely-being-rewarded-for-loyalty-new-study-251968

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: US and Russia squabble over Arctic security as melting ice opens up shipping routes

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Stefan Wolff, Professor of International Security, University of Birmingham

    “You cannot annex another country.” This was the clear message given by the Danish prime minister, Mette Frederiksen, at a recent press conference with the outgoing and incoming prime ministers of Greenland. It did not appear aimed at Russian president Vladimir Putin, but at Donald Trump, the president of one of her country’s closest allies, who has threatened to take over Greenland.

    Frederiksen, speaking in Greenland’s capitak Nuuk, was stating something that is obvious under international law but can no longer be taken for granted. US foreign policy under Trump has become a major driver of this uncertainty, playing into the hands of Russian, and potentially Chinese, territorial ambitions.

    The incoming Greenlandic prime minister, Jens-Frederik Nielsen, made it clear that it was for Greenlanders to determine their future, not the United States. Greenland, which is controlled by Denmark, makes its own domestic policy decisions. Polls suggest a majority of islanders want independence from Denmark in the future, but don’t want to be part of the US.

    Trump’s interest in Greenland is often associated with the island’s vast, but largely untapped, mineral resources. But its strategic location is arguably an even greater asset. Shipping routes through the Arctic have become more dependable and for longer periods of time during the year as a result of melting sea ice. The northwest passage (along the US and Canadian shorelines) and the northeast passage (along Russia’s Arctic coast) are often ice free now during the summer.


    Breaking the Ice: Arctic Development and Maritime Transportation, ArcticPortal.org

    This has increased opportunities for commercial shipping. For example, the distance for a container ship from Asia to Europe through the northeast passage can be up to three times shorter, compared to traditional routes through the Suez Canal or around Africa.

    Similarly, the northwest passage offers the shortest route between the east coast of the United States and Alaska. Add to that the likely substantial resources that the Arctic has, from oil and gas to minerals, and the entire region is beginning to look like a giant real estate deal in the making.

    Arctic assets

    The economic promise of the Arctic, and particularly the region’s greater accessibility, have also heightened military and security sensitivities.

    The day before J.D. Vance’s visit to Greenland on March 28, Vladimir Putin, gave a speech at the sixth international Arctic forum in Murmansk in Russia’s high north, warning of increased geopolitical rivalry.

    While he claimed that “Russia has never threatened anyone in the Arctic”, he was also quick to emphasise that Moscow was “enhancing the combat capabilities of the Armed Forces, and modernising military infrastructure facilities” in the Arctic.

    Equally worrying, Russia has increased its naval cooperation with China and given Beijing access, and a stake, in the Arctic. In April 2024, the two countries’ navies signed a cooperation agreement on search and rescue missions on the high seas.


    National Snow & Ice Data Center, Arctic Portal

    In September 2024, China participated in Russia’s largest naval manoeuvres in the post-cold war era, Ocean-2024, which were conducted in north Pacific and Arctic waters. The following month, Russian and Chinese coastguard vessels conducted their first joint patrol in the Arctic. Vance, therefore, has a point when he urges Greenland and Denmark to cut a deal with the US because the “island isn’t safe”.

    That the Russia-China partnership has resulted in an increasingly military presence in the Arctic has not gone unnoticed in the west. Worried about the security of its Arctic territories, Canada has just announced a C$6 billion (£3.2 billion) upgrade to facilities in the North American Aerospace Defense Command it operates jointly with the United States.

    It will also acquire more submarines, icebreakers and fighter jets to bolster its Arctic defences and invest a further C$420 million (£228 million) into a greater presence of its armed forces.



    Read more:
    Arctic breakdown: what climate change in the far north means for the rest of us

    Svalbard’s future role?

    Norway has similarly boosted its defence presence in the Arctic, especially in relation to the Svalbard archipelago (strategically located between the Norwegian mainland and the Arctic Circle). This has prompted an angry response from Russia, wrongly claiming that Oslo was in violation of the 1920 Svalbard Treaty which awarded the archipelago to Norway with the proviso that it must not become host to Norwegian military bases.

    Under the treaty, Russia has a right to a civilian presence there. The “commission on ensuring Russia’s presence on the archipelago Spitzbergen”, the name Moscow uses for Svalbard is chaired by Russian deputy prime minister Yury Trutnev, who is also Putin’s envoy to the far eastern federal district. Trutnev has repeatedly complained about undue Norwegian restrictions on Russia’s presence in Svalbard.

    From the Kremlin’s perspective, this is less about Russia’s historical rights on Svalbard and more about Norway’s – and Nato’s – presence in a strategic location at the nexus of the Greenland, Barents and Norwegian seas. From there, maritime traffic along Russia’s northeast passage can be monitored. If, and when, a central Arctic shipping route becomes viable, which would pass between Greenland and Svalbard, the strategic importance of the archipelago would increase further.

    From Washington’s perspective, Greenland is more important because of its closer proximity to the US. But Svalbard is critical to Nato for monitoring and countering Russian, and potentially Chinese, naval activities. This bigger picture tends to get lost in Trump’s White House, which is more concerned with its own immediate neighbourhood and cares less about regional security leadership.

    Consequently, there has been no suggestion – so far – that the US needs to have Svalbard in the same way that Trump claims he needs Greenland to ensure US security. Nor has Russia issued any specific threats to Svalbard. But it was noticeable that Putin in his speech at the Arctic forum discussed historical territorial issues, including an obscure 1910 proposal for a land swap between the US, Denmark and Germany involving Greenland.

    Putin also noted “that Nato countries are increasingly often designating the Far North as a springboard for possible conflicts”. It is not difficult to see Moscow’s logic: if the US can claim Greenland for security reasons, Russia should do the same with Svalbard.

    The conclusion to draw from this is not that Trump should aim to annex a sovereign Norwegian island next. Maritime geography in the north Atlantic underscores the importance of maintaining and strengthening long-established alliances.

    Investing in expanded security cooperation with Denmark and Norway as part of Nato would secure US interests closer to home and send a strong message to Russia. It would also signal to the wider world that the US is not about to initiate a territorial reordering of global politics to suit exclusively the interests of Moscow, Beijing and Washington.

    Stefan Wolff is a past recipient of grant funding from the Natural Environment Research Council of the UK, the United States Institute of Peace, the Economic and Social Research Council of the UK, the British Academy, the NATO Science for Peace Programme, the EU Framework Programmes 6 and 7 and Horizon 2020, as well as the EU’s Jean Monnet Programme. He is a Trustee and Honorary Treasurer of the Political Studies Association of the UK and a Senior Research Fellow at the Foreign Policy Centre in London.

    – ref. US and Russia squabble over Arctic security as melting ice opens up shipping routes – https://theconversation.com/us-and-russia-squabble-over-arctic-security-as-melting-ice-opens-up-shipping-routes-253493

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: The women who shaped Sigmund Freud and a hero who can’t feel pain – what to watch, read and do this week

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Anna Walker, Senior Arts + Culture Editor

    Think of Sigmund Freud, the “father of psychoanalysis”, and a few images probably come to mind. A smouldering cigar. His small wire-frame glasses. And of course, his psychoanalytic couch – the divan his patients would lie on during sessions. While the couch has become an enduring symbol of Freud’s practice, and indeed for therapy more generally, few people know that it was originally a gift from one of his wealthy woman patients, Madame Benvenisti.

    It’s on show at London’s Freud Museum as part of the exhibition Women & Freud: Patients, Pioneers, Artists. Until May 5, the space will be packed with works that celebrate the women in Freud’s life.

    Throughout the exhibition, images, film footage and artworks are brought together to ask questions about the women of psychoanalysis. Whether they are patients, analysts, friends and family, or artistic inheritors of its legacy, the show offers much food for thought.

    Marie Bonaparte, great-grandniece to Napoleon, intervened to save Freud from the Nazis. She is remembered through previously undisplayed correspondence. Portuguese artist Paula Rego’s work speaks to Freud’s ideas about the family. And contributions to the wider field of psychoanalysis by American-born Maria Battle Singer, Britain’s first black psychoanalyst, are finally celebrated.

    Women & Freud: Patients, Pioneers, Artists is at the Freud Museum until May 5.



    Read more:
    Freud Museum exhibition uses art to explore the psychoanalyst’s often contradictory relationships with women

    The dance of death

    White Lotus Mondays have become a ritual in my household. If you’ve been watching season three, you probably have the same questions as me. Who is going to die? Who is going to kill them? And what on Earth is going on with those brothers?

    For most viewers, this season, set on the Thai island of Ko Samui, has been a slower burn than the previous one. And who isn’t missing Jennifer Coolidge’s unforgettable turn as the eccentric heiress Tanya McQuoid? But, for my money, series three has now more than earned our trust. The latest episode delivered confrontations, realisations and some jaw-dropping escalations.

    The trailer for the final episode of The White Lotus season three.

    As we head into Monday’s 90-minute final episode, we’ve been reflecting on the way the show’s creator Mike White has engaged with Buddhist philosophy. Brooke Schedneck, an expert in contemporary Buddhism and religious tourism in Thailand, explains what the show gets right and wrong about common Buddhist practices.

    White Lotus is streaming on Sky Atlantic and Now TV.



    Read more:
    What ‘The White Lotus’ gets wrong about the meaning and goals of common Buddhist practices

    One thing most of this season’s White Lotus characters have in common is a love for a good dance – whether neon-daubed at a full-moon party, dripping with sweat in a mega club or vibing on the decks of a super yacht.

    Thailand’s dance culture has its roots in a movement that began in dingy bars in the UK, before spreading to Ibiza, eastern Europe and finally Asia. We asked the experts behind new book Transatlantic Drift, which tracks the emergence, evolution and global spread of nightclubs, to explain the history of dance music and the spaces it’s enjoyed in. As they explain, from basements to beaches, dancefloors have always mirrored social change.

    Transatlantic Drift by Katie Milestone and Simon A. Morrison is out now.



    Read more:
    A brief history of dance music – from basements to beaches, dancefloors have mirrored social change

    The pain of uncertainty

    Another book on our reading lists this week is Embracing Uncertainty by entrepreneur Margaret Heffernan. As our world faces a perfect storm of environmental, societal and economic challenges, the need to support innovation and champion persistence has seldom felt greater. Heffernan’s book explores how writers, musicians and artists can thrive in our unpredictable world.

    We asked professor of cognitive neuroscience David Pearson for his take. He found Heffernan to be an engaging storyteller and thought the book’s hopeful and inspiring stories pointed the way to a more optimistic future.

    Embracing Uncertainty by Margaret Heffernan is out now.



    Read more:
    Embracing Uncertainty: what we can all learn from how artists thrive in an unpredictable world

    Jack Quaid – son of Dennis Quaid and Meg Ryan – has quietly been making a name for himself as an actor to watch. I greatly enjoyed his work in Companion, an AI-gone-wrong thriller that deserved far more attention. And he showed his romcom chops in 2019’s wedding caper, Plus One.

    The trailer for Novocaine.

    Now he’s turning to another genre, action, as the lead in Novocaine. Quaid plays Nathan, a man who feels no pain and is on a mission to save the girl of his dreams from the bank robbers who have taken her hostage. He takes bullets without flinching, grabs a hot pan with his bare hands and fishes a gun from a deep frier – all without feeling a thing.

    As far as the movie goes, it’s a recipe for zany, if gory, fun. But in real life this condition, known as congenital insensitivity to pain, is far from a superpower. Pain may not feel nice, but it saves lives, as our medical expert explains.

    Novocaine is in cinemas now.



    Read more:
    Novocaine: the movie action hero with a real-life syndrome that makes him immune to pain

    – ref. The women who shaped Sigmund Freud and a hero who can’t feel pain – what to watch, read and do this week – https://theconversation.com/the-women-who-shaped-sigmund-freud-and-a-hero-who-cant-feel-pain-what-to-watch-read-and-do-this-week-253773

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Why ChatGPT is a uniquely terrible tool for government ministers

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Deepak Padmanabhan, Senior Lecturer in AI, Queen’s University Belfast

    Shutterstock/Prachova Nataliia

    The news that Peter Kyle, secretary of state for science and technology, had been using ChatGPT for policy advice prompted some difficult questions.

    Kyle apparently used the AI tool to draft speeches and even asked it for suggestions about which podcasts he should appear on. But he also sought advice on his policy work, apparently including questions on why businesses in the UK are not adopting AI more readily. He asked the tool to define what “digital inclusion” means.

    A spokesperson for Kyle said his use of the tool “does not substitute comprehensive advice he routinely receives from officials” but we have to wonder whether any use at all is suitable. Does ChatGPT give good enough advice to have any role in decisions that could affect the lives of millions of people?

    Underpinned by our research on AI and public policy, we find that ChatGPT is uniquely flawed as a device for government ministers in several ways, including the fact that it is backward looking, when governments really should be looking to the future.

    1. Looking back instead of forward

    Where government ministers should ideally be seeking new, fresh ideas with a view to the future, the information that comes out of an AI chatbot is, by definition, from the past. It’s a very effective way of summarising what has already been thought of but not equipped to suggest genuinely new ways of thinking.

    ChatGPT responses are not based on all past equally. The ever-increasing digitisation over the years steers ChatGPT’s pattern-finding mechanism to the recent past. In other words, when asked by a minister to provide advice on a specific problem in the UK, ChatGPT’s responses would be more anchored in documents produced in the UK in recent years.

    And notably, in Kyle’s case, that means that not only will a Labour minister be accessing information from the past, but he’ll be advised by an algorithm leaning heavily on advice given to Conservative governments. That’s not the end of the world, of course, but it’s questionable given that Labour won an election by promising change.

    Kyle – or any other minister consulting ChatGPT – will be given information grounded in the policy traditions reflecting the Rishi Sunak, Boris Johnson, Theresa May and David Cameron eras. They are less likely to receive information grounded in the thinking of the New Labour years, which were longer ago.

    If Kyle asks what digital inclusion means, the answer is more likely to reflect what these Tory administrations think it means rather than thoughts of governments more aligned with his values.

    Amid all the enthusiasm within Labour to leverage AI, this may be one reason for them to distance themselves from using ChatGPT for policy advice. They risk Tory policy – one they so like to criticise – zombieing into their own.

    2. Prejudice

    ChatGPT has been accused of having “hallucinations” – generating, uncanny, plausible-sounding falsehoods.

    There is a simple technical explanation for this, as alluded to in a recent study. The “truth model” for ChatGPT – as for any large language model – is one of consensus. It models truth as something that everyone agrees to be true. For ChatGPT, its truth is simply the consensus of views expressed across the data it has been trained on.

    This is very different from the human model of truth, which is based on correspondence. For us, the truth is what best corresponds to reality in the physical world. The divergence between the truth models could be consequential in many ways.

    For example, TV licensing, a model that operates only within a few nations, would not figure prominently within ChatGPT’s consensus model built over a global dataset. Thus, ChatGPT’s suggestions on broadcast media policy are unlikely to substantially touch upon TV licensing.

    Besides explaining hallucinations, divergences in truth models have other consequences. Social prejudices, including sexism and racism, are easily internalised under the consensus model.

    Consider seeking ChatGPT advice on improving conditions for construction workers, a historically male dominated profession. ChatGPT’s consensus model could blind it from considerations important to women.

    The correspondence model of truth enables humans to continuously engage in moral deliberation and change. A human policy expert advising Peter Kyle could illuminate him on pertinent real-world complexities.

    For example, they might highlight how recent successes in AI-based diagnostics could help tackle distinct aspects of the UK’s disease burden in the knowledge that one of Labour’s priorities is to cut NHS waiting times.

    3. Pleasing narratives

    Tools such as ChatGPT are designed to give engaging, elegant narratives when responding to questions. ChatGPT managed this partly by weeding out bad quality text from its training data (with the help of underpaid workers in Africa).

    These poetic pieces of writing work well for engagement and help OpenAI to keep users hooked on their product. Humans enjoy a good story, and particularly one that offers to solve a problem. Our shared evolutionary history has made us story-tellers and story-listeners unlike any other species.

    But the real world is not a story. It is a constant swirl of political complexities, social contradictions and moral dilemmas, many of which can never be resolved. The real world and the decisions government ministers have to make on our behalf are complex.

    There are competing interests and irreconcilable differences. Rarely is there a neat answer. ChatGPT’s penchant for pleasing narratives stands at odds with the public policy imperative to address messy real-world conditions.

    The very features that make ChatGPT a useful tool in many contexts are squarely incompatible with the considerations of public policy, a realm that seeks to make political choices to address the needs of a country’s citizens.

    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. Why ChatGPT is a uniquely terrible tool for government ministers – https://theconversation.com/why-chatgpt-is-a-uniquely-terrible-tool-for-government-ministers-253294

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: The problem with Trump’s takeover of the Kennedy Center isn’t the possibility of ‘Cats’

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Joanna Dee Das, Associate Professor of Dance, Washington University in St. Louis

    Donald Trump visits the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts on March 17, 2025. Jim Watson/AFP via Getty Images

    When President Donald Trump announced that he was assuming control of the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, he described the move as a triumph over “wokey” programming. He subsequently fired the 17 board members appointed by President Joe Biden and installed himself as chairman.

    Some critics have reacted to the move by suggesting Trump doesn’t understand art.

    One protester declared that Trump has “no artistic bones in his body.” Theater aficionados claim that he misinterprets his favorite musicals, “Cats” and “Les Misérables.”

    The New Yorker magazine’s satirical description of the Kennedy Center’s 2025 programming under Trump included a fictional show called “Forbidden Branson.” The title plays on the show “Forbidden Broadway,” replacing New York’s storied theater district with the popular Ozarks tourist destination that has been maligned as a mecca of bad taste.

    To me, these responses play right into Trump’s hands, reinforcing his claims that liberals are out-of-touch elitists.

    I’ve spent the past seven years researching and writing a book about Branson, Missouri, a town that offers a plethora of live entertainment, including magic shows, country music performances and variety shows. Many of the productions have a conservative, Christian slant. In my view, a Branson-style show could – and should – belong among the offerings at the Kennedy Center.

    Rather than ridiculing the president’s taste, I think responses to the takeover would be better placed focusing on more fundamental questions about the role of the U.S. government in the nation’s artistic life.

    How can a national arts institution best reflect the country’s diverse range of people and interests? Prior to Trump, how well was the Kennedy Center doing at that?

    Historical opposition to arts funding

    For most of U.S. history, government had a very limited role in the arts.

    European royals had long patronized the arts. In contrast, the founders of the United States, fearful of tyranny, created a weak federal government that could barely impose taxes, let alone establish a national theater.

    Instead, artists of the 18th and 19th centuries operated in a for-profit marketplace. Their audiences rejected elitist cultural norms and watched Shakespeare mixed in with minstrel songs and comedy acts on the same program.

    At the end of the 19th century, the Second Industrial Revolution created a class of ultra-wealthy Americans who sought to imitate European royalty and their tradition of patronage. New cultural distinctions emerged. Opera, ballet and classical music were designated as high art; variety shows featuring comedians, popular songs and acrobatics were designated as low art. Musicals eventually found an uneasy niche as “middlebrow.” Performers who wished to avoid the grind of the commercial marketplace could now turn to private patrons. Nonwhite and working-class performers who lacked social connections to the upper crust had fewer opportunities to do so.

    The Great Depression compelled the U.S. government to fund artists for the first time. In 1935, President Franklin D. Roosevelt established Federal Project Number One, which included visual art, theater, music and writing programs. Its primary goal was to provide work for the unemployed. Its secondary purpose involved creating art that would be accessible to ordinary Americans both in terms of location – like murals in public buildings – and content, such as plays like “One Third of a Nation” that spoke to housing concerns.

    An audience enjoys a public Federal Theatre Project performance in New York in the late 1930s.
    Dick Rose/Library of Congress/Corbis/VCG via Getty Images

    Heated controversies over the program ensued. If the main criterion to receive a grant was need, not skill, would government funding churn out bad art?

    Conservative congressmen argued that Federal One artists were taking “unbridled license to ridicule American ideals and to suggest rebellion against our government.” In 1938, the newly formed House Committee on Un-American Activities accused the head of Federal One’s Theatre Project of supporting communism.

    Soon thereafter, the Federal One programs ended.

    The Cold War and the Kennedy Center

    The Cold War created a new opportunity for arts funding as the United States scrambled to counteract the Soviet Union’s depiction of America as “culturally barren.” Under President Dwight D. Eisenhower, the State Department began to sponsor American artists and fund international tours of their work.

    Even this modest attempt at public arts patronage – European nations were spending 20 to 40 times as much on the arts – faced pushback from conservatives, who cast the tours as a waste of taxpayer money. Nonetheless, Eisenhower persisted. In 1958, he signed the National Cultural Center Act to authorize a national arts complex.

    The act failed to provide enough money to actually build the center. In 1962, President John F. Kennedy embarked on a campaign to raise US$30 million in private money. Part of those fundraising efforts involved reassuring donors that their high-art tastes would be reflected.

    The Kennedy Center finally opened its doors in September 1971. Given the need for constant fundraising ever since, philanthropists have dominated its board.

    Today, the Kennedy Center receives $43 million as a public subsidy, or 16% of its budget. Ticket sales, facility rentals and donations comprise the other 84%. No government funds go to artistic programming, which has blunted potential criticism about censorship or propaganda. But this has also precluded the ability of regular people across the nation to weigh in about what appears onstage.

    With members of the Kennedy family looking on, President Lyndon B. Johnson shovels dirt during the groundbreaking ceremonies for the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in 1964.
    Bettmann/Getty Images

    An uncertain future

    The Kennedy Center staff has attempted to work within the constraints of a philanthropy model to reach a broad audience and challenge high/middle/low distinctions. In its first year, the center appointed renowned choreographer Katherine Dunham as a technical adviser in intercultural communication. She aimed to “make the center more responsible to the community” and establish a model of local engagement in Washington that could be replicated throughout the country.

    It didn’t materialize. Programming remained in the traditional high art category until Kennedy Center President Deborah Rutter expanded into genres like hip-hop and comedy in the 2010s. In 2020, the center made progress toward Dunham’s vision with its Social Impact initiative, which focused on free performances and transportation to arts events for local Washington communities. Trump has since dissolved it.

    By declaring himself chairman and personally overseeing the programming, Trump has followed in the footsteps of Russian czars or monarchs like Louis XIV of France, who established arts institutions as extensions of royal power. In effect, it realizes 18th-century Americans’ fears about government involvement in the arts as a form of control.

    At the same time, the private philanthropy model has been far from perfect. It has left the Kennedy Center vulnerable to attacks of elitism. Perhaps future leaders can imagine more robust models of public support and stewardship that reflect America’s diverse and multifaceted national landscape – if they’re ever given an opportunity to do so.

    Joanna Dee Das 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. The problem with Trump’s takeover of the Kennedy Center isn’t the possibility of ‘Cats’ – https://theconversation.com/the-problem-with-trumps-takeover-of-the-kennedy-center-isnt-the-possibility-of-cats-253196

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Insects are everywhere in farming and research − but insect welfare is just catching up

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Bob Fischer, Professor of Philosophy, Texas State University

    Employees sort crickets by size at a farm in Thailand. AP Photo/Sakchai Lalit

    Did you know your lipstick might be made from beetles? Or that some cat food may soon be made from flies?

    People farm insects for all sorts of reasons: Farmers rear bees to pollinate billions of dollars of crops, textile companies raise silkworms for their cocoons, and cosmetic companies use cochineal beetles for dyes. Researchers also put insects to work in labs: Fruit flies have revolutionized genetics, cockroaches provide insights into neurobiology, and ants inspire AI-driven robots.

    On top of that, medical companies raise blowfly larvae to clean wounds, desert locusts for compounds that might help reduce the risk of heart disease, and lac insects for their secretions, which are used to coat pills.

    All told, trillions of insects are farmed each year across the globe – more than all other livestock combined. Each year, producers rear some 2.1 trillion black soldier flies alone – and, if industry trends hold, will be rearing three times as many in 2035. Currently, roughly 30 times as many insects are produced as the most-farmed “traditional” farm animal: the chicken.

    As an ethics professor, I think this raises pressing questions about what it means to treat insects humanely. Several years ago, I was skeptical that these questions were worth asking, as most questions about animal welfare center on pain – and I didn’t think there was much chance that insects could feel it. However, as science has uncovered more about insects’ abilities, the emerging field of insect welfare seems increasingly important.

    Dried, crushed female insects known as Dactylopius coccus, which will be used to produce natural red dye, at a farm in Mexico.
    AP Photo/Eduardo Verdugo

    New science of animal minds

    In the 17th century, many scientists believed that all nonhuman animals were mere machines that behaved as if they felt pain but didn’t actually experience it.

    While most scientists have long abandoned this view, researchers have not identified a definitive test for the capacity to feel pain in any nonhuman animal. There is no known brain structure or pattern of neural activity whose presence or absence settles the question. There’s no single behavior that decisively establishes pain, either.

    So, researchers look for several markers of pain that, taken together, support taking this possibility seriously. Some of these markers are neurobiological, such as specialized damage receptors and regions of the brain that integrate those signals with information from other senses. Some are behavioral, such as an animal making trade-offs between avoiding harm and pursuing rewards.

    Fruit flies, for example, are willing to cross electrical barriers that give them mild shocks to reach food. However, they won’t cross barriers that give them stronger shocks, even when very hungry. This suggests that there’s something more than simple reflexes at work: The animal is weighing different motivations to make a decision.

    Evidence like this keeps accumulating. Some bees can remember experiencing high heat and weigh this against the reward of sugar when it’s offered in hot containers. They also display emotion-like states, in that they respond to cognitive bias tests the way other animals do. These tests are used to assess how animals’ emotions influence their cognitive processes: Like people, animals handle uncertain situations differently if stressed or satisfied.

    Fruit flies become averse to temperatures that were once innocuous after researchers amputate their legs, just as some injuries in humans can lead to heightened pain sensitivity. Tobacco hornworm moth larvae and cockroaches tend to their wounds when hurt. And contrary to a common myth, many male praying mantises try to avoid being eaten by females; they don’t always just continue mating.

    Again, no single marker – or even the lot of them – proves that insects can feel pain. However, the accumulated evidence suggests that there’s at least a realistic possibility. This position is reflected in two scientific consensus statements: the 2012 Cambridge Declaration on Consciousness and the 2024 New York Declaration on Animal Consciousness, which are attempts to summarize the state of knowledge about many groups of animals.

    Humane practices?

    It’s widely acknowledged that it’s wrong to cause unnecessary pain in animals – an imperative codified in the ethical principles that U.S. federal agencies consult when making regulations about research. So, if insects can feel pain, as most Americans believe, then there is an ethical reason to protect their welfare.

    Of course, it isn’t certain that they can feel pain. So, precautionary reasoning becomes important: taking steps to reduce the risk of causing harm that are, in some sense, proportional to the magnitude of the risk. In other words, people who rear insects should take modest steps to reduce the risk that they are causing more pain than they need to cause.

    On some insect farms, a potential concern is injuries from cannibalism and aggression, which occur at greater rates when animals such as crickets are crowded together. The issue crops up in other farming systems as well: Chickens harm their flockmates when they don’t have sufficient room.

    There are also worries about slaughter. Typically, a humane death is fast, but many insects are killed using very slow methods, such as baking and microwaving. Grinding and boiling, by contrast, may be much quicker.

    Black soldier flies being grown as fish food live in laying-and-rearing aviaries at a factory in France.
    AP Photo/Aurelien Morissard

    In lab research, one potential concern is performing live dissections, once known as vivisection, without anesthetics or analgesics. The practice has been almost universally abandoned for vertebrate animals but is still routine with some insects. People have described many cases of insect neglect to me, including times when researchers have accidentally let insects starve or become fatally dehydrated after experiments conclude, rather than euthanizing them.

    Granted, it’s hard to be sure that any particular practice causes pain. If there’s a realistic possibility, however, then it’s worth considering alternative practices.

    As scientists have suggested, insect producers could reduce the number of animals in each container to reduce problems associated with crowding. They could investigate strategies for stunning insects before processing them, just as other animals are stunned before slaughter.

    In most countries, insect researchers are not legally required to follow the standard ethical guidelines for other animal researchers. But there is nothing to prevent insect researchers from following them voluntarily. These international guidelines recommend avoiding the use of live animals entirely when possible; using fewer live animals when they do need to be used; and refining practices to minimize the risk of pain and distress, such as giving insects anesthesia before dissection.

    It’s possible to treat insects more humanely. And since they may be able to feel pain, I believe it’s important to take reasonable steps to do so.

    Bob Fischer is on the board of the Insect Welfare Research Society and the Arthropoda Foundation.

    – ref. Insects are everywhere in farming and research − but insect welfare is just catching up – https://theconversation.com/insects-are-everywhere-in-farming-and-research-but-insect-welfare-is-just-catching-up-249585

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Hormone therapy may cut cardiovascular risk in younger menopausal women

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Matthew Nudy, Assistant Professor of Medicine and Public Health Sciences, Penn State

    Hormone therapy relieves many symptoms of menopause. Ariel Skelley/DigitalVision via Getty Images

    Menopause can have profound effects on heart health, yet many people are unaware of this important connection.

    The hormonal shifts occurring during menopause mark the end of a woman’s reproductive years and contribute to an increased risk of cardiovascular disease, the most common cause of death among women globally. As estrogen levels drop, changes in cholesterol, blood pressure, inflammation and fat distribution can lead to plaque buildup in blood vessels, which is a major cause of heart disease.

    Hormone therapy has long been prescribed to relieve bothersome menopausal symptoms, but research published in 2002 and 2004 raised concerns about its safety, especially regarding cardiovascular health. Those findings led to years of confusion and debate. Although hormone therapy was also previously prescribed to prevent chronic diseases such as cardiovascular disease, medical guidelines today no longer recommend it for this purpose based on this prior research.

    As a cardiologist studying the prevention of heart disease in menopausal women, I investigate how hormone changes affect heart health and how treatments can be improved to lower cardiovascular disease risk. As research continues to shed light on menopause and heart health, it is becoming increasingly clear that hormone therapy used to treat menopausal symptoms in younger, healthy women is not only safe for the heart but may even offer some cardiovascular benefits.

    The estrogen-cardiovascular link explained

    Menopause, defined as 12 consecutive months without a menstrual period, marks the end of a woman’s reproductive years and typically occurs between ages 45 to 55. The transition leading to menopause, known as perimenopause, can last several years and is characterized by fluctuating levels of hormones, including estrogen and progesterone. These hormonal changes often cause symptoms such as hot flashes, night sweats and sleep disturbances.

    Hormone therapy got a bad rap in the early 2000s.

    What’s less widely known is that menopause and lack of estrogen also drive changes to the heart and blood vessels. Estrogen has protective effects on the cardiovascular system, and its decline can lead to increased blood vessel stiffness, resulting in high blood pressure, higher cholesterol levels, more inflammation, and shifts in fat deposition, which lead to a greater risk of heart disease.

    One reason for this is that estrogen helps keep blood vessels flexible and supports the production of nitric oxide, a molecule that allows vessels to relax and maintain healthy blood flow. Estrogen also influences how the body processes cholesterol, helping to make changes to cholesterol to reduce plaque buildup in artery walls. When estrogen levels drop during menopause, these protective factors diminish, making arteries more susceptible to stiffening, plaque buildup and inflammation. These biological processes raise the risk of long-term cardiovascular disease.

    Hormone therapy’s rocky history

    Hormone therapy using estrogen alone or a combination of estrogen and progestin, a synthetic derivative of progesterone, restores estrogen levels and effectively treats menopausal symptoms. It comes with some risks, though, which depend on factors such as a woman’s age, time since menopause began and overall health.

    The medical community’s view on hormone therapy has shifted dramatically over the years. In the 1970s, hormone therapy was widely promoted as a fountain of youth and was prescribed commonly to prevent age-related chronic diseases such as heart attack and stroke.

    Then, in the early 2000s, the Women’s Health Initiative, one of the largest clinical trials testing oral hormone therapy in women, found an increased risk of stroke and breast cancer in those who used hormone therapy. Doctors abruptly stopped prescribing it, and medical guidelines shifted their recommendations, saying the treatment had more risks than benefits.

    However, additional analyses of data from the Women’s Health Initiative along with results from further studies pointed researchers to a theory called the timing hypothesis, which suggests that the risks and benefits of hormone therapy depend on when treatment begins.

    According to the timing hypothesis, hormone therapy may lower the risk of heart disease in menopausal women who start it before age 60 and within 10 years of menopause onset, and who are otherwise in good health. Women who begin hormone therapy much later – after age 60 or more than 10 years after menopause onset – may instead face increased cardiovascular risks.

    Studies show that estrogen can support heart health.
    Adam SmigielskiE+ via Getty Images

    A personalized approach to treating menopause

    My research supports this idea. In a 2019 study, my colleagues and I analyzed data from 31 clinical trials of women who started hormone therapy at different ages, and we found that women under 60 who used hormone therapy tend to live longer and are less likely to die from heart disease. However, our study did find an increased risk in blood clots and stroke with hormone therapy. This risk was present in menopausal women under 60 years old and continuously increased as women got older.

    Additionally, research has shown that different methods of taking hormone therapy may affect its impact on cardiovascular health. For example, using estrogen patches worn on the skin may have a lower risk of blood clots compared with hormone therapy taken as a pill.

    This is due to a phenomenon called first pass metabolism. Hormone therapy taken by mouth is processed by the liver before entering the bloodstream. The liver produces clotting factors, which raises the risk of blood clots. In contrast, estrogen patches deliver the medication into the bloodstream, bypassing the liver, and do not increase this risk.

    Overall, we found that women who took oral hormone therapy tended to have lower cholesterol levels, and this effect persisted over many years. For healthy younger women who are within 10 years of menopause onset, hormone therapy is safe from a cardiovascular standpoint and may even provide benefit.

    However, hormone therapy is still not recommended for women with existing heart disease, history of blood clots, prior stroke, gallbladder disease or certain types of cancers.

    Medical experts now recognize that blanket recommendations for or against hormone therapy are not appropriate. Instead, treatment decisions should be individualized, considering factors such as age, time since menopause began and overall health.

    If you are considering hormone therapy, discussing risks and benefits with your health care provider is vital.

    Here are questions to consider asking your health care provider:

    • Am I a good candidate for hormone therapy based on my health history?

    • What are the risks and benefits of starting hormone therapy at my age?

    • What type of hormone therapy, such as pills, patches or gel, is safest and most effective for me?

    • How long should I stay on hormone therapy?

    Matthew Nudy 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. Hormone therapy may cut cardiovascular risk in younger menopausal women – https://theconversation.com/hormone-therapy-may-cut-cardiovascular-risk-in-younger-menopausal-women-243561

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Being alone has its benefits − a psychologist flips the script on the ‘loneliness epidemic’

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Virginia Thomas, Assistant Professor of Psychology, Middlebury

    Studies show that choosing ‘me time’ is not a recipe for loneliness but can boost your creativity and emotional well-being. FotoDuets/iStock via Getty Images Plus

    Over the past few years, experts have been sounding the alarm over how much time Americans spend alone.

    Statistics show that we’re choosing to be solitary for more of our waking hours than ever before, tucked away at home rather than mingling in public. Increasing numbers of us are dining alone and traveling solo, and rates of living alone have nearly doubled in the past 50 years.

    These trends coincided with the surgeon general’s 2023 declaration of a loneliness epidemic, leading to recent claims that the U.S. is living in an “anti-social century.”

    Loneliness and isolation are indeed social problems that warrant serious attention, especially since chronic states of loneliness are linked with poor outcomes such as depression and a shortened lifespan.

    But there is another side to this story, one that deserves a closer look. For some people, the shift toward aloneness represents a desire for what researchers call “positive solitude,” a state that is associated with well-being, not loneliness.

    As a psychologist, I’ve spent the past decade researching why people like to be alone – and spending a fair amount of time there myself – so I’m deeply familiar with the joys of solitude. My findings join a host of others that have documented a long list of benefits gained when we choose to spend time by ourselves, ranging from opportunities to recharge our batteries and experience personal growth to making time to connect with our emotions and our creativity.

    Being alone can help remind people who they are.

    So it makes sense to me why people live alone as soon as their financial circumstances allow, and when asked why they prefer to dine solo, people say simply, “I want more me time.”

    It’s also why I’m not surprised that a 2024 national survey found that 56% of Americans considered alone time essential for their mental health. Or that Costco is now selling “solitude sheds” where for around US$2,000 you can buy yourself some peace and quiet.

    It’s clear there is a desire, and a market, for solitude right now in American culture. But why does this side of the story often get lost amid the warnings about social isolation?

    I suspect it has to do with a collective anxiety about being alone.

    The stigma of solitude

    This anxiety stems in large part from our culture’s deficit view of solitude. In this type of thinking, the desire to be alone is seen as unnatural and unhealthy, something to be pitied or feared rather than valued or encouraged.

    This isn’t just my own observation. A study published in February 2025 found that U.S. news headlines are 10 times more likely to frame being alone negatively than positively. This type of bias shapes people’s beliefs, with studies showing that adults and children alike have clear judgments about when it is – and importantly when it is not – acceptable for their peers to be alone.

    This makes sense given that American culture holds up extroversion as the ideal – indeed as the basis for what’s normal. The hallmarks of extraversion include being sociable and assertive, as well as expressing more positive emotions and seeking more stimulation than the opposite personality – the more reserved and risk-averse introverts. Even though not all Americans are extroverts, most of us have been conditioned to cultivate that trait, and those who do reap social and professional rewards. In this cultural milieu, preferring to be alone carries stigma.

    But the desire for solitude is not pathological, and it’s not just for introverts. Nor does it automatically spell social isolation and a lonely life. In fact, the data doesn’t fully support current fears of a loneliness epidemic, something scholars and journalists have recently acknowledged.

    In other words, although Americans are indeed spending more time alone than previous generations did, it’s not clear that we are actually getting lonelier. And despite our fears for the eldest members of our society, research shows that older adults are happier in solitude than the loneliness narrative would lead us to believe.

    It’s all a balancing act – along with solitude, you need to socialize.

    Social media disrupts our solitude

    However, solitude’s benefits don’t automatically appear whenever we take a break from the social world. They arrive when we are truly alone – when we intentionally carve out the time and space to connect with ourselves – not when we are alone on our devices.

    My research has found that solitude’s positive effects on well-being are far less likely to materialize if the majority of our alone time is spent staring at our screens, especially when we’re passively scrolling social media.

    This is where I believe the collective anxiety is well placed, especially the focus on young adults who are increasingly forgoing face-to-face social interaction in favor of a virtual life – and who may face significant distress as a result.

    Social media is by definition social. It’s in the name. We cannot be truly alone when we’re on it. What’s more, it’s not the type of nourishing “me time” I suspect many people are longing for.

    True solitude turns attention inward. It’s a time to slow down and reflect. A time to do as we please, not to please anyone else. A time to be emotionally available to ourselves, rather than to others. When we spend our solitude in these ways, the benefits accrue: We feel rested and rejuvenated, we gain clarity and emotional balance, we feel freer and more connected to ourselves.

    But if we’re addicted to being busy, it can be hard to slow down. If we’re used to looking at a screen, it can be scary to look inside. And if we don’t have the skills to validate being alone as a normal and healthy human need, then we waste our alone time feeling guilty, weird or selfish.

    The importance of reframing solitude

    Americans choosing to spend more time alone is indeed a challenge to the cultural script, and the stigmatization of solitude can be difficult to change. Nevertheless, a small but growing body of research indicates that it is possible, and effective, to reframe the way we think about solitude.

    For example, viewing solitude as a beneficial experience rather than a lonely one has been shown to help alleviate negative feelings about being alone, even for the participants who were severely lonely. People who perceive their time alone as “full” rather than “empty” are more likely to experience their alone time as meaningful, using it for growth-oriented purposes such as self-reflection or spiritual connection.

    Even something as simple as a linguistic shift – replacing “isolation” with “me time” – causes people to view their alone time more positively and likely affects how their friends and family view it as well.

    It is true that if we don’t have a community of close relationships to return to after being alone, solitude can lead to social isolation. But it’s also true that too much social interaction is taxing, and such overload negatively affects the quality of our relationships. The country’s recent gravitational pull toward more alone time may partially reflect a desire for more balance in a life that is too busy, too scheduled and, yes, too social.

    Just as connection with others is essential for our well-being, so is connection with ourselves.

    Virginia Thomas 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. Being alone has its benefits − a psychologist flips the script on the ‘loneliness epidemic’ – https://theconversation.com/being-alone-has-its-benefits-a-psychologist-flips-the-script-on-the-loneliness-epidemic-250742

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Hard work feels worth it, but only after it’s done – new research on how people value effort

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Piotr Winkielman, Professor of Psychology, University of California, San Diego

    How many stairs would you climb for that payoff? Ozgur Donmaz/DigitalVision via Getty Images

    When deciding if something is worth the effort, whether you’ve already exerted yourself or face the prospect of work changes your calculus. That’s what we found in our new research, published in the Journal of Experimental Psychology: General.

    When you consider a future effort, more work makes the outcome less appealing. But once you’ve completed the work, more effort makes the outcome seem more valuable. We also discovered that hiding behind this general principle of timing there are individual differences in how future and past effort shapes people’s value for the fruits of their labor.

    What’s it worth to you?

    In our experiment, we gave participants a choice between a fixed amount of money and a household item – a mug – that they could take home if they exerted some amount of physical effort, roughly equivalent to walking up one, two or three flights of stairs.

    This setup allowed us to determine the value each person placed on the effort – did it add to or subtract from the value of the item? For instance, if putting in a little more effort made someone switch their decision and decide to go with the cash instead of the mug, we could tell that they valued the mug plus that amount of effort less than that sum of money.

    We also manipulated the time aspect of effort. When the effort was in the future, participants decided whether they wanted to go with the cash or get the mug with some effort. When the effort was in the past, participants decided whether they wanted to cash in the mug they had already earned with effort.

    As we had expected, future effort generally detracted from the value of the mug, but the past effort generally increased it.

    But these general trends do not tell the whole story. Not everyone responds to effort the same way. Our study also uncovered striking individual differences. Four distinct patterns emerged:

    1. For some people, extra effort always subtracted value.
    2. Others consistently preferred items with more work.
    3. Many showed mixed patterns, where moderate effort increased value but excessive effort decreased it.
    4. Some experienced the opposite: initially disliking effort, then finding greater value at higher levels.

    These changing patterns show that one’s relationship with effort isn’t simple. For many people, there’s a sweet spot – a little effort might make something more valuable, but push too far and the value drops. It’s like enjoying a 30-minute workout but dreading a 2-hour session, or conversely, feeling that a 5-minute workout isn’t worth changing clothes for, but a 45-minute session feels satisfying.

    Our paper offers a mathematical model that accounts for these individual differences by proposing that your mind flexibly computes costs and benefits of effort.

    Why violate the ‘law of less work?’

    Why should timing even matter for effort? It seems obvious that reason and nature would teach you to always avoid and dislike effort.

    A hummingbird that puts in lots of extra work to get the same amount of nectar won’t last long.
    Juan Carlos Vindas/Moment via Getty Images

    A hummingbird that prefers a hard-to-get flower over an easy equal alternative might win an A for effort, but, exhausted, would not last long. The cruel world requires “resource rationality” – optimal, efficient use of limited physical and mental resources, balancing the benefits of actions with the required effort.

    That insight is captured by the classic psychological “law of less work,” basically boiling down to the idea that given equivalent outcomes, individuals prefer easier options. Anything different would seem irrational or, in plain language, stupid.

    If so, then how come people, and even animals, often prize things that require hard work for no additional payoff? Why is being hard-to-get a route to value? Anyone who has labored hard for anything knows that investing effort makes the final prize sweeter – whether in love, career, sports or Ikea furniture assembly.

    Could the answer to this “paradox of effort” be that in the hummingbird example, the decision is about future effort, and in the Ikea effect, the effort is in the past?

    Our new findings explain seemingly contradictory phenomena in everyday life. In health care, starting an exercise regimen feels overwhelming when focusing on upcoming workouts, but after establishing the habit, those same exercises become a source of accomplishment. At work, professionals might avoid learning difficult new skills, yet after mastering them, they value their enhanced abilities more because they were challenging to acquire.

    John F. Kennedy supported space exploration efforts, ‘not because they are easy, but because they are hard.’
    Robert Knudsen. White House Photographs. John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, Boston, CC BY

    What still isn’t known

    Sayings like “No pain, no gain” or “Easy come, easy go” populate our language and seem fundamental to our culture. But researchers still don’t fully understand why some people value effortful options more than others do. Is it physical aptitude, past experiences, a sense of meaning, perception of difficulty as importance or impossibility, moralization of effort, specific cultural beliefs about hard work? We don’t know yet.

    We’re now studying how effort shapes different aspects of value: monetary value; hedonic value, as in the pleasure one gets from an item; and the aesthetic value, as in the sense of beauty and artistry. For instance, we’re investigating how people value artful calligraphy after exerting different amounts of effort to view it.

    This work may shed light on curious cultural phenomena, like how people value their experience seeing the Mona Lisa after waiting for hours in crowds at the Louvre. These studies could also help researchers design better motivation systems across education, health care and business.

    Piotr Winkielman received funding for this research from the University of California, San Diego, Academic Senate.

    Przemysław Marcowski received funding for this research from the National Science Centre Poland.

    – ref. Hard work feels worth it, but only after it’s done – new research on how people value effort – https://theconversation.com/hard-work-feels-worth-it-but-only-after-its-done-new-research-on-how-people-value-effort-252684

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Faced with new tariffs and a truculent Trump, Japan and South Korea toe a cautious line

    Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By Sebastian Maslow, Associate Professor, International Relations, University of Tokyo

    Two months into US President Donald Trump’s second term, the liberal international order is on life support.

    Alliances and multilateral institutions are now seen by the United States as burdens. Europe and NATO are framed as bad business, “ripping off” the US. On his so-called “Liberation Day”, Trump also imposed 20% tariffs on all European Union imports.

    The Trump administration has been far less critical of the US’ alliances in the Indo-Pacific region. On a visit to Tokyo this week, US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth described Japan as America’s “indispensable partner” in deterring Chinese aggression.

    Yet, Japan and South Korea fared even worse than the EU with Trump’s new tariffs. Trump slapped Japan with 24% tariffs and South Korea 25%. (Both countries enjoy a trade surplus with the US.)

    So, how are the US’ two main allies in the Indo-Pacific dealing with the mercurial US leader? Will they follow Europe’s lead in reassessing their own security relationships with the US?

    Japan: a positive summit but concerns remain

    America’s post-war security strategy in Asia differs from Europe. While NATO was built on the premise of collective defence among its members, the US adopted a “hub-and-spokes” model in Asia, relying on bilateral alliances to contain the spread of communism.

    Japan and South Korea have long sheltered under the US nuclear umbrella and hosted major US military bases. Both are also highly sensitive to changes in the US’ Indo-Pacific policies.

    Japan, in particular, has a long history of careful alliance management with the US, epitomised by former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s courting of Trump.

    During Trump’s first term in office, Abe’s policy goals aligned closely with the US: transforming Japan’s security posture to make it a serious military and diplomatic power. Japan increased military spending, lifted arms export restrictions and deepened ties with India and Australia.

    Prime Minister Fumio Kishida continued to raise Japan’s security profile from 2021-24, again increasing military spending and taking a tough line on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. He emphasised “Europe today could be Asia tomorrow”.

    His successor, Shigeru Ishiba, had a successful summit with Trump in February, immediately after his inauguration. The joint statement reaffirmed US security guarantees to Japan, including over the Senkaku Islands, which are claimed by China.

    Japan also agreed to import American liquefied natural gas, and later committed to working with South Korea to develop a US$44 billion (A$70 billion) plan to export LNG from Alaska.

    However, these positive developments do not mean the relationship is on firm ground.

    In early March, Trump complained the US-Japan security agreement signed in 1960 was “one-sided” and a top administration official again called for Japan to increase its defence spending to 3% of gross domestic product (GDP) – a huge increase for a country facing serious demographic and fiscal pressures.

    Reports also emerged the US was considering cancelling a new joint headquarters in Japan aimed at deeper integration between US and Japanese forces.

    South Korea: extremely vulnerable on trade

    South Korea faces similar pressures. Ties between the two countries were strained during Trump’s first term over his demand South Korea increase the amount it pays to host US forces by
    nearly 400%. A 2021 agreement restored some stability, but left Seoul deeply worried about the future of the alliance.

    South Korea’s acting president, Choi Sang-mok, has expressed a desire to strengthen ties with the US, though Trump has reportedly been cool to his advances.

    With a US$66 billion (A$105 billion) trade surplus with the US, South Korea is considered the country most vulnerable to trade risk with the Trump administration, according to a Swiss research group.

    Trump’s past suggestions that both South Korea and Japan develop nuclear weapons or pay for US nuclear protection has also rattled some nerves. As confidence in the US alliance erodes, both countries are engaging in an urgent public debate about the possibility of acquiring nuclear weapons.

    Tensions moving forward

    Potential for conflict is on the horizon. For example, Tokyo and Washington are set to renegotiate the deal that dictates how much Japan pays to host US troops next year.

    Both allies pay huge sums to host US bases. South Korea will pay US$1.14 billion (A$1.8 billion) in 2026, and Japan pays US$1.72 billion (A$2.7 billion) annually.

    A trade war could also prompt a reassessment of the costs of US efforts to decouple from China, potentially leading to closer economic ties between Japan, South Korea and China. The three countries have agreed to accelerate talks on a trilateral free trade agreement, which had been on hold since 2019.

    Another challenge is semiconductors. Japan’s new semiconductor revitalisation strategy is prioritising domestic investment, raising questions about whether Trump will tolerate “friendshoring” if Japan diverts investments from the US.

    In 2024, Japan outspent the US in semiconductor subsidies (as a share of GDP), while Taiwan’s TSMC, the world’s largest contract chipmaker, expanded its production capacity in Japan.

    Seoul remains an important partner to Washington on semiconductors. Samsung and SK Hynix are both boosting their investments on new semiconductor plants in the US. However, there is now uncertainty over the subsidies promised to both companies to invest in America under the CHIPS Act.

    Ultimately, the strength of these alliances depends on whether the Trump administration views them as long-term bulwarks against China’s rise in the region, or merely vassals that can be extorted for financial gain.

    If the US is serious about countering China, its regional alliances are key. This would give Japan and South Korea some degree of leverage – or, in Trump terms, they’ll hold valuable cards. Whether they get to play them, however, depends on what Trump’s China policy turns out to be.

    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. Faced with new tariffs and a truculent Trump, Japan and South Korea toe a cautious line – https://theconversation.com/faced-with-new-tariffs-and-a-truculent-trump-japan-and-south-korea-toe-a-cautious-line-244172

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Russia and China both want influence over Central Asia. Could it rupture their friendship?

    Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By Dilnoza Ubaydullaeva, Lecturer in Government, Flinders University

    As he looks to solidify his territorial gains in Ukraine in a potential ceasefire deal, Russian President Vladimir Putin has one eye trained on Russia’s southern border – and boosting Russian influence in Central Asia.

    Following his 2024 re-election, Putin made Uzbekistan his third foreign visit after China and Belarus. The visit signalled the region’s continued importance to Moscow.

    In response to Western sanctions on Moscow over the Ukraine war, trade and investment between Russia and Central Asian countries have grown significantly.

    Russia’s Lukoil and Gazprom are now the dominant foreign players in Uzbekistan’s energy fields. In Kazakhstan, Moscow controls a quarter of the country’s uranium production.

    But as Russia tries to reaffirm its role in the region, China has also been quietly expanding its influence.

    Could this growing competition over Central Asia affect Beijing and Moscow’s broader relationship?

    Central Asia drifting apart from Moscow

    The Central Asian region is home to approximately 79 million people spread across five nations. It was part of the Soviet Union until its collapse in 1991. Its strategic location between Russia and China, on the doorstep of the Middle East, has long made it a “grand chessboard” for great power politics.

    While Russia has traditionally dominated the region, Central Asian leaders have made efforts to somewhat distance themselves from Moscow recently.

    At the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) summit in October 2022, for example, Tajikistan’s president publicly challenged Russian President Vladimir Putin. He demanded respect for smaller states like his.

    Similarly, during Putin’s 2023 visit to Kazakhstan, President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev made a symbolic statement at the press conference by delivering his speech in Kazakh rather than Russian. This was a rare move that seemed to catch Putin’s delegation off guard.

    In another striking moment, Tokayev declared at an economic forum in Russia in 2022 that Kazakhstan does not recognise Russia’s “quasi-states”, referring to its occupied territories of Ukraine.

    Yet, all Central Asian states remain part of at least one Russia-led organisation, such as the Commonwealth of Independent States, the Collective Security Treaty Organization, or the Eurasian Economic Union.

    Three states (Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan) rely on Russian security guarantees through the Collective Security Treaty Organization.

    And the region’s economic dependency on Russia remains significant. Of the 6.1 million migrants in Russia, the largest groups come from Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. These countries depend heavily on remittances from these migrant workers.

    China’s growing influence

    With Russia preoccupied with Ukraine and constrained by Western sanctions, China has seized the opportunity to deepen its engagement in the region.

    Beijing’s involvement in Central Asia has long been economic. In 2013, for instance, China unveiled its ambitious, global Belt and Road Initiative in Kazakhstan. And by 2024, it was China, not Russia, that was the largest trading partner of every Central Asian country except Tajikistan.

    But in recent years, China has expanded its influence beyond economic ties, establishing itself as a key player in regional politics.

    At the inaugural China-Central Asia Summit in 2023, for example, Chinese leader Xi Jinping pledged support for the sovereignty, security and territorial integrity of the region. This is traditionally a role played by Russia.

    Xi has also been making high-profile visits to Central Asian states, signalling Beijing’s growing strategic interests here.

    Local populations, however, remain wary. Public opinion surveys indicate China is viewed more negatively than Russia.

    Many Chinese-funded projects bring their own workers, limiting job opportunities for locals and fuelling resentment. There is also anxiety about potential “debt trap” diplomacy. Civil society groups have called for economic diversification to avoid over-reliance on Beijing.

    Further complicating matters is Beijing’s treatment of the Muslim minority Uyghur population in the Xinjiang region of western China. This has reinforced suspicions in Muslim-majority Central Asia about China’s long-term intentions in the region.

    Growing competition

    The increasing competition raises questions about the potential impact on the broader, “no limits” relationship between Moscow and Beijing.

    At a recent forum, Putin acknowledged Beijing’s growing economic role in the region. However, he insisted Russia still has “special ties” with Central Asian states, rooted in history. And he notably dismissed concerns about China’s expansionist aims, saying:

    There is nothing about domination in the Chinese philosophy. They do not strive for domination.

    On the ground, however, things aren’t so simple. So far, China and Russia have managed to avoid stepping on each other’s toes. How long that balance remains, however, is an open question.

    Central Asian countries, meanwhile, are courting both sides – and diversifying their ties beyond the two powers.

    Many of the region’s educated elite are increasingly looking toward Turkey – and pan-Turkic solidarity – as an alternative to both Russian and Chinese dominance.

    Russia’s historical influence in the region remains strong. But the days of its unquestioned dominance appear to be over.

    Russia may try to reassert its preeminent position, but China’s deepening economic presence is not going anywhere.

    With both countries pushing their own regional agendas, it’s hard to ignore the overlap – and the potential for a future clash over competing interests.

    Dilnoza Ubaydullaeva 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. Russia and China both want influence over Central Asia. Could it rupture their friendship? – https://theconversation.com/russia-and-china-both-want-influence-over-central-asia-could-it-rupture-their-friendship-251023

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Myanmar military’s ‘ceasefire’ follows a pattern of ruling generals exploiting disasters to shore up control

    Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By Tharaphi Than, Associate Professor of World Cultures and Languages, Northern Illinois University

    Myanmar’s military chief, Min Aung Hlaing, called for elections on March 27, 2025 – a day before an earthquake devastated the country. STR/AFP via Getty Images

    After a 7.7 magnitude earthquake struck Myanmar on March 28. 2025, the country’s military and the myriad resistance groups fighting a yearslong civil war faced international calls for an immediate ceasefire. A pause in the fighting would enable vital aid to enter the major quake zones and allow rescuers to assist victims in a disaster that has already killed more than 3,000 people.

    The first to heed the call was the opposition National Unity Government, which unilaterally announced a two-week pause on attacks by its armed wing, the People’s Defense Force, on March 29. The Three Brotherhood Alliance – a coalition of three ethnic resistance groups: the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army, the Ta’ang National Liberation Army and the Arakan Army – likewise agreed to a temporary truce.

    But Myanmar’s military demurred. Just hours after the quake, as rescuers continued to dig through rubble in search of survivors, the generals ordered airstrikes on enemy positions in Shan state and Karen state in the country’s east – a decision that United Nations special rapporteur Tom Andrews described as “nothing short of incredible.”

    The generals eventually yielded to pressure late on April 2 – some five days after the earthquake hit – announcing that they would halt fighting until April 22. But the statement appeared to be hollow, with reports just a day later that the military’s bombing campaign and ground offensive were continuing unabated in Kachin state in Myanmar’s north.

    Mandalay buildings, like Myanmar’s democracy, lie in ruins.
    STR/AFP via Getty Images

    As an expert on the political history of Myanmar, I believe the behavior of the country’s military is of no surprise. The generals who have had a grip on the country for much of the past six decades have a track record of exploiting disasters for political gain. Weakened by years of entrenched civil war, they are now seeking an opportunity in the earthquake to rehabilitate their image overseas, while consolidating power at home.

    From disasters to elections

    Myanmar’s ruling junta has tried this tactic before. In 2008, a week after the deadly cyclone Nargis killed more than 100,000 people in Myanmar, the military proceeded to hold a constitutional referendum that would guarantee the military’s control of government by reserving 25% of all parliamentary seats for officers while requiring 75% of votes for any future constitutional reform. It also allowed for the military to take over the country “in the event of an emergency.”

    The referendum took place while much of Myanmar was still reeling from disaster, yet the junta announced a 98.12% turnout, of which 92.48% voted in favor of the new pro-military constitution.

    It paved the way to elections in 2010, which the military’s Union Solidarity and Development Party won. Though that vote was boycotted by the opposition National League for Democracy, or NLD, Washington had by then signaled a shift in policy toward “pragmatic engagement” with the then-ruling junta. This U.S. shift forced the recalcitrant NLD to cooperate in subsequent elections, giving legitimacy to a process that was stacked in favor of the generals.

    Using a fig leaf of legitimacy

    The latest disaster comes as the junta is again attempting to push for elections. Just a day before the earthquake, Myanmar’s military chief, Min Aung Hlaing, confirmed plans for a December national vote and called on opposition parties to participate.

    But the proposed election in Myanmar is widely seen as a face-saving strategy for both the Myanmar military and, I would argue, an international community that has done little of any significance to end the civil war. In this context, elections would allow the generals to cover their 2021 power grab with a fig leaf of legitimacy.

    The entrenched civil war that was sparked by that military takeover – a coup that ended a 10-year experiment with limited democracy – derailed the military’s initial plan to return to full control of the country.

    Anti-military soldiers sit in a long-tailed boat on the Salween River.
    Thierry Falise/LightRocket via Getty Images

    Four years of fighting a broad-based opposition that includes ethnic minority groups like the Karen National Union, Kachin Independence Army, Arakan Army, Ta’ang National Liberation Army, Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army, People’s Defense Force and Bamar People’s Liberation Army has taken its toll on the military.

    It has lost territorial control in many regions to the myriad resistance groups. Internationally, it has become more isolated through sanctions, and its largest trading partner, China, concerned over instability on its border, has slowed investments as it tries to play all sides of the conflict.

    In desperation, the generals have resorted to forced conscription for foot soldiers, while looking to Russia for arms and investment.

    The failure of the generals

    What the military desperately needs now is a lifeline and a civil war exit plan. The earthquake could provide both, with a ceasefire – no matter how badly observed – providing a cover for allowing for a national vote.

    But as has been evident in the days surrounding the announcement of a truce, the military is likely to exploit the disaster to weaken the resistance along the way. It has said that it will take “necessary” measures against any resistance group found to be regrouping or attacking the state during the ceasefire. Yet it has reportedly continued its own offensive.

    The earthquake has revealed the failures and brutalities of the military in other ways, too. In the aftermath of the disaster, the military shut down private clinics and hospitals in badly hit Mandalay for allegedly employing rebel doctors and nurses who were treating members of the resistance. As it was, many health care workers have been in hiding since the coup, and young people who could have been on the front lines of relief efforts have either joined the resistance groups or fled the country.

    The earthquake will also further hurt a Myanmar business community already suffering from the pullout of international businesses after the 2021 coup.

    On unsecure foundations

    Yet, the military may be hoping that it can use the disaster to rebuild its brand overseas. The surprise announcement of a ceasefire by the generals is part of that process. So, too, is the decision to allow in international rescue teams, after initially blocking relief workers from entering the country. It is the military’s way of showing willingness to cooperate with the wider world.

    In short, disaster diplomacy has kicked in for Myanmar’s military, as it did after 2008’s Cyclone Nagris. That earlier cyclone provided an opportunity for the junta to present a different face to the international community. Elections were held, not once, but twice – encouraged by the U.S. and others – and investments rushed into Myanmar as the country was touted as “Asia’s next Tiger.”

    But the foundations of military-backed reform in Myanmar were built on fault lines that cracked and crumbled amid the 2021 coup. The military’s exploitation of the 2025 earthquake will, I fear, result in similar ends.

    Tharaphi Than 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. Myanmar military’s ‘ceasefire’ follows a pattern of ruling generals exploiting disasters to shore up control – https://theconversation.com/myanmar-militarys-ceasefire-follows-a-pattern-of-ruling-generals-exploiting-disasters-to-shore-up-control-253577

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Why was South Africa’s ambassador to the US expelled? A view of the Ebrahim Rasool affair

    Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Peter Vale, Senior Research Fellow, Centre for the Advancement of Scholarship, University of Pretoria., University of Pretoria

    In a rare move, the Trump administration expelled Ebrahim Rasool, South Africa’s ambassador to Washington, in mid-March 2025. In a post on X, US secretary of state Marco Rubio accused Rasool of hating the US and President Donald Trump, and said the ambassador was “no longer welcome in our great country”. The expulsion came after comments Rasool had made during a webinar organised by a South African think-tank, the Mapungubwe Institute for Strategic Studies. Rasool had said he thought that Trump was “mobilising a supremacism” and trying to “project white victimhood as a dog whistle” as the white population faced becoming a minority in the US.

    Relations between the two countries had reached a new low in the first weeks of the Trump administration. Trump had lashed out at South Africa for taking Israel to the International Court of Justice on accusations of genocide in Gaza; frozen all funding to South Africa; and offered asylum to white Afrikaners from South Africa, emboldening fringe far-right groups in the country. Peter Vale, regarded as an authority on South Africa’s place in the world, answers questions about the ambassador’s expulsion.

    What was your initial reaction to the Rasool appointment?

    I know and respect Ebrahim Rasool – we worked together at the University of the Western Cape 30 years ago – and I also thought he had done a fine job as ambassador to the US during the Obama years.

    Remember, his appointment under the Trump administration was announced a week after the November poll. Preparations for this would have been months in the making. So, one question was, did the South African government think Joe Biden would win? If so, they were not following the polls very closely. South Africa’s relations with the US under Biden, although at times testy, were managable and Rasool was familiar with the individuals responsible for their making.

    More importantly, both Rasool and the Department of International Relations and Cooperation seemed to ignore the ancient Greek philosopher Heraclitus’ warning:

    Never step into the same river twice, for it is not the same river, and he is not the same man.

    Politics in the US has changed in paradigmatic proportions since Obama.

    Then there was the fact that Rasool’s politics are rooted at the sharpest edge of the African National Congress: the United Democratic Front faction. Speaking plainly in the language of the country’s streets was the gift the United Democratic Front gave national politics. It was the most important internal anti-apartheid movement in the 1980s, bringing together youth, student and civic organisations.

    Nevertheless, this, the language of the heart (as we might call it), has been eclipsed by the rise of techno-speak of the 2020s – a language that consists of buzzwords, esoteric language, or technical jargon and has become a kind of diplo-speak: diplomatic language in which the careful use of euphemism and noncontroversial language obscures points that might cause contention. Both bedevil South Africa’s domestic politics and mute the country’s foreign policy because racial justice, gender equality and compensation for colonialism seemingly have no place in everyday political discourse.

    What happened at the Mapungubwe seminar?

    The fracas arose during a virtual seminar organised by a leading South African think-tank which discussed the deepening tension in the relations between Pretoria and Washington.

    The late South African politician Frederik van Zyl Slabbert, who was brilliant with words, used to distinguish between (what he called) a conspiracy and a cock-up. Sometimes, however, it can be a mix of both.

    I think that Rasool was confounded by the audience to which he spoke – was it local or was it local and foreign?

    If there was deceit in the gathering itself, this was not to Rasool’s account. This points instead to a journalist looking to trip up any position South Africa took in the matter seemingly to advance his career. This is said to be the Breitbart journalist Joel Pollack, who made no secret of his desire to be the US ambassador in South Africa. He was registered as “Anonymous” on the webinar call. He did not disclose his name, or profession, when he asked Rasool a question.

    In my opinion, disclosure is a professional responsibility.

    Interestingly, there is no indication that the meeting was operating under the well-known Chatham House Rule by which

    participants are free to use the information received, but neither the identity nor the affiliation of the speaker(s), nor any other participant, may be revealed.

    Although not without its critics, myself included, this rule binds participants to non-disclosure by creating a safe space for candid and honest discussion.

    Where does the responsibility of an ambassador lie?

    The consensus among observers and commentators that’s emerged since the expulsion is that it was Rasool’s responsibility to hold his tongue – a kind of golden rule in diplomacy.

    There is another way of thinking about this.

    There have been many cases where the professional responsibility of diplomatic representation should follow a higher standard than that set by the incumbent government.

    This choice faced diplomats in the country during apartheid. So, for instance, in 1986, the apartheid government expelled the Swedish ambassador following that country’s strong opposition to apartheid. There were other expulsions, too. These moves were part of the broader international pressure surrounding apartheid, where responsibility of the diplomats shifted from the minority incumbent government to the country’s people.

    However, most famously, this understanding emerged in the writing of Thomas Paine, the American pamphleteer, that Benjamin Franklin (then the ambassador of the fledgling United States to Paris) was “not the diplomat of a Court, but (that the Ambassador) represented MAN (KIND)”.

    This intervention is regarded as the first recognition that human – as opposed to state – rights enjoyed currency in international relations.

    The age of turbulence through which we live has further muddied this water.

    What do you make of the reaction to Rasool’s explusion?

    A cacophony of voices, both within and without the country, have debated the pros and cons of the American decision.

    Much has been predictable in content and source. Some garbled. Former South African president Thabo Mbeki was schoolmasterish during a lecture he gave following Rasool’s expulsion, but he reminded the country of the tremendous power that ambassadors had at hand.

    Of concern to those with an ethical interest in international relations was that the trope “the national interest” appeared again and again and that, as it did so, the form it took was economic. So, it is in the national interest that South Africa “grow the economy”, “create jobs” and “fight HIV” with American money.

    Nevertheless, le affaire Rasool has reminded South Africans that the country also has other “national interests” like fighting climate change and defending human rights worldwide.

    Peter Vale 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. Why was South Africa’s ambassador to the US expelled? A view of the Ebrahim Rasool affair – https://theconversation.com/why-was-south-africas-ambassador-to-the-us-expelled-a-view-of-the-ebrahim-rasool-affair-253640

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: World Affairs Briefing: World considers response to Trump’s tariffs – and Israel launches new Gaza offensive

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Sam Phelps, Commissioning Editor, International Affairs

    This article was first published in The Conversation UK’s World Affairs Briefing email newsletter. Sign up to receive weekly analysis of the latest developments in international relations, direct to your inbox.

    Donald Trump has announced a massive package of trade tariffs on some of America’s largest trading partners. In a speech on the White House lawn, Trump said that America had been “looted, pillaged and raped” by these countries for decades, adding that “in many cases, the friend is worse than the foe”.

    Trump claims that April 2, which he has called “liberation day”, will “forever be remembered as the day American industry was reborn”. The tariffs include 20% on imports from the EU, 24% on those from Japan, 27% for India, and 34% for China. The UK got off comparatively lightly, with tariffs of 10%.

    Renaud Foucart, a senior lecturer in economics at Lancaster University, explores how the world may react. In his view, there are three possible scenarios.



    Read more:
    How the UK and Europe could respond to Trump’s ‘liberation day’ tariffs

    First, countries may seek to forge trade deals with the US that, as Foucart puts it, “give Trump enough rope to climb down”. This is the approach favoured by British prime minister Keir Starmer. But it does send the message that the US can obtain concessions from its international partners by bullying them.

    Sign up to receive our weekly World Affairs Briefing newsletter from The Conversation UK. Every Thursday we’ll bring you expert analysis of the big stories in international relations.

    Second, countries may retaliate. Whether through reciprocal tariffs or tools like the European Commission’s “anti-coercion instrument”, the goal will be to force the US to back down. If this scenario plays out, new modelling by Niven Winchester of Auckland University of Technology suggests it is probably the US that stands to lose the most, while some countries may actually gain.



    Read more:
    New modelling reveals full impact of Trump’s ‘Liberation Day’ tariffs – with the US hit hardest

    Third, in what is the most dramatic scenario, we may see a reorganisation of the world order that more or less avoids the US. This would take the world to uncharted economic and political territories.

    A renewed offensive

    Meanwhile, Israeli officials have announced a major expansion of military operations in Gaza. In a statement released on Wednesday, Israel’s defence minister, Israel Katz, said that “troops will move to clear areas of terrorists and infrastructure, and seize extensive territory that will be added to the state of Israel’s security areas”.

    The country’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, later confirmed the plans. In a video message, he announced that Israel would be building a new security corridor called the “Morag Route” to “divide up” the Gaza Strip. Netanyahu says carving Gaza will add pressure on Hamas to return the remaining 59 hostages.

    We spoke to Scott Lucas, a Middle East expert at University College Dublin and a regular contributor to our coverage of the war in Gaza, about Israel’s renewed offensive and some of the other key issues involved.

    In his view, the resumption of the ground offensive in Gaza was largely inevitable once Netanyahu’s government refused to move from phase one of the ceasefire to phase two. The second phase would have involved the establishment of a permanent ceasefire and a complete Israeli military withdrawal. This, as Lucas explains, was never going to be agreed by Netanyahu.

    “Beyond his personal opposition to the requisite Israeli military withdrawal from Gaza, powerful hard-right ministers in his government had made clear that their acceptance of phase one was conditioned on no phase two and on a return to military operations,” Lucas writes. Netanyahu’s political survival depends on the continuation of the war.



    Read more:
    Why is Israel expanding its offensive in Gaza and what does it mean for the Middle East? Expert Q&A

    But according to Leonie Fleischmann, a senior lecturer in international politics at City St George’s, University of London, the decision to launch another ground offensive in Gaza remains a high-risk strategy.

    Netanyahu is already unpopular among many Israeli citizens, as is the continued assault on Gaza. And his recent attempts to bend Israel’s legal system to his will by pushing through a law that would give the government the power to appoint new members of the supreme court have certainly not endeared him to many.

    The move has the potential to undermine the country’s system of checks and balances which, as in many western democracies, rests largely on the separation of powers. But in Fleischmann’s view, it was not unexpected.

    Netanyahu has done anything he can to try to gain control of the country’s judiciary over the past few years. He was charged with bribery, fraud and breach of trust in 2019, which he denies, and has consistently sought to delay legal proceedings.

    It remains to be seen whether pressure from the Israeli public can check Netanyahu’s power. Widespread unrest over the weekend caused Netanyahu to pause plans for judicial reform, though he has maintained that the overhaul is still needed.



    Read more:
    As Israel begins another assault in Gaza, Netanyahu is fighting his own war against the country’s legal system

    Elsewhere, we have reported on the recent endorsement of Trump’s policies by Aleksandr Dugin, who is sometimes referred to as “Putin’s brain” because of his ideological influence on Russian politics.

    “Trumpists and the followers of Trump will understand much better what Russia is, who Putin is and the motivations of our politics,” Dugin said in an interview with CNN on March 30.

    His endorsement should be a warning of the disruptive nature of the Trump White House, says Kevin Riehle of Brunel University of London.



    Read more:
    ‘Putin’s brain’: Aleksandr Dugin, the Russian ultra-nationalist who has endorsed Donald Trump

    And China may be making preparations for an invasion of Taiwan. As naval history expert Matthew Heaslip of the University of Portsmouth reports, a handful of so-called Shuiqiao barges were filmed at a beach in China’s Guangdong province in March.

    The barges, the name of which translates to “water bridge”, were working together to form a relocatable bridge to enable the transfer of vehicles, supplies and people between ship and shore.

    Heaslip points out that, as there is no obvious commercial role for such large vessels, the most likely purpose is for landing armed forces during amphibious operations. But, as he reassures in this piece, their appearance does not guarantee that a Chinese invasion of Taiwan is imminent.



    Read more:
    What these new landing barges can tell us about China’s plans to invade Taiwan

    There are reported to be three completed prototype landing barges ready for deployment and three under construction. This would offer just one or two beach bridges, which would be of minimal value in a major invasion.

    World Affairs Briefing from The Conversation UK is available as a weekly email newsletter. Click here to get updates directly in your inbox.

    – ref. World Affairs Briefing: World considers response to Trump’s tariffs – and Israel launches new Gaza offensive – https://theconversation.com/world-affairs-briefing-world-considers-response-to-trumps-tariffs-and-israel-launches-new-gaza-offensive-253647

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: How a lone judge can block a Trump order nationwide – and why, from DACA to DOGE, this judicial check on presidents’ power is shaping how the government works

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Cassandra Burke Robertson, Professor of Law and Director of the Center for Professional Ethics, Case Western Reserve University

    The Trump administration has asked the Supreme Court to limit judges’ power to issue what legal experts call ‘nationwide preliminary injunctions.’ Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images

    When presidents try to make big changes through executive orders, they often hit a roadblock: A single federal judge, whether located in Seattle or Miami or anywhere in between, can stop these policies across the entire country.

    These court orders have increasingly become a political battleground, increasingly sought by both Republicans and Democrats to fight presidential policies they oppose.

    This explains why the Trump administration recently asked the Supreme Court to limit judges’ power to issue what legal experts call “nationwide preliminary injunctions.” Congress also held hearings on curtailing judges’ ability to issue the injunctions.

    But what exactly are these injunctions, and why do they matter to everyday Americans?

    Immediate, irreparable harm

    When the government creates a policy that might violate the Constitution or federal law, affected people can sue in federal court to stop it. While these lawsuits work their way through the courts – a process that often takes years – judges can issue what are called “preliminary injunctions” to temporarily pause the policy if they determine it might cause immediate, irreparable harm.

    A “nationwide” injunction – sometimes called a “universal” injunction – goes further by stopping the policy for everyone across the country, not just for the people who filed the lawsuit.

    Importantly, these injunctions are designed to be temporary. They merely preserve the status quo until courts can fully examine the case’s merits. But in practice, litigation proceeds so slowly that executive actions blocked by the courts often expire when successor administrations abandon the policies.

    Legislation introduced by GOP Sen. Chuck Grassley would ban judges from issuing most nationwide injunctions.
    Sen. Chuck Grassley office

    More executive orders, more injunctions

    Nationwide injunctions aren’t new, but several things have made them more contentious recently.

    First, since a closely divided and polarized Congress rarely passes major legislation anymore, presidents rely more on executive orders to get substantive things done. This creates more opportunities to challenge presidential actions in court.

    Second, lawyers who want to challenge these orders have gotten better at “judge shopping” – filing cases in districts where they’re likely to get judges who agree with their client’s views.

    Third, with growing political division, both parties aim to use these injunctions more aggressively whenever the other party controls the White House.

    Affecting real people

    These legal fights have tangible consequences for millions of Americans.

    Take DACA, the common name for the program formally called Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, which protects about 500,000 young immigrants from deportation. For more than 10 years, these young immigrants, known as “Dreamers,” have faced constant uncertainty.

    That’s because, when President Barack Obama created DACA in 2012 and sought to expand it via executive order in 2015, a Texas judge blocked the expansion with a nationwide injunction. When Trump tried to end DACA, judges in California, New York and Washington, D.C. blocked that move. The program, and the legal challenges to it, continued under President Joe Biden. Now, the second Trump administration faces continued legal challenges over the constitutionality of the DACA program.

    More recently, judges have used nationwide injunctions to block several Donald Trump policies. Three different courts stopped the president’s attempt to deny citizenship to babies born to mothers who lack legal permanent residency in the United States. Judges have also temporarily blocked Trump’s efforts to ban transgender people from serving in the military and to freeze some federal funding for a variety of programs.

    While much of the current debate focuses on presidential policies, nationwide injunctions have also blocked congressional legislation.

    The Corporate Transparency Act, passed in 2021 and originally scheduled to go into effect in 2024, combats financial crimes by requiring businesses to disclose their true owners to the government. A Texas judge blocked this law in 2024 after gun stores challenged it.

    In early 2025, the Supreme Court allowed the law to take effect, but the Trump administration announced it simply wouldn’t enforce it – showing how these legal battles can become political power struggles.

    A polarized Congress rarely passes major legislation anymore, so presidents – including Donald Trump – have relied on executive orders to get things done.
    Christopher Furlong/Getty Images

    Too much power or necessary protection?

    Some critics say nationwide injunctions give too much power to a single judge. If lawyers can pick which judges hear their cases, this raises serious questions about fairness.

    Supporters argue that these injunctions protect important rights. For example, without nationwide injunctions in the citizenship cases, babies born to mothers without legal permanent residency would be American citizens in some states but not others – an impossible situation.

    Congress is considering legislation to limit judges’ ability to grant nationwide injunctions.

    The Trump administration has also tried to make it expensive and difficult to challenge its policies in court. In March 2025, Trump ordered government lawyers to demand large cash deposits – called “security bonds” – from anyone seeking an injunction. Though these bonds are already part of existing court rules, judges usually set them at just a few hundred dollars or waive them entirely when people raise constitutional concerns.

    Under the new policy, critics worry that “plaintiffs who sue the government could be forced to put up enormous sums of money in order to proceed with their cases.”

    Another way to address the concerns about a single judge blocking government action would be to require a three-judge panel to hear cases involving nationwide injunctions, requiring at least two of them to agree. This is similar to how courts handled major civil rights cases in the 1950s and 1960s.

    My research on this topic suggests that three judges working together would be less likely to make partisan decisions, while still being able to protect constitutional rights when necessary. Today’s technology also makes it easier for judges in different locations to work together than it was decades ago.

    As the Supreme Court weighs in on this debate, the outcome will affect how presidents can implement policies and how much power individual judges have to stop them. Though it might seem like a technical legal issue, it will shape how government works for years to come – as well as the lives of those who live in the U.S.

    Cassandra Burke Robertson 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 a lone judge can block a Trump order nationwide – and why, from DACA to DOGE, this judicial check on presidents’ power is shaping how the government works – https://theconversation.com/how-a-lone-judge-can-block-a-trump-order-nationwide-and-why-from-daca-to-doge-this-judicial-check-on-presidents-power-is-shaping-how-the-government-works-252556

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Blue Origin’s all-female space flight urges women to shoot for the stars – but astronaut memoirs reveal the cost of being exceptional

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Jasleen Chana, PhD Candidate, Science and Technology Studies, UCL

    For the first time since Russian cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova’s solo flight in 1963, a spacecraft will enter orbit with only women aboard. Blue Origin’s all-female space flight crew, which includes popstar Katy Perry, is set to take off this spring.

    Jeff Bezos’ crew is assembled from successful and well-known women, also including television presenter Gayle King, producer Kerianne Flynn, former Nasa scientist Aisha Bowe, civil rights activist Amanda Nguyen and journalist Lauren Sanchez. Promotional material for the flight, claims that Perry “hopes her journey encourages her daughter and others to reach for the stars, literally and figuratively”.

    The glamorous optics of this spaceflight are supposedly designed to encourage women to strive for their dreams. The glossy narrative tells others that they can be just like these extraordinary women. Yet, behind this aspirational ideal, there is a more problematic story regarding successful women in science and their roles in public.

    My PhD research examines memoirs written by women astronauts. They construct appealing depictions of women who are successful and exceptional. But in practice their success stories are nigh on impossible for ordinary women to emulate.

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    This is epitomised in astronaut Catherine Coleman’s reaction to wearing a spacesuit designed for men. In her 2024 memoir, she wrote: “Most of the time, I took the approach that if the suit didn’t fit, I would simply wear it anyway – and wear it well. Wear it better than anyone expected.”

    Mae Carol Jemison was the first black woman to travel to space.
    Nasa

    As this quote shows, women who have travelled to space tend to construct themselves as having worked exceptionally hard to deny the norms of what is expected of them and to offset systemic biases.

    From the outset of her memoir, Coleman emphasises that she’s always had to be an “exception” from the rest of humanity, which feels alienating. But she also consistently suggests that her life was destined to be this way. “Space felt like home to me,” she says, tacitly acknowledging that she was always meant to be there.

    Jemison, who was the first African American woman in space, also expresses this sense of destiny in her 2001 memoir. “I perched quietly, looking out of the windows on the flight deck,” she writes. “Strange, but I always knew I’d be here. Looking down and all around me, seeing the Earth, the moon, and the stars, I just felt like I belonged.”

    The crew set to board the Blue Origin flight want to be storytellers in the same way that women astronauts are in their memoirs. But the well-known members of its crew are a reminder that hard work is only part of this particular story – fortune and privilege also play a part.

    Eileen Collins was the first woman to pilot and command a space shuttle. In her 2021 memoir, she details the pressures and expectations of working in a male-dominated field. She found that it exacerbated already tricky decision-making and the need to perform critical actions correctly.

    When she says “current and future women pilots are counting on me to do a perfect job up here,” she exemplifies the harsh scrutiny that women astronauts are often subject to when they are the first of their gender.

    Behind the cover

    The issue with popular scientific memoirs is that they are consistently marketed as honest and truthful works. These books promise to reveal who the astronaut actually is, but they are, in fact, carefully curated images of the women they portray.

    So while they intend to motivate and inspire others, the memoirs don’t always do so in a totally honest way. This draws a parallel with the Blue Origin flight.

    Perry discusses her space flight.

    Many of these narratives seek to rewrite past stereotypes of scientists while also functioning as a response to the contemporary appetite for memoirs that reveal the interior emotional world of their subjects. For example, Kathryn Sullivan discusses “wrestling” with visceral “pangs” of pain at being unable to launch her mission due to technical issues.

    This concept reflects why there is a fevered public expectation that the Blue Origin flight crew will embark on a perspective-shifting journey and experience “deep emotions from space”.

    While current coverage surrounding the launch frames it as a celebration of collective advancement, the people comprising this spaceflight crew do not reflect most women.

    If the Blue Origin mission is to be a lodestar for a universal feminist narrative, using women’s spaceflight as a measure of progress, then it should also be considered in tandem with the incongruities and uniqueness of women’s experiences. Ultimately, it is important to move away from narratives that inform us that science, spaceflight and success are only synonymous with fame and exceptionalism.

    Jasleen Chana 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. Blue Origin’s all-female space flight urges women to shoot for the stars – but astronaut memoirs reveal the cost of being exceptional – https://theconversation.com/blue-origins-all-female-space-flight-urges-women-to-shoot-for-the-stars-but-astronaut-memoirs-reveal-the-cost-of-being-exceptional-251880

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Consecutive El Niños are happening more often and the result is more devastating – new research

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Zhengyao Lu, Researcher in Physical Geography, Lund University

    El Niño, a climate troublemaker, has long been one of the largest drivers of variability in the global climate. Every few years, the tropical eastern Pacific Ocean seesaws between warm (El Niño) and cold (La Niña) phases. This reshuffles rainfall patterns, unleashing floods, droughts and storms thousands of miles from the Pacific origin.

    The 1997-98 and 2015-16 El Niño events, for instance, brought catastrophic flooding to the eastern Pacific while plunging Africa, Australia and southeast Asia into severe droughts.

    These disruptions don’t just alter weather, but devastate crops, collapse fisheries, bleach coral reefs, fuel wildfires, and threaten human health. The 1997-98 El Niño alone caused an estimated US$5.7 trillion (£4.4 trillion) in global income losses.

    Now, something more alarming is unfolding: both El Niño and La Niña are lingering longer than ever before, which is amplifying their destructive potential.

    Traditionally, El Niño events lasted about a year, alternating with La Niña in an irregular cycle every two to seven years.

    And normally when an El Niño or La Niña event ends, the disturbance to global weather patterns gradually subsides. But when these anomalies persist or re-emerge, the damage compounds and complicates recovery efforts. For instance, a single-year El Niño-driven drought can challenge agricultural systems, but consecutive years of drought could overwhelm them.

    In recent decades, these climate patterns have been persisting longer and recurring more often. A striking example is the 2020-2023 La Niña, a rare “triple-dip” event that lasted for three years. Rather than returning to neutral conditions, these anomalies are prolonging devastation and making recovery increasingly difficult.

    In a recent study, my colleagues and I revealed that multi-year Enso (El Niño-southern oscillation, or both warm El Niño and cold La Niña) events have been steadily increasing over the past 7,000 years, and are now more frequent than ever. This is due to a fundamental shift in Earth’s climate system.

    Clear proof of this shift comes from ancient corals in the central Pacific. These fossilised time capsules preserve a climate record stretching back thousands of years. By analysing oxygen isotopes in their skeletons, scientists can reconstruct past ocean temperatures and Enso activity.

    What we’ve found is remarkable: in the early Holocene (7,000 years ago), single-year Enso events were the norm. But over time, multi-year events have become five times more common.

    To confirm this, we turned to sophisticated computer simulations that replicate Earth’s climate system. The latest advancements in these global climate models allow us to simulate Enso dynamics stretching back hundreds of millions of years, across vastly different climate conditions and continental arrangements.

    In our study, we used a group of models contributed by international research teams to track Enso evolution over millennia, incorporating factors such as ocean circulation, atmospheric conditions, vegetation changes and solar radiation. The results align with coral records: Enso events have grown more prolonged over time.

    Look at the graphs below. On the left are black circles which represent fossilised coral slice records (bigger circles contain data for longer periods). The increasing trend (blue dashed line) shows the ratio of multi-year Enso events to single-year events increasing over the past 7,000 years (a ratio of 0.5 means one multi-year Enso event for every two single-year events). On the right, climate model simulations also show this ratio increasing.

    The increasing trend (blue dashed lines) of mult-year ENSO occurrence over the last 7,000 years. Ancient coral reconstructions on the left, climate model simulations on the right.
    Lu et al. (2025)/Nature

    The role of Earth’s orbit and humans

    This trend of Enso events lasting longer started gradually in the Holocene and is linked to changes in the Pacific Ocean’s thermocline, which is the boundary between warm surface waters and cooler deep waters. Over millennia, the tropical Pacific’s thermocline has become shallower and more stratified, enabling more efficient interaction between the atmosphere and ocean that allow El Niño and La Niña events to persist for longer.

    The primary driver of this stratification has been the slow change in Earth’s orbit, which alters the distribution of solar energy our planet receives. These orbital variations have subtly influenced upper ocean temperatures in the tropical Pacific, nudging Enso towards longer phases. This slow process has unfolded naturally, but now there’s a new and powerful force accelerating it: human-driven climate change.

    Greenhouse gas emissions, predominantly from burning fossil fuels, are turbocharging this trend. The extra heat trapped in the atmosphere and ocean is making conditions even more favourable for persistent Enso events, and possibly more intense. What was once a slow, natural evolution is now accelerating at an alarming rate. Unlike past climate shifts, this one is happening in our lifetimes, with consequences we can already see.

    The implications are staggering. If Enso events keep lasting longer, we can expect more frequent and prolonged droughts, heatwaves, wildfires, floods and back-to-back intense hurricane seasons driven by multi-year Enso. Agriculture, fisheries, water supplies and disaster response systems will face increasing strain. Coastal cities, already struggling with rising seas, could face even more destructive storm surges fuelled by extended El Niño conditions.

    This is less a scientific puzzle than a growing crisis. While we can’t change Earth’s orbit, we can cut carbon emissions, strengthen climate resilience efforts and prepare for more persistent extreme weather. The science is clear: El Niño and La Niña are sticking around longer, and their consequences will be felt across the globe. The time to act is now, before the next multi-year Enso shockwave hits.

    Don’t have time to read about climate change as much as you’d like?

    Get a weekly roundup in your inbox instead. Every Wednesday, The Conversation’s environment editor writes Imagine, a short email that goes a little deeper into just one climate issue. Join the 40,000+ readers who’ve subscribed so far.

    Zhengyao Lu receives funding from the Swedish Research Council, FORMAS and the Crafoord Foundation.

    – ref. Consecutive El Niños are happening more often and the result is more devastating – new research – https://theconversation.com/consecutive-el-ninos-are-happening-more-often-and-the-result-is-more-devastating-new-research-251504

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: As Israel begins another assault in Gaza, Netanyahu is fighting his own war against the country’s legal system

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Leonie Fleischmann, Senior Lecturer in International Politics, City St George’s, University of London

    The Israel Defense Forces has launched a further major ground assault in Gaza – this time with the intention of taking and holding significant amounts of territory as a “security buffer”. This appears unlikely to endear the prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, to many of the families of the remaining 59 Hamas hostages, who may well fear the worst for their loved ones.

    It’s a high-risk strategy on Netanyahu’s part. But the prime minister is already walking a political tightrope as he simultaneously attempts to bend his country’s legal system to his will.

    Thousands of Israelis have taken to the streets to protest the prime minister’s recent attempts to bring the country’s supreme court under government control. The saga started when he sacked the country’s most important spy chief, the head of Shin Bet, Ronen Bar, in mid-March.

    This was the first time a government had dismissed a serving head of Shin Bet, and the supreme court stepped in to freeze the order until it had the chance to hear opposition objections.

    The attorney-general, Gali Baharav-Miara, a vocal critic of Netanyahu, accused the prime minister of ignoring the law. This led the government to pass a no-confidence motion in her as well.

    Israel’s parliament, the Knesset, subsequently passed a law which would give the government the power to appoint new members of the supreme court.

    The move was criticised by the Israel Democracy Institute, which described the new law as a “broader shift toward subordinating legal and security institutions to political authority” in Israel. It certainly has the potential to undermine the country’s system of checks and balances which – as in many western democracies – rests largely on the separation of powers.

    Israel does not have a single written constitution. What it has is a set of “Basic Laws” which provide the rules of governance. Within these are checks and balances, which aim to prevent any one institution or individual from exercising untrammelled control. Putting the make-up of the supreme court into the hands of the government would threaten this basic democratic principle on which Israel has always operated.

    On March 19, Netanyahu posted on X from the prime ministerial account: “In America and Israel, when a strong right-wing leader wins, the leftist Deep State weaponizes the justice system to thwart the people’s will. They won’t win in either place!” He later removed the post and reposted the same thing from his personal account.

    The post linked his efforts to control the judiciary with the Trump administration’s loudly voiced campaign against state barriers to its power.

    But anyone who has followed Netanyahu’s decision-making in recent years will discern a pattern. Since being charged with bribery, fraud and breach of trust in 2019 (which he denies) he has done anything he can to try to gain control of the country’s judiciary – for his own political preservation.

    Netanyahu’s motivations

    At the same time, many critics believe Netanyahu’s conduct of the war in Gaza had been with one eye to prolonging hostilities to delay proceedings in his own trials. Now it appears that the Israeli prime minister is attempting a frontal assault on Israel’s judiciary.

    His decision to sack Bar came as the Shin Bet chief was supervising an investigation into allegations concerning, as he put it in a letter to the cabinet before his sacking: “Qatar’s involvement at the highest levels of Israeli decision-making, including the Prime Minister’s Office.”

    Equally questionable is the attempted ousting of Attorney-General Baharav-Miara, who is overseeing the criminal case against him. Replacing them with more compliant and loyal individuals would help ensure that Netanyahu and the policies of his government are protected.

    All of this drew a strong response from the former consul general of Israel in New York, Alon Pinkas. Writing in the opposition paper Haaretz on March 21, Pinkas argued that Israeli “democracy’s guardrails” are being brought “crashing down fast and furious by Netanyahu’s design”.

    He concluded that the only two remaining checks on Netanyahu’s power are “the supreme court and the Israeli public” – adding that the court can only act when it is permitted. “So the Israeli public becomes the only potentially effective check.”

    An active civil society is an important marker of democracy and my research shows that Israel has a strong history of protest and extra-parliamentary action across a range of social, economic and political issues.

    There has been a continuous stream of anti-Netanyahu protests in Israel since the “black flag protests” in 2020 in opposition to Netanyahu’s continuing in power despite facing serious criminal charges. The protests grew ever stronger, despite COVID safeguarding regulations.

    When the government attempted wide-ranging reforms which many critics feared would fundamentally weaken the independence of the judiciary, hundreds of thousands took to the streets weekend after weekend, forcing the government eventually to shelve its plans.



    Read more:
    Israel protests: Netanyahu delays judicial reforms over fears of ‘civil war’ – but deep fault-lines threaten future of democracy

    Since the start of the war in Gaza, the political focus of protests shifted to broad consensus in calling the government to do everything in its power to ensure the release of the October 7 hostages. Now the protests will focus more centrally back on the considerable public discontent with the prime minister himself.

    It remains to be seen, now, whether Alon Pinkas is right and whether the Israeli public can be an effective check against a leader who appears now to be governing solely in his own interests.

    Leonie Fleischmann 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. As Israel begins another assault in Gaza, Netanyahu is fighting his own war against the country’s legal system – https://theconversation.com/as-israel-begins-another-assault-in-gaza-netanyahu-is-fighting-his-own-war-against-the-countrys-legal-system-253568

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Would you join the resistance if stuck in an authoritarian regime? Here’s the psychology

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Magnus Linden, Associate Professor of Psychology, Lund University

    Female activist protesting with megaphone during a strike with group of demonstrator in background. Jacob Lund/Shuttestock

    Most of us like to believe we would have opposed the rise of Nazism in 1930s Germany. We may even like to imagine that we would have bravely fought for the resistance to Nazism in the 1940s. But would we? Our ability to take a stand may be put to the test as authoritarianism is increasing worldwide.

    All electoral democracies can transform into autocracies. These are governments that restrict political and civil rights, centralise executive power, manipulate elections and minimise the diversity of political views.

    In western democracies, a move toward autocracy is often led by would-be strongmen whose focus is to reinstate traditionalist values and nationalism. They typically target the free media, opponents and stigmatised social groups without moral compunction.

    Moves to deepen autocracy are always resisted, however. Depending on how autocratic a country is, this resistance will differ. Early in the autocratisation process, resistance is common within formal state institutions. It may be expressed in overt actions, including public statements condemning government actions.

    In closed autocracies, however, resistance is exercised more by covert social movements. One reason for this is the personal risk connected to resistance. In Vladimir Putin´s autocratic Russia, for example, political dissenters know they risk being either murdered or imprisoned if they’re caught.

    In the United States, on the other hand, where the new administration has taken steps that increase the level of autocracy, dissonant views may effectively be silenced because of fear of retribution. Many people are scared of losing their jobs or having their companies harmed.

    Psychological profile

    The science about the choices made by those who resist autocratic regimes, and the strategies they apply in resisting, is evolving.

    Interviews with resisters in Myanmar suggest that personal moral commitments, being compassionate and feeling compelled to act when witnessing violations of rights, are all factors motivating resistance.

    These factors are also evident in those who helped Jews survive during the Holocaust. For example, studies suggest that rescuers were more empathic and morally conscious than others. They had essentially been socialised into being ethical in childhood and were also more inclusive of people from other social groups.

    People who join resistance groups also tend to be more open to taking risks. That makes sense: the more driven you are by a need to feel safe, the less likely you are to engage in anything that could jeopardise that – even if your moral compass suggests you should.

    Beyond resisting autocratic steps, research on moral courage in everyday settings shows that believing you can succeed, that you have the necessary knowledge and skills, is an important predictor for intervention when people witness norm violations, whether this means addressing a perpetrator or protecting a victim.

    Leadership characteristics

    That said, it’s not all down to individual followers. No autocratic leader can gain power without influencing their followers. The same is true of resistance: resistance cannot exist without effective leadership.

    Research suggests that followers are influenced by leaders who create a positive ethical climate, which in turn influences their own ethical behaviour.

    For fighting autocracy, one important aspect of this process is to communicate that inclusive moral values, such as universalism (the idea that things like liberty, justice, fraternity and equality should apply to everyone) and benevolence (helping, forgiving, being responsible) are a prominent part of the group’s identity.

    Members of the French resistance group Maquis in La Tresorerie, September 14 1944, Boulogne.

    For example, when the Danish Jews were persecuted by the Nazis in 1943, representatives of morally-grounded institutions, including bodies representing the Protestant clergy and hospital physicians, started to actively resist the regime. They became effective leaders as they were already in jobs perceived to be morally “committed”, and people trusted their judgement.

    Research on nonviolent resistance also shows that strong resistance organisations, and their leaders, tend to embrace diversity among people. And when they are successful, they often include the pillars in society that have the power to disrupt, such as military forces or economic elites.

    Research on the underground railroad, the network of activists helping enslaved people escape to the northern states in America or Canada, has shown that influential church leaders played a crucial role. They refused to follow federal legislation that obliged them to help slave owners capture enslaved people that had escaped.

    Knowing that ethical role models are taking a stand is important for a resistance movement’s followers. Stanley Milgram gave evidence for this in his much-debated psychological obedience studies, showing that 90% of the participants who had been asked to give others electrical shocks stopped immediately if two assistant teachers stopped first.

    Building resistance

    In a world where autocracy is on the rise, how can we foster traits in people that promote appropriate forms of resistance?

    Teaching others about morally courageous figures can work, but heroism is not the key for all learners. The science suggests a number of other – perhaps surprising – objectives which can move ordinary people to stand up for democracy. In particular, educational initiatives that boost contact between different groups may be useful.

    To be able to resist autocratic regimes, and help people who are persecuted under them, we ultimately need empathy for people who are different to ourselves. There’s plenty of research showing that white people who move to more diverse areas, within cities, for example, become less racist.

    So perhaps the more time we spend with people who are unlike us, the more we are growing our potential as resistance fighters.

    We may also want to boost our self-efficacy, or self-confidence. One technique is to repeatedly expose ourselves to situations that evoke fear, but which force us to act courageously, such as standing up to bullies. This is a crucial part of ethical police training, for example.

    Learning about moral values can also help build confidence. Educators who are given the challenge to teach good moral behaviour can do this effectively by focusing on universal principles – rather than those that are based on culture or social class – such as treating others how we wish to be treated.

    These are building blocks for a group identity which favours empathy with all and expectations of good behaviour.

    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. Would you join the resistance if stuck in an authoritarian regime? Here’s the psychology – https://theconversation.com/would-you-join-the-resistance-if-stuck-in-an-authoritarian-regime-heres-the-psychology-252533

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: ‘Doom loops’ are accelerating climate change – but we can break them

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Jack Marley, Environment + Energy Editor, UK edition

    Surasak Jailak/Shutterstock

    Vicious cycles are accelerating climate change. One is happening at the north pole, where rising temperatures caused by record levels of fossil fuel combustion are melting more and more sea ice.

    Indeed, the extent of Arctic winter sea ice in March 2025 was the lowest ever recorded. This decline in sea ice means the Earth reflects less of the Sun’s energy back into space. So, more climate change leads to less sea ice – and more climate change.

    Human behaviour is not immune to this dynamic either, according to a recent report by the International Energy Agency (IEA). It identified another troubling feedback loop: demand for coal rose 1% globally in 2024 off the back of intense heatwaves in China and India, which spurred a frenzy for air-conditioners and excess fuel to power them.

    The need to cool ourselves, and briefly escape the consequences of climate change, is driving more climate change. Thankfully, there are ways to break these cycles and form greener habits. Today, we’ll look at one in particular.

    This roundup of The Conversation’s climate coverage comes from our award-winning weekly climate action newsletter. Every Wednesday, The Conversation’s environment editor writes Imagine, a short email that goes a little deeper into just one climate issue. Join the 40,000+ readers who’ve subscribed.

    The Sun can cool you down

    “As the climate crisis deepens, close to half of the world’s people have little defence against deadly heat,” says Radhika Khosla, an associate professor of urban sustainability at the University of Oxford.



    Read more:
    COP28: countries have pledged to cut emissions from cooling – here’s how to make it happen

    “At the same time, energy demand from cooling – by those who can afford it – could more than double by 2050.”

    If wealthy countries paid the enormous climate finance debt they owe the developing world, it could help finance the closing of this gap. And thankfully, advancements in renewable energy technology mean no one should need to contribute to a spike in fossil fuel use just to keep cool.



    Read more:
    Wealthy nations owe climate debt to Africa – funds that could help cities grow

    “The absurdity of resorting to coal to power air conditioners … is difficult to miss”, say a team of engineers and energy experts at Nottingham Trent University and Coventry University, led by Tom Rogers. They recommend rooftop solar panels instead, which can soak up sunshine during heatwaves and turn it into electricity for air-conditioning units.

    “Rooftop solar can also reduce demand for cooling by keeping buildings in the shade,” the team say. “A study conducted by Arizona State University found that even a modest group of solar panels that shade about half a roof can lead to anything from 2% to 13% reduction in cooling demand, depending on factors such as location, roof type and insulation levels.”



    Read more:
    Rising temperatures mean more air conditioning which means more electricity is needed – rooftop solar is a perfect fit

    Of course, solar panels are less helpful for powering air conditioners in the evening, when lots of people turn them on after work or school.

    “Researchers in Australia have proposed a clever solution to address this imbalance, by programming air-conditioning units to work in tandem with solar systems to pre-cool buildings before people arrive home,” Rogers and his colleagues add.

    There is huge untapped potential for generating electricity from rooftop solar – even in the dreary UK. It could ensure that future heatwaves are a boon for solar energy, not coal power.

    “Consider the possibilities for Nottingham and Coventry, two cities in England’s Midlands where we work,” they say.

    “If Nottingham were to maximise its rooftop potential, all those panels could generate nearly 500 megawatts (MW) of electricity, about the same as a medium-sized gas power plant. Coventry has greater potential, with 700MW.

    “These capacities would equate to nearly one-third of Nottingham’s electricity demand and almost half of Coventry’s – from their rooftops alone.”

    Doom loops

    Installing solar panels on top of buildings worldwide will need massive investment in equipment and training. It will require new means of incentivising the uptake of this technology and, as mentioned earlier, the redistribution of wealth to allow low-emitting but highly vulnerable nations to make the switch.

    But there are likely to be virtuous cycles as well as vicious ones. Once a certain threshold has been crossed, like the price and capacity of batteries or the number of homes with heat pumps installed, “a domino effect of rapid changes” takes effect such that green alternatives swiftly become the established norm.



    Read more:
    Climate ‘tipping points’ can be positive too – our report sets out how to engineer a domino effect of rapid changes

    However, the prospect of harmonising these efforts across borders butts against a trend moving in the opposite direction. As the world warms, relations between nations are becoming more fraught and war, trade tensions and internal strife are obscuring the universal threat of climate change.

    A Trump yard sign during the 2024 election campaign.
    Dlbillings_Photography/Shutterstock

    Climate risk expert Laurie Laybourn and earth system scientist James Dyke, both at the University of Exeter, say that extreme weather in 2022 caused crop failures that made food more expensive and stoked headline inflation rates. Climate-sceptic Donald Trump made hay with these high prices in the 2024 US election.

    “The risk is that this ‘doom loop’ runs faster and faster and ultimately derails our ability to phase out fossil fuels fast enough to avoid the worst climate consequences,” they say.



    Read more:
    A ‘doom loop’ of climate change and geopolitical instability is beginning

    However, Laybourn and Dyke are not wholly pessimistic. History shows that periods of instability and crisis like the one we are living through also provide fertile ground for positive change, they argue, and the chance to accelerate virtuous circles.

    “For example, out of the crises of the interwar period and the devastation of the second world war came legal protections for human rights, universal welfare systems and decolonisation.”

    – ref. ‘Doom loops’ are accelerating climate change – but we can break them – https://theconversation.com/doom-loops-are-accelerating-climate-change-but-we-can-break-them-253457

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –