FSI's Center for Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law (CDDRL) is pleased to announce the launch of a new research project entitled, "Promoting Popular Sovereignty in Statebuilding," to be conducted during the 2010-11 academic year.  Led by Ben Rowswell, a Canadian diplomat currently on leave as a Visiting Scholar at CDDRL, the project will draw on lessons from Afghanistan, Iraq and other countries recovering from conflict. Funding has been generously provided by the Canadian Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade through the Global Peace and Security Fund.

Through a practitioner's lens, this project will develop a new approach to statebuilding that focuses on the local population and the need to foster accountability from those who exercise power over it-both state institutions and their sources of international support. It will examine constraints to effective statebuilding, particularly the emphasis placed on national sovereignty and the rush to transition. The final output of this research will be a volume for publication that will inform policy and programming approaches that help statebuilding efforts generate lasting stability.

A highlight of this project will be a two-day symposium held at CDDRL on February 25 and 26, 2011.  This event will bring Afghan officials, diplomats, the military, academia and non-governmental organizations to Stanford University to exchange experiences, review lessons and test conclusions suggested by the research. 

"It would be hard to find a more experienced, principled, and yet pragmatic practitioner than Ben Rowswell to lead this effort," said CDDRL Director Larry Diamond.  "Ever since I met him in Iraq in 2004, I have been deeply impressed with Ben's intellect, humanity, and operational ability."

Rowswell's experience in statebuilding spans three conflicts, from Somalia (1993) to Iraq (2003-05) and most recently Afghanistan (2008-10).  From 2009 to 2010, Rowswell served as Representative of Canada in Kandahar, at the heart of the Afghan conflict. In this position he directed the Kandahar Provincial Reconstruction Team, leading more than 100 American and Canadian diplomats, aid workers, civilian police and other experts. Prior to that, he served as Deputy Head of Mission of Canada's embassy in Kabul.

In 1998, in the twilight of the 20th century, the resignation of Indonesia's autocratic president Suharto ushered in a new political era. Corresponding changes occurred in Indonesia's economic, social, and cultural landscape. That transformation challenged and transformed the thinking of many Indonesians. One of them was Dr. Dino Patti Djalal, who recently became his country's ambassador to the United States. "I entered the twenty-first century with a new mindset," said Djalal to an overflow audience at the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center (Shorenstein APARC) on November 18, 2010.

As the son of a renowned Indonesian diplomat, Djalal spent much of his youth and early adulthood abroad. He attended high school in the United States and college in Canada, and went on to earn his doctorate from the London School of Economics and Political Science. Djalal's diverse professional talents and experience encompass writing, politics, and film production. Passionate about inspiring and empowering young Indonesians, Djalal founded Modernisator, a youth leadership movement in Indonesia. Before becoming ambassador to the United States in September 2010, he served on the staff of Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono as a spokesperson and special adviser on foreign affairs.

Djalal's speech at Shorenstein APARC featured his top eight personal beliefs about the 21st century. His remarks were a mixture of optimism and wonder tempered by caution. This new century in Djalal's eyes promises great progress and opportunity, in contrast to the 20th century, which he called "probably the bloodiest century ever in human history." Looking forward, he spoke of an "explosion of creativity," the growth of emerging and developing economies, and major advances in technology. The power to eradicate poverty and to achieve world harmony is within our grasp, he argued, provided countries are willing to be open to new ideas and to embrace progress and change.

The last century, Djalal noted, saw the fall and fragmentation of empires and the birth of many new states. Looking ahead, he did not foresee great changes in the world's geopolitical map. He hoped that world leaders would not promote a further proliferation of new countries, which would increase rivalry and instability. Instead the goal should be unification, as in the case of the Korean Peninsula. He spoke optimistically of the trend whereby existing countries such as Indonesia manage to "proliferise," or acquire new and greater global relevance, and advocated a "geopolitics of cooperation" among larger and smaller countries, as in the Group of 20.

Djalal stressed the need for rapid innovation and ongoing social, economic, and educational change. A nation that wants to succeed in the 21st century must be open and adaptable. Analysts once thought that major changes could only unfold over several generations, but now, Djalal argued, dramatic change can occur in the span of a single generation. In addition to developing open and progressive political thinking, said Djalal, good governance is essential if the world is to enjoy stability and prosperity in this century. Having a democratic government does not automatically ensure good governance, he argued. Political leaders must strive to build strong, accountable institutions that emphasize positive outcomes in key sectors such as health, education, and entrepreneurship.

Addressing the younger generation, Djalal said, "skill is your best currency" in the present century. Individuals, empowered by education and technology, are now free to make their way in the world based on their own talents. He recalled that in an earlier era in Indonesia, as in many other parts of the world, access to information was limited by social status, wealth, and gender. More than any other factor, according to Djalal, technology is the "most important driver of change." It is the small, innovative technologies such as cell phones and online banking that will most change the world, provided we learn "how to adopt it without destroying the human soul."

Globalization is here to stay, Djalal argued, so it is crucial to "embrace it intelligently." Indonesia is a large country. But rather than rely on superior physical size, Indonesia and other large countries must climb the global ranks on less tangible dimensions such as education, including the skill sets needed to develop their economies. While being open to engaging with the rest of the world, he added, countries must also cultivate a strong sense of national identity.

Djalal closed on a high and provocative note, suggesting that the free, innovative, and global nature of the current century provides the means for young people today to become "potentially the best generation of all previous generations." How then should we proceed, as individuals and as countries, to realize that bright future? Djalal left that question hanging in the air for his audience to consider and to answer.

FSE director Rosamond L. Naylor is among a talented group of advisors in Spain for the annual meeting of the Advisory Committee of the Pew Fellows Program in Marine Conservation. The Advisory Committee of the Pew Fellows Program in Marine Conservation featured in the photograph above from left to right:

• Ellen Pikitch, Executive Director of the Institute for Ocean Conservation Science, School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences, Stony Brook University
  
• Michael Lodge, Legal Counsel, International Seabed Authority, Jamaica
  
• Meryl Williams, Director, Fish-Watch Asia Pacific, Australia
  
• Larry Crowder, Professor of Marine Biology, Duke University
  
• Stephen Roady (kneeling), Attorney, Earthjustice, Washington DC
  
• Callum Roberts, Professor of Marine Conservation, University of York, UK
  
• Peter Tyedmers, School for Resource and Environmental Studies, Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada
  
• Pablo Marquet, Professor of Ecology, Catholic University, Chile

In spring 2009, the Forum on Contemporary Europe (FCE) and the Division on Languages, Civilizations and Literatures (DLCL) delivered the first part of its multi-year research and public policy program on Contemporary History and the Future of Memory.  The program explored how communities that have undergone deep and violent political transformations try to confront their past.

Despite vast geographical, cultural and situational differences, the search for post-conflict justice and reconciliation has become a global phenomenon, resulting in many institutional and expressive responses. Some of these are literary and aesthetic explorations about guilt, commemoration and memorialization deployed for reconciliation and reinvention.  Others, especially in communities where victims and perpetrators live in close proximity, have led to trials, truth commissions, lustration, and institutional reform. This series illuminates these various approaches, seeking to foster new thinking and new strategies for communities seeking to move beyond atrocity.

Part 1: Contemporary History and the Future of Memory

In 2008-2009, this multi-year project on “History and Memory” at FCE and DLCL was launched with two high profile conference and speaker series: “Contemporary History and the Future of Memory” and “Austria and Central Europe Since 1989.”  For the first series on Contemporary History, the Forum, along with four co-sponsors (the Division of Literatures, Civilizations, and Languages, principal co-sponsor; the department of English; The Center for African Studies; Modern Thought and Literature; the Stanford Humanities Center), hosted internationally distinguished senior scholars to deliver lectures, student workshops, and the final symposium with Stanford faculty respondents.

Part 2: History, Memory and Reconciliation

In 2009-2010, we launch part 2 of this project by adding “Reconciliation” to our mission.  We are pleased to welcome the Human Rights Program at the Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law as co-sponsor of this series.  This series will examine scholarly and institutional efforts to create new national narratives that walk the fine line between before and after, memory and truth, compensation and reconciliation, justice and peace. Some work examines communities ravaged by colonialism and the great harm that colonial and post-colonial economic and social disparities cause.   The extent of external intervention creates discontinuities and dislocation, making it harder for people to claim an historical narrative that feels fully authentic.  Another response is to set up truth-seeking institutions such as truth commissions. Historical examples of truth commissions in South Africa, Peru, Chile, Argentina, Morocco inform more current initiatives in Canada, Cambodia, Colombia, Kenya, and the United States.  While this range of economic, social, political and legal modalities all seek to explain difficult pasts to present communities, it is not yet clear which approach yields greater truth, friendship, reconciliation and community healing.  The FCE series “History, Memory, and Reconciliation” will explore these issues.

The series will have its first event in February 2010. Multiple international scholars are invited.  Publications, speaker details, and pod and video casts will be accessible via the new FSI/FCE, DLCL, and Human Rights Program websites.

Series coordinators:

• Elisabeth Mudimbe-Boyi
• Helen Stacy
• Saikat Majumdar
• Roland Hsu

In early spring, historic health reform passes, extending insurance to millions of uninsured. Despite problems with workplace-based coverage, controversy over government subsidies for insurance premiums, and disparities across a large and diverse nation, dramatic shift to a single-payer system was seen as impractical.

Instead, reforms focus on expanding current social insurance programs as well as new initiatives to cover the uninsured, improve quality, and control spending. They provide a basic floor, subsidized for the poorest, but preserve consumer freedom to choose in health care. No government body dictates choice of doctor or hospital; investor-owned and private not-for-profits compete alongside government-run providers like community health centers and rural hospitals.

Left to be addressed in later phases are the difficult questions of how to slow the relentless pace of health care spending increases -- driven in part by technological change and population aging, but also perverse incentives embedded in fee-for-service payment and fragmented delivery. Pushed through despite multiple crises confronting the leadership, the final landmark health reform works in conjunction with measures enacted as part of the fiscal stimulus package to strengthen the healthcare system. Some provisions take effect immediately; others will take many years to unfold.

President Obama’s triumph on his top domestic priority? Actually, there were no votes along partisan lines, no controversy over abortion. I am describing health reform in China, which was announced almost exactly a year ago.

We do not hear much about the parallels in the US and Chinese social policy. But we cannot fully understand each other if we ignore these commonalities. We do not hear much about those who, in both societies, have been rendered destitute merely because they or a family member became sick or injured in a system with a social safety net full of gaping holes.

It will surprise many Americans to know that government financing as a share of total health spending was lower in socialist China over the last decade than in the United States. Now China has pledged about US$124 billion over 3 years to expand basic health insurance, strengthen public health and primary care, and reform public hospitals.

In China, the injustice of differential access to life-saving healthcare had sparked cases of social unrest. The April 2009 reform announcement was the culmination of years of post-SARS (2003) soul searching for a healthcare system befitting China’s dynamically transforming society. Special interests block change. (Sound familiar?) The CPC Central Committee and the State Council acknowledge that successful health reform will be “an arduous and long-term task”.  

If the US can pass sweeping health reform despite an unprecedented financial crisis, and China can envision universal health coverage for 1.3 billion while “getting old before getting rich,” then together we should be able to look past our many differences to focus on our common interests. Our two proud nations must work together to confront numerous challenges, such as upholding regional stability (e.g. on the Korean peninsula); redressing global economic imbalances (increasing health insurance can help spur China towards more domestic consumption); and investing in “green tech” for a warming planet and “grey tech” for an aging society.

* * *

When searching for insights about how other countries deal with similar challenges, Americans often look to Europe and Canada. Rarer is the comparison to counterparts across the Pacific. Yet President Obama has clearly articulated the vision of the US as a Pacific Nation, and there are developments around the Pacific Rim that merit consideration in our debates.  

Australia pioneered cost-effectiveness in health care purchasing, while the US continues to debate whether cost should be part of comparative effectiveness research and policy decisions.

Both Japan and South Korea, like Germany, have enacted long term care insurance to smooth the transition to an aging society. Their experiences might be fruitful as we implement the first national government-run long-term care insurance program, a little-heralded component of the newly passed legislation (and a fitting legacy of Senator Edward Kennedy).

Japan and Singapore provide universal coverage to older populations than ours with health systems that, although surprisingly different from each other in terms of public financing and role of market forces, both ranked among the best in the world -- and far higher than the US -- in the World Health Organization’s ranking of health systems in the year 2000. Although one may quibble with the ranking, it is indisputable that Japan spends a much smaller share of GDP on healthcare than the US does, despite being one of the oldest and longest-lived societies in the history of the world and having (like the US) a fee-for-service payment system.

Japan and South Korea are also democracies, where health policies occasionally engender heated debates. In South Korea, physicians went on nationwide strike three times to oppose the separation of prescribing from dispensing. Although Japan’s incremental reforms rarely spur such drama, the passions aroused by end-of-life care – embodied in the bizarre “death panels” controversy in the US health reform debate of 2009 – has its counterpart in the bitter nickname for Japan’s separate insurance plan for the oldest old: “hurry-up-and-die” insurance.

Yet Japan, Singapore, and Hong Kong all offer health systems that provide reasonable risk protection and quality of care for populations older than ours, with a diverse range of government and market roles in financing and delivery, while spending far less per capita than the US.

No system has all the answers. But the US and our neighbors across the vast Pacific have a common interest in sharing what we’ve found that works for health reform. Despite divergence in our political and economic systems, we all value long, healthy lives for ourselves and our children -- and we’re united in health reforms that try to further that goal.

This annual award, which carries a cash prize of $10,000, honors a journalist not only for a distinguished body of work, but also for the particular way that work has helped American readers to understand the complexities of Asia. It is awarded jointly by the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Center at Stanford University, and the Shorenstein Center on Press, Politics, and Public Policy at Harvard University, part of the Kennedy School of Government. Events have been hosted alternately at both centers.

Barbara Crossette serves as United Nations correspondent for The Nation and is a freelance writer on foreign policy and international affairs. Her articles and essays have appeared periodically in World Policy Journal, published at the New School University in New York. "Will John Bolton Ruin the UN?" an article published in Foreign Policy, in the July/August 2006, presaged the campaign that led to the resignation of the ambassador.

Crossette was the New York Times bureau chief at the United Nations from 1994 to 2001. She was earlier a Times chief correspondent in Southeast Asia and South Asia and a diplomatic reporter in Washington. She has also reported from Central America, the Caribbean, and Canada, and been deputy foreign editor and senior editor in charge of the Times' weekend news operations. Before joining newspaper paper in 1973, Crossette worked for The Evening and Sunday Bulletin in Philadelphia and The Birmingham Post in Birmingham, England.

She is the author of several books on Asia, including So Close to Heaven: The Vanishing Buddhist Kingdoms of the Himalayas (1995) and The Great Hill Stations of Asia (1998). The latter was a New York Times notable book of the year in 1998. In 2000, Crossette wrote a survey of India and Indian-American relations, India: Old Civilization in a New World, for the Foreign Policy Association in New York. She is also the author of India Facing the 21st Century (1993). Most recently she was a co-author with George Perkovich of a section on India in the 2009 book Powers and Principles: International Leadership in a Shrinking World.

In 1999, Crossette received the Business Council of the United Nations' Korn Ferry Award for outstanding reporting on the organization, and in 2003 the United Nations Correspondents' Association's lifetime achievement award. In 2008, she was awarded a Fulbright prize for her contributions to international understanding.

Crossette has taught journalism, politics, and international affairs at a broad range of institutions, including the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, Punjab University, Princeton University, Bard College, and the Royal University of Phnom Penh. In 2004 and 2005 she also worked with journalists in Brazil as a Knight International Press Fellow.

Born in Philadelphia, Crossette received a BA in history and political science from Muhlenberg College. She is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and the Women's Foreign Policy Group.