foreignpolicy--2020-07-14--China Will Use Huawei to Spy Because So Would You

Boris Johnson ’ s government announced Tuesday that it would block the Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei from Britain ’ s next-generation cellular 5G network .
A review by Britain ’ s National Cyber Security Centre ( NCSC ) had concluded that recent U.S. sanctions imposed on Huawei would make it impossible for Britain to use its 5G technology .
But apart from such technical questions , the underlying question about Huawei equipment—whether it poses a threat to British national security—deserves far more attention .
Previously , the NCSC assessed that Huawei ’ s risk could be mitigated by limiting its @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Britain ’ s 5G network while shielding its sensitive “ core.
” It is reassuring that Britain ’ s signals intelligence service , GCHQ , which the NCSC is part of , has investigated Huawei since it first entered Britain ’ s broadband network years ago and has not to date detected any evidence of malicious Chinese state cyberactivity through Huawei .
Absence of evidence , however , should not be interpreted as evidence of absence—or intent .
In fact , there is a long history of all kinds of governments exploiting commercial @ @ @ @ @ @ @ bulk to further their interests and protect their national security .
The British and U.S. governments have themselves been previous perpetrators of such exploitation—and victims .
Uncovering this history is inherently difficult , as it involves some of the most closely guarded secrets in modern history , but newly opened intelligence archives now make it possible .
They show that London and Washington previously brokered covert agreements with communication companies to rig their hardware to give code breakers easier access to material whenever they believed doing so advanced their national interests .
Together @ @ @ @ @ @ @ : It would be naive to expect the Chinese government not to exploit Huawei hardware on Britain ’ s 5G network for intelligence collection .
Throughout history , leaders found ways to intercept and read private communications of adversaries—from steaming open postal letters to intercepting telegrams , telephonic communications , and now those passed over the internet .
As communication technologies developed , so did corresponding interception methods .
In 1902 , Guglielmo Marconi made history by sending the first wireless radio message across the Atlantic .
That same year , the great @ @ @ @ @ @ @ prophetic essay , “ Wireless , ” in which he described “ eavesdropping ” on communications sent by Morse equipment .
Although Kipling ’ s story was what today would be called science fiction , it soon became reality .
Twelve years later , on the outbreak of World War I , Britain imposed emergency legislation , the Defence of the Realm Act , which allowed for mass interception of postal and telegraph communications .
This turned Kipling ’ s idea of eavesdropping into a real-world industrial enterprise .
One of the first @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the start of hostilities in August 1914 was secretly to cut German cables .
At the time , Britain had the most advanced undersea telegraph cable system in the world , spread out across its vast empire .
In an act of what today would be called strategic information warfare , as soon as war was declared , Britain launched a coordinated attack to cut German undersea cables across the world , from Hong Kong to Gibraltar to those running under the English Channel .
According to a secret history of wartime censorship—a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ was to deprive Germany of its outside communications and force communications from German cables onto British-controlled wires , where they could be collected and decrypted .
During the war , 180 British censors at U.K. offices read 50,000 messages each day , with another 400 censors working in 120 stations overseas .
Britain also cut trans-Atlantic cables that came ashore in Cornwall—the same place where , a century later , Edward Snowden revealed that British and U.S. intelligence were tapping fiber-optic internet cables crossing the Atlantic .
During the war , 180 British @ @ @ @ @ @ @ each day , with another 400 censors working in 120 stations overseas .
As well as bulk collection of cable communications of their wartime enemies , Germany and the Central Powers , British code breakers also collected cable communications of neutral countries , which before 1917 included the United States .
That year , the Royal Navy ’ s code-breaking section , Room 40 , broke the Zimmermann Telegram , a message sent from German Foreign Minister Arthur Zimmermann suggesting an alliance between Germany and Mexico against the United States .
Room 40 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ but U.S. cables , which carried the enciphered German communication .
British intelligence then passed the telegram to U.S. officials but deceived them about how they obtained it , devising a cover story that it came from a human agent , or “ spy.
” The Zimmermann Telegram was made public in March 1917 and was central in bringing the United States into World War I on the side of Britain and France .
There are few more significant examples of the direct impact that bulk collection of foreign communications and code-breaking had @ @ @ @ @ @ @ bring the United States into the war , British code breakers indelibly advanced U.K. national interests .
After World War I , the U.S. government created its own code-breaking department , the Black Chamber .
Its head , Herbert Yardley , brokered a secret—and illegal—agreement with U.S. telegraphic companies , such as Western Union , to obtain copies of telegrams entering into and going out of the United States .
The agreement , which Yardley personally orchestrated with Western Union ’ s president , Newcomb Carlton , involved a messenger calling at its @ @ @ @ @ @ @ took copies of cables to the Black Chamber and returned them to Western Union before the day ’ s close .
In his later sensational account of its work , Yardley claimed that that Black Chamber “ sees all , hears all .
… Its sensitive ears catch the faintest whisperings in the foreign capitals of the world.
” Yardley claimed that that Black Chamber “ sees all , hears all .
… Its sensitive ears catch the faintest whisperings in the foreign capitals of the world.
” The reality was different .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ House administrations paid less and less interest to its activities , believing that eavesdropping was morally grubby and unworthy of resources .
When Herbert Hoover became president in 1929 , he appointed Henry Stimson as secretary of state , whose well-advertised insistence on high moral standards in public affairs set him on a collision course with the Black Chamber .
When he discovered what it did , Stimson closed it down , famously claiming that gentlemen should not read each other ’ s mail .
As a result of Stimson ’ s decision @ @ @ @ @ @ @ strategic threats in the 1930s without the benefit of a dedicated , independent signals intelligence agency , while America ’ s foreign adversaries showed no such gentlemanly restraint when it came to reading U.S. mail .
If Stimson had allowed the Black Chamber to continue its un-gentlemanly work , hoovering up cable traffic through shadowy agreements with cable companies , it is likely the United States would have been better informed about the strategic threats it faced in the 1930s .
Stimson himself eventually became President Franklin D. Roosevelt ’ s war secretary—and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ chief consumers of Japanese wartime decrypts obtained by U.S. code breakers .
The story of Britain ’ s bulk collection of German communications during World War II , and its impact on the Allied war effort , is now well known .
The German military used Enigma machines to encipher its communications , which comprised a keyboard and scrambler rotors encoding a message in billions of ways , making it effectively unbreakable .
However , by exploiting weaknesses and a captured German code book , code breakers at Bletchley Park built a machine @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Thereafter Bletchley was able to decrypt German communications on an industrial scale .
By 1943 , it was decrypting 3,000-4,000 messages per month .
While Bletchley Park ’ s wartime achievements are now well known , its postwar history is far less understood .
A major reason why British intelligence was determined to keep the achievements of Bletchley Park , known by the code name “ Ultra , ” secret after 1945 was because British colonies were using Enigma machines to encrypt their communications .
In fact , at the end of the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ German Enigma machines and gave them to British colonies , insisting they were necessary for securing communications .
Having seized the wartime Enigma cipher , communications of those colonies using Enigma machines were easy prey for Bletchley ’ s postwar successor , GCHQ .
The British government also convinced colonial governments that GCHQ should manufacture ciphers for them after independence .
This happened in the Gold Coast , a British colony in West Africa , which in 1957 became the first colony in sub-Saharan Africa to gain independence .
GCHQ officials visited the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ secret agreement with its government-in-waiting that they would manufacture cipher pads for Ghana ( as the Gold Coast was renamed after independence ) because of the vast expense involved .
Unfortunately , declassified records do not expressly set out what happened thereafter , but it is reasonable to conclude that , having manufactured the country ’ s cipher hardware , Ghana ’ s communications were effectively open books for GCHQ .
Bulk collection through rigged hardware allowed the British government to advance its interests in the Cold War .
A major strategic question @ @ @ @ @ @ @ was whether colonial states seeking independence from Britain in Africa , and elsewhere , would align with the Soviet Union in the Cold War .
High-level British intelligence assessments about the Soviet or communist threat in those colonies were persistently nonalarmist , calming policymakers ’ fears in London and Washington .
Code words stamped across the top of those British intelligence reports , such as “ UMBRA , ” indicate they were derived in part from signals intelligence—doubtless obtained from compromised Enigma machines or rigged cipher pads that Britain manufactured .
In the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ set in , Britain ’ s and America ’ s signals intelligence agencies , GCHQ and the National Security Agency ( NSA ) , continued with wartime bulk interception projects .
They did so through secret—and illegal—agreements with major U.S. cable companies .
In an operation code-named “ Shamrock , ” U.S. military signals intelligence ( the NSA ’ s predecessor ) , assisted by GCHQ , brokered an under-the-table agreement with three major U.S. cable companies—Western Union , RCA Global , and ITT World International—to provide daily copies of all cable traffic @ @ @ @ @ @ @ United States .
The companies did so for “ patriotic reasons , ” understanding they were helping U.S. national security .
Like the Black Chamber ’ s earlier arrangement with Western Union , Shamrock involved NSA couriers calling at the cable companies ’ offices in New York , Washington , and San Francisco each day to get microfilm copies of cable traffic .
When those companies switched to using magnetic tapes in the 1960s , the NSA set up an office in New York to duplicate tapes and keep copies for itself .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ have involved 150,000 messages printed and analyzed by the NSA each month .
In another iteration , code-named “ New Shamrock , ” the NSA tapped teleprinter and other communication links of between 60 and 70 foreign embassies in the United States .
At its height , Shamrock seems to have involved 150,000 messages printed and analyzed by the NSA each month .
Little is known in the public domain about Shamrock ’ s actual impact on U.S. national security or statecraft .
According to the NSA ’ s long-serving deputy director , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ on ” since its beginnings in World War II , “ without a great deal of attention from anyone , ” and actually “ wasn ’ t producing very much of value ” —which raises the question why it was operating .
The Church Committee , investigating abuses by U.S. intelligence in 1975 , exposed Shamrock , concluding that it was “ probably the largest government interception program affecting Americans ever undertaken.
” Its exposure led to the passing the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act ( FISA ) of 1978 , designed to restrict @ @ @ @ @ @ @ whose successor legislation continues to be scrutinized by Congress .
However , the principle established by Shamrock persisted after it was closed down : Communication companies remained willing to collude with U.S. intelligence in schemes they suspected were illegal .
The digital revolution unfolding today is fundamentally changing the nature , scope , and scale of government bulk collection of communications .
In doing so , it is also changing the nature of intelligence itself .
However , the underlying principles of exploiting communication companies in order to collect intelligence remain the same @ @ @ @ @ @ @ order to find a needle in a communication haystack , it is necessary for states to own that haystack .
Unlike their past projects , the NSA and GCHQ have not achieved their bulk collection programs in the internet age through shadowy agreements brokered with communication companies but instead through legislation allowing it .
The NSA ’ s bulk collection program of telephone call metadata ( information about calls , not their underlying content ) has been achieved through Section 215 of the USA Patriot Act .
In 2017 , the NSA used @ @ @ @ @ @ @ telephone calls and text message records .
A corresponding bulk collection program , under Section 702 of FISA , targets internet communications of foreigners outside the United States .
In Britain , GCHQ used antiquated and obscure legislation to carry out its bulk collection programs before they were exposed by Snowden , a former NSA contractor .
Although the NSA collected a vast number of telephone calls and text message records , these have resulted in remarkably few specific queries about “ known or presumed U.S. persons.
” Contrary to claims made at @ @ @ @ @ @ @ metadata collection programs were not “ mass surveillance , ” which suggests persistent observation .
In reality , as a U.S. intelligence transparency report after Snowden ’ s disclosures reveals , although the NSA collected a vast number of telephone calls and text message records , these have resulted in remarkably few specific queries about “ known or presumed U.S. persons.
” As in the past , their bulk collection programs appear to have protected British and U.S. national security .
An independent inquiry into Britain ’ s bulk collection program revealed that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , counternarcotics and counter-human trafficking .
In fact , it appears that it was through bulk collection that GCHQ first identified ( and thwarted ) a Russian hacking group , Fancy Bear , attempting to meddle in Britain ’ s 2015 general election ; Fancy Bear then went on to conduct hacking operations during the 2016 U.S. presidential election .
More recently , however , the NSA ’ s bulk collection program has attracted criticism , including the agency ’ s deletion of three years of collected data in June 2018 .
Reporting @ @ @ @ @ @ @ collection program under Section 215 may no longer be worth the effort .
Suspicions about governments using new communication platforms to spy are wider than China and Huawei : Kaspersky Lab ’ s anti-virus software is thought to have links to Russian intelligence ; an Emirati messaging app , ToTok , is apparently used by Emirati intelligence ; and the Chinese government is thought to be exploiting the wildly popular social media platform TikTok .
It is impossible to believe that China ’ s one-party state , in which no entity is truly @ @ @ @ @ @ @ exploit Huawei hardware if it desired , just as British and U.S. intelligence did with earlier communication hardware .
In fact , under China ’ s National Intelligence Law of 2017 , companies are required to cooperate with intelligence activities if requested .
If the Chinese government ordered it , Huawei would be obliged to act in a harmful way to Britain .
Britain ’ s cyber-experts previously suggested that it was possible to draw a distinction between “ edge ” and “ core ” in a 5G network , keeping the latter @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Others have argued that in a 5G “ virtualized ” network , distinctions between the core and edges are blurred , thereby enhancing threats even at the periphery .
But even if China ’ s exploitation of Britain ’ s 5G network is relegated to its periphery , the intelligence rewards for Beijing—and the weakening of British national security—may still be substantial .
Hitherto , states have conducted espionage and sabotage in the physical world , but today they are doing so in cyberspace .
Huawei ’ s presence on Britain ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ economic espionage , stealing British intelligence property passing over its network .
Huawei ’ s presence on Britain ’ s 5G network could allow Beijing to conduct economic espionage , stealing British intelligence property passing over its network .
It could also collect ostensibly nonsensitive bulk data on British citizens , which may inadvertently reveal precisely the kinds of activities that the British government wants kept secret—the work of its defense , security , and intelligence services .
For example , Chinese data scientists could use a rapidly developing methodology called “ social @ @ @ @ @ @ @ relationships between places and people , for intelligence targeting against Britain .
With its foot in Britain ’ s 5G door , such analysis may expose Britain ’ s security and intelligence activities to Beijing .
Then there is the potential for Chinese cybersabotage .
Beijing could use Huawei equipment to disrupt or take down Britain ’ s telecommunications network during an international crisis or as part of a cyberattack—flipping the kill switch for British communications , much as Britain did German communications in 1914 .
The true scale of the threat posed @ @ @ @ @ @ @ we consider how it could be combined with billions of internet-enabled devices , sensors , and gadgets in households , offices , and infrastructure , most of which are unsecured and whose owners may not even know are networked .
They would effectively constitute billions of hidden backdoors into British society .
The British and U.S. governments should know from their own history the value of secret deals with communication companies , and rigging their hardware , to collect intelligence .
There is no reason why Beijing would not find similar value from @ @ @ @ @ @ @ we are all now living virtualized Zoom lives , which makes a lightning-quick 5G network even more appealing .
At the same time , as we all move to inhabit a cyberworld , it is also more important than ever not to forget about threats from before the pandemic .
If Huawei were a Russian , not a Chinese , company , would Britain ever have considered allowing it into its 5G network ?
The answer is surely “ no .
”

Boris Johnson’s government announced Tuesday that it would block the Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei from Britain’s next-generation cellular 5G network. A review by Britain’s National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) had concluded that recent U.S. sanctions imposed on Huawei would make it impossible for Britain to use its 5G technology.
Boris Johnson’s government announced Tuesday that it would block the Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei from Britain’s next-generation cellular 5G network. A review by Britain’s National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) had concluded that recent U.S. sanctions imposed on Huawei would make it impossible for Britain to use its 5G technology.
But apart from such technical questions, the underlying question about Huawei equipment—whether it poses a threat to British national security—deserves far more attention. Previously, the NCSC assessed that Huawei’s risk could be mitigated by limiting its access to the “periphery” of Britain’s 5G network while shielding its sensitive “core.” It is reassuring that Britain’s signals intelligence service, GCHQ, which the NCSC is part of, has investigated Huawei since it first entered Britain’s broadband network years ago and has not to date detected any evidence of malicious Chinese state cyberactivity through Huawei.
Absence of evidence, however, should not be interpreted as evidence of absence—or intent. In fact, there is a long history of all kinds of governments exploiting commercial communication companies to collect foreign intelligence in bulk to further their interests and protect their national security. The British and U.S. governments have themselves been previous perpetrators of such exploitation—and victims.
Uncovering this history is inherently difficult, as it involves some of the most closely guarded secrets in modern history, but newly opened intelligence archives now make it possible. They show that London and Washington previously brokered covert agreements with communication companies to rig their hardware to give code breakers easier access to material whenever they believed doing so advanced their national interests.
Together, this history offers a clear message: It would be naive to expect the Chinese government not to exploit Huawei hardware on Britain’s 5G network for intelligence collection.
British cadets practice Morse code on one of the model ships built for training at the Nautical Training School at Heswall, Cheshire, on Dec. 3, 1936.
Bulk eavesdropping
Throughout history, leaders found ways to intercept and read private communications of adversaries—from steaming open postal letters to intercepting telegrams, telephonic communications, and now those passed over the internet. As communication technologies developed, so did corresponding interception methods. In 1902, Guglielmo Marconi made history by sending the first wireless radio message across the Atlantic. That same year, the great British imperial writer Rudyard Kipling wrote a prophetic essay, “Wireless,” in which he described “eavesdropping” on communications sent by Morse equipment. Although Kipling’s story was what today would be called science fiction, it soon became reality.
Twelve years later, on the outbreak of World War I, Britain imposed emergency legislation, the Defence of the Realm Act, which allowed for mass interception of postal and telegraph communications. This turned Kipling’s idea of eavesdropping into a real-world industrial enterprise. One of the first acts undertaken by the British government at the start of hostilities in August 1914 was secretly to cut German cables. At the time, Britain had the most advanced undersea telegraph cable system in the world, spread out across its vast empire. In an act of what today would be called strategic information warfare, as soon as war was declared, Britain launched a coordinated attack to cut German undersea cables across the world, from Hong Kong to Gibraltar to those running under the English Channel. According to a secret history of wartime censorship—a polite term for eavesdropping—Britain’s strategy was to deprive Germany of its outside communications and force communications from German cables onto British-controlled wires, where they could be collected and decrypted. During the war, 180 British censors at U.K. offices read 50,000 messages each day, with another 400 censors working in 120 stations overseas. Britain also cut trans-Atlantic cables that came ashore in Cornwall—the same place where, a century later, Edward Snowden revealed that British and U.S. intelligence were tapping fiber-optic internet cables crossing the Atlantic.
During the war, 180 British censors at U.K. offices read 50,000 messages each day, with another 400 censors working in 120 stations overseas.
As well as bulk collection of cable communications of their wartime enemies, Germany and the Central Powers, British code breakers also collected cable communications of neutral countries, which before 1917 included the United States. That year, the Royal Navy’s code-breaking section, Room 40, broke the Zimmermann Telegram, a message sent from German Foreign Minister Arthur Zimmermann suggesting an alliance between Germany and Mexico against the United States. Room 40 obtained the telegram by reading not German but U.S. cables, which carried the enciphered German communication. British intelligence then passed the telegram to U.S. officials but deceived them about how they obtained it, devising a cover story that it came from a human agent, or “spy.”
The Zimmermann Telegram was made public in March 1917 and was central in bringing the United States into World War I on the side of Britain and France. There are few more significant examples of the direct impact that bulk collection of foreign communications and code-breaking had on international relations. By helping to bring the United States into the war, British code breakers indelibly advanced U.K. national interests.
A cryptogram published by the code breaker Herbert Yardley in the Saturday Evening Post in 1931.
America’s Black Chamber
After World War I, the U.S. government created its own code-breaking department, the Black Chamber. Its head, Herbert Yardley, brokered a secret—and illegal—agreement with U.S. telegraphic companies, such as Western Union, to obtain copies of telegrams entering into and going out of the United States. The agreement, which Yardley personally orchestrated with Western Union’s president, Newcomb Carlton, involved a messenger calling at its Washington office each morning, who then took copies of cables to the Black Chamber and returned them to Western Union before the day’s close. In his later sensational account of its work, Yardley claimed that that Black Chamber “sees all, hears all. … Its sensitive ears catch the faintest whisperings in the foreign capitals of the world.”
Yardley claimed that that Black Chamber “sees all, hears all. … Its sensitive ears catch the faintest whisperings in the foreign capitals of the world.”
The reality was different. As the 1920s moved on, White House administrations paid less and less interest to its activities, believing that eavesdropping was morally grubby and unworthy of resources. When Herbert Hoover became president in 1929, he appointed Henry Stimson as secretary of state, whose well-advertised insistence on high moral standards in public affairs set him on a collision course with the Black Chamber. When he discovered what it did, Stimson closed it down, famously claiming that gentlemen should not read each other’s mail. As a result of Stimson’s decision, the U.S. government faced tactical and strategic threats in the 1930s without the benefit of a dedicated, independent signals intelligence agency, while America’s foreign adversaries showed no such gentlemanly restraint when it came to reading U.S. mail.
If Stimson had allowed the Black Chamber to continue its un-gentlemanly work, hoovering up cable traffic through shadowy agreements with cable companies, it is likely the United States would have been better informed about the strategic threats it faced in the 1930s. Stimson himself eventually became President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s war secretary—and, ironically, became one of the chief consumers of Japanese wartime decrypts obtained by U.S. code breakers.
Left: The machine room in Hut 6 of Bletchley Park, the British forces’ intelligence center during World War II, in 1943. Right: Photos from a GCHQ file of the Enigma code-breaking machine.
Enigma: industrial espionage
The story of Britain’s bulk collection of German communications during World War II, and its impact on the Allied war effort, is now well known. The German military used Enigma machines to encipher its communications, which comprised a keyboard and scrambler rotors encoding a message in billions of ways, making it effectively unbreakable. However, by exploiting weaknesses and a captured German code book, code breakers at Bletchley Park built a machine that successfully cracked the Enigma cipher. Thereafter Bletchley was able to decrypt German communications on an industrial scale. By 1943, it was decrypting 3,000-4,000 messages per month.
While Bletchley Park’s wartime achievements are now well known, its postwar history is far less understood. A major reason why British intelligence was determined to keep the achievements of Bletchley Park, known by the code name “Ultra,” secret after 1945 was because British colonies were using Enigma machines to encrypt their communications. In fact, at the end of the war, British authorities gathered thousands of German Enigma machines and gave them to British colonies, insisting they were necessary for securing communications. Having seized the wartime Enigma cipher, communications of those colonies using Enigma machines were easy prey for Bletchley’s postwar successor, GCHQ.
The British government also convinced colonial governments that GCHQ should manufacture ciphers for them after independence. This happened in the Gold Coast, a British colony in West Africa, which in 1957 became the first colony in sub-Saharan Africa to gain independence. GCHQ officials visited the colony, undercover, and reached a secret agreement with its government-in-waiting that they would manufacture cipher pads for Ghana (as the Gold Coast was renamed after independence) because of the vast expense involved. Unfortunately, declassified records do not expressly set out what happened thereafter, but it is reasonable to conclude that, having manufactured the country’s cipher hardware, Ghana’s communications were effectively open books for GCHQ.
Bulk collection through rigged hardware allowed the British government to advance its interests in the Cold War. A major strategic question that both London and Washington needed answering was whether colonial states seeking independence from Britain in Africa, and elsewhere, would align with the Soviet Union in the Cold War. High-level British intelligence assessments about the Soviet or communist threat in those colonies were persistently nonalarmist, calming policymakers’ fears in London and Washington. Code words stamped across the top of those British intelligence reports, such as “UMBRA,” indicate they were derived in part from signals intelligence—doubtless obtained from compromised Enigma machines or rigged cipher pads that Britain manufactured.
An NSA office on Nov. 6, 1968.
Bulk collection: Shamrock
In the postwar years, as the Cold War set in, Britain’s and America’s signals intelligence agencies, GCHQ and the National Security Agency (NSA), continued with wartime bulk interception projects. They did so through secret—and illegal—agreements with major U.S. cable companies. In an operation code-named “Shamrock,” U.S. military signals intelligence (the NSA’s predecessor), assisted by GCHQ, brokered an under-the-table agreement with three major U.S. cable companies—Western Union, RCA Global, and ITT World International—to provide daily copies of all cable traffic crossing their wires entering and exiting the United States. The companies did so for “patriotic reasons,” understanding they were helping U.S. national security. Like the Black Chamber’s earlier arrangement with Western Union, Shamrock involved NSA couriers calling at the cable companies’ offices in New York, Washington, and San Francisco each day to get microfilm copies of cable traffic. When those companies switched to using magnetic tapes in the 1960s, the NSA set up an office in New York to duplicate tapes and keep copies for itself. At its height, Shamrock seems to have involved 150,000 messages printed and analyzed by the NSA each month. In another iteration, code-named “New Shamrock,” the NSA tapped teleprinter and other communication links of between 60 and 70 foreign embassies in the United States.
At its height, Shamrock seems to have involved 150,000 messages printed and analyzed by the NSA each month.
Little is known in the public domain about Shamrock’s actual impact on U.S. national security or statecraft. According to the NSA’s long-serving deputy director, Louis Tordella, Shamrock “just ran on” since its beginnings in World War II, “without a great deal of attention from anyone,” and actually “wasn’t producing very much of value”—which raises the question why it was operating. The Church Committee, investigating abuses by U.S. intelligence in 1975, exposed Shamrock, concluding that it was “probably the largest government interception program affecting Americans ever undertaken.” Its exposure led to the passing the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) of 1978, designed to restrict interception of communications of U.S. citizens, whose successor legislation continues to be scrutinized by Congress. However, the principle established by Shamrock persisted after it was closed down: Communication companies remained willing to collude with U.S. intelligence in schemes they suspected were illegal.
A sticker featuring the fugitive NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden—partially reading “asylum”—is seen on a Berlin street on May 26, 2014.
Internet bulk collection
The digital revolution unfolding today is fundamentally changing the nature, scope, and scale of government bulk collection of communications. In doing so, it is also changing the nature of intelligence itself. However, the underlying principles of exploiting communication companies in order to collect intelligence remain the same today as in the past. In order to find a needle in a communication haystack, it is necessary for states to own that haystack.
Unlike their past projects, the NSA and GCHQ have not achieved their bulk collection programs in the internet age through shadowy agreements brokered with communication companies but instead through legislation allowing it. The NSA’s bulk collection program of telephone call metadata (information about calls, not their underlying content) has been achieved through Section 215 of the USA Patriot Act. In 2017, the NSA used it to collect a staggering 534 million telephone calls and text message records. A corresponding bulk collection program, under Section 702 of FISA, targets internet communications of foreigners outside the United States. In Britain, GCHQ used antiquated and obscure legislation to carry out its bulk collection programs before they were exposed by Snowden, a former NSA contractor.
Although the NSA collected a vast number of telephone calls and text message records, these have resulted in remarkably few specific queries about “known or presumed U.S. persons.”
Contrary to claims made at that time and since, their bulk metadata collection programs were not “mass surveillance,” which suggests persistent observation. In reality, as a U.S. intelligence transparency report after Snowden’s disclosures reveals, although the NSA collected a vast number of telephone calls and text message records, these have resulted in remarkably few specific queries about “known or presumed U.S. persons.” As in the past, their bulk collection programs appear to have protected British and U.S. national security. An independent inquiry into Britain’s bulk collection program revealed that it contributed to British counterespionage, counterterrorism, counternarcotics and counter-human trafficking. In fact, it appears that it was through bulk collection that GCHQ first identified (and thwarted) a Russian hacking group, Fancy Bear, attempting to meddle in Britain’s 2015 general election; Fancy Bear then went on to conduct hacking operations during the 2016 U.S. presidential election.
More recently, however, the NSA’s bulk collection program has attracted criticism, including the agency’s deletion of three years of collected data in June 2018. Reporting suggests that the NSA’s vast collection program under Section 215 may no longer be worth the effort.
Pedestrians use their cell phones near a Huawei advertisement at a bus stop in central London on April 29, 2019.
Brave new world
Suspicions about governments using new communication platforms to spy are wider than China and Huawei: Kaspersky Lab’s anti-virus software is thought to have links to Russian intelligence; an Emirati messaging app, ToTok, is apparently used by Emirati intelligence; and the Chinese government is thought to be exploiting the wildly popular social media platform TikTok. It is impossible to believe that China’s one-party state, in which no entity is truly independent, would not be able to exploit Huawei hardware if it desired, just as British and U.S. intelligence did with earlier communication hardware. In fact, under China’s National Intelligence Law of 2017, companies are required to cooperate with intelligence activities if requested. If the Chinese government ordered it, Huawei would be obliged to act in a harmful way to Britain.
Britain’s cyber-experts previously suggested that it was possible to draw a distinction between “edge” and “core” in a 5G network, keeping the latter beyond the reach of Chinese eavesdroppers. Others have argued that in a 5G “virtualized” network, distinctions between the core and edges are blurred, thereby enhancing threats even at the periphery.
But even if China’s exploitation of Britain’s 5G network is relegated to its periphery, the intelligence rewards for Beijing—and the weakening of British national security—may still be substantial. Hitherto, states have conducted espionage and sabotage in the physical world, but today they are doing so in cyberspace.
Huawei’s presence on Britain’s 5G network could allow Beijing to conduct economic espionage, stealing British intelligence property passing over its network.
Huawei’s presence on Britain’s 5G network could allow Beijing to conduct economic espionage, stealing British intelligence property passing over its network. It could also collect ostensibly nonsensitive bulk data on British citizens, which may inadvertently reveal precisely the kinds of activities that the British government wants kept secret—the work of its defense, security, and intelligence services. For example, Chinese data scientists could use a rapidly developing methodology called “social network analysis,” which reveals nonobvious relationships between places and people, for intelligence targeting against Britain. With its foot in Britain’s 5G door, such analysis may expose Britain’s security and intelligence activities to Beijing.
Then there is the potential for Chinese cybersabotage. Beijing could use Huawei equipment to disrupt or take down Britain’s telecommunications network during an international crisis or as part of a cyberattack—flipping the kill switch for British communications, much as Britain did German communications in 1914. The true scale of the threat posed by 5G Huawei hardware becomes clear when we consider how it could be combined with billions of internet-enabled devices, sensors, and gadgets in households, offices, and infrastructure, most of which are unsecured and whose owners may not even know are networked. They would effectively constitute billions of hidden backdoors into British society.
The British and U.S. governments should know from their own history the value of secret deals with communication companies, and rigging their hardware, to collect intelligence. There is no reason why Beijing would not find similar value from Huawei. During the coronavirus pandemic, we are all now living virtualized Zoom lives, which makes a lightning-quick 5G network even more appealing. At the same time, as we all move to inhabit a cyberworld, it is also more important than ever not to forget about threats from before the pandemic.
If Huawei were a Russian, not a Chinese, company, would Britain ever have considered allowing it into its 5G network? The answer is surely “no.”


foreignpolicy--2020-07-14--The U.S. Declared China’s South China Sea Claims ‘Unlawful.’ Now What?

The U.S .
Declared China ’ s South China Sea Claims ‘ Unlawful.
’ Now What ?
On Monday , Secretary of State Mike Pompeo staked out the United States ’ bluntest position yet on China ’ s illegal land grab in the crucial South China Sea , declaring both Beijing ’ s excessive maritime claims and its browbeating of smaller neighbors to be “ unlawful.
” It was a departure of sorts from years of cautious diplomatic speak and could open the door to tougher U.S. reprisals against Chinese behavior .
The new position , which takes specific legal @ @ @ @ @ @ @ claims , is part and parcel of the Trump administration ’ s tougher approach to Beijing ’ s encroachment in the region—and part of a broader , and widening , showdown with China .
Washington is still embroiled in a trade war with China , has sanctioned Chinese officials involved in Xinjiang detention camps , plans to scrap the extradition treaty with Hong Kong over China ’ s imposition of a new national security law , is mulling tougher rules for Chinese firms listing on U.S. stock markets , and is successfully getting @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the world .
In response to the new legal posture , a Chinese Embassy spokesperson called on the United States to “ stop its attempts to disrupt and sabotage regional peace and stability.
” In recent years , China has sought to harden its claim to the resource-rich and strategically significant waterway by constructing artificial islands and placing military hardware on disputed shoals and atolls , even while claiming that underwater rocks somehow give Beijing license to exploit the area ’ s oil , gas , and fisheries wealth .
In 2016 , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a case brought by the Philippines , finding its actions in violation of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea .
Although the United States has not ratified the convention , Pompeo ’ s statement at last brings U.S. policy formally in line with that ruling .
What exactly does the new U.S. position say ?
The new U.S. posture takes direct aim at many of the legally specious claims that Beijing has used for years to attempt to grab ownership of the vast majority of the South China Sea @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Beijing ’ s claims to offshore resources across most of the South China Sea are completely unlawful , as is its campaign of bullying to control them , ” Pompeo declared .
For most of the past decade , China has used questionable claims to tiny specks of land in the South China Sea to lay claim to offshore fisheries and oil and gas reserves , chasing off ships from nations like the Philippines , Indonesia , and Malaysia that have their own claims to those waters and the resources in them .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ policy explicitly in line with the landmark 2016 ruling , Pompeo said .
That is particularly important for the Philippines , which brought that case and which has been battling China for years over access to fisheries and potential oil riches near little features like Scarborough Shoal , Mischief Reef , and Second Thomas Shoal .
Pompeo also took issue with China ’ s illegal efforts to snap up waters off the coasts of Vietnam , Malaysia , Brunei , and Indonesia .
“ The world will not allow Beijing to treat the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , ” Pompeo said .
How big a deal is this ?
In one way , the new U.S. policy is the first full-throated rejection of China ’ s so-called “ nine-dash line ” that encompasses most of the sea .
“ Beijing has offered no coherent legal basis for its ‘ Nine-Dashed Line ’ claim in the South China Sea since formally announcing it in 2009 , ” Pompeo noted .
But while the new U.S. policy is a big deal in terms of explicitly siding with existing international law on the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s not a radical departure ” from previous U.S. positions , said Greg Poling , the director of the Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative at the Center for Strategic and International Studies ( CSIS ) .
Pompeo , for instance , took pains to describe China ’ s maritime claims as unlawful while still remaining neutral on questions of territory—in line with the 2016 Hague ruling .
“ It makes explicit a lot of things that were implicit under the previous administration , ” Poling said .
David Stillwell , the assistant secretary of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and the U.S. State Department ’ s top diplomat on the region , played down the significance of the announcement .
Speaking on Tuesday at an online event hosted by CSIS , Stillwell said the decision simply recognizes existing maritime law .
“ This is housekeeping , ” he said .
But housekeeping can do a lot of good .
Pompeo ’ s announcement may have an impact politically , said James Kraska , the chair of the Stockton Center for International Law at the U.S .
Naval War College , by securing @ @ @ @ @ @ @ other monitoring equipment .
Internationally , it serves as a signal to other nations that the United States is increasing its engagement on the issue—after smaller Southeast Asian nations have clamored all spring for a more muscular U.S. response to stepped-up Chinese aggression in the region .
Why now ?
China ’ s been doing this for more than a decade .
Kraska said the move is an acceleration of already established U.S. behavior in the region .
He cited the use of freedom of navigation operations—a way of challenging existing claims by @ @ @ @ @ @ @ areas to demonstrate the right to transit—by the Obama administration that have continued under the Trump administration .
The United States has increased its use of the tactic in the Trump administration , conducting four freedom of navigation operations this year alone , including an operation on July 14 that sent a guided-missile destroyer near the Spratly Islands , the day after Pompeo ’ s big statement .
The Obama administration conducted just six freedom of navigation operations in eight years .
For Poling , the announcement stems from both a political motivation @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s ongoing feud with China and a reflection of the rapidly changing strategic environment .
Poling said China ’ s maritime strength—with a big navy and a huge and aggressive coast guard—is making it increasingly difficult for smaller nations to operate .
“ We ’ re not that far away from the South China Sea being a Chinese lake , ” he said .
“ So if you don ’ t make your move now , you might as well not make it.
” What happens next ?
In the near term , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ merely “ destabilizing ” to “ unlawful ” potentially opens the door to sanctions , Poling said , similar to those imposed on Chinese individuals over the treatment of Uighurs in Xinjiang .
When asked about sanctions at the CSIS forum , Stillwell didn ’ t say that route was being considered but said , “ Nothing is off the table.
” In China , the nationalist Global Times in a through-the-looking-glass editorial called the Pompeo announcement “ despicable ” and accused the United States of making the statement as a “ prelude @ @ @ @ @ @ @ has sovereignty and jurisdiction over the South China Sea in accordance with international law , including the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea , and China also has historical rights in the South China Sea , ” the editorial argued .
( None of that is true , as the Hague ruling made clear . )
Although increased U.S. patrols in the area raise the risk of a China-U.S. confrontation , that ’ s unlikely , Poling said .
More likely , he added , is a clash between Chinese @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that could trigger U.S. mutual defense treaties—and an unintended great-power showdown .
Pompeo last year explicitly included the disputed Scarborough Shoal under the umbrella of the U.S.-Philippine defense treaty , making the rocks a potential tripwire .

On Monday, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo staked out the United States’ bluntest position yet on China’s illegal land grab in the crucial South China Sea, declaring both Beijing’s excessive maritime claims and its browbeating of smaller neighbors to be “unlawful.” It was a departure of sorts from years of cautious diplomatic speak and could open the door to tougher U.S. reprisals against Chinese behavior.
On Monday, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo staked out the United States’ bluntest position yet on China’s illegal land grab in the crucial South China Sea, declaring both Beijing’s excessive maritime claims and its browbeating of smaller neighbors to be “unlawful.” It was a departure of sorts from years of cautious diplomatic speak and could open the door to tougher U.S. reprisals against Chinese behavior.
The new position, which takes specific legal issue with a host of over-the-top Chinese claims, is part and parcel of the Trump administration’s tougher approach to Beijing’s encroachment in the region—and part of a broader, and widening, showdown with China.
Washington is still embroiled in a trade war with China, has sanctioned Chinese officials involved in Xinjiang detention camps, plans to scrap the extradition treaty with Hong Kong over China’s imposition of a new national security law, is mulling tougher rules for Chinese firms listing on U.S. stock markets, and is successfully getting Huawei yanked out of telecommunications networks around the world.
In response to the new legal posture, a Chinese Embassy spokesperson called on the United States to “stop its attempts to disrupt and sabotage regional peace and stability.”
In recent years, China has sought to harden its claim to the resource-rich and strategically significant waterway by constructing artificial islands and placing military hardware on disputed shoals and atolls, even while claiming that underwater rocks somehow give Beijing license to exploit the area’s oil, gas, and fisheries wealth. In 2016, an international tribunal ruled against China in a case brought by the Philippines, finding its actions in violation of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea. Although the United States has not ratified the convention, Pompeo’s statement at last brings U.S. policy formally in line with that ruling.
What exactly does the new U.S. position say?
The new U.S. posture takes direct aim at many of the legally specious claims that Beijing has used for years to attempt to grab ownership of the vast majority of the South China Sea. “We are making clear: Beijing’s claims to offshore resources across most of the South China Sea are completely unlawful, as is its campaign of bullying to control them,” Pompeo declared. For most of the past decade, China has used questionable claims to tiny specks of land in the South China Sea to lay claim to offshore fisheries and oil and gas reserves, chasing off ships from nations like the Philippines, Indonesia, and Malaysia that have their own claims to those waters and the resources in them.
The declaration was meant to bring U.S. policy explicitly in line with the landmark 2016 ruling, Pompeo said. That is particularly important for the Philippines, which brought that case and which has been battling China for years over access to fisheries and potential oil riches near little features like Scarborough Shoal, Mischief Reef, and Second Thomas Shoal. Pompeo also took issue with China’s illegal efforts to snap up waters off the coasts of Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei, and Indonesia.
“The world will not allow Beijing to treat the South China Sea as its maritime empire,” Pompeo said.
How big a deal is this?
In one way, the new U.S. policy is the first full-throated rejection of China’s so-called “nine-dash line” that encompasses most of the sea. “Beijing has offered no coherent legal basis for its ‘Nine-Dashed Line’ claim in the South China Sea since formally announcing it in 2009,” Pompeo noted.
But while the new U.S. policy is a big deal in terms of explicitly siding with existing international law on the disputed maritime claims, “it’s not a radical departure” from previous U.S. positions, said Greg Poling, the director of the Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS). Pompeo, for instance, took pains to describe China’s maritime claims as unlawful while still remaining neutral on questions of territory—in line with the 2016 Hague ruling.
“It makes explicit a lot of things that were implicit under the previous administration,” Poling said.
David Stillwell, the assistant secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific affairs and the U.S. State Department’s top diplomat on the region, played down the significance of the announcement. Speaking on Tuesday at an online event hosted by CSIS, Stillwell said the decision simply recognizes existing maritime law. “This is housekeeping,” he said.
But housekeeping can do a lot of good. Pompeo’s announcement may have an impact politically, said James Kraska, the chair of the Stockton Center for International Law at the U.S. Naval War College, by securing increased funding from Congress for radar and other monitoring equipment. Internationally, it serves as a signal to other nations that the United States is increasing its engagement on the issue—after smaller Southeast Asian nations have clamored all spring for a more muscular U.S. response to stepped-up Chinese aggression in the region.
Why now? China’s been doing this for more than a decade.
Kraska said the move is an acceleration of already established U.S. behavior in the region. He cited the use of freedom of navigation operations—a way of challenging existing claims by sending U.S. vessels or aircraft through disputed areas to demonstrate the right to transit—by the Obama administration that have continued under the Trump administration. The United States has increased its use of the tactic in the Trump administration, conducting four freedom of navigation operations this year alone, including an operation on July 14 that sent a guided-missile destroyer near the Spratly Islands, the day after Pompeo’s big statement. The Obama administration conducted just six freedom of navigation operations in eight years.
For Poling, the announcement stems from both a political motivation as part of the Trump administration’s ongoing feud with China and a reflection of the rapidly changing strategic environment. Poling said China’s maritime strength—with a big navy and a huge and aggressive coast guard—is making it increasingly difficult for smaller nations to operate.
“We’re not that far away from the South China Sea being a Chinese lake,” he said. “So if you don’t make your move now, you might as well not make it.”
What happens next?
In the near term, the shift from describing Chinese behavior from merely “destabilizing” to “unlawful” potentially opens the door to sanctions, Poling said, similar to those imposed on Chinese individuals over the treatment of Uighurs in Xinjiang.
When asked about sanctions at the CSIS forum, Stillwell didn’t say that route was being considered but said, “Nothing is off the table.”
In China, the nationalist Global Times in a through-the-looking-glass editorial called the Pompeo announcement “despicable” and accused the United States of making the statement as a “prelude to inciting more confrontations.”
“China has sovereignty and jurisdiction over the South China Sea in accordance with international law, including the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, and China also has historical rights in the South China Sea,” the editorial argued. (None of that is true, as the Hague ruling made clear.)
Although increased U.S. patrols in the area raise the risk of a China-U.S. confrontation, that’s unlikely, Poling said. More likely, he added, is a clash between Chinese ships and vessels from smaller Asian nations that could trigger U.S. mutual defense treaties—and an unintended great-power showdown. Pompeo last year explicitly included the disputed Scarborough Shoal under the umbrella of the U.S.-Philippine defense treaty, making the rocks a potential tripwire.
“It’s a non-zero chance,” Poling said.


foreignpolicy--2020-07-14--Opposition Victories Force a Crack in Singapore’s Carefully Managed Democracy

When Singapore ’ s prime minister , Lee Hsien Loong , decided to call a snap election in the middle of the pandemic , he had almost everything going for him .
His People ’ s Action Party ( PAP ) , which has ruled Singapore since independence in 1965 , was forewarned about the impending nine-day campaign sprint .
COVID-19 regulations also meant that physical rallies , a major avenue for outreach and fundraising for opposition political parties , were banned from this year ’ s general election .
Walkabouts and house visits were allowed as long as safe @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of the campaigning was moved online .
With the local traditional media known to take a pro-PAP slant—Singapore doesn ’ t rank 158th on the World Press Freedom Index for nothing—the asymmetry of resources , and concern about a “ flight to safety ” mentality among voters , opposition parties worried that the PAP would win every single seat in Parliament .
But that didn ’ t happen .
Instead , the party ’ s vote-share slipped from the 70 percent it received in the 2015 election to 61 percent , and the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 93 seats .
This is the largest opposition presence Singapore has seen since 1966 ; the Workers ’ Party leader Pritam Singh will be officially recognised as leader of the opposition and given staff and resources .
That ’ s a major concession by the government , since the role has previously been only an unofficial and unsupported one .
Most other political parties in democratic countries would see a 61 percent vote-share as pretty respectable , particularly since it translated into 83 seats , allowing the PAP to continue its supermajority in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ : “ We have a clear mandate , but the percentage of the popular vote is not as high as I had hoped for , ” Channel News Asia reported him saying in a press conference .
The PAP wants a managed , compliant democracy in which the opposition acts as Parliamentary window dressing .
Singaporeans seeking a more competitive political scene than the PAP favors are happier than Lee .
While the PAP still overwhelmingly dominates their lives , this general election has marked shifts that bode well for the possibility of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
It ’ s commonly observed that Singaporean elections are fought on “ bread-and-butter issues ” : matters such as the cost of living , property prices , and the management of the Central Provident Fund , a forced savings retirement scheme .
While these issues were still relevant in this election , they were supplemented by talk of diversity and plurality in politics—instead of fearing the boogeyman of gridlock , more Singaporeans were talking about the need for a greater range of voices in Parliament this time than I ’ d ever @ @ @ @ @ @ @ especially true of younger voters .
The usual chatter is that young Singaporeans are less concerned than their parents and grandparents about bread-and-butter issues , and choose to look instead to less “ tangible ” concerns such as racial inequalities and political rights .
That ’ s true , but it also fails to make the real connection : Young Singaporeans , myself included , care about issues such as racism , inequality , and civil liberties because they recognise that these are inextricably linked to people ’ s well-being and ability to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ harder to impress them with one-off transfers and handouts ; they want to see deeper discussions of structural issues and the dismantling of institutionalized injustice .
The site of the Workers ’ Party ’ s most exciting triumph was Sengkang Group Representation Constituency , a newly carved out megaconstituency where their team of four knocked out a PAP team that included a minister , senior minister of state , and a senior parliamentary secretary .
Sengkang is home to many young families , and more than 60 percent of residents are below the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ national average .
The government responded fiercely to the challenge it faced in Sengkang .
In the middle of the campaigning period , the Singapore police announced that , following reports and advice from the Attorney-General ’ s Chambers that an offense had been disclosed , they had opened an investigation into Raeesah Khan , one of the Workers ’ Party candidates in Sengkang GRC , for old Facebook comments that allegedly promoted enmity between racial and religious groups .
Raeesah , an activist who , unlike any previous candidate , identifies as @ @ @ @ @ @ @ sharp differences in treatment between different class , racial , and religious groups in Singapore .
Following the police statement , the PAP jumped on her case , portraying her as a racist and asking , “ Why does the WP still consider her worthy of consideration as an MP ?
This is a serious matter , which goes to the fundamental principles on which our country has been built.
” This comes straight out of the old PAP playbook of demonizing political opponents .
Raeesah wasn ’ t its only target this @ @ @ @ @ @ @ accused the Singapore Democratic Party ’ s leader Chee Soon Juan for spreading falsehoods , and slammed the same party ’ s chairman and infectious diseases expert Paul Tambyah for making “ baseless ” claims in his critique of the PAP government ’ s handling of COVID-19 .
Yet the attack against Raeesah , and by extension her party , didn ’ t work on the voters of Sengkang GRC .
Some have argued that the Workers ’ Party ’ s triumph in that constituency demonstrated that the PAP ’ s negative campaigning @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Tambyah—which were accompanied by use of the “ fake news ” law passed by the PAP in 2019—also had limited effect .
Although neither won a seat in Parliament , they received decent shares of the vote .
Chee ’ s 45 percent was a marked improvement from the 39 percent he received from the same constituency during a 2016 by-election , while Tambyah ’ s 46 percent of the vote was impressive considering he ’ d only revealed that he was contesting the constituency on Nomination Day itself .
I ’ ve @ @ @ @ @ @ @ situation so far .
If I were to push that optimism a little further , I ’ d hope that this election has taught the ruling party that its old hard-line tactics aren ’ t as effective in today ’ s Singapore as they might have been in the past .
But I know that this trajectory towards a more open democracy is still only a possibility , not a promise .
When asked about his party ’ s performance , Singh was extremely circumspect , despite his victories .
“ I ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ In fact , I think there ’ s a lot of work to do , ” he said , reminding those assembled that while winning four more seats than they did in 2015 is progress , it ’ s “ still not exactly a quantum leap.
” The PAP ’ s power is still entrenched in Singapore , and there are many ways it can continue to make things difficult for the opposition and civil society .
Being elected a member of Parliament doesn ’ t erase the fact that Raeesah Khan is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , alongside his party chairman Sylvia Lim and former secretary-general Low Thia Khiang , are also still awaiting appeals in a civil case brought against them in relation to their management of town councils .
There is no guarantee that the PAP will be open to the lessons many Singaporeans hope they ’ ll learn .
It ’ s far too soon for Singaporeans , young or old , to be patting themselves on the back for improving their country ’ s political climate .
But in the immediate aftermath of an intense @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to take a moment to sit back and feel hopeful .

When Singapore’s prime minister, Lee Hsien Loong, decided to call a snap election in the middle of the pandemic, he had almost everything going for him. His People's Action Party (PAP), which has ruled Singapore since independence in 1965, was forewarned about the impending nine-day campaign sprint. COVID-19 regulations also meant that physical rallies, a major avenue for outreach and fundraising for opposition political parties, were banned from this year’s general election. Walkabouts and house visits were allowed as long as safe distancing guidelines were observed, but much of the campaigning was moved online. With the local traditional media known to take a pro-PAP slant—Singapore doesn’t rank 158th on the World Press Freedom Index for nothing—the asymmetry of resources, and concern about a “flight to safety” mentality among voters, opposition parties worried that the PAP would win every single seat in Parliament.
When Singapore’s prime minister, Lee Hsien Loong, decided to call a snap election in the middle of the pandemic, he had almost everything going for him. His People’s Action Party (PAP), which has ruled Singapore since independence in 1965, was forewarned about the impending nine-day campaign sprint. COVID-19 regulations also meant that physical rallies, a major avenue for outreach and fundraising for opposition political parties, were banned from this year’s general election. Walkabouts and house visits were allowed as long as safe distancing guidelines were observed, but much of the campaigning was moved online. With the local traditional media known to take a pro-PAP slant—Singapore doesn’t rank 158th on the World Press Freedom Index for nothing—the asymmetry of resources, and concern about a “flight to safety” mentality among voters, opposition parties worried that the PAP would win every single seat in Parliament.
But that didn’t happen. Instead, the party’s vote-share slipped from the 70 percent it received in the 2015 election to 61 percent, and the Workers’ Party captured 10 out of 93 seats. This is the largest opposition presence Singapore has seen since 1966; the Workers’ Party leader Pritam Singh will be officially recognised as leader of the opposition and given staff and resources. That’s a major concession by the government, since the role has previously been only an unofficial and unsupported one.
Most other political parties in democratic countries would see a 61 percent vote-share as pretty respectable, particularly since it translated into 83 seats, allowing the PAP to continue its supermajority in Parliament. But Lee admitted his disappointment: “We have a clear mandate, but the percentage of the popular vote is not as high as I had hoped for,” Channel News Asia reported him saying in a press conference.
The PAP wants a managed, compliant democracy in which the opposition acts as Parliamentary window dressing. Singaporeans seeking a more competitive political scene than the PAP favors are happier than Lee. While the PAP still overwhelmingly dominates their lives, this general election has marked shifts that bode well for the possibility of a more robust democracy in the city-state.
It’s commonly observed that Singaporean elections are fought on “bread-and-butter issues”: matters such as the cost of living, property prices, and the management of the Central Provident Fund, a forced savings retirement scheme. While these issues were still relevant in this election, they were supplemented by talk of diversity and plurality in politics—instead of fearing the boogeyman of gridlock, more Singaporeans were talking about the need for a greater range of voices in Parliament this time than I’d ever seen in previous elections.
This is especially true of younger voters. The usual chatter is that young Singaporeans are less concerned than their parents and grandparents about bread-and-butter issues, and choose to look instead to less “tangible” concerns such as racial inequalities and political rights. That’s true, but it also fails to make the real connection: Young Singaporeans, myself included, care about issues such as racism, inequality, and civil liberties because they recognise that these are inextricably linked to people’s well-being and ability to make ends meet. It’s harder to impress them with one-off transfers and handouts; they want to see deeper discussions of structural issues and the dismantling of institutionalized injustice.
The site of the Workers’ Party’s most exciting triumph was Sengkang Group Representation Constituency, a newly carved out megaconstituency where their team of four knocked out a PAP team that included a minister, senior minister of state, and a senior parliamentary secretary. Sengkang is home to many young families, and more than 60 percent of residents are below the age of 45, higher than the national average.
The government responded fiercely to the challenge it faced in Sengkang. In the middle of the campaigning period, the Singapore police announced that, following reports and advice from the Attorney-General’s Chambers that an offense had been disclosed, they had opened an investigation into Raeesah Khan, one of the Workers’ Party candidates in Sengkang GRC, for old Facebook comments that allegedly promoted enmity between racial and religious groups. Raeesah, an activist who, unlike any previous candidate, identifies as an intersectional feminist, had questioned the sharp differences in treatment between different class, racial, and religious groups in Singapore. Following the police statement, the PAP jumped on her case, portraying her as a racist and asking, “Why does the WP still consider her worthy of consideration as an MP? This is a serious matter, which goes to the fundamental principles on which our country has been built.”
This comes straight out of the old PAP playbook of demonizing political opponents. Raeesah wasn’t its only target this election, either; the party also accused the Singapore Democratic Party’s leader Chee Soon Juan for spreading falsehoods, and slammed the same party’s chairman and infectious diseases expert Paul Tambyah for making “baseless” claims in his critique of the PAP government’s handling of COVID-19.
Yet the attack against Raeesah, and by extension her party, didn’t work on the voters of Sengkang GRC. Some have argued that the Workers’ Party’s triumph in that constituency demonstrated that the PAP’s negative campaigning backfired.
The swipes at Chee and Tambyah—which were accompanied by use of the “fake news” law passed by the PAP in 2019—also had limited effect. Although neither won a seat in Parliament, they received decent shares of the vote. Chee’s 45 percent was a marked improvement from the 39 percent he received from the same constituency during a 2016 by-election, while Tambyah’s 46 percent of the vote was impressive considering he’d only revealed that he was contesting the constituency on Nomination Day itself.
I’ve painted a very optimistic picture of the situation so far. If I were to push that optimism a little further, I’d hope that this election has taught the ruling party that its old hard-line tactics aren’t as effective in today’s Singapore as they might have been in the past. But I know that this trajectory towards a more open democracy is still only a possibility, not a promise.
When asked about his party’s performance, Singh was extremely circumspect, despite his victories. “I’m not feeling euphoric at all. In fact, I think there’s a lot of work to do,” he said, reminding those assembled that while winning four more seats than they did in 2015 is progress, it’s “still not exactly a quantum leap.”
The PAP’s power is still entrenched in Singapore, and there are many ways it can continue to make things difficult for the opposition and civil society. Being elected a member of Parliament doesn’t erase the fact that Raeesah Khan is still under police investigation. Singh himself, alongside his party chairman Sylvia Lim and former secretary-general Low Thia Khiang, are also still awaiting appeals in a civil case brought against them in relation to their management of town councils. There is no guarantee that the PAP will be open to the lessons many Singaporeans hope they’ll learn.
It’s far too soon for Singaporeans, young or old, to be patting themselves on the back for improving their country’s political climate. But in the immediate aftermath of an intense pandemic election, it’s forgivable to take a moment to sit back and feel hopeful.


foreignpolicy--2020-07-14--Populism Isn’t Always Xenophobic. Just Ask Ontario’s Premier.

Ford is a self-styled man of the people , and his was a people ’ s cheesecake , made with Dream Whip and a hefty amount of refined sugar .
A few pundits attempted to follow the recipe and reported mixed results , but that ’ s about the worst thing most of them had to say on the topic .
For weeks , Ford ’ s popularity had been surging .
The cheesecake video—an affirmation of small , domestic pleasures in an uncertain world—was remarkably well received .
In 2018 , Ford came to power much like insurgent politicians @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of elites .
( He is the older brother of Rob Ford , the late mayor of Toronto whose crack cocaine habits made him a global celebrity in the early 2010s . )
During the campaign , major international newspapers reported that Canada was having its Trump moment .
The comparisons were too easy to resist .
Like Trump , Ford was a burly , blond-haired man , hostile to the press , popular at rallies , and inexperienced in government .
In Ford ’ s early days as premier , his actions @ @ @ @ @ @ @ He attempted to appoint a friend as superintendent of the provincial police , and he redrew polling districts , cutting the size of city councils just as municipal elections were getting underway—a disruptive measure that led to a series of court challenges .
His inaugural budget was wildly unpopular , pushing his approval rating below 30 percent .
It was a disastrous first year , and detractors predicted more chaos to come .
Then the pandemic hit , and Ford struck a conciliatory tone .
He not only recruited public health experts but @ @ @ @ @ @ @ In early April , he released epidemiological projections about COVID‑19 and enacted a stringent lockdown regimen followed by a cautious reopening .
At daily press conferences , he was plain-spoken , respectful , and candid about the tough times ahead .
In many democracies , right-wing populists have struggled to weather the COVID-19 storm : Trump , Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro , and Matteo Salvini , the former deputy prime minister of Italy , have all seen their approval ratings tumble .
But in May , 76 percent of voters approved of Ford @ @ @ @ @ @ @ put him in company with New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and German Chancellor Angela Merkel .
So , how did Canada ’ s Trump suddenly morph into a sober , decorous statesman ?
The simple answer is that Ford isn ’ t—and never was—Canada ’ s Trump .
True , Ford has built a center-right coalition by tapping into the restless , anti-establishment energy that is as prevalent in Canada as it is in Trump ’ s America and seemingly everywhere else .
But he is channeling that energy into a style @ @ @ @ @ @ @ nimble .
Globally , right-wing populism isn ’ t likely to disappear anytime soon ; the cultural forces that sustain it are much too powerful .
Ford , however , offers a more durable , less dangerous vision for what it could be .
Although he comes from a family of politicians , Ford spent much of his adult life focused on business .
His career took an unconventional turn , though , in 2010 , when he sought ( and won ) the council seat his brother had vacated to become mayor @ @ @ @ @ @ @ newly elected right-hand man , Doug was suddenly in the middle of the most high-profile political story in the country .
Many people recall Rob ’ s single-term mayoralty as a clown show : He is remembered for his impolitic outbursts , his penchant for public intoxication , and an awkward appearance on Jimmy Kimmel Live .
But to write off Rob Ford as a failure is to miss one crucial point : He connected viscerally with voters , particularly those who felt estranged from the city ’ s managerial and creative classes @ @ @ @ @ @ @ people of color .
He seemed to have unlimited time for all of them .
“ I remember when we did our first round of polling , ” said Fraser Macdonald , the deputy communications director on the mayoral campaign .
“ Our pollster said , ‘ I have never seen this depth of support for a candidate .
The people who like him love him.
’ ” John Filion , a Toronto councillor who served alongside the Ford brothers , believes that Doug ’ s time at City Hall was formative .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ the mayor , ” Filion said .
“ Rob had always been his dumb kid brother , but then , all of a sudden , he was drawing these massive , adoring crowds.
” Doug may be temperamentally different from Rob—he ’ s more calculated , less prone to outrage , and unburdened by addiction—but he studied his brother ’ s gut-based , highly effective style of politics .
“ Doug was smart enough , ” Filion added , “ to see that the stuff Rob did worked.
” Rob Ford died of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to uphold the family brand .
In January 2018 , mere months before a scheduled election , Patrick Brown , the leader of Ontario ’ s center-right Progressive Conservative Party , was ousted amid accusations of sexual misconduct .
A week later , Ford announced his intention to seek Brown ’ s job .
Five months after that , he was elected premier , bringing the center-left Ontario Liberal Party to the end of its 15 years in government .
The start of his premiership marked a return to the Rob Ford era @ @ @ @ @ @ @ For Rob , all elites were equally contemptible , but Doug reserves his harshest words for cultural elites—environmental activists and university professors .
“ Doug sees himself as a big-systems man , ” said Zack Taylor , a Canadian political scientist .
“ His anti-elitism doesn ’ t extend everywhere .
He respects management consultants , even if he ’ s less enamored of , say , [ the famed Canadian writer and environmentalist ] Margaret Atwood.
” Ford appeals directly to economically marginalized voters .
The 2018 election saw decisive wins not @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in exurban bedroom communities , industrial towns , and the multiracial suburbs of Toronto .
What these voters have in common , says Kory Teneycke , who managed the 2018 campaign , is a sense of estrangement from the cultural preoccupations of the left : the environmental arguments that , when communicated poorly , seem contemptuous of industry and the social justice rhetoric that draws heavily on academic vocabulary—language that is commonplace among English majors but alienating to those who attended vocational schools .
“ There ’ s been a shift in the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ talk about , ” Teneycke said .
“ There used to be much more of a blue-collar element to their rhetoric .
But they ’ ve become less connected to working people.
” This realignment offers a political opportunity that Ford—an avuncular man in an inexpensive suit—is uniquely able to exploit .
His rhetoric often scrambles traditional left-right divides .
Like the yellow vest movement in France , Ford has reframed environmental skepticism as a form of class politics : He doesn ’ t deny the existence of climate change but insists that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to pay for ambitious carbon reduction schemes .
Similarly , although he appeals to members of suburban minority communities who feel excluded from an affluent , downtown elite , his ideas about race are inconsistent .
( During the first year of his tenure , Ford cut funding to various refugee services , a fiscally conservative measure that also seemed like a sop to immigration-skeptical voters .
And as his muddled response to the U.S. police killing of George Floyd revealed , concepts like “ systemic racism ” don ’ t come naturally @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the faculty-club set isn ’ t Ford ’ s target audience .
His public communications are often light on policy and heavy on affect , with statements that appear boorish to his critics but authentic to his supporters .
He has spoken witheringly—if not exactly accurately—about his predecessors in the Ontario legislature ( “ the most politically corrupt government this country has ever seen ” ) , the federal carbon-pricing scheme enacted under Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau ( “ a complete scam ” ) , and the political culture among university students @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
As part of this carefully cultivated populist image , Ford ’ s government polls voters frequently on a variety of quality-of-life issues and has built a web portal through which business owners can submit requests for simple regulatory changes .
This approach has led to a grab bag of policies , some conservative ( cuts to education , health care , and social services ) , some progressive ( tax relief for low-income workers ) , and much of them softly libertarian : Ford has scrapped emissions tests on used automobiles , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ carbon-pricing program , reduced the minimum price of alcohol , allowed people to bring dogs onto restaurant patios , and permitted barbershops to operate one sink instead of two .
The core principles at play are frugality , smaller government , and opposition to environmental measures that cost working people money .
Yet one senses that even these are negotiable .
During the 2018 campaign , Ford defied eco-activists and pledged to allow housing developments on a protected green space near Toronto , but when the idea tanked in the polls , he @ @ @ @ @ @ @ through the people , ” he said .
His measured response to COVID-19 is therefore hardly surprising .
If he is concerned about ethnically diverse , inner-suburban neighborhoods where infection rates are the highest , it ’ s partly because these communities make up a large chunk of his base .
If he is comfortable deferring to public health experts , it ’ s because these aren ’ t the types of elites he distrusts .
And if he has evinced thoughtfulness , care , and cooperation over the last four months , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ most people—including his people—expect from their leaders in times of crisis .
Those who call Ford a right-wing populist in the mold of Trump have observed one simple truth : His politics skew right of center , and his style—plain-spoken , anti-elitist , accessible—is distinctly populist .
But to assume that all right-wing populists are Trump replicas is to miss much of what makes him unique .
Ford is capable of reining in his combative instincts when it ’ s politically expedient to do so .
And while the Trump movement has roots @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the fever swamps of 4chan , Ford developed his political brand in Toronto , one of North America ’ s most diverse cities .
To assume that all right-wing populists are Trump replicas is to miss much of what makes Ford unique .
Trump promises a return to a mythical lost era of “ greatness , ” but Ford ’ s pitch to supporters is less grandiose : a government that feels accessible , isn ’ t condescending , and makes life easier in small but measurable ways .
He is , ultimately @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a personalized , transactional style—one more commonly associated with city governance—into a much larger arena .
Critics of right-wing populism tend to assume that the movement is inseparable from the worst human impulses : xenophobia , paranoia , and contempt for cities where millions of people live .
There ’ s plenty of evidence to back this assertion up , at least in most parts of the world .
But populism is more of a style than an ideology and is therefore changeable in ways that other political orientations aren ’ t .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ uniquely Canadian—tailored , as it is , to a political climate where citizens are pragmatic and less consumed by nativism—it still offers potential lessons for politicians elsewhere .
Ford ’ s electoral success indicates that there may be a market for working-class conservatism in places other than the white , rural heartlands , and his favorable poll numbers suggest that even centrists and progressives can , in theory , accept a populist conservative as a legitimate leader , even if they ’ re unlikely to ever support him .
Like a cheesecake made @ @ @ @ @ @ @ political style may seem like a poor approximation of the thing it ’ s supposed to be .
It ’ s markedly different from classical starched-collar conservatism or from the more virulent brand of right-wing populism that has recently swept the globe .
It is a practical recipe , using whatever ingredients are at hand .
But it may have a longer shelf life .
And it ’ s beloved among those who like it—and at least palatable among those who don ’ t .

In mid-May, as COVID-19 infections approached their peak, Doug Ford, the Canadian politician often branded the “Donald Trump of the North,” put out a viral video on Twitter. Ford, the premier of Ontario, Canada’s most populous province, wasn’t burnishing his legislative record, spewing conspiracy theories, or fulminating against his enemies. Rather, he was making cheesecake. “I learned this recipe years ago, off my mother,” he said, wearing disposable gloves and a T-shirt reading “We’re all in this together.” “These are some of the fun things you can do when you’re self-isolating.”
Ford is a self-styled man of the people, and his was a people’s cheesecake, made with Dream Whip and a hefty amount of refined sugar. A few pundits attempted to follow the recipe and reported mixed results, but that’s about the worst thing most of them had to say on the topic. For weeks, Ford’s popularity had been surging. The cheesecake video—an affirmation of small, domestic pleasures in an uncertain world—was remarkably well received.
In 2018, Ford came to power much like insurgent politicians everywhere—as a pugnacious outsider and an enemy of elites. (He is the older brother of Rob Ford, the late mayor of Toronto whose crack cocaine habits made him a global celebrity in the early 2010s.) During the campaign, major international newspapers reported that Canada was having its Trump moment. The comparisons were too easy to resist. Like Trump, Ford was a burly, blond-haired man, hostile to the press, popular at rallies, and inexperienced in government.
In Ford’s early days as premier, his actions seemed to vindicate the Trump comparisons. He attempted to appoint a friend as superintendent of the provincial police, and he redrew polling districts, cutting the size of city councils just as municipal elections were getting underway—a disruptive measure that led to a series of court challenges. His inaugural budget was wildly unpopular, pushing his approval rating below 30 percent. It was a disastrous first year, and detractors predicted more chaos to come.
Then the pandemic hit, and Ford struck a conciliatory tone. He not only recruited public health experts but also praised and deferred to them. In early April, he released epidemiological projections about COVID‑19 and enacted a stringent lockdown regimen followed by a cautious reopening. At daily press conferences, he was plain-spoken, respectful, and candid about the tough times ahead. In many democracies, right-wing populists have struggled to weather the COVID-19 storm: Trump, Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, and Matteo Salvini, the former deputy prime minister of Italy, have all seen their approval ratings tumble. But in May, 76 percent of voters approved of Ford’s performance, a figure that put him in company with New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and German Chancellor Angela Merkel.
Ford holds his daily virtual coronavirus press conference with reporters at the Ontario Legislative Building on May 2.
So, how did Canada’s Trump suddenly morph into a sober, decorous statesman? The simple answer is that Ford isn’t—and never was—Canada’s Trump. True, Ford has built a center-right coalition by tapping into the restless, anti-establishment energy that is as prevalent in Canada as it is in Trump’s America and seemingly everywhere else. But he is channeling that energy into a style of politics that is heterodox and surprisingly nimble. Globally, right-wing populism isn’t likely to disappear anytime soon; the cultural forces that sustain it are much too powerful. Ford, however, offers a more durable, less dangerous vision for what it could be.
Although he comes from a family of politicians, Ford spent much of his adult life focused on business. His career took an unconventional turn, though, in 2010, when he sought (and won) the council seat his brother had vacated to become mayor of Toronto. As Rob’s newly elected right-hand man, Doug was suddenly in the middle of the most high-profile political story in the country. Many people recall Rob’s single-term mayoralty as a clown show: He is remembered for his impolitic outbursts, his penchant for public intoxication, and an awkward appearance on Jimmy Kimmel Live.
But to write off Rob Ford as a failure is to miss one crucial point: He connected viscerally with voters, particularly those who felt estranged from the city’s managerial and creative classes: low-income residents, suburbanites, and people of color. He seemed to have unlimited time for all of them. “I remember when we did our first round of polling,” said Fraser Macdonald, the deputy communications director on the mayoral campaign. “Our pollster said, ‘I have never seen this depth of support for a candidate. The people who like him love him.’”
John Filion, a Toronto councillor who served alongside the Ford brothers, believes that Doug’s time at City Hall was formative. “He saw how people reacted to the mayor,” Filion said. “Rob had always been his dumb kid brother, but then, all of a sudden, he was drawing these massive, adoring crowds.” Doug may be temperamentally different from Rob—he’s more calculated, less prone to outrage, and unburdened by addiction—but he studied his brother’s gut-based, highly effective style of politics. “Doug was smart enough,” Filion added, “to see that the stuff Rob did worked.”
Rob Ford died of cancer in 2016, leaving his brother to uphold the family brand. In January 2018, mere months before a scheduled election, Patrick Brown, the leader of Ontario’s center-right Progressive Conservative Party, was ousted amid accusations of sexual misconduct. A week later, Ford announced his intention to seek Brown’s job. Five months after that, he was elected premier, bringing the center-left Ontario Liberal Party to the end of its 15 years in government.
Doug Ford (right) stands next to his brother Rob Ford, the mayor-elect of Toronto, as he speaks to the media at Don Bosco Catholic Secondary School, where the latter was a football coach, on Oct. 26, 2010.
The start of his premiership marked a return to the Rob Ford era but with a more technocratic spin. For Rob, all elites were equally contemptible, but Doug reserves his harshest words for cultural elites—environmental activists and university professors. “Doug sees himself as a big-systems man,” said Zack Taylor, a Canadian political scientist. “His anti-elitism doesn’t extend everywhere. He respects management consultants, even if he’s less enamored of, say, [the famed Canadian writer and environmentalist] Margaret Atwood.”
Ford appeals directly to economically marginalized voters. The 2018 election saw decisive wins not only in white rural districts but also in exurban bedroom communities, industrial towns, and the multiracial suburbs of Toronto. What these voters have in common, says Kory Teneycke, who managed the 2018 campaign, is a sense of estrangement from the cultural preoccupations of the left: the environmental arguments that, when communicated poorly, seem contemptuous of industry and the social justice rhetoric that draws heavily on academic vocabulary—language that is commonplace among English majors but alienating to those who attended vocational schools.
“There’s been a shift in the things that the progressive left used to talk about,” Teneycke said. “There used to be much more of a blue-collar element to their rhetoric. But they’ve become less connected to working people.”
This realignment offers a political opportunity that Ford—an avuncular man in an inexpensive suit—is uniquely able to exploit. His rhetoric often scrambles traditional left-right divides. Like the yellow vest movement in France, Ford has reframed environmental skepticism as a form of class politics: He doesn’t deny the existence of climate change but insists that working people shouldn’t be made to pay for ambitious carbon reduction schemes. Similarly, although he appeals to members of suburban minority communities who feel excluded from an affluent, downtown elite, his ideas about race are inconsistent. (During the first year of his tenure, Ford cut funding to various refugee services, a fiscally conservative measure that also seemed like a sop to immigration-skeptical voters. And as his muddled response to the U.S. police killing of George Floyd revealed, concepts like “systemic racism” don’t come naturally to him.)
Then again, the faculty-club set isn’t Ford’s target audience. His public communications are often light on policy and heavy on affect, with statements that appear boorish to his critics but authentic to his supporters. He has spoken witheringly—if not exactly accurately—about his predecessors in the Ontario legislature (“the most politically corrupt government this country has ever seen”), the federal carbon-pricing scheme enacted under Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau (“a complete scam”), and the political culture among university students (“crazy Marxist nonsense”). As part of this carefully cultivated populist image, Ford’s government polls voters frequently on a variety of quality-of-life issues and has built a web portal through which business owners can submit requests for simple regulatory changes.
Ford, leader of Ontario’s Progressive Conservative Party, unveils his campaign bus and “For the People” slogan at the Toronto Coach Terminal on April 15, 2018.
This approach has led to a grab bag of policies, some conservative (cuts to education, health care, and social services), some progressive (tax relief for low-income workers), and much of them softly libertarian: Ford has scrapped emissions tests on used automobiles, attempted to opt out of the national carbon-pricing program, reduced the minimum price of alcohol, allowed people to bring dogs onto restaurant patios, and permitted barbershops to operate one sink instead of two. The core principles at play are frugality, smaller government, and opposition to environmental measures that cost working people money. Yet one senses that even these are negotiable. During the 2018 campaign, Ford defied eco-activists and pledged to allow housing developments on a protected green space near Toronto, but when the idea tanked in the polls, he quickly reversed course. “I govern through the people,” he said.
His measured response to COVID-19 is therefore hardly surprising. If he is concerned about ethnically diverse, inner-suburban neighborhoods where infection rates are the highest, it’s partly because these communities make up a large chunk of his base. If he is comfortable deferring to public health experts, it’s because these aren’t the types of elites he distrusts. And if he has evinced thoughtfulness, care, and cooperation over the last four months, it’s because this is what most people—including his people—expect from their leaders in times of crisis.
In Canada, as in the United States, opposition to the lockdown has come from a vocal minority on the populist right; the majority wants government to handle the issue sensibly. Unlike Trump or Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey, Ford is sufficiently in touch with public opinion to understand this fact—and is adaptive enough to respond to it.
Those who call Ford a right-wing populist in the mold of Trump have observed one simple truth: His politics skew right of center, and his style—plain-spoken, anti-elitist, accessible—is distinctly populist. But to assume that all right-wing populists are Trump replicas is to miss much of what makes him unique.
Ford is capable of reining in his combative instincts when it’s politically expedient to do so. And while the Trump movement has roots in the chauvinism of Breitbart News and the fever swamps of 4chan, Ford developed his political brand in Toronto, one of North America’s most diverse cities.
To assume that all right-wing populists are Trump replicas is to miss much of what makes Ford unique.
Trump promises a return to a mythical lost era of “greatness,” but Ford’s pitch to supporters is less grandiose: a government that feels accessible, isn’t condescending, and makes life easier in small but measurable ways. He is, ultimately, a retail politician seeking to bring a personalized, transactional style—one more commonly associated with city governance—into a much larger arena.
Critics of right-wing populism tend to assume that the movement is inseparable from the worst human impulses: xenophobia, paranoia, and contempt for cities where millions of people live. There’s plenty of evidence to back this assertion up, at least in most parts of the world. But populism is more of a style than an ideology and is therefore changeable in ways that other political orientations aren’t.
While Ford’s brand may be uniquely Canadian—tailored, as it is, to a political climate where citizens are pragmatic and less consumed by nativism—it still offers potential lessons for politicians elsewhere. Ford’s electoral success indicates that there may be a market for working-class conservatism in places other than the white, rural heartlands, and his favorable poll numbers suggest that even centrists and progressives can, in theory, accept a populist conservative as a legitimate leader, even if they’re unlikely to ever support him.
Like a cheesecake made with Dream Whip, Ford’s political style may seem like a poor approximation of the thing it’s supposed to be. It’s markedly different from classical starched-collar conservatism or from the more virulent brand of right-wing populism that has recently swept the globe. It is a practical recipe, using whatever ingredients are at hand. But it may have a longer shelf life. And it’s beloved among those who like it—and at least palatable among those who don’t.