World Exposé

Amar Breckenridge of Frontier Economics joins us to discuss today's global trading system, assessing historic trends and looking at how Covid-19 and climate change may affect its future state. 

We delve into the direction of global trade growth pre pandemic as well as how trade and sustainability will be intertwined going forward.

Enjoy!

Alexandre Lefebvre is a Professor of International Relations and Philosophy at the University of Sydney. We discuss the subject of his book “Human Rights and the Care of the Self”, and his book currently in writing called “Liberalism as a Way of Life”.

“Liberalism can serve as a worldview and way of living: not just in terms of how people relate to one another, but as a way of everyday life that reaches the level of sentiments, desires, and self-understanding. If citizens of liberal democracies were to recognize the potential costs of a shift away from liberalism, then perhaps they would be less inclined to resignation, or indifference to its fate”.

Alexandre discusses the main claims developed by human rights philosophers including Wollstonecraft, Tocqueville, Bergson, Rawls, and Roosevelt, and how overcoming personal attachment to all social and political forces (including patriarchism, individualism, xenophobia, conformity and materialism) is the single most important key to living well.

He explains how human rights is also about working on the self through personal transformation, which is fundamental to achieving any measure of contentment, tranquility, and self-realization. In this way it can bring about social and political transformations and create more pluralistic and liberal societies.

We also hear about the work of the great philosopher Henri Bergson and why France assigned him to strike up a personal relationship with President Woodrow Wilson to convince America to enter WWI.

Dr. Ainsley Elbra of the University of Sydney discusses the African Resource Curse, private governance by mining companies, and how Botswana adopted strategic policies to avoid falling victim to the Resource Curse.

She also discusses the evolution of the mining industry post-colonialism, the nationalization of the mining industry by many African states in the spirit of Pan-Africanism of the 1970's, its subsequent collapse, and the restructuring of their mining and trade policies for the international market.

Further, she discusses the current state of the mining industry in Ghana, Tanzania, and South Africa - and what it means for its citizens.

Prof. Alanna O’Malley of Leiden University, and political writer, discusses the role of the United Nations in the Congo Crisis amid the Cold War, and the role of the UN today as the only international governing body. 

She discusses the future of the United Nations, and how superpower politics are impeding global governance and cooperation against international challenges, notably the Covid-19 Pandemic and Climate Change.

Timothy Garton Ash is a Professor of European Studies at the University of Oxford. He is a political writer and columnist and author of 'Free Speech: 10 Principles for a Connected World'.

Timothy discusses the Fall of Communism in Eastern Europe and the re-joining of Europe, challenges facing the European Union – including the Hungarian dictatorship, the Covid-19 pandemic exacerbating underlying issues, and the North-South divide. He also discusses Free Speech in our modern tech world, and the duality of the internet in protecting this fundamental right.

Andreína Itriago is a political journalist in Venezuela and a correspondent for El Tiempo. 

She discusses the catastrophic downfall of Venezuela under the Maduro Regime. The collapse of the country’s oil industry, an imminent civil war, the refugee crises, and little hope for the fall of the regime as the military remain loyal to the illegitimate narco-government. 

She also discusses the western world’s unified support against the dictator, and the dangers of reporting in Venezuela.

Prof. Isabella Jackson of Trinity College Dublin discusses the evolution of China from the Opium Wars to the rise of communism, nationalism in exile in Taiwan, the one-child policy, Chinese censorship - and how this may have indirectly led to the Covid-19 pandemic. 

She also discusses her research into child slavery and attitudes to childhood in China, and her personal experience with Chinese Censorship.