Uncommon Decency

On episode five of this show, the late Gyórgy Schópflin, then retired and in the twilight of his life, made a lucid observation about what, at bottom, set his native Hungary apart from his adoptive Great Britain. "Hungary has no post-colonial guilt", intoned the retired academic and former Member of the European Parliament (MEP). Schöpflin meant this as a partial explanation—if not a justification—of the nationalist politics practiced by Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, the subject of our episode that day. Not having colonized other territories, Orbán's dealings with other world leaders were, in Schópflin's view, a function of Hungary having fallen under the dominion of foreign powers throughout recent history, be it Austria or the Soviet Union. What did Schópflin mean about the UK, however? Simply put, that conversely things like the British public's toleration of high levels of immigration from former colonies or its support for high levels of development aid towards them are also, in their own way, a function of Britain's past as the ruler of a vast empire. In his latest book, Colonialism: A Moral Reckoning (2022), Oxford University ethicist Nigel Biggar hopes to inform a reassessment of Britain's colonial guilt, placing on a single moral ledger the calamities and abuses worthy of guilt and condemnation along with the achievements worthy of praise and celebration. The Emeritus Regius Professor of Moral and Pastoral Theology at the University of Oxford, Biggar is joined in this latest episode by Felipe Fernández-Armesto, a historian of Spanish colonialism and the William P. Reynolds Professor of History at the University of Notre Dame. Together, our two guests challenge one another to comparatively assess the historical and moral record of the Spanish and British empires. Enjoy!

As always, please rate and review Uncommon Decency on Apple Podcasts, and send us your comments or questions either on Twitter at @UnDecencyPod or by e-mail at [email protected]. And please consider supporting the show through Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/undecencypod.

"It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us, that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion, that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain, that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth." That is the peroration from possibly the greatest speech ever written, Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg Address. The final words have been a rallying call for the voices of liberty and democracy not just in the US but across the world. However, those voices have been met with a growing chorus pushing back on the ideals of democratic governance. The debate over whether we are in a democratic recession has become a mainstay of modern political discourse, and world leaders are increasingly casting the world in manichean terms of democracies vs. autocracies. That is the context in which our guest this week, Martin Wolf, wrote his latest book. The Chief Economics Commentator for the Financial Times and one of the preeminent thought leaders in the West on economics and politics, Wolf is the author of a number of books, with his latest one, The Crisis of Democratic Capitalism (2023), covering all the most pertinent issues shaping the globe today. What is ailing democracy? What reforms are needed? What is the relationship between capitalism and democracy? These were just some of the questions that we covered during this episode. There is also a policy discussion for our Patreons including the merits of Starship Trooper's citizenship policy, and a discussion on changing voting laws away from one person one vote, not to ranked choice voting, but something far more interesting.

As always, please rate and review Uncommon Decency on Apple Podcasts, and send us your comments or questions either on Twitter at @UnDecencyPod or by e-mail at [email protected]. And please consider supporting the show through Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/undecencypod.

Since mid-December, a corruption scandal has been unfolding in Brussels that could soon begin rock the European Union's (EU) very foundations. Eva Kaili, a 44-year-old Member of the European Parliament (MEP), was detained by Belgian authorities along with three other suspects—including fellow MEP Marc Tarabella and Kaili's partner, an assistant to another MEP—for allegedly accepting large bribes from foreign government officials in exchange for whitewashing the image of those governments in Brussels. Qatar was frontline in the scandal, but so was Morocco, and more recently, even Mauritania. As this episode goes to press, no less than 1.5 million EUR in cash have been seized, much of which was lying around the house of Kaili's father, who is also ensnared. With the World Cup then about to take place in Qatar and amid widespread allegations of unsafe working conditions for migrant workers hired to build the facilities, Kaili and her fellow suspects had their work cut out for them. Now—the scandal's implications cannot be overstated. While the EU has long labored under critiques of its democratic legitimacy, the moral legitimacy of its leaders has largely gone unquestioned. That all changes now. To discuss the repercussions of this scandal, we have with us Frank Furedi, executive director of Mathias Corvinus Collegium (MCC) Brussels and Thomas Fazi, a columnist at UnHerd and Compact.

As always, please rate and review Uncommon Decency on Apple Podcasts, and send us your comments or questions either on Twitter at @UnDecencyPod or by e-mail at [email protected]. And please consider supporting the show through Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/undecencypod.

"Exactly a year ago, I broadcast a message that contained the two things that remain most important now: that Russia had launched a full-scale war against us, and that we are strong. We are ready for anything. We will defeat anyone. Because we are Ukraine. We will never rest until the Russian murderers face the punishment they deserve. The punishment of the international tribunal. The judgement of God. Of our warriors. The verdict is clear. Nine years ago, the neighbor turned into our aggressor. A year ago, the aggressor turned executioner, looter and terrorist. We have no doubt that they will be held accountable. We have no doubt that we will win". That was Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenski marking the one-year anniversary of Russia's invasion of Ukraine last week. To take stock of how profoundly this one-year war is changing our continent, we have decided, on this bonus episode, to reflect upon three unique angles of it: (1) the shifting tectonics of public opinion, (2) the enduring resilience of the transatlantic relationship and (3) the message the invasion sends to other authoritarian would-be aggressors like China. Enjoy the episode!

As always, please rate and review Uncommon Decency on Apple Podcasts, and send us your comments or questions either on Twitter at @UnDecencyPod or by e-mail at [email protected]. And please consider supporting the show through Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/undecencypod.

"Those who would give up essential liberty, to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety". These words by American statesman Benjamin Franklin are often paraphrased into "those who sacrifice liberty for security, deserve neither". Franklin was talking about taxes, but don't worry—that's not what we're going to cover today. We're diving back into the world of espionage. This episode originally would have been combined with the one on Russia's security services, but we finally decided to keep them separate because we had so many interesting things to discuss with Dan Lomas. Dan is a senior lecturer in intelligence and security studies at Brunel University. This week, we asked him to comment on the role of intelligence agencies in democratic societies. We talked about the war on terror and how it affected the public's view of the security services, as well as the debate over Huawei and other forms of Chinese espionage. For those of you listening in February, we had a brief discussion about the infamous Chinese spy balloon and what it says about the country's security posture. For our Patreon subscribers, you will be able to hear Dan discuss the effects of surveillance capitalism on the security services and how the collection of personal data by companies is reshaping intelligence work. Naturally, any conversation on Western spies must include a debate over who is the best James Bond—subscribe to hear Dan's answer!

As always, please rate and review Uncommon Decency on Apple Podcasts, and send us your comments or questions either on Twitter at @UnDecencyPod or by e-mail at [email protected]. And please consider supporting the show through Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/undecencypod.

«With your democratic laws we will colonize you, and with our koranic laws we will dominate you». This rather bellicose warning for Europeans came from a 2002 speech by Yusuf Al-Qaradawi, one of the key intellectual leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood (MB). It's a great insight on what the MB is—a strictly religious and conservative reaction to modernity that was launched in Egypt in 1928 by Hassan El-Banna. It's also an insight into its modus operandi. The MB works in the shadows and builds its strength slowly through a complex maze of sister organisations to push its narrative and its pawns. Two decades after that speech, a series of controversies around EU institutions funding MB-adjacent organisations have highlighted the MB's influence in Europe. We tried to stay light on acronyms but we mention FEMYSO a few times: that's the Forum of European Muslim Youth and Student Organisation, which is one of these glossy organisations that get a lot of visibility in Brussels but that have strong ties with the MB's web of organisations. To cover this issue we have invited Florence Bergeaud Blackler, an anthropologist at the French CNRS who has been working on these issues for a while and just released in French «Le Frérisme et ses réseaux, l'enquête» (The Brotherhood and its networks, an investigation). On the other side of the line we have Tommaso Virgili, a Postdoctoral Researcher at the WZB Social Center in Berlin where he works on modernization movements within Islam in response to the challenge of fundamentalism. He co-authored in 2021 a report for the European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR) on the MB in Europe entitled «Network of Networks, the MB in Europe».

Before we move on, we're very happy to announce that we have partnered up with What's Up EU, the best newsletter out there to follow all the policy and political development in EU politics. Take for example all the conversation we had on this podcast on trade. What's Up EU will walk you through the inner workings of policymaking and all the horse-trading that goes behind it. It's trusted by hundreds of journalists, policymakers, diplomats all across the world and if you need—or want—to follow what happens in Brussels, then subscribing to What's Up EU is the best thing you can do, the link to subscribe is in the description.

As always, please rate and review Uncommon Decency on Apple Podcasts, and send us your comments or questions either on Twitter at @UnDecencyPod or by e-mail at [email protected]. And please consider supporting the show through Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/undecencypod.

"The Soviet State Security Service is more than a secret police organization, more than an intelligence and counter-intelligence organization. It is an instrument for subversion, manipulation and violence, for secret intervention in the affairs of other countries". Those were the words of Allen Dulles, the long-time head of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), but they may just as well describe the security services of today's Russia. Welcome back to a new season of Uncommon Decency where this week, we are starting with a conversation about the Chekhist state that Russian President Vladimir Putin has created. Joining us for this episode was Andrei Soldatov, a Russian investigative journalist who has been covering the security services and terrorism issues since 1999. He is a non-resident senior fellow at the Center for European Policy Analysis (CEPA), and he has written a number of books on the Russian state including his most recent work, The Compatriots: The Russian Exiles Who Fought Against the Kremlin (2022). This episode covered a lot of ground and referenced a lot of groups so let's start by outlining some of the abbreviations and names you'll hear: KGV, SVR, FSB, GRU, Wagner Group.

As always, please rate and review Uncommon Decency on Apple Podcasts, and send us your comments or questions either on Twitter at @UnDecencyPod or by e-mail at [email protected]. And please consider supporting the show through Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/undecencypod.

It's that time of the year again—a time to look back on the year lapsed and make resolutions for the coming one. At episode 75, Uncommon Decency readies to enter its third calendar year—we launched in October 2020—with a potent mix of hope and derision. For the first time this year, we are greeting 2023 with a very special series of Uncommonly Decent awards and gifts. Who claims our "Brutus" award for betrayal of the year—Rishi Sunak, Giuseppe Conte or the Pakistani military? Who's our "Gorbachev" spectacular collapse of the year—Liz Truss, BoJo, Putin or the European Parliament? Who pulled the "De Gaulle" political comeback of the year—Leo Varadkar, Bibi Netanyahu, Anwar Ibrahim or Lula? Who wins the "how-do-you-still-have-a-job" award—Berlusconi, de Kirchner or Sergei Shoigu? To hear us bestow these funnily-titled awards, listen to this special bonus episode marking the new year—and make sure to tell us how you'd have voted by reaching out through the usual channels?

As always, please rate and review Uncommon Decency on Apple Podcasts, and send us your comments or questions either on Twitter at @UnDecencyPod or by e-mail at [email protected]. And please consider supporting the show through Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/undecencypod.

It was the opening shot of what the Wall Street Journal's (WSJ) editorial board fears may become a protracted climate trade war between the European Union (EU) and the United States. In a notorious departure from standard EU lip service to free trade, late last week French President Emmanuel Macron urged fellow European leaders anew to match the Biden administration's round of green subsidies pork-barrelled into the Inflation Reduction Act. Unhelpfully acronymized as IRA, that legislative package was signed into law in August. As part of it, the US Treasury will be offering tax breaks and other market-rigging subsidies to companies manufacturing electric vehicles in the US, which Macron fears will unfairly disadvantage their European competitors. Macron claims there should be greater joint efforts to accelerate the green transition. In this latest episode with The Economist's Charlemagne columnist, Stanley Pignal, and POLITICO's Barbara Moens, we inquire whether the EU was really as committed to free trade as its liberal cheerleaders claim in the first place, and whether this latest round of rhetorical animus may spark a real trade war between transatlantic allies.

As always, please rate and review Uncommon Decency on Apple Podcasts, and send us your comments or questions either on Twitter at @UnDecencyPod or by e-mail at [email protected]. And please consider supporting the show through Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/undecencypod.

"Within our mandate, the European Central Bank (ECB) is ready to do whatever it takes to preserve the euro, and believe me, it will be enough." By uttering those three words, Mario Draghi saved the Eurozone from collapsing, thereby ushering Europe's monetary policy into the 21st century. European fiscal policy, meanwhile, has not quite caught up. To this day, it still sticks with the treaty-enshrined limits to member-states' debt and deficit--the European Stability Mechanism (ESM)--albeit with varying degrees of fidelity. These days, the European Commission is proposing a new economic governance framework that would give member states greater flexibility on their spending plans and the Commission a larger role in the continent's policy. This week we spoke to Rebecca Christie—a fellow at Bruegel—to discuss the Commission's proposal and the broader sweep of European economic policy. Rebecca is the author of an intellectual history of the ESM and a columnist for BreakingViews. This conversation got quite wonky quickly, as we rattled through arguments on capital markets unions, deficit targeting, bond spreads, tackling inflation, and Alexander Hamilton.

As always, please rate and review Uncommon Decency on Apple Podcasts, and send us your comments or questions either on Twitter at @UnDecencyPod or by e-mail at [email protected]. And please consider supporting the show through Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/undecencypod.