Security v Liberty: Lies, Spies and Deceit

A hero for the modern age

Edward Snowden’s attempts to ‘protect basic liberties for people around the world’ with revelations over the extent to which apparently liberal democracies are able to spy on their own citizens, the citizens of other countries, their allies and their trading partners has again reignited the old debate of security versus privacy and liberty. UK Foreign Secretary William Hague’s insistence that innocent law abiding citizens ‘have nothing to fear’ as only terrorists, spies and criminals will be spied upon is disingenuous nonsense and simply a flippant dismissal of genuine fears about the reach of the state into our private lives, how this sits within the law, how it is supervised and who is accountable. Politicians on both sides of the political divide, and on both sides of the Atlantic, appear to be showing the same dismissive attitude as Hague, and remain happy to erode civil liberties and spy on their citizens and allies with the simple justification of being the good guys fighting the bad guys (you can choose from a wide range of bad guys, including: terrorists, criminals, foreign spies, paedophiles, hackers or anyone else that there is a disproportionate amount of fear of that can be used to emotionally blackmail the public). If you think that the dismissive reaction of the UK government is bad, which I do, then the aggressive attitude of the US administration is even worse. The US government has not stopped for one second to consider that they are in the wrong and have instead decided to pursue Edward Snowden, even to the extent of damaging international relationships, in order to bring him to ‘justice,’ where justice appears to be being silenced for exposing tyranny within a liberal democracy. When, as a liberal democracy, you are being lectured about freedom of expression, and over the top intrusion, by China you might want to rethink your course of action.

Cyber attack!

It should come as no surprise that politicians use fear of - insert bad guy here - to justify actions that have been in no way accountable to the public, or that they use it to justify further increases in their own power and the power of the intelligence, defence and police forces for whom they have responsibility and oversight of as well as power over. This has been a common theme throughout the ‘war on terror’ and has been used to justify rendition flights for torture, the detention of suspects without charge or trial, erosion of civil liberties, killing without any due process, invasions of foreign countries and the support of vicious and oppressive dictators who happen to share our enemies. We are now seeing the use of the internet – something which was given freely to the world 20 years ago that has allowed ordinary people across the globe so much freedom and power to communicate and organise –  as a tool for surveillance and control of these ordinary people by the very liberal democracies one would hope would be the biggest defenders of something which encourages freedom of speech and expression and the exchange of knowledge and experience. Whilst not surprising, considering the tendencies of the US and the UK to use fear to manipulate their citizens and to erode civil liberties and privacy, it is shocking, deeply embarrassing and potentially harmful to international relations, particularly for the US who are now being slammed by China for cyber attacks following so many US accusations being thrown the other way. Of course, it is not just US politicians who appear to be hypocritical, the UK has our fair share as well, my favourite example here is the ever reliable Jack Straw and his seemingly conflicting views on privacy. On the one hand he is against intrusion into private life, of course this is where it would appear to mostly concern public figures, but, on the other hand, is completely in favour of more power for public officials and their security services where it involves private individuals. This would appear a bizarre contradiction but it is entirely par for the course where national security is concerned, as politicians now seem to believe that they are entirely unaccountable for any actions taken ‘in the interests of national security’ and that they, through privilege of position, should be allowed greater privacy as public figures than should the public as private citizens.

Protesters highlighting the
plight of detainees

Having had a look at the rank hypocrisy on show from our elected representatives in both the UK and the US, it is perhaps time to examine the idea that the innocent have nothing to fear from mass surveillance, breaches of privacy, the erosion of civil liberties and increased power for politicians, the intelligence services and the police. If these things sound familiar to you it’s because they are, they are common traits of oppressive, and often violent, regimes throughout history and across the globe. The argument that only the bad guys have anything to fear is a surprisingly popular one on both sides of the Houses of Parliament, and I suspect with both Republicans and Democrats in the US as well, considering that these people are elected representatives of the people within liberal democracies, who are currently perpetuating a ‘war on terror’ which, at its heart, is a war of ideas, as well as a geo-political one, where each side wants its idea to be dominant. Apparently, the idea which we are trying to protect is above all one of freedom and liberty, which is focused on the rights of the individual, democracy, freedom of expression and freedom from oppression. Somewhat ironically, since the beginning of ‘the war on terror,’ the protection of this idea has consistently been used as a justification for the erosion of its principles in both the UK and the US. Not only have people been detained without charge or trial in the US, the UK and overseas; been sanctioned without charge or trial; been flown to less liberal allies for torture; had their freedom of protest curtailed; been tried in secret courts; and numerous other erosions of our precious liberties, but US citizens have actually been killed in drone strikes authorised by the Obama administration. Now, I am not suggesting that everyone who has suffered because of these things is innocent of any crime whatsoever, but, and this is a rather crucial point, the ones of which I speak have not been convicted of any crime at trial, a central tenet of our judicial system, and would therefore, without the circumvention of our normal rules, be considered to be innocent.

Scary human rights enthusiasts

Not only does it seem that our liberal democratic principles are being eroded in such a way as to circumvent what would have been considered due process for people deemed dangerous by the state, we have also seen revelations that those who would be considered innocent of any wrong doing by the vast majority have perhaps been subjected to surveillance by intelligence and security services. In the UK, for the ‘crimes’ of embarrassing the police, the intelligence services or the government and holding them to account, it seems that a number of people and groups have been targeted, including the family of murdered teenager Stephen Lawrence following public sympathy which followed a botched police investigation. As well as these, there is also the example of Liberty, a group which campaigns for human rights, being targeted in the past by MI5 which now fears it has fallen victim again. Liberty has a track record of standing up to Western governments where they show a disregard for human rights, civil liberties and their own liberal ideals. These are just a few examples in the UK which have surfaced over the past few days, and there can be little doubt that the ability of the state to intrude upon our privacy and to put us under surveillance has increased dramatically since the 90s, when the police are accused of trying to undermine political and protest groups through infiltration. That this was also a time before the ‘war on terror,’ and its use as eternal justification for such blatant disregard of liberty and privacy, is also worth noting, as, through creating an atmosphere of fear, it is now easier to make a claim that something is necessary 'in the interests of national security.'

In the case of the US, you need go no further than two recent and high profile whistleblowers, in Edward Snowden and Bradley Manning, the first of whom has fled the country whilst the other is on trial. In Snowden's case, in his role working for a defence contractor he came across evidence that the US has been systematically spying on its citizens, citizens of foreign countries and its allies and partners which he then leaked to the Guardian. For this he has been branded a traitor and a defector by Congress and is being hunted by a White House administration which is happy to attempt to bully any country that may be harbouring him. Bradley Manning's court-martial is currently under way, following the leaking of sensitive material that included video footage of US forces shooting unarmed men and diplomatic cables which embarrass the US and show its government to be calculatingly hypocritical. As whistleblowers, you would expect them to be protected from the state in a liberal democracy, like the US, when making the public aware of the actions of their representatives and their military, but, unfortunately, they have been deemed traitors for exposing tyranny, hypocrisy, oppression, murder and an over reaching and too powerful state. It is hard to reconcile the idea that we all live in free democracies, free from oppression and with a right to privacy, when those who make public the actions of public officials are routinely prosecuted and shamed, whilst politicians and generals get pensions and position, and groups which disagree with the government are hacked and infiltrated.

With a well constructed narrative and complex tools at their disposal, as well as the consistent silencing and disparaging of those who seek to expose any wrong doing or hypocrisy, it is hard to understand how anyone can buy into the opinion that the innocent have nothing to fear from a state already proven to have acted against innocents and run by politicians and institutions in whom public trust is at an all time low. Throughout history, the innocent have been the ones to suffer when civil liberties and privacy are eroded and they still have the most to fear from it now, particularly considering that there are powers in place for the security services to put suspected criminals and terrorists under surveillance as it is. This begs the question of why there is a desire to access the data of so many citizens? It is not that I am suggesting that the US and UK are now comparable with the worst of history's regimes, but, the more we erode civil liberties, the more we erode privacy and the more we silence those who seek to hold the state to account, the more like a police state we become, and we should not allow this to happen on the justification that we are protecting ourselves from an existential threat that does not exist.

Drone Strikes Set a Dangerous Precedent

'Look there, in the sky'

When listening to the US administration’s justification for drone strikes and the parameters for their use deemed acceptable, it is hard not to feel that President Obama is setting a dangerous precedent for the use of force by any state, nation, or group, against its enemies. One would have to assume that, if this is the limit of the rules by which they consider themselves bound, the use of violence in this way must surely be acceptable to them where it is used by another, even by those considered enemies. By claiming moral and legal justification for such acts of violence, you must accept that you justify others use of the same justifications, otherwise it is deeply hypocritical and we’d surely never see this from a US administration.

Deadly drone

By declaring this a global war, not restricted to areas of operations or zones of ‘hot war,’ President Obama and his administration seek to justify the killing of people not engaged in combat that they have deemed to be enemies without charge, evidence, trial, representation or any legal process whatsoever, and whilst residing in the sovereign territory of other states. The justification for this is simply that these people are planning to harm the US. What the many civilians also killed are guilty of has yet to be decided, although it can be as simple as being a combat aged male, as the they would rather argue over the numbers than the principle, a clear hint that there is no legal or moral justification for the deaths of innocents caused by military strikes within the sovereign territory of supposed allies. Where this justification becomes dangerous is in following it to its logical conclusions in terms of the scope of the reach of the US’s ‘war on terror’ and also in terms of what it implies is a justifiable act in a war.

First of all, the implication that the US considers it justifiable to attack its ‘enemies,’ who are planning to harm the US, no matter where they are in the world has implications for us all. Whilst it is unlikely that it would happen, it suggests that it would be legitimate to strike on UK soil to take out someone considered to be plotting against the US, and of course take out any innocent civilians who happen to be near them at the time. This is of course highly unlikely given the intelligence sharing between the US and the UK, the fact that we are allies in the same abstract war and that we would be likely to either prosecute anyone plotting in this way in the UK or extradite them to the US. It is worth considering however for the way in which it would feel to be morally wrong and the way in which it would be expected to be considered illegal as well. I use it mainly to illustrate the point that if we would consider it to be morally and legally wrong if it were to happen in the UK, then the same thinking should apply to anywhere else. It is always worth considering how actions would affect you and your own country when trying to understand the use of such actions in a place far removed from your reality.

Drone strike aftermath

Secondly, the implication is that killing someone whom you perceive to be a threat, and those who happen to be near them, is an acceptable tactic in this modern war of ours. If this applies to enemies on the sovereign soil of one’s allies, it surely must apply to any leader or service personnel on the soil of your enemies, when you are at war these people must surely be considered to be a threat to you. I think it obvious where I am going with this, but I’ll spell it out anyway. The logical conclusion to the justification of drone strikes is that it would be acceptable to kill soldiers and political leaders, and of course anyone who happens to be near them, outside of a ‘hot war’ zone if you consider them to be a threat to you, an example of which would be killing a British soldier on the streets of London or the bombing of any leading UK or US politician and their family. Given that we are apparently engaged in a war on a global scale against radical Islam, a radical Islamist could point to this justification of the US administrations drone strikes as a justification for violence in the UK or US. As well as the above, this sort of logic could be used for the removal of political dissidents abroad, political assassinations and military strikes by states who consider certain people to be a threat to their state. If this logic is to be acceptable to us as justification for US violence then it is hard to argue against it if it were to be used by Russia, Iran, China or anyone else, even though comparable actions have certainly been condemned in the past

It almost feels as though the justifications trotted out by the US administration for their use of drone strikes are the perfect justifications for certain acts which would normally be labelled terrorism, were they to happen in the West, or of state sponsored assassinations of political or military adversaries who have sought safety elsewhere. Once you start acting outside the boundaries of what would normally be considered legal and you start having to perform complex mental gymnastics to try and morally justify your actions, it is time to start considering what it is that sets you apart from your enemies. This is particularly relevant when you are already detaining people without trial, torturing suspects, abusing prisoners, killing civilians, eroding civil rights at home and prosecuting those who expose such actions. Once we give up the rule of law and principles of fairness and liberty, we have lost the war of ideas no matter what happens in the war of arms.

Michael Gove: The Education Secretary Who Couldn't Learn

Today sees Michael Gove reveal his latest attempt to reform our education system, which, quite laughably, includes the radical change of replacing A*-G with numbers 1-8. Aside from that game changer, it would appear that Gove’s attempts to play up to the angry, nostalgic and, above all, ill informed and ignorant wing of his party’s support, or those most likely to support his inevitable leadership bid, is to keep repeating the words rigorous and tough. What this translates to is a huge step backwards towards the schooling that Gove and his peers enjoyed, meaning the scrapping of coursework, an increased difficulty level and longer exams with everything riding on them. Of course, this sort of system will be fine for those who excel academically, happen to live near a good school or can afford a tutor, as they do in the current system, but, it is not a system within which the majority can thrive and get the best out of their education. If we want the evidence of this, we simply need to study our own history, something of course Gove doesn't agree with unless it consists of a long list of British triumphs; he doesn't much go for the use of critical analysis.

Gove pretends to listen

I have no problem with the idea of reforming our education system, it actually makes perfect sense following the move to compulsory education until the age of 18 and with an ever expanding knowledge of how children develop and how best to teach them. It is unfortunate however that our very own Education Secretary has proved himself unable to keep up with much of this research, or of engaging his critical faculties to garner an understanding of what is needed to improve every child’s experience in the modern world. He has instead relied on the prejudices, sorry ‘knowledge,’ of his inner circle of aides, where research not in line with his beliefs is rejected and only bits which agree with him are considered, all the while justifying his changes through the use of discredited statistics concerning the UK’s comparative international performance. This sort of narrow-minded, closed and selective approach is exactly the sort of approach that any self respecting student engaged in critical analysis would shun, and really should earn Gove a failing grade. Most worrying of all, is the apparent ignorance of the existence of the internet, it really isn't necessary to memorise lists of facts with them so readily available, and the callous and uncaring approach to the emotional needs of students, forcing them to adhere to a single educational approach with all of the pressure piled on them in a final exam which bears no resemblance whatsoever to the ‘real world.’ 

Gove’s favourite Pisa statistics, which were discredited by the governments own statistics watchdog, don’t seem to tally with those of another independent study carried out by Pearson, which appear to show that the UK is actually performing somewhere near the top in terms of international achievement, this may explain the high demand worldwide for those educated in the UK and the high numbers of foreign students throughout our education system. Perhaps more interesting than this, is the assertion that ‘successful countries give teachers a high status and have a "culture" of education.’ This would seem like common sense to many but, somewhat ironically from someone trying to appeal to the Daily Mail readers amongst us, Gove appears not to realise this and has instead insisted on ignoring the importance of the development of children and their interest in learning as well as systematically undermining, and making enemies of, almost the entire education profession. From the managers, so often not aligned with practitioners, in head teachers, to the practitioners themselves, the teachers, and right through to the academics, who train our teachers and inform our knowledge and understanding through their research, Gove has faced stern criticism that has led to him being widely loathed. Creating a culture of education, with teachers being of a high status, would appear to be the exact opposite of what Gove is trying to achieve. It is vital that teachers are well motivated, supported and appreciated, how else can they be expected to perform the task of motivating, supporting and appreciating the next generation? It is also vital that children are engaged with their education and supported in the myriad different ways which they need to get the best out of them. Gove’s reforms do neither and it makes him a dangerous failure.

Learning by rote

There is much that can be done to improve our education system but the truth of the matter is that it is extra funding and training that is needed as well as a different change of direction to that of Gove’s. Creating a culture of education with teachers as high status individuals will not be achieved by going back to a learn by rote and exam focused system within which teachers and academics are roundly attacked by government for having the temerity to put forward an informed opinion. The focus on league tables and exams from an early age is routinely criticised as leading to a ‘teach to the test’ method and a lack of a rounded education. This is where the direction needs to change. Take the pressure off of head teachers, teachers and pupils by removing rigid assessment criteria and focus on a more well rounded education where teachers are assessed on their methods and their ability to engage children with the curriculum. This would help to create a culture of learning where children are encouraged to learn and enjoy education rather than being steered towards passing a test. Where teachers are falling behind the standards expected, there should be meaningful training to aid their professional development both within schools and without. There is no positive outcome from assessing teachers when there is no meaningful action that they can take to progress and improve; it is bad for morale, bad for the teacher, bad for the pupil and bad for the school. It is also vital that either class sizes are reduced or more well trained assistants are available in class to support the teacher and pupils, or, better still, a combination of both. To get the best out of each and every child, it is necessary to understand their needs and how they learn, and to engage them with their studies in a positive way; Gove’s way is the opposite of this and will instead lead to a prescriptive form of teaching where the exam is all and many pupils are left behind because their needs don’t fit into his world view.

Many seem to agree that the years before GCSEs and A Levels should not be so focussed on assessment and categorising, and that we need to ensure that children, whilst of course studying a broad range of subjects and learning the key basics, are engaged with their education and are encouraged to help foster a culture of education. Without focusing on the needs of pupils and engaging them with education, by giving them the support they need within a more flexible framework, any changes to our assessment structure for GCSEs and A Levels will likely prove fruitless, or, in Gove’s case, counter-productive. Considering the need to engage pupils with education and the importance of emotional development to achieving better results, it beggars belief that we are to see a regressive step in education to a learn by rote and exam heavy structure. There should be no problem with posing pupils challenges and expecting them to be able to solve problems, but, different people learn in different ways and respond to different approaches, it says more about the arrogance of Gove than the ability of the UK's children that he believes only exams are 'tough' and 'rigorous' tests of ability and indicators of achievement. He appears to have had no thought beyond differentiating between the best and the brightest in academic terms, with no thought to those with special educational needs, no thought for those not of an academic mind and no thought for those who are not served best by having their entire future and educational achievement riding on final exams. These reforms are regressive, they are callous, they will fail so many of the next generation and they have been informed by the ignorance and arrogance of one man in the face of an entire profession. Michael Gove, Secretary of State for Education, is an abject failure and a dangerous ideologue whose beliefs are deemed more important than others knowledge and the future of the UK’s children.