BANKSIDE, LONDON, UK -- This week has been a cautiously optimistic, academic and culturally insightful learning experience. What the heck does that even mean?
Well, almost immediately after posting my blog entry last week, one of my good friends here at LSE, who also happens to live at Bankside, came down with swine flu. I wasn't doing anything and happily got her medicine, but then the next day I found out that another friend of mine at LSE, who is also in the same program/class/study group as us, also caught swine flu. So yes for awhile there I was quite worried and obsessively washing my hands and face and staying super clean. Apparently it worked! Both of them are better and made it to class on Thursday, and I'm feeling 100% as always, so that is the "cautiously optimistic" bit.
Academically it was busy... we are now in the final 1/3 of the term, so suddenly there is a renewed focus on readings and actually doing the work you can get away with slacking off on the first 2/3 of the term. Not that I have been doing that consciously or intentionally, but sometimes when the pressure piles up you can perform at your best. I'm nowhere near that point yet, either, but it's a healthy balance. Class was relatively standard this week, but yesterday I attended those two lectures mentioned last week. First, the Prime Minister of Norway, Jens Stoltenberg, spoke on an extremely relevant topic: the relationship between development and climate change. In a way his entire lecture was a summary of my Global Environmental Governance class, except obviously from a Norwegian standpoint. I digress:
Jens spoke about the natural connection between economic development and productivity with a rise out of poverty. From a moral and ethical standpoint, all countries have a right to develop to the point where the vast majority of its' citizens are living outside of poverty, with clean water and shelter. This, however, poses an enormous logistical challenge. Scientific estimates are not good: in order to have a chance to prevent all glaciers from melting (and really causing permanent damage to the Earth's atmosphere and oceanic currents), we need to cut carbon emissions by around 50% from 1990 levels by 2050. However, population projections indicate that the global population will increase from around 6 billion in 1990 (about 6.8 billion today) to 9 billion in 2050. How, then, are we supposed to burn half the carbon we did, with 150% of the people, while ALSO ensuring everyone has a higher standard of living?
Well, that is the question that the world is finally seeking to address. For Norway's part, they are on a path to becoming carbon-neutral by 2050, by taxing carbon emissions in all forms (if you fly, you pay a tax; if you eat meat, you pay a tax, all depending on how much carbon is emitted in producing what you consume). Thus by intentionally manipulating the market, Norway is hoping to provide a strong incentive for corporations that otherwise wouldn't care at all about the environment to reduce emissions and save money. Beyond that, Norway is the fifth-largest oil exporter and third-largest natural gas exporter in the world. Yes, it is in their economic interest, but they are actively trying to get countries to burn natural gas instead of coal, which emits half the carbon for the same amount of output. Furthermore, Norway is investing heavily in carbon capture technology that actually sucks carbon out of the atmosphere, condenses it, and buries it deep in the Earth's crust. Finally, they are investing heavily in protecting global rainforests to act as the biggest carbon sink to also suck carbon out of the air.
...after that lecture, I saw another LSE public lecture, panel-style, featuring HM Queen Noor of Jordan, US Ambassador to Germany Richard Burt (former), and UK nuclear disarmament activist Kate Hudson speak about how to eliminate nuclear weapons from the world. Yes, it's a tough goal, but they presented the options in this way: Would you rather, 30 years from now, have a world free of nuclear weapons, or have 20-30 countries with nukes instead of the 8 that currently have them? In a post-Cold War framework, the idea is that the biggest threat to the world today is not another state gaining and launching a nuclear weapon, but rather, that a state somehow loses a nuke to a non-state actor (ie, terrorist), who then can use it to either inflict unthinkable destruction, or seek incredible power in exchange for not using it (ie, taking over the Middle East/South Asia/North Africa). Needless to say this is incredibly concerning. They do note, however, that public opinion is actually supporting this process for the first time:
Global Zero has nearly 200,000 signatures in the past year alone advocating for a world without nuclear weapons. President Obama and President Mendev both support reducing and ultimately eliminating nuclear weapons, and so does PM Gordon Brown. If the US and Russia reduce their weapons arsenals drastically from the 10,000 or so nuclear weapons each has at present, there is a chance that China, a country with relatively few nukes (300 or so) would follow. If China signed on, so would India. If India, then Pakistan. The UK and France would already be on board. North Korea can be dealt with diplomatically, and the idea is that so can Iran. In 25 years if the Palestinians actually have a stable state, Israel could follow as well, and viola. Overly optimistic? Sure, but then again, you have to start somewhere, and it was fascinating to hear their united perspective. Click on the
Global Zero link to sign the petition.
From a cultural perspective, this past Wednesday was the
State Opening of Parliament. The oldest and longest continuously running democratic tradition in the world, the Monarch travels from Buckingham Palace to Westminster to deliver an address written by the Prime Minister to officially open the political year in Parliament. Numerous famous incidents have taken place at State Openings in the past. In 1605, Guy Fawkes famously tried to turn the UK to anarchy by killing the King while he was in Parliament, in the "
gunpowder plot." Remember, remember, the fifth of November. In 1642, King Charles essentially initiated the English Civil War by trying to arrest 5 members of the House of Commons during the State Opening of Parliament. To this day, the Monarch is not allowed in the House of Commons, and instead the address is delivered in the House of Lords. There are very few places in this world that Queen Elizabeth II can not enter: the House of Commons, just down the road from Buckingham Palace, is one of them. Since she became Queen, she has only missed two State Openings, the two times she was pregnant. Enough of the historical element... I got a small group of people from my program to join in and we walked over together, and it was quite the pompous ceremony. There was a military band playing everything from the royal tunes to "Grease Lightning," the crown jewels got their own carriages, and then the Queen was taken by carriage, surrounded by some 2,000 royal guards, and marched down through Whitehall into Parliament.
After seeing the Queen pass, we headed over to Trafalgar Square, where we saw the "
Ghost Forest." The Ghost Forest is a public art project that essentially is a series of cut-down trees from the rainforest in Ghana. They were taken out after they were cut down, cleaned, and shipped from Accra to London, where they have been displayed in the Square this week to educate people on climate change and the importance of rainforests in carbon capture (which, as I noted, was a key point of Jens' talk). In fact, after this week, they are packing up the pieces again, and shipping them across the North Sea to Copenhagen, where they will be on display for the COP 15. My goal is to take some of the same pictures that I took at Trafalgar Square on Wednesday with the stumps at the display in Copenhagen in a few weeks... which reminds me, I will be in CPH in 2 weeks! As we get closer, things are really picking up in the media, and also through G-1 Billion. We had our first full writers-team meeting today online, and are beginning to assign events to cover as well as topics to be published. Check out the website by
clicking here.
Sports update: The last few weeks were for World Cup qualifying matches, so no Chelsea games (until today, which they just won 4-0!), and England already qualified. BUT, on Wednesday night I saw the Ireland-France match, and the Irish got ROBBED! Check out this
CLEAR hand-ball that resulted in the game-winning goal for France, in extra time to send them to the World Cup and keep the Irish out. The officials missed it, and perhaps even worse, FIFA does not use video replay technology like most American sports now do, and they refuse to replay the game (even though the player who committed the hand ball for France admitted it, and actually apologized for the way the game ended). One of the worst calls I have ever seen in sports, period. In American college football, the Badgers won again last week, and take an impressive 2-loss record into Northwestern to close out the Big Ten season today. In hockey, I know last week I mentioned that the Blackhawks were on a roll, but they are officially the hottest team in the NHL. They have won 5 games in a row (not coincidentally, the 5 games since Toews returned from injury), and just beat the pants off of Calgary, 7-1, in their own building a couple of nights ago. Tonight they're in Edmonton, and another 2 points would be just what the Doctor ordered!
In weather, things calmed down a lot since last Saturday's hurricane. It has been raining a lot, sure, but that is to be expected, and overall it has actually warmed up back into the mid-50s that it has been since I got here 2 months ago already.
Pictures and video links!
Have a great weekend!
