The novel coronavirus (COVID-19) is a global public health disaster of almost biblical proportions. It is a once-in-a-century occurrence that threatens to destroy countless lives, ruin economies, and stress national and international institutions to their breaking point. And, even after the virus recedes, the geopolitical wreckage it leaves in its wake could be profound.

Many have understandably drawn comparisons to the influenza pandemic of 1918 and 1919. That pandemic, which began in the final months of World War I, may have infected 500 million people and killed 50 million people around the globe. As the grim toll of COVID-19 mounts, it remains to be seen if that comparison will prove apt in terms of the human cost.

But, if we want to understand the even darker direction in which the world may be headed, leaders and policymakers ought to pay more attention to the two decades after the influenza pandemic swept the globe. This period, often referred to as the interwar years, was characterized by rising nationalism and xenophobia, the grinding halt of globalization in favor of beggar-thy-neighbor policies, and the collapse of the world economy in the Great Depression. Revolution, civil war, and political instability rocked important nations. The world’s reigning liberal hegemon — Great Britain — struggled and other democracies buckled while rising authoritarian states sought to aggressively reshape the international order in accordance with their interests and values. Arms races, imperial competition, and territorial aggression ensued, culminating in World War II — the greatest calamity in modern times.

In the United States, the interwar years also saw the emergence of the “America First” movement. Hundreds of thousands rallied to the cause of the America First Committee, pressing U.S. leaders to seek the false security of isolationism as the world burned around them. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt pushed back, arguing that rising global interdependence meant no nation — not even one as powerful and geographically distant as the United States — could wall itself off from growing dangers overseas. His warning proved prescient. The war eventually came to America’s shores in the form of the attack on Pearl Harbor.

Even before COVID-19, shadows of the interwar years were beginning to re-emerge. The virus, however, has brought these dynamics into sharper relief. And the pandemic seems likely to greatly amplify them as economic and political upheaval follows, great-power rivalry deepens, institutions meant to encourage international cooperation fail, and American leadership falters. In this respect, as Richard Haas notes, the COVID-19 pandemic and the aftershocks it will produce seem poised to “accelerate history,” returning the world to a much more dangerous time.

However, history is not destiny. While COVID-19 worsens or sets in motion events that may increasingly resemble this harrowing past, we are not fated to repeat it. Humans have agency. Our leaders have real choices. The United States remains the world’s most powerful democracy. It has a proud legacy of transformational leaps in human progress, including advances that have eradicated infectious diseases. It is still capable of taking urgent steps to ensure the health, prosperity, and security of millions of Americans while also leading the world to navigate this crisis and build something better in its aftermath. America can fight for a better future. Doing so effectively, however, requires understanding the full scope of the challenges it is likely to face.

Read the rest at War on the Rocks

STANFORD, CA, April 8, 2020  — Stanford University’s Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center (APARC) is pleased to announce that journalist and author Tom Wright is the recipient of the 2020 Shorenstein Journalism Award for excellence in coverage of the Asia-Pacific region. Wright, who over the past twenty-five years has worked mainly in South and Southeast Asia, is the coauthor of the New York Times bestseller Billion Dollar Whale, which unravels the story of one of the world's greatest financial scandals involving the multibillion-dollar looting of the Malaysian sovereign wealth fund 1Malaysia Development Bhd (1MDB). The book builds on Wright’s multiyear investigative reporting for the Wall Street Journal, where he most recently served as Asia economics editor. In the coming fall quarter, Wright will receive the award at a ceremony and headline a panel discussion at Stanford.

Wright started his career with Reuters in Indonesia in the 1990s at a time when Gen. Suharto’s military dictatorship was crumbling. During the Asian financial crisis of 1997-98, he joined Dow Jones Newswires in Bangkok, later moving to the Wall Street Journal. He has investigated corruption in Indian companies, the failure of the U.S.’s civilian aid program for Pakistan, and was one of the first journalists to arrive at the scene of the raid in which Navy SEALs killed Osama bin Laden. His 2013 award-winning series on the Rana Plaza factory disaster in Bangladesh, which killed over 1,000 people, exposed how international garment manufacturers turned a blind eye to safety violations to reduce costs.

In 2015, he began investigations into the 1MDB scandal, one of the largest financial frauds of all time in which bankers at Goldman Sachs helped a young Malaysian financier steal at least $4 billion from Malaysian state fund 1MDB. The three-year investigation revealed the degree to which Western institutions, from Wall Street banks, law firms, auditors, and even Hollywood film companies, ignore malfeasance in the pursuit of profits. Wright’s work sparked investigations by law enforcement and regulators in multiple countries and outrage in Malaysia, where the ruling coalition, after 61 years in power, suffered a landslide defeat in a shocking 2018 election.

“Throughout his career, Tom Wright’s consummate reporting and persistent investigations have repeatedly shone a light on major Asian affairs and the complicity of Western institutions in the affliction of corruption in Asia,” said Gi-Wook Shin, Shorenstein APARC director. “His work embodies an unwavering commitment to the pursuit of truth and to advancing a critical consideration of both Asian and Western societies. We are delighted to recognize him with the Shorenstein Journalism Award.”

Presented annually by APARC, the Shorenstein award, which carries a $10,000 cash prize, honors the legacy of APARC’s benefactor, Mr. Walter H. Shorenstein, and his twin passions for promoting excellence in journalism and understanding of Asia. “We are grateful to the Shorenstein family for its support of our Center and its mission and to the members of the award selection committee for their expertise and service,” noted Shin.

The selection committee for the Shorenstein Journalism Award, which unanimously chose Wright as the 2020 honoree, includes Wendy Cutler, vice president and managing director, Washington, D.C. Office, Asia Society Policy Institute; James Hamilton, Hearst Professor of Communication, chair of the Department of Communication, and director of the Stanford Journalism Program, Stanford University; Raju Narisetti, global publishing director-elect, McKinsey & Company; Philip Pan, weekend editor, former Asia editor, the New York Times; and Prashanth Parameswaran, senior editor, the Diplomat. 

Eighteen journalists have previously received the Shorenstein award, including most recently Maria Ressa, CEO and executive editor of Rappler; Anna Fifield, the Washington Post’s Beijing bureau chief and long-time North Korea watcher; Siddharth Varadarajan, founding editor of the Wire; Ian Johnson, a veteran journalist with a focus on Chinese society, religion, and history; and Yoichi Funabashi, former editor-in-chief of the Asahi Shimbun.

Information about the 2020 Shorenstein Journalism Award ceremony and panel discussion featuring Wright will be forthcoming in the fall quarter.

Find out more at aparc.fsi.stanford.edu/events/shorenstein-journalism-award.

Media Contact:

Noa Ronkin
Associate Director for Communications and External Relations
Shorenstein APARC
noa.ronkin@stanford.edu

In the midst of the damage to public health and the global economy, the COVID-19 crisis could present an unexpected opportunity both to resolve the only hot war in Europe and to address Russian President Vladimir Putin's assault on international norms of behavior.

As the spreading coronavirus and collapsing oil prices weigh increasingly on the Kremlin, the United States and its allies should offer to lift international sanctions against Russia if Putin will end his military incursions into Ukraine. President Trump and Congress can advance America's interests, and the world's, with a bold step to encourage an end to this war. The Trump administration and Congress should seize this opening.

Read the rest at NPR.org.

Ukrainians rode a wild roller coaster in March.  President Volodymyr Zelensky began the month by firing the prime minister and reshuffling the cabinet, prompting concern that oligarchs were reasserting their influence.  COVID-19 and its dire economic implications, however, refocused attention.  At the end of the month, the Rada (Ukraine’s parliament) passed on first reading legislation key to securing low-interest credits from the International Monetary Fund.

Meanwhile, controversy flared over the Donbas.  A March 11 agreement reached by Zelensky’s chief of staff broke a long-standing Ukrainian position by giving status to the so-called Donetsk and Luhansk “people’s republics”—the parts of Ukraine’s eastern region of Donbas occupied by Russian and Russian proxy forces.  It is unclear if Kyiv will go forward with the agreement.

Cabinet Reshuffle

On March 4, Prime Minister Oleksiy Honcharuk resigned at Zelensky’s request.  Honcharuk and his cabinet were widely viewed as inexperienced but honest and pro-reform.  Only in office for six months, Honcharuk’s team did not have time to achieve much of its ambitious agenda.

The new prime minister, Denys Shmyhal, brought little in the way of a national reputation, and the new cabinet lacks the reformist sheen of its predecessor.  Few took Zelensky’s reason for the reshuffle—the cabinet’s supposed ineffectiveness—at face value.  Some speculated that falling approval ratings provided the real motive.  Others wondered whether this signified Zelensky’s shedding the pro-reform, anti-corruption persona that won him the top job in 2019 and feared a return to the country’s unfortunate tradition of quiet government dealings with oligarchs.

Reformers became more depressed on March 5 when Prosecutor General Ruslan Riaboshapka was fired for refusing to investigate Petro Poroshenko, Zelensky’s predecessor.  Riaboshapka had a sterling reputation.  His replacement has never served as a prosecutor, is personally close to Zelensky, and ran on his party’s parliamentary ticket.  Her appointment raises doubts about the independence of the Prosecutor General’s Office.

The timing of the reshuffle—just as Kyiv sought to secure a new $5.5 billion agreement with the IMF—puzzled many.  Departing Finance Minister Oksana Makarova had made significant progress in negotiations with the IMF, but her immediate successor, Ihor Umanskiy, questioned the value of working with the Fund.

Back on Track, at least with IMF?

The newly appointed prime minister spent the month stressing the importance of securing the IMF program.  While he expressed his readiness to travel to Washington to meet the Fund’s leadership, the IMF told Kyiv to first complete two key preconditions.

One was Rada passage of a banking law that would prevent former owners whose banks had been nationalized from regaining ownership.  This targeted oligarch Ihor Kolomoisky, a former owner of PrivatBank.  After a 2016 audit revealed PrivatBank’s accounts were short $5 billion, the government nationalized it and made good the missing funds.  However, Kolomoisky recently suggested legal action to regain ownership or compensation, a deal-breaker for the IMF.

Kolomoisky has a link to the president, as he owns the television network that broadcast the comedy show in which Zelensky played a common man suddenly thrust into the presidency.  How the government handles the ownership of PrivatBank has become a litmus test for Zelensky.

The second issue was Rada passage of an agricultural reform bill that would lift a moratorium on the sale of agricultural land.  Ukraine has 30 percent of the world’s black earth, and the agricultural sector represents a bright spot in the economy.  But the prohibition on land sales denied private farmers the ability to use their land as collateral to secure loans to buy better seed, fertilizer and equipment.

While the Rada debated these measures in March, the rising number of COVID-19 cases and looming economic downturn focused attention on the need for the IMF program.  On March 30, the Rada sacked Umanskiy, replacing him with a new minister with established reform credentials, and replaced the minister of health as well.  It then approved, on first reading, the banking and agricultural land reform laws. 

The Rada has not satisfied the IMF completely, but March closed with Ukraine seemingly on track to secure its IMF program and suggestions that the Fund might make available more than $5.5 billion.  The vote on the banking law suggests a major break between the president and Kolomoisky, although doubts persist about Zelensky’s commitment to reform.  In any case, Kyiv will be swamped by the challenges of managing simultaneous health and economic crises.

Donbas Controversy

Domestic developments did not grab all of the March headlines.  A March 11 agreement regarding the Minsk Trilateral Contract Group (TCG) became a major point of contention in Kyiv.  The TGC consists of officials of Ukraine, Russia and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, with representatives of the so-called Donetsk and Luhansk “people’s republics” attending as unofficial “invitees.”  It has met for five years but has registered little progress toward implementing the objectives of the 2015 Minsk II agreement:  ending the fighting and restoring Ukrainian sovereignty over all of Donbas.

Andriy Yermak, the president’s chief of staff, sought to shake up the chessboard and tentatively agreed to a subgroup reporting to the TCG that would include equal numbers of representatives from Ukraine and of the occupied territory, with German, French, OSCE and Russian officials sitting in as observers.  The details leaked and provoked an immediate furor.

First, the subgroup was seen to give status to the two “people’s republics,” something Kyiv has carefully avoided over the course of the six-year-long conflict.  Second, by putting Russia on par with Germany, France and the OSCE, the agreement seemed to accept Moscow’s narrative that Russia is not a party to the conflict and that it is a civil war—despite the fact that Russian and Russian proxy forces occupy parts of Donetsk and Luhansk.

More broadly, critics saw no sign that the Kremlin, which still pulls the strings in occupied Donbas, had decided to end the conflict.

Officials close to the president asserted that the new subgroup would be consultative in nature.  They said the Ukrainian government would select ten members for the subgroup.  Of the ten to speak for the occupied territories, five would come from the ranks of internally-displaced persons who have left occupied Donbas—and Kyiv would influence who was chosen.  Ukrainian officials argued that this would be a favorable make-up (Kyiv picking fifteen of the twenty Ukrainian participants) and, in any case, the subgroup would only make recommendations to the TCG, not take decisions.

The new format poses risks, which officials acknowledge.  By the end of March, Kyiv seemed to have second thoughts, and the agreement was not signed on March 25, as had been planned. 

March was tough for Zelensky, and April may prove even more challenging.  The month began with the president and his government trying to come to grips with COVID-19 and an economy tipping toward recession, tempered by hope that Ukraine can manage the final steps necessary to secure an IMF program.  Battered over the TGC gambit, it is possible Kyiv will let the idea for a new subgroup die quietly.  As he nears the end of his first year as president, Zelensky, who came to the office a political neophyte, is finding just how difficult governing—for real, not in a television comedy show—can be.

* * * * *

As we watch President Trump tell the states they have to do more to find their own personal protective equipment for their health-care workers, governors lash back with demands for a national leader who will unlock the emergency powers of the federal government.

The response to the COVID-19 pandemic has exposed major weaknesses in the federalist system of public health governance, which divides powers among the federal, state and local governments, argues SHP’s Michelle Mello in this New England Journal of Medicine commentary.

The coronavirus, she writes, “is exactly the type of infectious disease for which federal public health powers and emergencies were conceived: it is highly transmissible, crosses borders efficiently, and threatens our national infrastructure and economy.”

“Strong, decisive national action is therefore imperative,” writes Mello, a professor of medicine and a professor of law, and Rebecca L. Haffajee, a policy researcher at the RAND Corporation. “Yet the federal response has been alarmingly slow to develop, fostering confusion about the nature of the virus and necessary steps to address it.”

The authors warn this “lack of interjurisdictional coordination has and will cost lives.”

Though states must respect constitutionally protected individual rights — such as due process, equal protection and freedom of travel and association — the Constitution puts primary responsibility for public health with the states, cities and counties. It gives them the right to exercise broad police powers to protect their citizens’ health during ordinary times.

In extraordinary times — like the one we’re experiencing now — states and the federal government can activate emergency powers to expand their abilities to act swiftly and protect human life and health. All 50 states and dozens of localities and the federal government have declared emergencies.

“The resulting executive powers are sweeping: they can range from halting business operations, to restricting freedom of movement, to limiting civil rights and liberties, to commandeering property,” Mello and Haffajee write in the NEJM Perspective.

This emergency legal framework has led to too few checks-and-balances on poor decisions—historically, in the direction of being overly aggressive, write the authors. They note a good example is when New Jersey’s governor ordered a nurse returning from Sierra Leone during the 2014 Ebola outbreak into quarantine, contrary to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidelines.

Too Little Too Late? 

“Today, we find ourselves in the opposite situation: the federal government has done too little,” the authors write. “Perhaps because of misleading early statements from federal officials about the gravity of the COVID-19 threat, public sentiment has weighed against taking steps that would impose hardships on families and businesses.”

The tumbling stock market and unprecedented 10 million unemployment claims last month also have created further pressure by the federal government to project a sense of calm.

“The resulting laconic federal response has meant that a precious opportunity to contain COVID-19 through swift, unified national action has been lost — a scenario that mirrors what occurred in Italy,” they write.

So the states had to pick up where the federal government fell short, the authors note. Many jurisdictions issued stay-at-home orders; others did not. As of March 31, more than a dozen governors had yet to issue statewide stay-at-home orders and eight had only ordered partial measures. Yet many jurisdictions turn a blind eye, they note, to noncompliance with social-distancing recommendations issued by the CDC, as evidenced by crowded beaches and children congregating in public parks.

“This is the dark side of federalism: it encourages a patchwork response to epidemics,” the authors write.

“A federal takeover of all public health orders would be out of step with our federalist structure,” the authors state, but there remain three good options:

• “The White House must reverse its current trajectory toward prematurely weakening existing federal measures and the resolve of governors who are enforcing stay-at-home orders and school closures.” Trump said last week he wanted the United States “opened up and raring to go by Easter.” A few days later, he heeded the call of medical experts and extended social-distancing guidelines until the end of April, but public health experts believe the crisis will likely be with us longer.
• Congress should “use its spending power to further encourage states to follow a uniform playbook for community mitigation that includes measures for effective enforcement of public health orders.” It could threaten to withhold some federal funds from states that do not comply.
• “Congress could leverage its interstate-commerce powers to regular economic activities that affect the interstate spread” of COVID-19, such as restricting large businesses from traveling and operating across state lines in ways that expose workers to risk.

The White House could also make further use of the Defense Production Act (DPA) to direct private companies to produce badly needed ventilators and personal protective equipment for health-care workers, the authors write. Trump has ordered General Motors to manufacture ventilators and the $2 trillion stimulus package includes $1 billion for DPA projects.                                                                     

“Learning is difficult in the midst of an emergency, but one lesson from the COVID-19 epidemic is already clear: when epidemiologists warn that a pathogen has pandemic potential, the time to fly the flag of local freedom is over,” the authors conclude. “Yet national leadership in epidemic response works only if it is evidence-based. It is critical that the U.S. response to COVID-19 going forward be not only national, but rational.”

Agricultural and development economist Christopher B. Barrett, a visiting scholar with the Center on Food Security and the Environment (FSE), gave a lecture at Stanford on food systems advances over the past 50 years that have promoted unprecedented reduction globally in poverty and hunger, averted considerable deforestation, and broadly improved lives, livelihoods and environments in much of the world (watch video here or below).

In that lecture, and a related interview with FSE Senior Fellow Roz Naylor (watch video here or below), Barrett shared perspectives on the reasons why, despite advances, those systems increasingly fail large communities in environmental, health, and increasingly in economic terms and appear ill-suited to cope with inevitable further changes in climate, incomes, and population over the coming 50 years. Barrett explored the new generation of innovations underway that must overcome a host of scientific and socioeconomic obstacles.