Features

Economics After Capitalism: A Guide to the Ruins and a Road to the Future

Derek Wall

London: Pluto Books, 2015

Pp. 174

It is a basic premise of this book that capitalism doesn’t work, as dramatically illustrated by the 2008 financial crisis caused by neo-liberal policies that deregulated banking. Other persistent signs of malfunction include growing income inequality, rising poverty and mounting environmental degradation. Yet, in many quarters, it is still business as usual, enforcing the “Washington Consensus” of deregulation, privatisation, tax cuts for corporations, and reduced welfare and trade union rights.

But what is the alternative? This is the question addressed by Derek Wall who teaches political economy at Goldsmiths, University of London and is international coordinator of the Green Party of England and Wales. “Providing an alternative based on the common good, rather than the needs of the 1 per cent, is challenging. However, anti-capitalism has deep roots, has never been removed and has the potential to flower.” (p. 5)

To prove his point, Wall reviews the whole range of anti-capitalist critique. At one end of the spectrum are reformers like Joseph Stiglitz and George Soros who think the system can be fixed by replacing the “Washington Consensus” package with updated Keynesian policies. Others disagree, calling for a total overhaul. Naomi Klein is perhaps the best known among those who target the monopoly practices, exploitation, crimes and overblown political clout of multinational corporations that continue the legacy of colonial conquest in their search for markets, raw materials and cheap labour. Among this group, some advocate “popular action to localise production” whereby “the free market can be restored and mighty corporations made low”. (p. 48) 

The “small is beautiful” contingent of green economists are almost alone in categorically opposing growth and globalisation which wreck the environment, waste resources and force workers to work more for less.  According to them, “All needs in a capitalist society are transformed into the need for commodities… Economic growth does not even remove poverty: the richest generally see the greatest gains, and the poorest are usually separated from resources…” (p. 54)

Others fault the finance industry and monetary policy. 

Very interesting chapters cover Marxist, autonomist and anarchist critiques, showing more overlap among them than one might expect, and providing fascinating insights into the ideas, actions and persons who motivate these movements. Walls examines crucial questions such as whether Marx had environmental concerns and the validity of his argument that capitalism’s development tends to create communism.

He also covers different views on imperialism and globalisation, and how Third World leaders, such as Castro, built on Marx, but added their own insights. In addition to countries that have opted for socialism, like Cuba and Venezuela, the most practical approach comes from this camp, where autonomous or anarchist groups carve out free zones through direct action, not waiting for guidance from political parties or states.

Wall cites examples from this area, naming the Arab Spring among signs of discontent with the existing order, and describing the work of the YPC (Community Defence Force) in the Kurdish zone Rojava in Syria, as “a practical example of anti-capitalist, ecological and feminist alternatives.” (p. 103)

For the more radical thinkers, a key concept is “the commons”, communal land or resources, which have been enclosed as private property under capitalism. (Some current land disputes in Jordan echo this conflict.) “Throughout history, the commons has been the dominant form of regulation, providing an alternative almost universally ignored by economists, who are reluctant to admit that substitutes to the market and the state even exist. Within the commons, scarcity, if it exists, is usually managed and resources conserved through allocation systems arranged by users.” (p. 145)

Today, many anti-capitalists advocate a return to the commons in the form of collective action projects. Examples range from community-owned football teams and collective three-dimensional printing labs to communally regulated forests in Finland, grassroots movements in South America and South Africa resisting the privatisation of water, open source designers seeking to maintain free access in cyberspace, and greens and ecofeminists preserving communal land from private corporations. Walls suggest that the commons could be extended to the right of workers to buy up the firms they work for.

“Economics After Capitalism” is like a crash course in critical economy. It disproves the notion that economics is boring or dense, partly because it approaches the subject in terms of human needs instead of dry statistics, and partly because of Wall’s accessible writing style. Without over-simplification of ideas, he writes in a manner that laypersons can understand, throwing in a lot of examples from the real world and even touches of humour, to give hope that humans could organise their common life differently and better.

“Economics After Capitalism” is available at the University Bookshop.

SAN FRANCISCO — Yahoo on Thursday set out to make its free e-mail service hip again with upgrades that included getting rid of the need for passwords on mobile devices.

Yahoo new e-mail application allows users to sign-in without passwords, which have long been lambasted as paltry defence mechanisms by security specialists.

The Yahoo Mail sign-in process called Account Key allows the option of having a message sent to a user’s smartphone asking for confirmation that access should be granted online.

“Passwords are difficult to remember and secondary sign-in verification is inconvenient and confusing,” Yahoo vice president of product management Dylan Casey said in a release.

“We’re now taking a major leap towards a password-free future with the launch of Yahoo Account Key, which uses push notifications to give users simple and secure access using their mobile device.”

The feature comes nearly two years after hackers slipped into Yahoo Mail accounts to loot information using stolen passwords.

A malicious computer programme armed with Yahoo Mail passwords and usernames apparently slipped into accounts aiming to glean names and addresses from messages that had been sent.

“Security attacks are unfortunately becoming a more regular occurrence,” Yahoo senior vice president for platforms and personalisation products Jay Rossiter said at the time that cyber attacks were “becoming a more regular occurence”.

Rival Web-based e-mail service providers such as Google have encouraged people to use “two-factor authentication” that calls for passwords to be backed up by something else, such as codes sent to smartphones in text messages, in order to get into accounts.

Yahoo has said it hopes to phase out passwords to make e-mail more secure, while adding improved encryption.

Moving on mobile

New Yahoo Mail software, which the California-based Internet-pioneer said marked the 18th anniversary of the free service, also let users manage Outlook, Hotmail, or AOL e-mail from inside Yahoo accounts.

Yahoo Mail apps tailored for mobile devices powered by Apple or Android software boasted smarter search and contact management capabilities as well.

“Mobile use requires a faster and smarter inbox,” said Jeff Bonforte, senior vice president of communication products at Yahoo.

“Both of these needs are at the centre of our new app.”

Versions of the new Yahoo Mail app began rolling out on Thursday as capabilities were added to the service accessed from desktop computers.

Yahoo Chief Executive Marissa Mayer has made a priority of keeping the company in tune with mobile Internet lifestyles. Making Yahoo Mail a preferred option could help put the company at the centre of people’s daily routines.

PARIS — A new method to chemically analyse dinosaur egg shells has allowed scientists to gauge the extinct lizards’ body temperature, researchers said on Tuesday.

The findings support recent work by other teams that dinosaurs were neither warm- nor cold-blooded, but somewhere in between, researchers wrote in the journal Nature Communications. 

But it also indicated that body temperature differed between dinosaur species.

“The temperatures we measured suggest that at least some dinosaurs were not fully endotherms [warm-blooded] like modern birds,” said the study’s lead author Robert Eagle of the University of California Los Angeles. 

“They may have been intermediate — somewhere between modern alligators and crocodiles and modern birds.”

This meant they could produce heat internally and raise their body temperature, but not maintain it at a consistently high level.

Warm-blooded animals, or endotherms, typically maintain a constant body temperature while cold-blooded ones, called ectotherms, rely on external heat sources to warm up — like lizards lazing in the Sun.

Scientists have been debating for 150 years whether dinosaurs were warm-blooded hunters, like mammals, or cold-blooded and sluggish like many reptiles.

“If dinosaurs were at least endothermic [warm-blooded] to a degree, they had more capacity to run around searching for food than an alligator would,” Eagle said.

Warm-blooded animals typically need to eat a great deal to stay warm, forcing them into frequent hunts or to eat large quantities of plants.

The team said it used a pioneering procedure to measure the internal temperature of dinosaur mothers that lived some 71-80 million years ago.

They examined the chemical makeup of the shells of 19 fossilised eggs from two types of dinosaur, unearthed in Argentina and Mongolia’s Gobi Desert.

‘Not truly cold-blooded’

One was a large, long-necked titanosaur sauropod, a member of the largest animal group to ever to walk the Earth, and the other a smaller oviraptorid — closely related to Tyrannosaurus rex and modern birds.

The team analysed the behaviour of two rare isotopes in calcium carbonate, a key ingredient in egg shells. The isotopes — carbon-13 and oxygen-18 — tend to cluster together more closely at colder temperatures.

“This technique tells you about the internal body temperature of the female dinosaur when she was ovulating,” said Eagle’s colleague, Aradhna Tripati.

The titanosaur mother’s temperature had been about 38OC, the team found. A healthy human temperature is 37OC.

The smaller dinosaur was substantially cooler, probably below 32OC — but was probably able raise its temperature above that of its environment, said the team. Fossilised soil from around the nest area in Mongolia had been about 26OC. 

“The oviraptorid dinosaur body temperatures were higher than the environmental temperatures — suggesting they were not truly cold-blooded but intermediate,” said Tripati.

With the power of the Internet today and all that it allows you to find, explore, discover and learn, do technology shows still mean anything? Are they relevant, or worth the trouble and the expense?

After all these shows are made, essentially, to provide information, and we know how much of it we can get just by browsing the Web, without spending a dinar, without wasting precious time travelling, just by sitting comfortably in a cosy armchair at home.

Without a doubt, the Internet has stolen a huge part of what we would usually physically gather at a technology show. Raw information, descriptions, prices, technical characteristics, experts’ reviews and the like, the Web is just the perfect means to obtain them, certainly the fastest.

Tech shows still retain two aspects that the Internet cannot handle. The first is the physical contact with the exhibitors, the vital, invaluable human communication, and the second is the products demos that you can watch live, that you can “touch”, question and inquire about in an irreplaceable manner. Not to mention that you can buy some of the products at the show without waiting for delivery.

Perhaps these two aspects, even when combined, do not represent the major part of what a tech show brings, but they are still critical. In a way it’s also about quality and not quantity.

At tech shows you can also discuss business deals and sign contracts. Despite widely available online functionalities like videoconferencing, where you can see and hear the other party, engage into interactive, live discussions, wherever in the world you or the other party may be, it will never be exactly the same as being there in the flesh.

Organisers of technology shows have understood the change and, therefore, have transformed the events into gatherings that chiefly target a professional crowd whereas in the past anyone, including children, families, would walk in to have some fun and collect colourful brochures.

On October 18, one of the major shows, Dubai’s Gitex, will open. With topics such as robotics, 3D printing, autonomous vehicles, drones, the Internet of Everything (IoT) and last but not least the Cloud, there is hardly one hot technology subject that won’t be tackled or presented.

Dubai’s Gitex is one of the world’s most prestigious large-scale tech shows, along with Las Vegas’ CES that takes place early January and Hannover’s (Germany) CeBIT that takes place mid-March. None of these shows has been discontinued or has lost an iota of its importance. The shows have just re-adapted to the global context and to the partial competition that the Web constitutes.

The number of visitors at Gitex has only very slightly declined. It was 150,000 in 2012, 140,000 in 2013 and 135,000 in 2014 (sources: gitex.com, Wikipedia and dubaicalendar.ae). It remains impressive by any measure. As for CeBIT in Germany, the number of visitors fell gradually from 490,000 in 2004 to 220,000 this year (source: statista.com).

Technology shows are like most analogue, “traditional” events or communication means, including the media of course. New, digital methods have come not to kill them or replace them completely but to transform them and in most cases to complement them.

Indian President Pranab Mukherjee was in Jordan this week. It was the first visit by an Indian head of state to the Hashemite Kingdom in 65 years. The warmth and grandeur, with which he was received, should ensure that he does not forget about this part of the world for such long periods again. 

In fact, to make his trip more memorable, the University of Jordan presented him with an honorary doctorate in political science. Even though he has more than five honorary doctorates already, this one should be special because of the subject it represents and the complexity of the political upheaval that is happening around us. 

Mukherjee started his political career roughly around the same time that I was born, which was 50 years ago. After having held several union ministerial portfolios for more than four decades, from industrial development, revenue and banking, defence, external affairs to finance, he was sworn in as the president of India on July 25, 2012. 

He is fondly referred to as “the little big man” in political circles because of his diminutive height and still answers to the nickname “Poltuda” in his native village of West Bengal. Watching him enter the elaborate banquet hall of the lavish hotel in Amman, where a reception was held in his honour, one can understand why. Literally dwarfed by the tall security aides flanking him on both sides, Mr President ambled in, as if he was taking a leisurely walk in the park. 

Even though I was standing near the entourage, I had to crane my neck in order to get a closer look at him. Spruced up in a smart Nehru jacket and dark trousers he looked far younger than his four score years. As he strolled unhurriedly past me, I had an insane urge to call out to him by his pet name. But before I could get my vocal cords to obey, he had walked away, and was out of hearing distance. 

The Jordanians gave him a rousing welcome and the Indian community joined in. The sight of our national flags fluttering together made me misty-eyed and I sang our national anthem with a lump in my throat. I was aghast at my unexpected patriotic sentimentality and wiped a tear surreptitiously, glad that nobody had noticed. 

Soon, our head of state was addressing the gathering. He spoke about the bilateral relations the two countries shared and underlined the several fields of cooperation. As the speech got into the details of the trade that was going to increase substantially, I was about to tune off. The litany of numbers was confusing. But then the president mentioned Abdoun and I sat up immediately. This was the area in Amman where I lived, my neck of the woods, so to speak. One street in Abdoun was to be named after Mahatma Gandhi, he declared. 

“The presidential delegation might arrive to name the lane in front of my house after the father of our nation! Wow!” said the voice in my head.

Next morning I was up bright and early. 

“Have you seen the small Indian paper flags I kept in this drawer?” I asked my husband. 

“Why?” he countered. 

“I want to wave them when Poltuda arrives to inaugurate our street,” I confessed. 

“You can always sing the national anthem for him,” my spouse said. 

“Uff”, I said, ignoring him. 

“And don’t cry this time,” he cautioned.

A more stylised successor to Nissan’s family crossover SUV, the new X-Trail’s is more assertive-looking and in line with Nissan’s familial design language. Losing none of its convenience, the new X-Trail is in fact a more practical, versatile, agile and comfortable vehicle, and features a flexible engine and silky smooth transmission.

Spacious but not bulky, well equipped without being ostentatious and refined yet sure-footed to drive, the X-Trail is a moderately priced good value proposition, and crucially doesn’t sacrifice substance for style. Driven in 2.5-litre guise with continually variable transmission (CVT) and four-wheel drive, the X-Trail was perky, efficient and sure-footed.

Stylised and spacious

With narrow grille, V-shaped chrome detailing and slim strongly browed headlights, big wide lower intake and skid-place style lower lip, the new X-Trail has a more aggressive presence. Accentuated further by ridged bonnet surfacing, the X-Trail’s tapered out and snouty fascia, and sharply angled D-pillar and rear window kink lend it a sense of forward momentum.  

Though more stylised than its squared-off predecessor, the new X-Trail’s dimensions are un-exaggerated in width and it remains manoeuvrable. A tall roof offers excellent headroom for front and rear passengers — especially without sunroof as tested. Spacious with low loading floor and wide tailgate, it accommodates 1,112-litre cargo to the roof — expanding to 1982 litres with rear seats folded.

A refined, practical and efficient daily drive crossover SUV rather than dedicated off-roader, the X-Trail, however, benefits from 210mm ground clearance, 18.5° approach and 24.7° departure angles, and 50:50 lockable four-wheel-drive — up to 40km/h — for confident ability over moderate off-road conditions. Well filling its wheel arches, the X-Trail’s 225/65R17 tyres provide a good compromise for road feel, cornering stiffness and forgiving absorption.

Flexible and fluent

Powered by a 2.5-litre four-cylinder engine with a long-stroke configuration, the X-Trail benefits from perky off-the-line responsiveness and generous low- and mid-range torque for on-the-move confidence and flexibility. Developing 170BHP at 6000rpm and 172lb/ft at 4000rpm, it is smooth, progressive and consistent in delivery, and with distant and slightly gruff mechanical note, is well-insulated from the cabin. 

With transverse engine configuration driving the front wheels under normal conditions, the X-Trail can transfer some power (5-40 per cent observed during test drive) to the rear wheels when necessary on low traction surfaces. However, with Trace Control driving assistance automatically selective braking, it proved sure-footed, tidy and agile through tight corners, getting along fine without needing to engage four-wheel drive.

With silky smooth CVT continually altering ratios, the X-Trail makes progress with a slight slingshot effect at sudden heavy throttle, as transmission ratios adjust to input and rising engine revs. Providing good anecdotally observed fuel efficiency, the X-Trail’ transmission also features six simulated “gear” ratios — manually selected through the lever — for greater driver involvement, during which the engine revs more freely at top-end.

Reassuring and eager

With front MacPherson strut and rear multi-link suspension, the X-Trail rides smooth, and reassuringly stable on motorways, and delivers buttoned-down and settled vertical rebound control. Taut through corners with good body control and lateral grip, the X-Trail feels slightly firm over sudden sharp cracks and bumps, but was surprisingly fluent and poised over choppy medium speed roads.

Tidier handling and more agile than expected — especially with Trace control engaged — the X-Trail was crisp, eager and controlled into corners and through switchbacks. Driving like a smaller car through winding country routes, the X-Trail is manoeuvrable, willing and with good at-the-limit instincts. Meanwhile, steering is light and precise with decent feel and tight turning circle.

Reassuringly controllable even with assistance controls and four-wheel drive disengaged the X-Trail understeers slightly but predictably into tight fast corners with Trace Control off, but easing off the through tidies up its cornering line. Eager and agile one can even nudge the X-Trail to subtly pivot weight transfer — with assistance systems disengaged and 2WD engaged — to tighten a cornering line.

Cavernous cabin

Spacious, practical, convenient and comfortable X-Trail features wise door swing angles for access, generous passenger room, including rear leg and headroom with 40:60 split sliding and reclining rear seats, which fold flat at a 40:20:40 split. Front seats are comfortable and well-adjustable front seats, providing a good driving position, but high headrest adjustability would be welcome.

User-friendly and ergonomic with prominent soft textures, the X-Trail has an airy ambiance with beige fabric upholstery, as tested. One would have, however, preferred one of the dark steering and dashboard palettes available. The X-Trail also features three three-point rear seatbelts, childseat latches, under-floor boot storage and optional seven-seat configuration. The test car was a 5-seater.

With a commanding driving position and good visibility in most directions, the X-Trail was fitted with a reversing camera, big mirrors and rear parking sensors, however front sensors would have been welcome to assist with front-side visibility in tight confines. Well-equipped, other features included multi-function steering, A/C, USB and Bluetooth connectivity, and hill descent control.

TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS

Engine: 2.5-litre, transverse 4 cylinders

Bore x stroke: 89 x 100mm

Valve-train: 16-valve, DOHC

Gearbox: Continuously variable transmission (CVT) 6-speed auto

Drive-train: Four-wheel drive

Gear ratios: 2.631:1–0.378:1

Reverse/final drive: 1.96:1/5.694:1

Power, BHP (PS) [kW]: 170 (172) [126] @6000rpm

Torque, lb/ft (Nm): 172 (233) @4000rpm

Fuel capacity: 60 litres

Length: 4640mm

Width: 1820mm

Height: 1710mm

Wheelbase: 2705mm

Track: 1575mm

Ground clearance: 210mm

Approach/departure angles: 18.5°/24.7°

Aerodynamic drag co-efficient: 0.33

Headroom, F/R: 1057/978mm

Legroom, F/R: 1092/963mm

Shoulder room, F/R: 1438/1420mm

Cargo volume, min/max, to roof: 1112-/1982 litres

Kerb weight: 1610-1631kg

Suspension, F/R: MacPherson struts/multi-link

Steering: Power-assisted, rack & pinion

Turning circle: 11.3 metres

Brakes: Ventilated discs

Tyres: 225/65R17

Price, starting from/as driven: JD27,350/JD29,820

Like it or not, we all are responsible for our own communication. E-mail evokes almost unprecedented cultural and generational challenges. 

Why, you ask? Because the primary caveat in communicating effectively is that what you “hear” is more important than what I think I’ve said. 

We have four generations actively engaged in the workplace, and our workplace is indeed global. A baby boomer is easily turned off by undue familiarity, as are individuals from countries more formal than the United States.

Mallory Fix, who teaches English as a Second Language at the University of Pennsylvania, says, “E-mail etiquette does vary across the globe, especially in ways to address the receiver, the directness of the message, and the closing.”

Here are the concerns this columnist hears most often:

Always use a salutation and a closing. Based on your relationship, only you can decide whether deference dictates a “Dear Professor…” or “Good morning, Dr Weber”. 

One colleague of mine received an e-mail greeting from a student of “Hey, Lou”, and then proceeded to ask him for a reference. Bad idea!

For your career’s sake, make sure you get the name and title right. In the situation above, the man was a full professor, entitled to more than a modicum of respect. Furthermore, his first name was Dennis!

Avoid trendy abbreviations and be careful of emoticons. They may be misunderstood and thus not clearly convey your meaning.

Don’t confuse e-mail with texting or IM. E-mail is more formal than that. Use complete sentences, correct grammar, correct punctuation and capitalisation, Yet subject lines should be as efficient as a tweet, concisely stating what’s important and relevant. 

Make sure your subject lines distinguish you from a hacker or a scammer by being current and germane. For example, “Change in Tuesday lunch meeting”. 

If a subject changes, change the header! Remember that e-mail is no place for stream of consciousness ruminations, so be direct, clear and succinct. Respond in full sentences.

When you have a long list of comments, put them in a single Word document attachment, or number the points so that the recipient knows you got everything. When there is a succession of e-mails, indicate “1 of 4”, for example.

No time to respond fully to a long e-mail? Reply to the sender that you received the e-mail and indicate when you will be responding. Nothing is more discouraging than feeling ignored.

Just because something can be forwarded doesn’t mean it should be. Remember, too, that a recipient can forward your e-mail, and you have no control at that point.

Patience is a virtue. Not every e-mail gets delivered. This happens more frequently than we would like to admit. Offer people the same grace that you would like to receive on e-mail responses. 

Pick up the phone if you don’t hear back after a couple of tries. It’s not fair to assume that, for example, your e-mail must be treated as top of the list, especially dealing with attorneys and physicians. 

Sometimes postal mail and faxes arrive at an office before your e-mail. Unless it’s an emergency, responses should be taken in order.

Remember that the person reading your e-mail has only the words on the screen. Now think about how much our tone of voice impacts our message, so beware of sarcasm. Consider, for example, how many ways we can interpret even the simple word, “please”.

For me, the “E” in e-mail represents two essential reminders. First: edit, edit, edit to be sure all your facts, grammar and punctuation are correct. Second: E-mail is eternal. Just ask Hillary Clinton.

Return: A Palestinian Memoir

Ghada Karmi

London-New York: Verso, 2015

Pp. 319

For many years, Ghada Karmi, a Palestinian resident in the UK, has campaigned eloquently for the Palestinian right of return. Yet, in her new memoir, return is presented as a conflicted issue. 

While its justice is not in doubt, she questions its feasibility for Palestinians like herself who have lived in exile for most of their lives. Her doubt springs from the deep, negative marks left on Palestinian society that she observes on a return visit in 2005. She doesn’t blame the people, however, but faults the cumulative effects of decades of occupation and the Oslo Accords. 

Karmi’s prose is searingly honest as she integrates her personal and political experience into a compelling whole. Though she repeatedly queries her own identity and where she belongs, her analytical acumen is not in doubt. 

While her earlier memoir, “In Search of Fatima”, focused on her pre-1948 childhood in Qatamoun, and growing up in London after the family had to leave Jerusalem, “Return” covers her adult life, not chronologically, but thematically, in retrospect. 

Two events frame the narrative: the illness and death of her father, the widely respected intellectual, Hassan Karmi, and the months she spent in Ramallah as a media consultant for the Palestinian Authority in 2005.

These experiences evoke memories and sometimes re-evaluations of family, particularly her relationship to her father and daughter, her medical and academic career in Britain, her activism, previous return visits to Palestine, the pain of being deprived of your home and homeland, and the evolution of the Palestinian struggle. But, most of all, they evoke conflicted feelings about the idea and reality of return and identity. 

For most of her adult life, “being Palestinian was the only thing that felt real” to Karmi. (p. 13)

Until the Palestinian leadership returned to Palestine, she felt that the gravity of the cause lay with those in exile, and that the Nakbeh was the seminal Palestinian event. Yet, after the Oslo Accords, “the rest of us still promoting the cause outside Palestine feel left behind, like people trying to catch a train that has long departed.” (p. 14)

Going to work as a media consultant to the Palestinian Authority was her way to catch up, but she felt she didn’t fit in, and what she had to contribute was not valued. “I looked back on my whole assignment in ‘Palestine’ and realised I had achieved none of my aims because it would never have been possible in the Palestine I found. I had travelled to the land of my birth with a sense of return, but it was a return to the past, to the Palestine of distant memory, not to the place it is now.” (p. 313)

It didn’t help that the ministry to which she was assigned was divided between two chiefs who were at war with one another, and most staff members were content to carry out their routine duties in a lacklustre spirit: “any interest or commitment to the content of their work was secondary to the need to remain in work, no matter what it was.” (p. 29) 

Shocked at West Bankers’ seeming indifference to an Israeli attack on Gaza, she later understands that it was not callousness, but “the effect of their closed lives spent inside the parcels of land into which Israel had confined them. Inevitably, they learned to think solely of their own affairs inside their parcel…” (p. 66)

Her incisive descriptions of many big and small happenings reveal what may be the most insidious effect of the Oslo Accords — that it has infiltrated people’s mindset. 

Eventually, Karmi learns not to take her work in the ministry so seriously, “because these were pretend places like the rest of the PA’s ‘ministries’, indeed like the ‘Palestinian state’ they were supposed to be a part of. Everyone who worked in them was also pretending, playing a part in a charade created by the international donors who encouraged the Palestinians to believe that they needed to have all the appurtenances of statehood ahead of attaining their state.” (p. 102)

Determined to get something out of her attempted return, Karmi spent much time outside the office, visiting many parts of Palestine and joining in cultural activities and protests, but what she saw was mainly disheartening: villages overwhelmed by settlements and the Apartheid Wall, daunting and tedious checkpoints, the encirclement of Jerusalem, the abysmal situation of Hebron and Gaza, etc. Yet, among ordinary people she did find an amazing resilience that gave cause for guarded optimism. 

She also found time to pursue her search for Fatima, the family housekeeper from whom she was separated in 1948. Her poignant descriptions of what she witnessed make the book fascinating (though often sad) reading, even for those who are aware of the facts that she presents. “Return” is a wake-up call addressed to the world and to the Palestinians themselves that pursuing the current course will not lead to a real solution, that there is a need for a radically new approach. 

“Return” is available at the University Bookshop and Readers.

MIAMI — In the Hollywood movie “The Martian” an American astronaut survives on Mars against all odds, but in reality NASA admits that huge obstacles remain before humans can reach the Red Planet.

NASA outlined the many steps ahead in a 36-page document that calls the problems “solvable” but steers clear of saying how much money is needed or when to expect an astronaut mission to Mars.

The strategy was released to the public late Thursday ahead of talks with Congress about budgets for space exploration and before a major international meeting of the space industry in Jerusalem next week.

Astronauts who journey to Mars could spend three years in deep space, where radiation is high and so are the risks of cancer, bone loss and immune problems, said the document, called “NASA’s Journey to Mars: Pioneering Next Steps in Space Exploration.”

“The journey is worth the risk,” it said, calling Mars “an achievable goal” and “the next tangible frontier for expanding human presence”.

But John Rummel, senior scientist at the SETI Institute, said the document contains “curious shortcomings”, noting that it only mentions the terms “food” and “air” once, without elaborating on how astronauts will grow food in space to survive.

It also ignores the fundamental issue of contamination risk to any potential tiny life forms on Mars from humans, or vice versa, Rummel told AFP.

“Without sufficient care, Earth contamination could be misread as Mars life,” he warned.

At a Capitol Hill hearing Friday, Republican Congressman Lamar Smith lamented the White House’s budget proposals in recent years, which have cut funding for Mars exploration — including a $440 million cut to Mars programmes in fiscal year 2016 — despite widespread support from the public and lawmakers on both sides of the aisle.

Smith, who chairs the House Science, Space and Technology Committee, also lashed out at NASA’s Mars strategy.

“This proposal contains no budget, it contains no schedule, no deadline. It is just some real pretty photographs and some nice words,” he thundered.

“That is not going to get us to Mars.

“It is actually a journey to nowhere until we have that budget.”

Closer than ever?

NASA administrator Charles Bolden said in a statement that the US space agency is “closer to sending American astronauts to Mars than at any point in our history”.

Bolden, a former astronaut, said he looked “forward to continuing to discuss the details of our plan with members of Congress, as well as our commercial and our international partners, many of whom will be attending the International Astronautical Congress next week”.

The path ahead is divided into three stages, the first of which is already under way with testing and experiments at the International Space Station.

The second phase, called “Proving Ground”, begins in 2018 with the first launch of the new deep-space capsule Orion atop the most powerful rocket ever built, known as the Space Launch System, or SLS.

After that, the space agency plans to practice other missions in the area of space between the Earth and Moon, or in the Moon’s orbit, known as cislunar space.

These include sending a robotic spacecraft in 2020 to lasso a boulder from a near-Earth asteroid and ferry it to an area in deep space that astronauts can investigate.

“NASA will learn to conduct complex operations in a deep-space environment that allows crews to return to Earth in a matter of days,” said the report.

The third phase involves living and working on Mars’ surface and in transiting spaceships “that support human life for years, with only routine maintenance”, as well as “harvesting Martian resources to create fuel, water, oxygen, and building materials”.

NASA gave no dates or details for this phase in the report, though one graphic mentioned “human missions to Mars vicinity in 2030+.”

The investments outlined in each of the three phases “are affordable within NASA’s current budget”, the report said.

Complex problem

As NASA presses farther into space, the agency acknowledged that the problems will grow more complex.

“Future missions will face increasingly difficult challenges associated with transportation, working in space and staying healthy,” said the report.

NASA also said it needs to develop adequate space suits to protect against the hazards of deep-space exploration and must test advanced solar electric propulsion to power spacecraft efficiently.

The spectacular sky-crane powered landing that allowed the Curiosity rover to touch down on Mars in 2012 must be completely revamped for a human-scale landing, which would be 20-30 times heavier.

A vehicle to lift humans from the surface of Mars into Mars’ orbit is also needed, and is considered “critical to crew survival.”

“NASA will have to learn new ways of operating in space,” said the report.

“Overcoming these challenges will be essential on the journey to Mars.”

While smoking is linked to an increased risk of developing diabetes, this risk appears to drop over the long term once cigarette use stops, a review of evidence suggests.

Researchers analysed data on almost 5.9 million people in 88 previous studies examining the connection between smoking, second-hand smoke exposure and diabetes. They estimated that roughly 28 million type 2 diabetes cases worldwide — or about 11.7 per cent of cases in men and 2.4 per cent in women — could be attributed to active smoking. 

The more cigarettes smokers consumed, the more their odds of getting diabetes increased.

If they quit, ex-smokers initially faced an even higher risk of diabetes, but as more years pass without cigarette use their odds of getting the disease gradually diminished, the analysis found.

“The diabetes risk remains high in the recent quitters,” said lead study author An Pan, of Huazhong University of Science and Technology in China. Weight gain linked to smoking cessation may be at least partly to blame for the heightened diabetes risk in those first months after giving up cigarettes, Pan added. 

“However, the diabetes risk is reduced substantially after five years,” Pan said by e-mail. “The long-term benefits — including benefits for other diseases like cancer and heart disease — clearly outweigh the short-term higher risk.”

Worldwide, nearly one in 10 adults had diabetes in 2014, and the disease will be the seventh leading cause of death by 2030, according to the World Health Organisation.

Most of these people have type 2 diabetes, which is associated with obesity and ageing and happens when the body can’t properly use or make enough of the hormone insulin to convert blood sugar into energy. Left untreated, diabetes can lead to nerve damage, amputations, blindness, heart disease and strokes.

Plenty of research has established a connection between smoking and diabetes, although the reason is still unclear.

For the current analysis, Pan and colleges focused on exploring the link between the amount and type of smoke exposure and diabetes risk, as well as the potential for this risk to diminish with smoking cessation. 

Overall, the pooled data from all the studies showed the risk of diabetes was 37 per cent higher for smokers than non-smokers, the study team reports in The Lancet Diabetes and Endocrinology.

Exactly how smoking might lead to diabetes isn’t firmly established, but it’s possible smoking might cause inflammation, which in turn boosts the risk for diabetes, Dr. Abbas Dehghan, of Erasmus University Medical Centre in Rotterdam, The Netherlands. 

“The more one smokes, the more chronic inflammation there will be, and the higher the risk of diabetes will be,” Dehghan, who wasn’t involved in the study, said by e-mail. 

Occasional smokers were 21 per cent more likely to have diabetes than people who never picked up the habit, while the increased risk was 57 per cent for heavy smokers.

People exposed to second-hand smoke were 22 per cent more likely to develop diabetes than people who never smoked, the study also found.

If smokers quit, their risk of diabetes over the next five years was 54 per cent higher than for people who never smoked. After that, the increased risk dropped to 18 per cent over the following five-year period. Remaining abstinent for a decade or more, however, reduced the extra risk to 11 per cent. 

While the connection between smoking and diabetes is nowhere near as strong as the link between cigarettes and lung cancer, the findings still suggest that doctors should add diabetes to the list of risks they warn smokers about, Amy Taylor of the University of Bristol in the UK and colleagues note in an accompanying editorial. 

The short-term increase in diabetes risk after quitting shouldn’t deter smokers’ cessation efforts, they argue. Instead, smokers should remember that cigarettes are tied to lower weight and cessation can lead some people to eat or drink more, leading to weight gain.