Winston Churchill once said, “I always avoid prophesying beforehand because it is much better to prophesy after the event has already taken place.” Still, the New Year always prompts contemplation of what events lie before us. This compilation of short articles reflects on what happened in 2013 and considers the implications of those events for 2014. Far from prophesying, we think about what important decisions lie ahead and what political factors will determine the outcomes of those decisions. Some topics, such as the turmoil in the Middle East, are fairly obvious. Others, like the prospect of a self-determination referendum in Catalonia, have received less media attention but are still globally significant. Though not a comprehensive list, the Review staff believes each issue presented here will shape the world we are looking at this time next year.
In this article:
Advancing an Ambitious Agenda in Mexico – by Jose I. Lobo Carrillo
Eradicating Poverty in a Post-2015 World – by Jacob Patterson-Stein
The Catalan Self-Determination Referendum – by Cristina López G.
US Foreign Policy in Crisis – by Emily Manna
Advancing an Ambitious Agenda in Mexico
2013 was a year of big changes for Mexico. In his first year in Office, President Enrique Peña Nieto managed to pass an important constitutional reforms agenda that had been stalled in Congress for years. The most important of these is the taboo-breaking energy sector reform that will allow foreign and private investment in the oil and gas industry, which is controlled by the state owned energy monopoly, PEMEX. Reforms on education, telecommunications, and even the electoral process were also approved. The political mechanism that facilitated these reforms is known as the “Pact for Mexico,” an agreement signed by the President and the top opposition leaders a day after Peña Nieto took office. Given that the signatories driving the process were mostly party leaders and not necessarily democratically elected legislators, the Pact for Mexico was not free from criticism. In the end, the reforms did pass through Congress, although the details on how these reforms will be implemented have yet to be determined. The Pact for Mexico may already be broken, with the exit of the left over disagreements on the energy reform. Protests against these reforms will continue to fill Mexico City’s streets as they did during 2013.
Most of Peña Nieto’s political capital may be already spent, yet many challenges remain. The economy performed poorly in 2013, with growth estimated to be close to 1 percent. Security also remains one of the main challenges for Mexico. While cities like Ciudad Juarez have seen improvement in safety levels, in states like Michoacán, self defense-groups are fighting criminal organizations. During his campaign, Peña Nieto promised to reduce homicides and kidnappings by 50 percent in his first year. Homicide rates have been slowly decreasing since 2011, but they are far from being cut in half, and the kidnap rate hit a new record high in 2013.
While some say Peña Nieto’s reform agenda will finally boost Mexico’s economic development, others claim the reforms are incomplete and will allow weak institutions, high levels of corruption, and the absence of transparency and accountability mechanisms to persist. Mexico has a long history of good intentions and bad implementation, and many of the desired impacts may take years to be seen. In addition, most of the fine print to implement these reforms, still needs to be defined by Congress.
Mexico is already the 14th biggest economy in the world. It is the United States’ third largest trading partner, one of only two Latin American countries in the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), and has 43 trade agreements with other countries, among the world’s highest. If these reforms succeed in accelerating growth, Mexico could move beyond its current status as a developing country with a relatively developed economy in the near future. What happens in 2014 will shed more light on the depth of this government’s ambitious agenda, and its capacity to negotiate and implement much needed reforms.
Eradicating Poverty in a Post-2015 World
In the world of international development policy, one of the most notable aspects of 2014 is also the most obvious. Namely, after 2014 comes 2015, the year by which the UN and its eight goals for the developing world should have been achieved. The UN Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), which contain targets for health, education, and extreme poverty, to name a few, were met with a fair share of criticism in their early years. This criticism has largely remained despite notable successes. Regardless of whether one believes the Goals were too lofty or too low, the influence of the MDGs has undeniably shaped the development conversation over the last 15 years.
Lively debate between practitioners, academics, and the global donor class about post-2015 goals started shortly after the MDGs were announced in 2000. In 2010, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon appointed a special advisor to lead the post-2015 process, which resulted in a High-Level Panel, multiple reports, and a shift to include “sustainable” (environmentally friendly) development in the next-stage goals. Even within the UN there are divergent opinions about what comes next, particularly on issues such as social inclusion and infrastructure development. What will be worth watching in the coming year is not just how the discussion of the MDGs evolves, but how it aligns with 2013’s shift toward a focus on one singular achievement: the end of extreme poverty.
Speaking at Georgetown University in April 2013, Jim Kim, president of the World Bank, announced that the Bank would focus its efforts on eradicating extreme poverty (defined as living on under $1.25 a day) by 2030. “Progress on the MDGs has been impressive, but it remains uneven across populations and countries,” Kim said while announcing the World Bank’s 2030 goal. In November, USAID’s Administrator, Raj Shah, followed suit, saying, “America stands ready to address that challenge [of ending extreme poverty]. Not simply with development investment alone, but by marshaling all of the resources of our policy, our government, our trade, our economy, our universities, and our innovators to help contribute to an extraordinary moral objective: the end of extreme poverty.” Two development institutions do not equal a trend, yet the World Bank and USAID are major players likely to influence the priorities that emerge from post-2015 development policy.
The objective of ending extreme poverty is not new, but it had previously been included alongside other goals focused on the environment and inclusive institutions. How and whether the MDG lobby, World Bank, and USAID cooperate and influence each other, or don’t, will shape what development means for the next 15 years. What is notable here is that these are not necessarily separate goals or conversations—many of the people leading the UN process have been either beneficiaries or employees of the World Bank. A recent ODI report noted, “there is still strong consensus on ending poverty.”
Yet, in a world of finite resources, decreasing tax-payer support for foreign aid, and ongoing debate about what “works” in development, how the post-2015 platform balances competing interests will be critical to the next decade and a half of foreign aid. This will be reflected both in the policies promoted by the UN and the bilateral agencies sympathetic to its mandates and in the rhetoric and headline initiatives of institutions like the World Bank and USAID, who are reforming their operations. The feasibility, and even the intent, of Jim Kim and Raj Shah’s lofty goal have been brought into question. Input and reactions from developing countries not represented on the UN’s high panel may affect the direction of future priorities through regional initiatives or by simply ignoring the dictates from Turtle Bay, and instead pursuing country-specific growth goals. Ending extreme poverty and the post-2015 development platform are intimately related, but how the tone, programming, and politics of the two evolve over the next year will make 2014 memorable.
The Catalan Self-Determination Referendum
Whether Catalonia, the most economically prosperous autonomous community in Spain, will achieve its long-awaited independence will be decided by a self-determination referendum, set to take place on November 9, 2014. Artur Mas, the president of the Catalan government, will submit two questions to the electorate: “Do you want Catalonia to be a state?” and “Do you want that state to be independent?”
The success of this democratic fight for independence will likely be threatened by the Spanish Government, as its economic reliance on Catalonian productivity gives it incentive to attempt to block the referendum. Through taxes, Catalonia contributes to the Spanish government far more than other regions, but the Catalan people receive less public expenditure per capita from the central government. Catalan production also accounts for more than 20 percent of Spain’s GDP. According to the Spanish government, headed by conservative leader Mariano Rajoy, the Spanish Constitution does not allow for matters such as the independence of autonomous communities to be determined by polls and therefore, the administration intends to make sure the referendum does not take place.
Since a referendum for self-determination is an unprecedented event in Spanish Law, the mechanisms Rajoy intends to use in order to block the referendum remain unclear. The Spanish government has historically thwarted Catalan dreams of self-determination: during the 40 years of General Francisco Franco’s brutal dictatorship, Spain went so far as to make Catalan and other regional languages illegal. In 2005, the Catalans passed a new Statute of Autonomy that redefined and increased the powers of their local government, but before its approval, it was revised and rewritten by the Spanish Parliament, removing the Statute’s main accomplishments. The Spanish Constitutional Court eventually revoked the Statute in 2010 in a unilateral process that still raises questions.
The idea that Catalonia has a distinct a national identity from Spain has been around since the 19th century, and the Catalans have increasingly supported independence. Franco’s oppression in the 20th century only exacerbated Catalan nationalism and bolstered the enthusiasm of separatist organizations and political parties. Catalan civil society has expressed its desire for independence through organized, massive public demonstrations. Polls show that 52 percent Catalans would support independence in a referendum, while only 24.1 percent would oppose it; 80.5 percent support holding the referendum. In 2012, more than a million citizens joined a public protest in the streets of Barcelona, united under the slogan “Catalonia, next state in Europe.” Only time will tell if and when the slogan becomes a reality.
As America’s post-9/11 war on terrorism approaches the 13-year mark in 2014, the US will have to face a Middle East with deepening crises and consistently dismal views of America. Violence in Iraq is at the highest level it’s been in years, and the US is poised to sign a security agreement that would keep American troops in Afghanistan for at least another decade. Despite increased condemnation of the policy, we can expect to see a more expansive use of drones in North Africa, with a new American drone base in Niger. With Congressional leaders claiming that the threat of terrorism overseas is “spreading…like a wildfire,” however, the Obama administration will be forced to consider the effectiveness of its current policy.
In 2014 we can expect much of the same in the Middle East, which is to say another year of instability and unpredictability. Egypt will certainly not remain stable for long, especially now that the Muslim Brotherhood has been labeled a terrorist organization and popular satirist Bassem Youssef, known as the Egyptian Jon Stewart, has been removed from the airwaves. The US suspended military aid to Egypt in October and could use that aid to bring about elections and a more inclusive interim government in 2014. Fighting in Syria has not abated and now threatens to bring another civil war to Lebanon, and any action that might have been taken by the US in the beginning of the conflict has now become almost impossible. If the US decides to conduct airstrikes on the Assad regime, it risks launching the entire region further into sectarian violence, not to mention ruining any chance of further negotiations with Iran, as Assad’s allies would feel compelled to defend the Syrian leader. Already, the new American relationship with Iran has damaged US ties with Gulf countries, and Saudi Arabia has openly declared its dissatisfaction and sent military aid to Lebanon.
The United States’ evolving relationship with Iran has broad implications for the region even beyond Syria. The threat of fresh sanctions from Congress could destroy the delicate rapport established between the US and Iran in 2013, but, if managed correctly, a productive relationship between the two countries could provide the key to forging a two-state solution between Israel and Palestine. Although it may seem that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict will remain stagnant for the foreseeable future, Secretary of State John Kerry emphasized in November what all the signs seem to indicate: time for the two-state solution is quickly running out as the region’s people grow increasingly exasperated by what appears to be a hopeless process. It’s possible that Kerry could wield Iran negotiations as a tool in working with Israel on an agreement with the Palestinians, especially given Iran’s influence with militant groups including Hezbollah. For the good of US interests in the Middle East and the region itself, we’ll be watching to see if diplomacy wins out in 2014.
Established in 1995, the Georgetown Public Policy Review is the McCourt School of Public Policy’s nonpartisan, graduate student-run publication. Our mission is to provide an outlet for innovative new thinkers and established policymakers to offer perspectives on the politics and policies that shape our nation and our world.
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