Conflict gold?

Well Well Well, haven't I been ignoring you. Ever so sorry, I have been in my home country and running around like a crazy person for the past couple of weeks.

Soooo... Let's treat the issue of Conflict Gold..
You may well have heard of conflict diamonds, but not of conflict gold. It's a similar principle with a different commodity.

In certain corrupted African countries, gold is being mined and the profit is used to fund their corrupt governments and conflicts.

 Hence, why it is called Conflict Gold. Now, this in principle means that it is banned from the markets. All gold has to have a registered point of origin, and if it is from these places it should not be used... However, with this come massive ethical issues. 

What are you on about?

Well... Often the gold mining is the only form of income for this remote areas, despite the workers only being paid a pittance. If you take away this income from the people, they won't have anything and they will be far worse off than if they mined the gold. 

They would not be able to afford food, clothes, school, transport etc. And thus the whole community would diminish back to a poorer state. And if you think about that, that isn't fair either, finally there is a way for these areas to flourish, at least a little bit, in developing countries.  When so much of what we do is about trying to help these developing countries, it doesn't seem right to take this away from the people living there.

And then you go back to the flipside:

The gold is funding conflicts, conflicts are bad and often have child soldiers involved in them. The governments are corrupt and totalitarian, so why on earth should we support a government that does such things? 

And that is exactly the question we face now, what matters more? Helping the people and their communities grow, or preventing the governments from funding their conflicts?

International Aid for Self Gain?

Sooo at uni we have to do a number of articles with a variety of titles, on of the first ones I think I have already posted, which is on the Palestine-Israel conflict. They're only allowed to be 4-5 hundred words long so I know there isn't a lot of depth in them.  They are meant to spark an interest and get people to research further for themselves. Below is one I did on international aid and I might post the redraft of the other article. If you're interested in any of this and would like to know where you can find more information, drop me a line and I'll help you as much as I can.

Discuss the extent to which developed countries use international aid for their own purposes.

International Aid was developed to aid those countries in need. One of the main goals that has been set for countries is to donate a minimum of 0.7% of GNI per year to stop hunger, but only a handful out of 22 countries that pledged to do so in the UN. 6 of those who have not met their pledge have not even started a schedule to work towards, including the US.

So if these countries are so reluctant to meet this pledge what is the point of International Aid at all?

Firstly, there is a difference between developmental and humanitarian aid. Humanitarian focusses mainly on instant relief from problems caused by natural disasters and conflict; whereas Developmental aid focusses on tackling the long term roots of the problems that cause poverty and hunger by prolonged donations from developed countries.

Secondly, on a very simplified basis International Aid works in a similar manner to the way that banks loan money to people and companies. One party lends to another with an interest rate, allowing for a greater return on the money lent. However, this would only lead the countries into greater debt eventually as they are lending from one country to pay back the other. Is it ethical to continue to ‘aid‘ when in the long term it doesn’t benefit the country you’re helping?

Thirdly, if a country puts a lot of aid into a particular nation then there is the possibility of political influence and personal gain. By aiding developing countries the western world is able to  build up ties with countries that have great oil supplies or tactical positioning on the globe. Additionally, there may also be imperialistic legacies that nations wish to be upheld - if a nation continues to assert influence within these regions then part of the culture that was brought initially may sustain for longer.

One of the great issues with aid remains the countries that gain it. Often developing countries have fledgling democracies - if that - and governments are corrupt, bringing with it the ethical issue that the support is going to a corrupt, often totalitarian rulership with little or no regard for Human Rights - is that justified?

According to many countries and organisations it is - they manage to get a lot of aid to the people in need and the governments that give eventually get a return out of their investment. But it is unclear as to whether the return is greater than the good that the aid will do in the long term, begging for the question: “Does International Aid really aid at all?”

UK Education?

So at the moment there is a whole debate about the UK Education system and how the exams should be regulated and set (content wise) by reputable universities. Somehow people are pissed off with this, why? because obviously exams are going to be getting harder... boo hoo. Suck it up, it will make your grades count, it will make your grades make sense and actually mean something to employers. It will allow you to learn more AT university, so why some people are trowing a hissy fit is beyond me.

There are so many things that I disagree with within the UK education system...
Firstly, it likes to narrow itself down as quickly as it possibly can, from age 14 you start dropping subjects and by age 16 you can drop your mother tongue. Grammar is no longer thoroughly taught and maths is often not even considered as something to take for those doing a levels.

I did the IB, something which is more similar to the Dutch education system and something I agree a lot more with, but there are still core subjects missing. In holland you take economics from a young age, it helps you to understand how the world goes round.
There is more international history so that you understand your place. There are second languages, third languages sometimes fourth languages taught.
There is proper sex education, which I think is essential to allow young people to be safe in their activities - kids are having sex younger and younger, it is better for them to be educated about it and know how to prevent anything they may not want (e.g. pregnancy or S.T.I.s).

And then there is the whole fact that the school system is streamed, something which to me makes a lot more sense than the way the English system works. Kids have to repeat years and ensure that their grades are maintained, they have to work hard to get to university. In this country you can get to university with straight Us (That's UNGRADED to those unaware of the ridiculous marking system in this country)...


And I understand that people change in university, they may well get fantastic grades in certain subject but I can't help feeling that there are so many people going to university just for 'the experience'. People are getting degrees (all be they 2-2s or 3rds) left right and centre. I think it is important, and time, to make it more difficult to get degrees, exams, and to take away some of the degrees that don't mean anything. You may want to find graduate work but if you've got a degree in 'media' it really isn't going to do much for you is it?

And what my university has done is it has now alienated the possibility of taking languages for interest - a key skill within any job market is to speak foreign languages, but now I can't improve those skills because you can't be bothered to offer it anymore? What is wrong with this world?!

Are Peace and True Democracy ever likely goals?

Within the whole western world we strive to have true democracy and peace all over the world. We believe that our system is a truthful one and that we have already reached true democracy... But have we really?

Is the Western world truly one of peace? We are constantly up in another part of the world trying to sort out either their issues or to use the countries that we are in for our own goals. I say 'we' in the loose meaning of the word as it is the Western World collectively that does this, not just one country.

Moreover, the Western world is one that prides itself on its democracy but is it truly democracy when the system used in some countries is one solely of a majority? And when countries do use systems such as proportional representation people are always keen to step in when someone that leans to far to the left or right gets a decent amount of votes.
 - don't get me wrong, I'm not an extremist and would not want another Hitler in power anywhere - but this is merely a point I am trying to make. More of a philosophical point than something completely concrete.



The reason that I am bringing these issues to the forefront now is due to the new peace talks that are happening in Palestine at the moment. Israel is complaining because they do not wish to cooperate with Hamas as Hamas is seen as a terrorist organisation. Which I frankly find extaordinarly ironic.
Have they looked at past presidents? And even the current one was a part of the IDF.
For instance look at Menachem Begin - Head of the Irgun who prided the Irgun and the Stern Gang (or Lehi) on their 'Splendid Act of Conquest' (see Spectacle.org) after killing hundreds of people in Deir Yassin.

Regardless of this I do hope that the new government (with Abbas as the interim prime minister until the elections) will be able to bring some peace into the region or at the very least help to start rebuild the devastated West Bank and Gaza areas.