The World at Yale

By Ashley Feng:

Why do parents in today’s Mainland China so passionately, even desperately, want their children to attend university? On Tuesday afternoon, Professor Andrew Kipnis, a Senior Fellow in the Australian National University’s Department of Anthropology, presented the economic, political, historical, and cultural answers suggested in his latest book, Governing Educational Desire, as part of the China Anthropology Colloquium Series.

Kipnis’s talk drew primarily from classroom observations and interviews with families at middle schools around Zoupin county in Shandong province, where the percentage of high school graduates enrolling in university is continually increasing despite high tuition rates; of the 280 parents Professor Kipnis spoke with, he found only one who did not express a strong desire for that his children attend university.

Shishi High School in Chengdu - one of China's top preparatory schools - is, alas, only a dream for most Chinese parents. (Courtesy of Wikipedia).

The effects of national policies, particularly the one-child policy, may have contributed by increasing many parents’ care and expectations for each child. Kipnis also considered local reasons for this emphasis on higher education, noting local government expansion of schools to create teaching, construction, and service jobs, and the fact that many of the most desirable jobs in Shandong are held by the local bureaucracy and therefore more often require educational credentials. However, he noted that educational desire can transcend economic incentives: enrollment remains high at third-tier universities whose diplomas have little or no educational value, while vocational schools offering relatively well-compensated technical work after graduation struggle to find students.

Kipnis proposed cultural factors as a strong driver of educational desire: Chinese society has historically emphasized the glories of education, from the imperial examination system to select public officials to a present-day society where street corners and buildings are adorned with huge posters of students who test into top schools. Kipnis remarked that centuries of granting the power and wealth of public office to those with the highest scores had created a tradition of “literary masculinity”, in which romantic prospects depended on academic success), which has become a major element of Chinese culture (he compared this phenomenon to a Jewish tradition of perceiving men who studied the Torah as more attractive, in contrast to European expectations that men who studied the Bible extensively would become monks).

The days of the imperial examinations may be over, but the secondary education system is still a brutal gauntlet focused entirely on student test scores and preparation for the university entrance examination. Professor Kipnis noted the impact of parental and systemic pressure on students. He showed a slide with the middle school’s summer schedule: classes and review activities from 6 a.m. until 10 p.m. seven days a week, and shared conversations with students who had passed the entrance exams- athletes who gave up their sports for the six years of secondary school to study- and others who had dropped out, frustrated with their poor grades in classrooms where those grades determined their value. Kipnis observed that despite the burdens testing imposes, the central government has upheld entrance exams for universities, many skilled jobs, and promotion within the party itself as the only way to preserve fair access in the face of rampant corruption.

The educational hopes of Chinese parents for their offspring highlight the complex interaction of ancient cultural values with political and economic trends in modern Chinese society: interactions difficult to illuminate, but impossible to ignore.

Ashley Feng ’15 is in Calhoun College. Contact her at ashley.feng@yale.edu.

By Willa Frej:

Lara Setrakian flew in directly from Dubai today to lead a master’s tea in Ezra Stiles, organized by the International Students Organization, during which she discussed “Five Things I’ve Learned as a Foreign Correspondent.” Based in Dubai, she works for both Bloomberg Television and ABC news covering business, politics, and news across the Middle East.

She seems to enjoy classifying in groups of five; she began today’s presentation with a brief discourse on five words that guide her through her career and her life – empathy, sincerity, hustle, humility, and respect.

Keeping these in mind, she delved right into her five pieces of advice. First: “perception can count as much as intention.” Lara explained that she has struggled with her dual identity while living in the Middle East, what she referred to as “an Eastern face with a Western attitude.” The key, according to her, is to anticipate these foreign perceptions and proceed with humility and respect.

Laura Setrakian, an ABC News reporter based in Dubai, expressed a justifiably high opinion of her own work and encouraged wide-eyed Yalies to follow her lead. (Courtesy Reporter.am).

Second: “fear is amplified with distance.” Lara encouraged the audience, however, to be aware of bravery that is derived from reducing this distance and approaching the unfamiliar.

Third: “it’s not who you know or what you know, it’s how hard you work.” This advice reflects Lara’s start as a journalist; she comes from a family of Armenian immigrants. Her perseverance landed her a summer internship shadowing a CBS war reporter on 60 Minutes in high school, and her passion for journalism led her to Harvard, where she forsake good grades to run a radio station.

Fourth: “you miss one hundred percent of the shots that you don’t take, and some that you do.” Lara actually stole this piece of advice from Wayne Gretzky, but she has applied this to her life and her career; it reinvigorates her and reconnects her to her mission of informing and creating globally minded citizens.

Finally, Lara’s personal favorite: “people are better than you think.” While it is natural to assume the worst of people, Lara prefers to remain optimistic, trusting her finely-honed instincts to stop her from crossing the fine line into naiveté. She reminded her audience that her goal is to serve her viewers, and her passion for journalism stems from her positive experiences with these viewers.

The overwhelming zeal Lara expressed for her career is indeed rare. She marveled at a certain state of “purity” she felt she’d attained—a feeling that came from doing what she knew she was meant to do in life. This is only natural, she reasoned, seeing as journalism is a meritocracy, and she, a meritorious journalist—attributing the greatest part of her success to her honesty. She proceeded to open a notebook filled with her musings to read a quote to the audience: “the truth should win, no matter who else loses.”

A free spirit unconcerned with negative press or network expectations, Lara views herself as a “freestyle swimmer” who chases stories worth viewers’ time. This attitude led to her designation as one of Foreign Policy’s ‘Twitterati 100;” her passion for informing her fellow citizens as often and as accurately as possible is truly inspiring. We can only hope that Lara’s five points of wisdom will inspire many others to continue to make viral these frank discussions about the conflicts that plague the globe.

Willa Frej ’13 is in Pierson College. Contact her at willa.frej@yale.edu.

By Janine Chow:

Today in the Sterling Law Building, Professor Shlomit Yanisky-Ravid directed a seminar on “Law and Society in Israel: Contemporary Issues.” An eminent Israeli Professor of Law and a fellow at Yale Law School’s Information Society Project, she drew on past research and experience to discuss multiple forms of discrimination in Israeli society today. The experience took the format of an especially dynamic class on law centered on relevant court cases.

Yanisky-Ravid couched her discussion on ideals of equality in the 1948 Israeli Declaration of Independence, which includes a promise to “ensure complete equality of social and political rights to all its inhabitants irrespective of religion, race or sex.” This idealism about equality pursues in the Israeli legal courts, she said, where verdicts tend to support the arguments of victims of prejudice. Laws forbidding workplace discrimination against sex and religion have expanded to cover sexual orientation and what the professor curiously called “freedom of pregnancy.”

Professor Shlomit Yanisky-Ravid takes a break from fighting the good fight to explain her quest for equal rights in a society that often holds fast to its regressive roots. (TYG/Chow).

But, Yanisky-Ravid warned, such cultural relativism is hardly prevalent outside of legal statues. Discrimination remains a deep issue in most every walk of Israeli society, from “hidden discrimination” against those who did not serve in the IDF (read: Arabs, immigrants, and disabled persons) to open discrimination against employees who refuse to work on the day of Sabbath.

The greater part of the seminar centered on the rights of the women and the rights of the ultra-Orthodox. Professor Yanisky-Ravid introduced the story of the woman who refused to give up her seat to an ultra-Orthodox man on a public bus, a story which inflamed the media and branded her as the “Israeli Rosa Parks.” One student at the table commented that “it’s tough for American Jews to listen” to this case, given the long history of human rights movements in the United States. “We’ve dealt with this,” he said.

Though the courts ultimately resolved that women be allowed to sit wherever they choose, according to the latest Knesset reports, most still continue to sit at the back of busses so as to avoid harassment. Another student pointed out that the rights of women and the rights of the ultra-Orthodox cannot really coexist. To this, Professor Yanisky-Ravid objected that despite the right to religious freedom, no society would sanction blood revenge today.  Gender discrimination “for me is like blood revenge,” she said—simply another part of Orthodox culture that should not be permissible.

The prospect of immutable discrimination is not so bleak, however. With each successive case, Israeli courts continue to rule in favor of the minority. Professor Yanisky-Ravid herself continues to work with the Israel Women’s Network and the International Labor Organization, and has even won a scholarship for research in the field of equality for women. If she and the rest of Israel’s women continue their work, equality might be inevitable.

Janine Chow ’15 is in Jonathan Edwards college. Contact her at janine.chow@yale.edu.

By Fil Lekkas:

Hot on the heels of one successful intervention in Libya, and arguably poised to attempt others in Syria and Iran, the role of the US globally is again in the center of public debate. To pinpoint the ideal aggression level for American foreign policy, the William F. Buckley Jr. Program and the Rozenkranz Foundation hosted a debate on Thursday, March the 22nd between Thomas Donnelly, director of the Center for Defense Studies at the American Enterprise Institute, and Christopher Preble, Vice President for Defense and Foreign Policy Studies at the CATO Institute. As representatives of divergent strands in conservative thinking—Preble representing  ”realists” and Donnelly neoconservatives—they sparred over the theory and practice of American foreign policy.

Preble began by taking aim at the neoconservative thinking that has long dominated US foreign policy circles. Wary of its “fatal conceit” in believing the US able to “better repair broken neighborhoods in Baghdad than it had been able to in Chicago”, he criticizes neoconservative understandings of “war as the ultimate state project”, however high the price tag.

Christopher Preble took on Thomas Donnelly on Thursday, arguing that his foe's ideas were both irresponsible and unaffordable. (CATO Institute).

Instead, Preble would pare down US foreign policy to its bare essentials, pursuing only “vital national interests” through “well-defined” and “publicly supported” initiatives. Though frustrated by the lack of participation from European allies—characterized as having “liabilities but few capabilities”—he did suggest that “maybe the Germans and the Japanese shouldn’t decide to do more” if that meant acquiring nuclear weapons. Though he knows his views lie “outside of the Beltway consensus”, he claims that a more restrained foreign policy would better reflect the preferences of the American public.

Taking a more ambitious stance, Donnelly emphasized the need for an active America. Instead of merely engaging “in a the kind of offshore balancing” that amounted to “splendid isolationism”, he prescribed to the US the role of ensuring safe global access to the traditional “international commons” of “the oceans and seas” as well as “the atmosphere, space, and the electromagnetic spectrum”.

Donnelly also highlighted the successes on America’s global record, including the pacifying of conflict-ridden Europe thanks to the sacrifices of “blood and treasure”, and the prosperity-kindling consequences of American intervention in Vietnam, which he claims helped establish the peace during which “the great Asian economic miracle” has taken place. Unlike Preble, he believes that Europeans, among others, “would prefer the US to be the strongest power in their region”. Though “Rasmussen polls may say otherwise”, he claims that the policies he defends have long been those of “American leaders of all political stripes”.

The policy consequences of their theoretical differences emerged more clearly when answering questions on priorities of American policy today. Regarding counter-terrorism, Donnelly defended a role for the military, arguing that “non-state actors are impossible to understand without the contexts in which they develop”—contexts, of course, the US military has considerable power to shape—as demonstrated by how “Al Qaeda’s power derived from controlling a piece of Afghanistan for a while.” Preble, again, urged caution, emphasizing how even when there is a state sponsor for a terrorist groups, even a “military solution doesn’t always involve an invasion”.

However, on China, Preble claimed they stood on similar ground, arguing that despite China’s success in raising “250-300 million people out of poverty, they still have 750 million to go”. Despite that, Preble was concerned about the potential for China’s leaders to “foment foreign conflict’ to deflect attention from internal unrest, which the presence of American vessels in the South China Sea would only accentuate. Donnelly, however, emphasized how domestic “nationalism”, rather than an assertive U.S. Navy, would determine whether China’s leaders pursued an aggressive foreign strategy.

As is often noted, whatever the outcome of these debates, the United States will remain the world’s only  superpower for the foreseeable future. Nonetheless, a spirited but respectful dialogue about policy priorities is our only hope to make the U.S. a more responsible player in the global arena.

Fil Lekkas ’14 is an Economics major in Calhoun college. Contact him at filippos.lekkas@yale.edu.

By Rachel Brown:

On February 24, György Szapáry, the Hungarian Ambassador to the U.S., spoke about strategies for resolving the current European debt crisis. Trained as an economist, Ambassador Szapáry has previously worked at the European Commission and the IMF (where he was Hungary’s Senior Representative), and has twice served as Deputy Governor of the National Bank of Hungary. Approaching the topic as both a diplomat and an economist, Szapáry offered the unique perspective of someone who has worked with many of the major players involved in the current crisis.

(Flickr Creative Commons/Fotopedia)

Although his talk was billed as a discussion of how the EU can work to “melt the iceberg” of debt, Ambassador Szapáry spent much of the talk outlining how Europe and the United States arrived at their current fiscal situations. In particular, he noted the confluence of a financial crisis, a debt crisis (in both the private and public sectors), and a growth crisis – a combination he deemed “quite exceptional” and which the world has not seen since the Great Depression. One of the central problems he identified was the inevitable tension that arises from the need to reduce debt through austerity measures and the fact that such cutbacks inhibit the economic growth necessary to emerge from a recession. He also addressed the problem of low consumer confidence and how this exacerbates the existing economic downturn.

Shifting his focus specifically to the Hungarian economy, Szapáry noted one way in which Hungary, which is not a member of the euro zone, has experienced the effects of the European debt crisis. Prior to the recession, domestic interest rates were high and so people circumvented this by borrowing in Euros and Swiss Francs, both of which had lower interest rates. However, in the uncertainty following the 2008 economic crisis, the Hungarian currency, the forint, started to depreciate and many of these foreign currency-based loans began to go bad. Ultimately the government reached a deal with banks that allowed customers to refinance their loans in forint at more favorable exchange rates.

Szapáry then broadened the discussion to include a comparison of the American and European economies. Although he noted that neither the U.S. nor Europe is in a strong economic position, he believes that America faces better prospects for recovery than Europe does, partly because the U.S. has a growing population and more flexible labor market. He illustrated his discussion of the differences between the two regions with a slide. The U.S. was represented by a large aircraft carrier, while Europe in contrast was a chain of destroyer ships. He explained that it is much easier for one captain to lead a ship, than for 27 different captains to coordinate their efforts.

Ambassador Szapáry expressed a strong conviction that the euro zone will remain intact. Despite the flaws in the existing system, he believes it is far better than the alternative of constantly managing exchange rates between different European countries. He also discussed the future of Greece, one of the most pressing concerns for euro zone watchers. He explained that when a nation faces a large debt (such as Greece currently does) they have three options: to pay their debt and suffer a lower standard of living, to default on the debt, or to pay the debt off with inflated dollars. However, as a member of the euro zone, Greece has forgone access to this third option. Yet, he does not think that Greece will default entirely, and believes that they will continue to pursue a policy of both austerity measures (to pay off the debt) and debt restructuring (to reduce the amount Greece actually has to pay). He added that even if Greece were to leave the euro zone, the rest of the zone would probably stick together.

When Ambassador Szapáry addressed the structural reforms needed to improve European competitiveness he used another transportation metaphor. He explained that in car racing, “what is important is not how your fast you come into the curve, but how fast you come out of it” and that speed is determined within the curve. Likening the “curve” to a recession, he explained that European leaders should use the recession as an opportunity to adjust their course and address problems they might have ignored in better economic times. Hopefully they will be able to emerge from the recession at a good speed.

Rachel Brown ’15 is in Saybrook College. Contact her at rachel.brown@yale.edu.

By Willa Frej:

On Tuesday afternoon, the Hellenic Studies Program at Yale’s MacMillan Center invited Dr. Bert Groen, Fellow at the Yale Institute of Sacred Music and the director of the Institute of Liturgy, Christian Art, and Hymnology at the University of Graz, to address current-day religious trends in Greece. Held in a classroom in Luce, the intimate talk took the form of a seminar in which the audience drove the conversation.

Groen began by upholding the commonplace belief that Greece is a nation defined by the Orthodox religion. There is no denying that the vast majority of Greeks are Orthodox and strictly abide by their faith. “The further North you go,” explained Groen, “the more cremations occur. The further South you go, cremations remain scarce.”

Orthodoxy is an integral part of modern Greek life. Orthodox churches, like this one in Athens, are numerous and visible in cities and towns all across Greece. (Flickr Creative Commons/David.Kamm)

Groen quickly changed gears to focus on the underlying religious diversity that exists in Greece, despite constitutional recognition of the Orthodox Church. Islam is the country’s largest minority group and is found in pockets of Thrace, an area near the Turkish border. Geographically isolated, Greek Muslims also face general economic hardship and constantly find themselves, according to Groen, needing to justify their faith to their country and to the world. Official mosques or imams have yet to appear across Greece, and so Muslims resort to worshipping in hotel restaurants, while those less fortunate practice their religion in more precarious locations carefully watched by police.

Roman Catholics, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Protestants, Jews, Classical Greeks, Free Masons, and atheists also sprinkle the Greek religious scene. For these minorities, Groen notes that today’s challenges lie in the Orthodox Church’s consistent marginalization, even though many Roman Catholics and Jehovah’s Witnesses are, in fact, ethnic Greeks who share a common history with Orthodox Greeks. He hopes that societal changes can lessen these divides.

How to reconcile Greece’s intense religious identity with its significant diversity? Greece can be commended for its efforts to enhance tolerance and approve regulations on religious freedoms, yet there is a staunch reticence to intermingle or dissolve prejudices.

Groen begs outsider nations to limit their judgments and generalizations on Greece’s religious makeup; his mission is to dispel the myth of the Greek monolith and reveal that, for better or for worse, diversity and some level of intolerance come hand in hand.

Willa Frej ’13 is in Pierson College. Contact her at willa.frej@yale.edu.

By Fil Lekkas:

Americans take bitter pleasure in speculating about the consequences of their country’s decline. But how might the immense, energy-rich, and nuclear state of Russia respond to the wane of U.S. power? On February 21, Calhoun College, in association with the Yale International Relations Association and the Poynter Journalism Fellowship, hosted Paul Starobin, contributing editor to the National Journal and author of After America: Narratives for the Next Global Age, to discuss what Russia might be like in four potential post-American worlds.

Whatever its future context, the Russia of today—and likely of tomorrow—is in a sorry state. With a shrinking population, “abysmal healthcare”, rampant corruption, an unruly and inefficient military, and an economy dependent on resources extraction, “Russia has been a declining power for over 20 years”. The regime of Vladimir Putin—led by him as Prime Minister for 12 years, and as President for 6—has financed its doings with a vast oil revenue, a product of sustained high oil prices.

Paul Starobin gave his audience the choice of four futures; of course, given chaos theory, a butterfly flapping its wings in Brazil today might completely rupture Russian policy in 2050. Or something like that. (Courtesy of Facebook).

However, as Russia has declined, so has America. This post-American world, to which Russia will have to adjust itself, will take on one of four forms: either a return to Westphalian multipolarity, a Chinese Century of Sinic preeminence, a Ancient-Greece-like world of city-states, or a homogenized universal civilization.

In the first of these, the Russian establishment would thrive. Without a global policeman to resists its moves, Russia would see few challenges to how it treated its “near-abroad”. Intriguingly, such a world could see stronger relations between Europe and Russia, as the threateningly expansionist policies of NATO—largely spearheaded by the United States—would recede along with the US.

Although it might be somewhat taken aback, Russia could manage in a Chinese Century. Having traditionally looked to Europe for cultural guidance, it would feel uncomfortable submitting to the Chinese, towards whom the Russians harbor a largely “condescending and racist attitude”. Combined with Russian fears over Chinese expansion into Siberia, this scenario would be tough to manage—but Russian energy exports to China would surely dominate the relationship.

Russia could almost be said to already inhabit the age of city states; in Starobin’s words, “everything that is happening in Russia … is happening in Moscow”. This is nothing new, as dominance by a single city—going as far back as Rus and Novgorod—is a hallmark of Russian history. In a world of city-states, Moscow’s preeminence would only be reinforced.

The final and most novel option is that of the universal civilization, which Starobin describes as a “Davos world, if you will, on steroids”, referring to the annual globalization-celebrating fête. This would be the world most foreign to Russians, as nationalism rather than cosmopolitanism colors the thinking of both the elites and the public. In a world dominated by well-enforced global standards of justice and commerce, the Russian instinct would be to resist vociferously.

How Russia engages with the world of tomorrow will have consequences not only for its own 180 million inhabitants, but also for those it might choose to trade with, imitate, or even invade. Though divining the future will never be a perfect science, it is a necessary (and fascinating) task.

Fil Lekkas ’14 is an Economics major in Calhoun college. Contact him at filippos.lekkas@yale.edu.

By Fil Lekkas:

On February 21, the Boris Kapustin, professor of Political Science at Yale, and Paul Starobin, veteran Russia correspondent and contributing editor to the National Journal, addressed a packed lecture hall in WLH. Organized by the Yale International Relations Association, their talk discussed the nature and future of the Putin regime in Russia, especially in light of the widespread protests organized in response to widely recognized electoral fraud.

Though intrigued by Russia’s current protests, Starobin emphasizes that liberalism and democracy remain very elusive. Vladimir Putin played a major role in creating the current situation, having “monopolized the assets of the country, eliminated opposition, and defanged the media”. However, a deeply ingrained tradition of “strong-man” autocracy combined with a national ethic defined by Orthodox obscurantism (the restriction of knowledge from the people), creates a public that is more willing than others to tolerate such practices. Furthermore, the disdain Russia’s educated elite and downtrodden poor feel for each other keep these two important parties tragically divided. In the light of all of the above, Starobin considers the likelihood of this “fractious” movement’s success slight. Despite that, he finds this attempt by ordinary Russians to “advance a kind of democratic possibility” (and resist their strongman) encouraging.

Boris Kapustin lectures in Harkness Hall. Kapustin and Paul Starobin split over Russia's splits, but both agreed that Putin remains unsplit. (Lekkas/TYG).

Where Starobin saw the deep forces of tradition combined with elite snobbery, Kapustin identified a deeply antidemocratic “peripheral capitalism” as the prime agent of the failure of liberalism. Unlike Starobin, he sees in Russia a liberal public waiting to break free of a “collusion of dominators” consisting of the “top brass of the police and military” and the oligarchic super-class. Intent of protecting their plunder, Russia’s elite are “foxes that are pretending to be lions”: bourgeois and decadent, but eager to appear imperialist to threaten their neighbors and beguile their people. In his view, Putin—though by no means a puppet—is entrapped by their maneuvering despite being the figurehead of “Kremlin Inc.”. As such, today’s Russia is not an “authoritarian state” run by Putin, but “to quite a large extent, a failed state”. Kapustin has little hope for the protest movement; even if the current protests were to elect a new Prime Minister, that person would be similarly “entangled in the collusion of the elites”.

However one interprets it, the situation in Russia looks grim. Deep structural factors—whether cultural, historical or economic—constitute a significant obstacle for those Russians discontent with their lot.

Fil Lekkas ’14 is an Economics major in Calhoun College. Contact him at filippos.lekkas@yale.edu.

By Matt Williams:

A signature foreign policy initiative of in the early days in President Barack Obama’s Administration was a “reset” of relations with Russia after years of cyclical mistrust and cooperation. Yet, as Thomas Graham, a Senior Fellow at the Jackson Institute for Global Affairs explains, the reset “ended at the moment when it reached its highest point” – the ratification of the New START Treaty 2010. Graham’s talk, part of a lecture series sponsored by the Jackson Institute drew a crowd of approximately 60 students, faculty, and members of the community and focused on the future of U.S.-Russian relations. As a managing director at Kissinger Associates, Inc., where he focuses on Russian and Eurasian affairs, Graham provided insight while also engaging his audience.

Graham began his talk with two related assertions. First, former and likely future President of Russia, Vladimir Putin will continue to lead Russia and second, the “reset” is dead. Much of this has to do with the fact that Mr. Putin symbolizes the negative images Americans hold in regard to Russia. With Dmitry Medvedev, Russia’s current President, both President Obama and the nation as a whole could better relate to his style, ideology, and love of technology. Yet, with the imminent “re-election” of Mr. Putin—which Putin recently revealed had been planned since his first term, with no other option for Russia’s people—the U.S. shows no signs of seeking a warmer relationship and has in fact increased its rhetoric against Russia to highlight our differences.

Thomas Graham speaks in the Sterling International Room. Given his topic, the nationless map behind him is bitterly ironic, don't you think? (Williams/TYG).

Ultimately, Graham sought to explore the question of whether or not “the U.S. and Russia can sum up the imagination to launch a new constructive page beyond the reset” or will we “continue within a cycle of hope and disappointment.” Indeed, it would seem as if we are presently within the disappointment stage: discussions relating to missile defense are stagnant, U.S. has denounced human rights abuses in Russia, and Russia has countered U.S. positions on Libya and most recently, Syria. But another reset is not enough. Like a slow computer that needs a restart, the current framework of relations needs to be scrapped in favor of a relationship defined by meeting new strategic challenges and interests.

Establishing such a relationship, Graham explained, is no easy task. The United States faces a world that is more globalized than ever before, in which it is no longer a “rising” power, and in which we can’t use traditional approaches to foreign policy (such as isolationism or the single threat framework such as containment or unconditional surrender) that defined much of 20^th Century American foreign policy. At the same time, Russia, for the first time in three centuries, is not the dynamic core of Eurasia. It is surrounded by stable, more dynamic power in China and Europe. Both countries, the U.S. and Russia continue to see each other as competitors rather than partners—but in reality, Graham notes, “neither poses a strategic threat to the other.”

Still, audience members left the talk without much hope for the warming of relations. A new constructive phase is unlikely to materialize under a renewed Putin administration in Russia and if both parties continue to view the relationship without considering both short-term and long-term goals. History and petty political differences will continue to prevent us from acting in a cooperative manner, even though this would be to both our interests—as in so much of world policy today.

Matt Williams ’13 is a Global Affairs major in Berkeley College. Contact him at matthew.williams@yale.edu.

By Ifeanyu Awachie:

The girl I am to interview sits down across from me – sharp and stylish in gold earrings, a bright teal sweater, and shining black leather boots. Her name is Marina Filiba, and she’s been wearing the same t-shirt for eight months.

Marina is participating in the I Am Challenge, a youth-led initiative that asks young people to commit to wearing a t-shirt with their name on it for 365 days while raising funds for causes they care about. Marina gave a talk on the I Am Challenge at the TEDx Yale conference this February 4^th. When I ask Marina how she found such an exclusive opportunity, I’m surprised to hear that she didn’t start out wanting to give a talk. A self-proclaimed “ TED junkie,” Marina was thrilled to hear that TED was happening at Yale and approached   TEDx Yale curator Diana Enriquez Schneider about helping to organize the event. By then, TEDx Yale had enough organizers, but Diana suggested Marina sign up for the student speaker competition. Though the idea made her nervous, Marina auditioned, became one of the most popular candidates in the online competition and won a spot on the stage.

Marina is currently the international director of the I Am Challenge, overseeing two to three regional directors of Challenge projects around the world. While the projects change depending on the region, the t-shirt remains the same in each country, establishing a connection between participants regardless of cultural separation. To Marina, that makes the world seem a little smaller—and this feeling is one of her favorite aspects of the Challenge.

Dozens of young people around the world have taken up the Challenge; those with long names might have some trouble, though. (Courtesy I Am Challenge).

In the beginning, the I Am Challenge consisted of Dan and Ben— two friends in New Zealand who dared each other to wear the same t-shirt for one year. Co-founder Dan Cullum says that he and Ben realized they “weren’t going to be able to get through the whole year if they didn’t have a cause.” So they contacted the New Zealand branch of World Vision, a humanitarian organization, and began a project to raise funds to build wells in water-deficient Tanzania. Soon after that, their friends asked to get involved, and the larger organization was born.

Since 2008, the Challenge has spread to 11 countries around the world, and over 300 young people have participated. Today, groups have adopted the challenge in Hong Kong, Marina’s homeland of Argentina, and my hometown of Atlanta. In New Zealand, a seasoned group of Challengers is working to sponsor arts programs in Christchurch, a city leveled by an earthquake last February. In 2012, they will launch a project in which each Challenger is paired with a child in a developing Asian country with the goal of raising $550 for that child. After completing the year-long Challenge, each participant gets a second assignment—to find someone to take up the Challenge and continue raising money for the same child.

In Kuwait, a team led by a regional director named Hiba is focusing its efforts on environmentalism. They plant trees and run a market where they sell goods made with recycled materials (like purses crafted from grocery bags). Marina has never met Hiba in person but says that she is “amazing.” Rather than letting their project fizzle out, Hiba’s team already has new leadership lined up for when she leaves for university. Marina says the group in Kuwait exemplifies the kind of commitment the Challenge aims to foster.

When I ask Marina whether she knows Dan and Ben personally, she tells me that Dan is her boyfriend—a detail they keep under wraps. The two met in London two years after Dan star TED the Challenge and have been dating ever since. For two years, Marina has never seen Dan without his “I Am” shirt. “I don’t know what my boyfriend looks like without that shirt,” she says, we both laugh. Dan never pressured Marina to take up the Challenge, but Marina tells me about times on her visits to New Zealand when she and Dan would be shopping at the grocery store, and Marina would see people wearing the t-shirt who didn’t even know Dan. It was this evidence of the Challenge’s impact that made Marina want to get involved.

Marina outlines the Challenge’s objectives for me: one is “getting rid of excuses”—the Challenge aims to refute the stereotype that today’s youth are commitment-challenged. Through “I Am”, kids our age show the world that we are passionate, that we can devote our lives to something. Marina and the other Challenge directors don’t try to sell their mission as an easy one—they know every participant will face days when they wake up, go to their closets, and regret their decision to wear the t-shirt. But as Marina said in her talk, “When you think back on this year, you’re not going to remember moments of hesitation, but rather the 365 days of genuine commitment to a cause much greater than one’s wardrobe.”

Another of the Challenge’s objectives is fundraising. As Dan says, the t-shirt is just a tool that Challengers can use to raise money for and awareness about causes they support. Marina points out that sponsorship is a great way for people to get involved in the Challenge if the t-shirt isn’t their style. She says, “My sister told me, ‘I’m past the age where I can wear some t-shirt and be an activist and all that, but I want to support you.’ So she became a sponsor and gives $25 a month to the Challenge.”

The Challenge’s third objective addresses fashion. This was an especially interesting part of Marina’s I Am Challenge story. She hails from Buenos Aires, Argentina, one of the fashion capitals of the world. When she started the Challenge, friends and family questioned her. “Are you crazy?” her dad asked when she talked about donning the t-shirt just before heading to Yale. Marina was unruffled: she saw the beginning of the school year as a great time to introduce her new classmates to the Challenge. She got some positive attention for it at the Orientation for International Students (OIS): at the end of the program, she received the award for “Best Wardrobe.”

I had to ask: doesn’t it get hard, wearing the same shirt every day? Marina answered that the longer she does the Challenge, the less she thinks about what she wears. She has become convinced that “[her] time is better spent in other ways.” She tells me that the Challenge pushes you toward this kind of self-discovery. She regularly hears stories of people who finished their long year of fashion suppression to find that they couldn’t return to life without the t-shirt. They figured if they were going to put effort into the clothes they wore, they might as well do it for a cause.

The Challenge has renewed Marina’s faith in today’s youth. Each week, she gets emails from people wanting to take up the Challenge in their communities. In New Zealand, an entire infrastructure—shirts, fundraising tools, moral support—already exists for those who wish to begin, but building project groups from scratch in other places leads to trouble with unwieldy logistics and heavy bureaucracy. But despite it all, they follow through with the Challenge. Seeing that, Marina says, is when she is most impressed.

So, are you thinking of signing up for the Challenge yet? If you are, you’ll be glad to hear that, along with a group of four fellow Yale freshmen, Marina is bringing the I Am Challenge to campus. The group includes Luis Schachner, Marina’s suitemate Nancy Xia, fellow international student Christian Rhally, and Monica Hannush, who met Marina immediately after her talk to learn how to get involved. The group is still deciding which cause they’ll adopt; one option they’re considering is fundraising for and volunteering with local tutoring programs. Marina stresses that they are open to suggestions from anyone for projects to support.

Marina is certain that even after she’s done wearing the t-shirt, the Challenge will still be part of her life—especially since she’s dating Dan. Service was a big part of her life before the Challenge and will be after it. She may even be starting an initiative of her own next year. Her studies at Yale have given her new ways of thinking about her work: last semester, Gateway to Global Affairs prodded her to examine the role of women in international activism. As for a major, she’s thinking Psychology or Political Science, or both.

Before concluding our interview, I ask Marina why her t-shirt says “I Am Maru” instead of “I Am Marina.” She explains that in Argentina, everyone goes by nicknames—if her mom calls her Marina, she probably hasn’t done her laundry. The “I Am” t-shirt allows one to present herself as she wants to be perceived, and Marina has always thought of herself as “Maru”—she’s still getting used to being called Marina in college. As the interview wraps up, another function of the shirt comes to mind—it’s a surefire way to bring about meaningful conversations with strangers and reporters alike.

Ifeanyu Awachie ’14 is in Timothy Dwight college. Contact her at ifeanyu.awachie@yale.edu.