Helping Kesi

I just recieved an envelope stating that I have now adopted Kesi. I am not the only one who have done so, but together, we help Kesi and all of her friends.

So who is Kesi, you ask? She is a 3 (and a half) year old orangutan, living at the rehabilitation centre in Nyaru Menteng on Borneo in Indonesia. Today it is the home of almost 500 orphaned orangutans and 150 employees.





Kesi's story is a sad one, but with what seems to be a happy ending: in 2005, the centre found the then three months old orang-utan (except for one hand, which had been cut off when humans killed her mother). At first, she had trouble keeping up with the other orang-utans at the centre but she kept trying and today, she has learnt to climb as well as the others.

Signing up for this programme was the result of my search for a charity to support. That has been hard work, because many charities tend to politicize everything. Which is fine, except many of them tend to choose a rather anti-capitalist stance. I may not be ultra-liberal, but I do like to think that the search for profit tend to work. With this choice, I have agreed to support Kesi until one day, she may be ready to be set free. Until then, I have found my kind of charity.

If you want to read more about the effort to save orang-utans, I can recommend this website: http://savetheorangutan.org/

PS: Yes, I too can see the irony of writing a blog entry about the future of this site and then not write anything for more than 10 months. But now I am back.

Legitimate?

Right now, the leaders of eight countries are sitting at Kempinski Grand Hotel in Heiligendamm, Germany, behind a 12 kilometre long steel fence. Outside, thousands of protesters are demonstrating. I believe that it is democracy at its finest when people take to protesting against or for things that are important to them, but the current scenario is beginning to look like we are one ring short of «Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus». In the first ring, we have the politicians and in the second we have the protestors. Some may claim that this shows how politicians have become kings and queens, removed from reality. Others – like myself – see this as a sad necessity brought on by violent protestors.

But the first thing to annoy me is the claim that meetings like G8, WTO and the World Economic Forum are not legitimate.

Christoph Kleine, a spokesperson for the collective, said their protest is a «clear sign of our rejection of the G8 and our belief that the G8 is completely illegitimate.

«These are the governments of eight countries who think they can rule the world because they are the richest and most powerful. This is not democratic.

«We can see the result of domination by these countries - war, social injustice. They stand for the danger of climate change. They are the countries who are responsible for most of the emissions.»

-From the BBC

The claim is, that G8 (as an example) is illegitimate because they try to rule the world and they are not the elected officials of said world. True, they are not elected on behalf of the world. They are elected by majorities on eight countries (we’ll ignore Russia as an example of a non-democracy in action). The G8 does not have any formal power, and can therefore only work at all if the eight countries agree and try to enforce the agreements.

Tricia O'Rourke, spokesperson for Oxfam, said: «We are reminding them that they have to deliver.»

«In 2005 in Gleneagles they promised they would increase aid to $50bn (£25bn) by 2010, but we recently calculated following current trends they will be short by $30bn.»

-From the
BBC

It sounds like an organisation with the ability to make and keep promises, right?

The G8 – like the World Economic Forum – is a gathering of people with power and influence who talk – don’t rule, but talk. Last time I checked, it’s a good thing when people talk. But apparently, it is a bad thing when the people talking actually have power.

So who can talk without democracy suffering? Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe? Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran? Hugo Chavez of Venezuela? Or maybe the few thousand demonstrators who set cars on fire in Rostock this week as part of their protest?

I think I prefer a world where people with power talk instead of throwing bricks and molotov cocktails.

Nice, Neat and Wrong.

I truly dislike bad statistics, and today, I found a very ugly example of this: The Global Peace Index.

One of the things we – all humans – like to do is rank everything and use it for comparisons: Danes will compare themselves to Norwegians and Swedes, they do the same. We all like to see how much better Scandinavia fares compared with the rest of the world. It is a natural urge and can be great for starting a discussion. But at the same time, an index serves as the basis for a brief news story confirming existing stereotypes.

Today’s example comes from the Reuters story: «US ranks low, just above Iran on new peace index» .

The short version is: a philanthropist, a small group of researchers and the Economist Intelligence Unit (as an economist, I can appreciate the humour in ‘economist intelligence’) got together to create the «Global Peace Index», a composite indicator of 24 variables that indicate and rank how peaceful 121 countries are. To quote Global Peace Index President Clyde McConaghy said:

«(…) peace can and has and will continue to be measured.»

That may be true, but that doesn’t say that this index has achieved that result.

The primary story was that: Iraq is at the bottom, the US fared pretty badly (worse than Yemen, better than Iran). Norway was at the top of the list, followed by New Zealand and Denmark (which earned it an honourable mention in a Danish newspaper ). And the final bit: Leo Abruzzese, the North American editorial director of the Economist Intelligence Unit said that in general the most peaceful countries were the smallest, the most politically stable and democratic.

Have you learned much new from the story? I didn’t either, but it did confirm the prejudices I was supposed to have: ‘I am good, other are not’. But it doesn’t really tell me much. Let us look at what it is they have made. First the idea of a composite indicator:

Composite indicator:

Definition:
A composite indicator is formed when
individual indicators are compiles into a single index, on the basis of an underlying model of the multi-dimensional concept that is being measured.

Context:
A composite indicator measures multi-dimensional concepts (e.g. competitiveness, e-trade or environmental quality) which cannot be captured by a single indicator. Ideally, a composite indicator should be based on a theoretical framework / definition, which allows individual indicators / variables to be selected, combined and weighted in a manner which reflects the dimensions or structure of the phenomena being measured.

Source: OECD Glossary of Statistical Terms

A composite indicator can be a great tool for some things, but they tend to oversimplify things, and the potential for bias in the indicators is sometimes rather high.

And then there is the issue of whether or not they measured the right thing in the first place. Let us take the example of the US. They allegedly scored low because of the number of wars it is involved in, large numbers of soldiers killed on the battlefield and high defence spending as well as by having the world's largest prison population per share of overall population and relatively high levels of violent crime. To me, that doesn’t quite work.

A belligerent country may try to invade others, peaceful ones may be engaged in a defensive war. Would the US during World War 2 be considered peaceful? Very unlikely, but they did not go into the war until attacked. They lost a lot of soldiers in battle and had high spending on the military, just like Germany and Japan did at the time. But do we learn much from an index that cannot distinguish between the two?

The US probably puts too many people in jail, but is that a measure of not being peaceful? Other countries use the death penalty very liberally against political opponents. That isn’t measured.

Another example was Israel, which ranked lower than Iran. Is there a greater chance that a suicide bomber will strike in Tel Aviv than in Teheran? Yes, but does that measure peacefulness? The Iranians were also rated as having more trust in other citizens. I wonder if that is because they don't have to fear suicide attacks. Just a thought.

At the end of it all, the index seems to measure whether the citizens can live in peace combined with whether their government (democratically elected or not) is using official military force abroad. Two different things, with one common denominator: they don’t explain the cause, only the action. If anyone wants a discussion about peace, they need to include measures for why countries see their soldiers dying abroad, what the alternatives to prison is and whether overt military actions are the only measure of creating the opposite of peace. What about supporting terrorist groups in other countries?

I will not claim that the US seems peaceful these days, but the group itself quote Albert Einstein: « Peace is not merely the absence of war but the presence of justice, of law, of order--in short, of government». I would like to see the Global Peace Index try to reflect that instead. It was a nice thought, but let's go back to the drawing board.

Green House Hot Air

If people have difficulties in believing in the Green House effect, blame the weather. Not that I don’t believe in it myself – I just think that the warm weather has employed the same PR experts who recommended Osama Bin Laden to send out a video a few days before the last presidential election in the US.

So what has made me think so? Let us review what has happened in the last months.

» Neoconservatives and right-wing Christian group are apparently advocating that driving a car suited for off-road driving in jungles and deserts with a fuel consumption equal to that of a small nation may not be the right thing to do. The Christians are worried that the green house effect may be damaging God’s creation and neoconservatives are worried about the dependence on oil from other – potentially not too friendly – countries. That should definitely help on reducing emissions. (Read: «Waking up and catching up» The Economist, January 25th 2007)

» The carmakers and oil companies are advocating green initiatives themselves. The motives could be many and varied – but probably with some aim on the bottom line. If someone decides to set up pro-environment initiatives, it’s better to make money off it than loose money because of it. That isn’t wrong either. Economics – and the world in general – works that way. Action follows the incentives. I am just sorry we didn’t set up the incentives earlier. Whatever the motivations, this is another positive for the environmentalists.

» One final incentive regards the direct financial loses that could arise from changes in the global climate. OECD is warning that tourism revenue from ski resorts may be a thing of the past in several European countries, as the rise in temperatures could eliminate the snow – and hence the skiing. And great wines may in the future not come from Italy, Greece, or Southern California but perhaps you would like a nice vintage from Cornwall or Niagara Falls? It will definitely upset the people who are currently making a living off skiing and wine. (Read: «OECD warns climate change is threatening Europe's skiing trade» OECD, December 13th 2006 and «Climate shifts will change the future of vintages» Worlds of Wine, April 21st 2004)

With all these incentives, it is perhaps not so surprising that traditional environmental lobbies, politicians and industry alike all talked the same talk. And the scene was perfect: no snow in Davos, as people started to arrive. No snow at the ski resort of Davos. It could not be any better. The scene is set. (Read: «Can this really be Davos?» BBC's Tim Weber, January 23rd 2007)

And this is where everything starts to fall apart. Just as everyone is settled in and ready for the Davos experience and a focus on global warming, it starts to snow!

I still believe that there is something to the notion of global warming, but it looks ridiculous when people discuss it with reporters live on BBC while they huddle up in thick winter coats around the microphone because they apparently are in the middle of a blizzard.

It just isn’t very sensible PR on behalf of Mother Nature.