Ugo Palheta: Gramsci predicted this moment of domination without hegemony

written by Filippo Ortona

 Interview. We interviewed the French sociologist and editor of Contretemps, Ugo Palheta. ‘We are at an intermediate moment in which political power is weakened by social opposition, yet still strong enough to move forward.’


Location
PARIS
Published on

May 3, 2023

Ugo Palheta is a French sociologist and researcher at the University of Lille. Founder of the journal Contretemps, he specializes in the study of inequality and in recent years has been working on the connections between neo-fascism and neoliberal policies.

In 2018 he published La possibilité du fascisme: France, la trajectoire du désastre (ed. La Découverte).

Emmanuel Macron is embroiled in an unprecedented crisis in France. Paradoxically, the more the crisis deepens, the more unlikely it seems that he will take a step back on pension reform. How can this contradiction be explained?

There is a deep crisis of the legitimacy of neoliberal policies, which had its origins long ago, but which has reached a climax during Macron’s term. His entire presidency has been marked by very strong mobilizations: the movement against François Hollande’s Loi Travail (for whom Macron served as economy minister), the gilets jaunes, the 2019 strikes against the previous attempt at pension reform, the refineries, the hospitals, the anti-racist and feminist movements – and, today, this social movement of historic breadth.

The neoliberal project seems to have reached that moment that Gramsci characterized as domination without hegemony: it now stands due to repressive coercion on the one hand and the weakness of the political left and the social movement on the other. The latter is strong enough to cause major shocks to any attempt to impose neoliberal reforms, but too weak to achieve their effective abandonment – not to mention the dissolution of Parliament or Macron’s resignation.

We are at an intermediate moment in which political power is weakened by social opposition, yet still strong enough to move forward. Nonetheless, the issue is now on the table, on the movement’s agenda: the legitimacy of the constitution of the Fifth Republic, its authoritarian and Bonapartist character.

The top-heavy character of the Fifth Republic is one of the central themes being challenged. Why did Macron choose to stretch the mechanisms of the French Constitution so far to the extreme?

The constitution of the Fifth Republic takes some liberties from democratic standards in this direction, being a fundamentally Bonapartist text that gives unbridled power to the executive. Since its implementation in 1958, France has never been a normal liberal democracy of the kind we are used to in the West.

The other, more general aspect is the moment that capitalism is undergoing: the marriage between democracy and capitalism was a temporary phenomenon. This marriage was based on the union of formal freedoms and social democracy, on the limitation (even if minimal) of exploitation and the guarantee of growth rates for capital: the legitimacy of the system lay at the intersection of these factors. That balance came into crisis decades ago, and we are still living within this long crisis of capitalism. The imposition of the European Constitution in 2005, against the referendum vote where the French rejected it, or the dismal fate reserved for Syriza in 2015, are examples of how capital now tends to emancipate itself from democracy: first and foremost from social democracy, but at this point also from political democracy, as we’re seeing in France.

The French crisis is due to this intersection between the country’s institutional history and the long crisis of capitalism, which is tending towards emancipating itself from democratic mechanisms.

In recent weeks, a series of polls have shown a growth in support for Marine Le Pen’s far-right. How is this possible, given the total absence of the Rassemblement National (RN) from the social movement?

One reason is that the polls are taken at a time when most people think that this social movement has little chance of winning the pension battle. For this struggle to produce the greatest possible effect for the left in electoral terms, it would have to result in a victory. But there is another aspect: the far right today provides a “reasonable” continuity to neoliberal policies. The “radical break” left, on the other hand, appears to many people as something risky. A policy of a break with neoliberalism in France could trigger a counteroffensive of capital, as happened in Greece or South America – and people are taking this into account.

In contrast, the far right offers a form of continuity: what Le Pen proposes is not a break with neoliberalism, but a version of it presented as more reasonable, which would continue some policies while intensifying others. This is true on the issue of security, where the RN’s program is entirely compatible with the racist evolution of French politics in recent decades, but it’s especially true on economic policy. For example, on pensions, Marine Le Pen proposes up to 43 years of contributions and retirement at age 60 only for those who started working before the age of 20: basically, a slightly more moderate version of Macron’s reform.

What differentiates Macron from the far right, as you’re saying the latter is in continuity with the current government?

The political area of discourse of the French far right is that of the Nation Threatened by Enemies, internal and external. This is what it builds its discourse on, its attempt at hegemony. If it comes to power, it will continue the neoliberal reforms, also adding a policy of repression against social movements and trade unions – a model similar to that put into practice by Orbán in Hungary, a kind of ordonationalism. In doing so, it could restore legitimacy to the neoliberal project, under the auspices of increasingly xenophobic policies and through the systematic construction of the figure of the Enemy Within: be it the trade unions, the social movements, ecologists, immigrants, etc. Unlike Macron, Le Pen’s electoral base doesn’t limit her at all in this regard: she will be able to go all the way in this process, built on a mixture of reactionary nationalism and neoliberal policies that are violent in content as well as in form.

Il manifesto global

Khader Adnan died on hunger strike, protesting detention without trial in Israel

written by Michele Giorgio

Il manifesto global

Analysis. The prisoner who had been on hunger strike for 86 days against the so-called administrative detention practiced by Israel died overnight between Monday and Tuesday. 

His organization, Jihad Islami, wants to avenge him.

May 4, 2023

Khader Adnan was not “the leader of Islamic Jihad,” as so many have said and written. What he had become was a symbol of “sumud” (resilience) for his organization and all Palestinians. Most importantly, Adnan was one of the 1,000 Palestinians – out of a total of about 5,000 political prisoners – imprisoned in Israel who are not subject to any trial and who are not allowed to know the official reason for their arrest.

Khader Adnan, 45, from Arrabe (Jenin), a father of nine, died the night between Monday and Tuesday in Nitzan prison (Ramle) after a long hunger strike of 87 days.

After his death, many Palestinians had words of praise for him, calling him a hero, martyr, fighter. But Adnan will go down in history for his battle against the “administrative detention” practiced by Israel, which on February 5 had thrown him behind bars once again without trial.

Adnan spent the last years of his life fighting against this potentially indefinite form of “pre-trial detention,” a legacy of the British Mandate over Palestine (1917-48) that Israel continues to employ almost exclusively against Palestinians under military occupation. He did so using the only possible means of protest, the hunger strike, on five separate occasions: for 25 days in 2004, 67 in 2012, 54 in 2014, 25 in 2021. On Tuesday, he became the first Palestinian political prisoner to die from a hunger strike in Israel since 1992. Palestinian sources reported that six other prisoners had died under similar circumstances in 1970, the early 1980s and 1992.

To justify Adnan’s detention, Israeli authorities insist he belonged to Islamic Jihad, and Israeli media added that the detainee had publicly expressed support for armed struggle. But Khader Adnan was not being prosecuted for anything, this time or the previous ones. No specific charges were brought against him, since this is a form of detention that aims first and foremost to “take out of circulation” a Palestinian deemed inconvenient or dangerous, for months, in some cases years, without intelligence producing any evidence of his supposed “crimes.”

Over the decades, activists, jurists, prominent figures, international and local human rights centers have spoken out against this practice, which first the British and then the Israelis have employed against Palestinians – there have been very few cases of Israeli citizens placed in administrative detention – but to no avail.

Adnan’s health had deteriorated rapidly in recent weeks. His family had warned that he was dying and at risk of a heart attack because of his past hunger strikes that had brought him to the brink of death several times. Israeli authorities are accused of refusing to transfer him to a hospital in April, after his condition deteriorated, although he was in immediate need of medical treatment. They claimed the detainee “refused to undergo medical tests and receive medical treatment.” The military court in Salem had summarily extended Adnan’s administrative detention order twice and denied him bail on April 23. On May 1, the military court’s appellate judge postponed his decision for another 10 days.

After he died, the Palestinian Human Rights Organizations Council (PHROC) accused the authorities of the “slow killing” and “premeditated murder” of Khader Adnan. His wife Randa Musa also attacked unspecified Palestinian parties who “did nothing concrete to stop the slow death” of her husband – words most likely aimed at the Palestinian National Authority (PNA), which failed to act to get Adnan released. For his part, PNA Prime Minister Muhammad Shtayyeh accused Israeli authorities of “deliberate assassination,” and the Foreign Ministry called for an international investigation into the circumstances of the prisoner’s death.

Islamic Jihad warned that Adnan’s death would not go unpunished. Demonstrations and protest rallies were held in the West Bank and Gaza, where a general strike was called.

The hours following the detainee’s death saw a slow but accelerating military escalation. Rocket attacks from Gaza into Israel by Jihad, Hamas and other groups were sporadic at first, and then became more sustained. 22 rockets had been launched as of Tuesday night, some of which fell in Sderot and other population centers, without casualties. Israel hit Gaza with its artillery and air force, then announced through its leaders that its response would get tougher as the hours passed.

More and more, the drumbeat of war took over, and the issue of administrative detention, condemned under international law as violating human rights, was hardly mentioned anymore.

Intro: The Iranian Interests of Chinese Energy Giants

by Tehran Bureau and Zamaneh Media

 

 May 2, 2023

 

Chinese companies have been gaining exclusive access to some of Iran’s most productive oil & gas fields for the past two decades, despite limited efficiency at developing new projects, and to the long-term detriment of Iran’s ability to profit from its own energy reserves. 

Iran, the world’s third-largest oil and second-largest natural gas reserve holder, is struggling to export its oil and meet its own energy needs due to outdated infrastructure. In hopes of raising its oil & gas revenue, the Iranian government awarded at least 14 contracts worth at least $79 billion (about $4.34 quadrillion Tomans, at an exchange rate of 54,960 Tomans/$1) to Chinese oil & gas companies over the past two decades.

Of the 14 projects Iran’s government awarded to Chinese companies since 2004, at least 9 were canceled by either the Iranian or the Chinese side, or fell significantly behind schedule, as shown in the chart below.

Despite their poor overall progress in the revitalization of the oil & gas sector, these Chinese companies have managed to cement their influence over the future development of Iran’s energy reserves. 

Open-source documents reviewed by Tehran Bureau show Chinese nationals have registered a total of 15 companies active in the oil & gas sector since 2004. Additionally, two universities and two research institutes are active in research and development relating to the oil and gas sector. These organizations have registered  a total of 45 patents for related products and technology. The large-scale patenting process, in particular, suggests that aside from selling its energy to China at cutthroat prices, Iran is permanently ceding its right to profit from the development of its oil and gas fields to Chinese contractors. The Iranian government does not control when, and if, the contractors will actually complete their tasks.

China’s obligations in Iran should be weighed against its interests elsewhere in the region. Under growing international isolation, Iran’s purchases from China have fallen from US$1.5 billion a month in 2016 to only $500 million in 2022. Saudi Arabia’s imports from China, by contrast, have risen from about the same level of $1.5 billion a month 2016 to $3.5 billion a month today. 

At the same time, Iran’s oil sales on the global oil market have fallen at least 65 percent since 2017, according to OPEC data, severely diminishing key revenues as well as its geostrategic clout. In this environment, Iran’s dependence on disadvantageous energy sales to China has increased, and now accounts for 70% of its total energy exports.

This inroad into a country’s oil and gas sector mirrors China’s activities in fossil fuel-rich countries throughout the world. In Angola, Beijing invested $60 billion over several decades in various oil and infrastructure projects, motivated by its growing domestic energy needs. After an initial honeymoon period, a majority of the projects, including oil blocks operated by Chinese companies, fell into disrepair and were mired by opaque deals with corrupt local officials. As a result, Angola is left honoring a disadvantageous deal that forces it to sell its remaining oil to China below global market prices.

Chinese Oil Companies in Iran

Chinese oil & gas companies escalated their activity in Iran in the early 2000s, when intensifying sanctions on Iran’s oil sector forced many other international firms to leave the country. 

The two main companies responsible for China’s oil & gas activities are China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) and China Petroleum and Chemical Corporation (Sinopec). Their subsidiaries have acquired various oil contracts for the development of Iran’s oil and gas fields.

We have reviewed these companies and their activities in detail in a series of articles. These articles will be published in the following days.

The Iranian Interests of Chinese Energy Giants, Part 1: CNPC

by Tehran Bureau and Zamaneh Media 

 May 4, 2023

The two main companies responsible for China’s oil & gas activities are the China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) and  SINOPEC. Both of these are large energy concerns owned by the Chinese state, with hundreds of subsidiaries around the world. Their subsidiaries have filed registration documents in Iran, and acquired various contracts for the development of Iran’s oil & gas fields. 

OVERVIEW: China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC)

CNPC is a Chinese state-owned oil company which has ranked 4th in Fortune Global 500, an index of the world’s wealthiest companies, since 2017. 

CNPC has patented various technologies in Iran. In 2007, CNPC invested $26 million on Kish Island, according to the SHANA news portal. 

The following 8 CNPC subsidiaries are active in Iran, according to documents reviewed by Tehran Bureau:

Playing the Long Game: CNPC Companies on Kish Island

CNPC has established two subsidiaries with a stated interest in developing the gas field near Kish island. Identified in 2006, the Kish gas field is Iran’s largest gas discovery in recent history, and ranks among the 20 largest in the world. However, despite big announcements by several administrations, the field remains undeveloped. Kish Island, meanwhile, remains reliant on pollutant power generators and diesel imports from Bandar Abbas for its own energy needs.

Established in Kish in 2004, P.A.B National Kish was created to “explore, develop and produce oil and gas” and “sell crude oil and natural gas and their derivatives in accordance with the laws of the country and CNPC regulations,” among other activities.  All board members are Chinese, according to this Rooznameh Rasmi document.

Another CNPC company, Persia Technical Services Kish Limited, was established in Kish in 2013, according to a posting on the job search website Iran Talent. It is a subsidiary of Great Wall Drilling Company (GWDC), which is a subsidiary of CNPC. Persia Technical Services Kish is also an Exploration & Production (E&P) company. Its services include “Drilling Rig Services, Drilling and Completion Fluid Services, Cementing Services Casing and Tubing Running Services, Coring Services, Directional and Horizontal Drilling Services, Bilateral and Multilateral Drilling Services, H2S Services, Waste Management Services, Wireline Logging Services, Mud Logging Services, Well Testing Services, Acidizing Services, Drill String Maintain Services, etc.” 

Upstream, Exploration & Production (E&P) companies like P.A.B National Kish and Persia Technical Services Kish are typically valued by the size of the oil or gas reserves they can access. The large, untouched gas discovery in Kish implies that the value of these companies is potentially quite high. Their existence suggests that China has set up the financial and corporate infrastructure to develop the Kish gas field, but lacks initiative to do so, despite Iran’s growing need. 

Petrochina’s Failed LNG Transport Project 

CNPC trademarked the brand “Petrochina” in Iran in 2007, the same year its subsidiary PetroChina Company Limited began its activities in the country, according to Rooznameh Rasmi.  Also that year, the then-CEO of the National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) Gholam-Hossein Nozari announced an agreement with PetroChina to sell Iran’s liquified natural gas (LNG), but the company failed to honor those obligations, according to SHANA news. 

Like its sister companies in Kish, PetroChina is an upstream, E&P company. In 2020, it patented a “A high-temperature diverting acid composition and preparation method”, a process used during well drilling, according to Rooznameh Rasmi.

From the Azadegan Oil Fields to the Cayman Islands Tax Haven: CNPC International

Investigations of international business registries show multiple CNPC subsidiaries, all based in different global tax havens, go by the name of CNPC International (CNPCI). The subsidiary involved in the development of the Azadegan oilfield is based in the Cayman Islands, a known tax haven, documents show. Another company, CNPCI (Cyprus) Ltd., was briefly responsible for developing the Masjed-e Soleyman oilfield, our previous reporting shows. 

In January 2009, Nozari signed a deal with CNPC to develop the North Azadegan oilfield, according to SHANA news. CNPC entered another agreement in the spring of that year to develop the South Azadegan oilfield. Located north of Ahvaz, the Azadegan oilfield is Iran’s largest oil discovery in the past 30 years. As in Masjed-e Soleymani, CNPC’s first large energy deal in Iran, the company soon proved unable to complete the project on schedule. 

By fall 2009, CNPCI purchased a majority of shares NIOC’s subsidiary, the  Swiss-based Naftiran Intertrade Company (NICO). In doing so, it effectively took over the NICO’s contract to develop the South Azadegan oil field, as the Iranian government, via NICO, was unable to finance the $2.5-billion project. 

Five years later, in 2014, the oil ministry canceled the CNPCI project due to a lack of progress.  The Chinese company had only completed 7 of the 185 oil wells required in phase 1 of the South Azadegan oilfeild’s development project and was “dragging its feet,” Iran oil ministry spokespeople told SHANA news. In 2016, however, the government announced NIOC was renewing negotiations with CNPCI and the second major Chinese energy concern active in Iran, SINOPEC, for the development of the second phase of the North Azadegan oilfield. 

The Chinese Companies Helping Iran Skirt U.S. Sanctions

Another CNPC subsidiary, Bank of Kunlun Co. Ltd, was sanctioned in 2012 by the U.S. Treasury for “providing financial services to designated Iranian banks and facilitating the movement of millions of dollars worth of international transactions.” The bank however, continued its transactions in yuan and euro with Iran until at least 2017, according to regulators. 

CNPC was also involved in the development of Phase 11 of South Pars, Iran’s half of the largest gas field in the world, in the Persian Gulf. Originally, Total of France was a 50.1% partner in the project, but withdrew in 2017 under the heavy pressure of sanctions. CNPC automatically took its place, but also withdrew later. This year, Iran signed a much-touted MOU with Russia to develop South Pars, but Russia’s actual intentions are doubtful. The current international sanctions against Russia following its invasion of Ukraine make it a direct competitor to Iran for energy exports to China. Helping Iran develop its own reserves would be against Russia’s own gas trade interests, at least in the near term.

Three More Subsidiaries With Oil & Gas Knowhow

Another three CNPC subsidiaries with exclusively Chinese ownership have trademarked business names or registered patents in Iran, and are thus poised to be the exclusive providers of machinery, chemical processes, and other essential components of the oil production process. In the long term, this places Iranian contractors at a disadvantage, because the existence of patents generally discourages the free transfer of technology and know-how.

Hebei Huabei Oilfield Rongsheng Machinery Manufacture Ltd (HRSB) is a “comprehensive petroleum machinery manufacturer,” according to the China International Petroleum & Petrochemical Technology and Equipment Exhibition (cippe) website. HRSB machinery “have been sold to all onshore and marine oil fields and gas fields in China and … exported to over 40 oil producing countries such as the U.S.A, Canada, Russia,etc.”

This company was active  in Iran in 2008, according to Rooznameh Rasmi. It trademarked “HRSB”  for “machinery used in the petrochemical industry, and machinery and other equipment used in oil extraction.” HRSB’s starting capital came from CNPC, according to its website. Rongsheng Machinery Manufacturer was featured as one of the 20 companies at the CNPC pavilion, according to a  2018 news item from the Cippe website.

CNPC and two more of its subsidiaries, both in E&P, are still active in Iran. In 2020, CNPC Chuanqing Drilling Engineering Co. Ltd. and its subsidiary Changqing Downhole Technology Operation Company patented a “recoverable instant thickening acid,” a chemical used to improve the performance of an oil well, in the country. The shareholders of both companies are all Chinese, according to Rooznameh Rasmi.

SEE https://en.radiozamaneh.com/

How Finland Virtually Ended Homelessness—and We Can Too

It turns out the very best thing to do is give people who don't have a place to live... a place to live.


An homeless woman begs for money in the streets of Helsinki by -18°C, on January 20, 2010.
(Photo by Olivier Morin/AFP via Getty Images)

LINDA MCQUAIG
Apr 29, 2023

Toronto Star

Determined to pack more homeless people into Toronto’s overcrowded shelters, officials have come up with a solution: reduce the number of inches between beds.

There’s a certain logic to this and it may be the best we can do — given our refusal to consider solutions that would actually be innovative.

And so it is that here in Toronto we’re busy studying how to jam more beds into already-cramped shelters, while over in Finland — where innovation is more than just another word for privatization — they’ve managed to virtually end homelessness.

OK, so the Finns are more generous and just shell out a lot more to help the homeless, right? Actually not. The Finns are simply smarter.

Instead of abandoning the homeless, they housed them. And that led to an insight: people tend to function better when they’re not living on the street or under a bridge. Who would have guessed?

It turns out that, given a place to live, Finland’s homeless were better able to deal with addictions and other problems, not to mention handling job applications. So, more than a decade after the launch of the “Housing First” policy, 80 per cent of Finland’s homeless are doing well, still living in the housing they’d been provided with — but now paying the rent on their own.

This not only helps the homeless, it turns out to be cheaper.

In Canada, however, we’re determined to stick to market-based solutions, no matter how badly they fail or how costly they are.

Indeed, homelessness is just the extreme end of Canada’s dysfunctional housing market, which we’ve left largely in the domain of the private marketplace, creating a huge divide between those who can afford to buy a house and those who can’t.

This has resulted in a large underclass of tenants — roughly one-third of Canadian households — many of whom are little more than a pay cheque away from eviction.
More government intervention required

The situation cries out for more government intervention.

In fact, the government does intervene in the housing market — most notably in ways that actually enhance the privileged position of homeowners by, for instance, sparing them tax on the capital gains they receive on the sale of their homes.

This largely hidden government intervention in the housing market not only amounts to an enormous subsidy for homeowners — costing the federal government almost $10 billion a year in lost revenue — it also further disadvantages tenants by driving up housing prices, putting a home farther out of reach.

Of course, the government also intervenes to increase the housing supply, ostensibly helping tenants. However, these measures often take the form of financial incentives for developers, mostly benefiting developers. The additional rental units created rarely result in lower rents, notes political economist Ricardo Tranjan in his new book “The Tenant Class.”

The best way to benefit low-income renters would be for government to create housing that isn’t based on the profit motive — by building housing itself or subsidizing non-profit groups to do so.

Canada used to be fairly good at this social housing, along with the Europeans. In the late 1960s and early 70s, about 10 per cent of new rental housing built in Canada was social housing.
Canada has exited social housing

But while the Europeans have remained strong in social housing, Canada has almost completely exited the field, with our social housing dropping to just 4 per cent of total households — roughly the same level as the devoutly pro-market U.S.

If we want to deal with our dysfunctional housing market more effectively than simply pushing the shelter beds more closely together, the answer will involve increasing the supply of housing that isn’t based on the profit motive.

Sadly, this is not on the political agenda, although it’s noteworthy that Toronto City Councillor Josh Matlow is advocating a proposal along these lines as part of his mayoral campaign.

Matlow’s proposal will no doubt be dismissed as impossibly costly by commentators who, as homeowners, quietly benefit from the impossibly costly (although largely hidden) subsidy provided to homeowners.

© 2023 TheStar.com


LINDA MCQUAIG is an author, journalist, and former NDP candidate for Toronto Centre in the Canadian federal election. The National Post has described her as "Canada's Michael Moore." She is also the author of "The Sport and Prey of Capitalists: How the Rich Are Stealing Canada's Public Wealth" (2019), "War, Big Oil and the Fight for the Planet: It's the Crude, Dude" (2006) and (with Neil Brooks) of "Billionaires' Ball: Gluttony and Hubris in an Age of Epic Inequality" (2012).
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Anti-trans campaigners can’t be allowed to ban trans kids from playing sport

Sport has numerous benefits for trans youths – yet 80% feel their gender identity has prevented them from taking part

Verity Smith
4 May 2023

London's fourth Trans Pride protest in July 2022 highlighted the daily injustices faced by trans people around the world |
Hollie Adams/Getty Images

A couple of years ago, Emily, a teenager from Liverpool, approached me after being forced to leave school because of transphobic bullying and violence. Her trauma reminded me of my own youth, when I played on a woman’s rugby team and cried myself to sleep at night knowing I was trans and not a woman, but unable to tell anyone. Or, decades later, in 2017, when I was beaten up by the opposition during a game, and later outed by them as trans to the press.

Women and girls have long faced challenges in accessing sports. This can be seen in a multitude of ways, from the cancellation of the women’s UK cycling tour due to lack of funding to the tens of thousands of hours of lost PE lessons for girls, which were highlighted in the wake of the England Lionesses’ World Cup victory last year.

Now, the weaponisation of unevidenced and ideologically motivated bans on participation are building a new class of discriminated athletes: trans young people.

These new victims are being blamed for injustices not of their making. And in the process, they’re being prevented from taking part in the activities they love – activities they might otherwise have relied on as a safe haven to help them to survive the backlash against them.

As an elite trans athlete and an advocate for trans young people in sport at Mermaids, a charity that supports trans and gender-diverse children, I’m being approached by more and more trans youth – particularly trans girls – who have been told they are no longer welcome on teams they have been happily and safely part of for years.

While I was able to negotiate with the UK Football Association to help Emily find a place on a supportive team, after she faced the despair of losing access to the adults friendlies team she was previously playing for, many other trans youth have told me they are being turned away from age-appropriate clubs when they disclose their identities.

Recent research carried out by Mermaids found that 79% of trans youth felt their gender identity had been a barrier to them taking part in sport, while over half of those surveyed said negative news stories had made them worry about their participation. One young person told us: “I worry that my future is being limited by people who have no knowledge of what it is to be trans.”

Trans youth face ever-increasing attacks on their rights and dignity. Between 2021 and 2022, hate crimes targeting trans people rose by 56% in England and Wales. And now the government is considering stripping trans people’s legal rights under the Equality Act. It’s little surprise that experts have warned mental health among the trans community is at a “crisis point”.

While conducting our research, Mermaids heard how sport has specific and transformational benefits for trans young people, including offering community and friendship to a group that regularly experiences marginalisation and discrimination. One young person told us how exercise allowed them to “build my strength, hopefully changing my body [so that] I can feel more comfortable in it”.

The research also found that 63% of trans youth felt exclusion from sport has worsened their mental health.

Given this context, one might assume sporting bodies would be taking steps to make trans youth feel safe and welcome at all levels. Instead, we have seen a succession of ‘trans sports bans’ by governing bodies, forcing many trans young people to choose between being who they are and playing the sport they love.

In 2021, the UK sports councils – UK Sport, Sport England, Sport Wales, SportScotland and Sport Northern Ireland – released guidance arguing that trans inclusion could not be balanced with “fairness and safety” in competitive sport. This has resulted in a series of ‘blanket bans’ barring trans women from taking part at every level, including in rugby, a sport where I know personally the importance of a trans-inclusive approach.

These arguments have increased in popularity and are often made by those who don’t think trans women have any place in sport, and, furthermore, fail to consider the trickle-down impact these top-down policies have in preventing trans young people from accessing sports.

A recent scientific review of the available evidence found that “there is no firm basis available in evidence to indicate that trans women have a consistent and measurable overall performance benefit after 12 months of testosterone suppression”. This was found in respect to athletes at elite level, never mind at grassroots sports clubs where the vast majority of people play sport.

The authors highlight that key evidence cited by the UK Sport guidance is better described as an “argumentative essay” than a rigorous scientific paper. It is becoming increasingly clear that transphobic pressure groups and anti-trans campaigners have been central to the formation of UK sporting bodies’ discriminatory approach.

Put plainly, policies banning trans women and girls are not based on scientific consensus. Rather, they are part of an increasingly extreme political campaign that aims to erase trans youth from every aspect of public life.

Whenever I get the chance to speak with sporting bodies, I explain the impact that their words and actions have on trans young people like Emily. Rather than listening to the needs and voices of inclusive grassroots clubs and trans athletes, sport chiefs are buying into this harmful culture war narrative that suggests trans women threaten to end meaningful competition in women’s sports.

My experiences, both positive and negative, of being a trans person in sport, mean I’m invited to speak with sports clubs across the country who want to include trans youth but lack support or guidance on how to do so. Our report builds on this work, and draws on the views of trans young people, to make clear recommendations that ensure trans youth’s inclusion in grassroots sports.

Sporting bodies in the UK must follow the pioneering approach of the German football association, which this year introduced a policy that allows amateur and youth transgender and non-binary players to choose if they play in men’s or women’s teams. Equally, there must be more trans representation in sport, from role models on the pitch to trans individuals appointed at a governance level.

The answer is simple: listen to trans young people and start from the basis of inclusion. I urge all sporting policymakers to get out of their boardrooms, speak directly to trans young people, and understand the hurt their bans are causing. Everyone has the right to experience the joy of competitive sport, whether trans youth can share this must not be denied by those motivated by hate towards trans communities.

Why Are Republican Leaders Eagerly Embracing Transphobia?

Scapegoating a minority group based on sexual orientation or gender identity gives their supporters more fuel for their misdirected anger.


A sign disparaging Bud Light beer is seen along a country road on April 21, 2023 in Arco, Idaho. Anheuser-Busch, the brewer of Bud Light, has faced backlash after the company sponsored two Instagram posts from a transgender woman.
(Photo: Natalie Behring/Getty Images)

ROBERT REICH
Apr 29, 2023

For a second week, Montana Republicans have blocked Democratic transgender lawmaker Zooey Zephyr from participating in a debate over proposed restrictions on transgender youth.

Zephyr, a first-term Democrat from Missoula and the first openly transgender woman elected to the Montana legislature, hasn't been allowed to speak on the state house floor since last Tuesday, when she told Republican colleagues they would have "blood on their hands" if they banned gender-affirming medical care for transgender youth.

On Monday, her supporters brought the House session to a halt, chanting, "Let her speak!" from the gallery before being escorted out. Seven were arrested for criminal trespass. Republican leaders describe the disruption as an "insurrection."

Bigotry against minority groups based on sexual orientation or gender Identity, such as the trans community, is a way fascism takes root.

Also this week, at least two Bud Light marketing executives have been put on leave after transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney posted a video of herself on Instagram holding a custom Bud Light can with her face on it. The company had sent it to her to help celebrate a year since she began her transition and had sponsored Mulvaney's Instagram post.

Her post prompted a Star Wars cantina—Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, and Fox News hosts all calling for a boycott of Bud Light. Kid Rock posted a video of himself shooting 12-packs with a submachine gun, and others filmed themselves destroying and dumping out cans.

Anheuser-Busch facilities have received bomb threats.

Sales of Bud Light fell 17% in the week ending April 15 compared to the same week in 2022. Some bars are halting its sales.

***

It's tempting to dismiss all this as just another outcropping of crazy right-wing bigotry.

And it's tempting to be appalled at such blatant prejudice but believe there must be more important issues to worry about. According to the Pew Research Center, only 1.6% of U.S. adults are transgender or nonbinary (that is, their gender differs from the sex they were assigned at birth).

Yet let me remind you: Bigotry against minority groups based on sexual orientation or gender Identity, such as the trans community, is a way fascism takes root.

As the world tragically witnessed in Europe in the 1920s and 1930s, the politics of sexual anxiety gains traction when traditional male gender roles of family provider and protector are hit by economic insecurity.

Fascist politics distorts and expands this male anxiety into fear that one's family is under existential threat from LGBTQ+ people who reject the family's traditional structure and traditions.

As philosopher Jason Stanley notes in his How Fascism Works (2018):
Men, already made anxious by a perceived loss of status resulting from increasing gender equality can easily be thrust into panic by demagoguery directed against sexual minorities… . The fascist leader is analogous to the patriarchal father, the "CEO" of the traditional family… . Attacking trans women, and representing the feared other as a threat to the manhood of the nation, are ways of placing the very idea of manhood at the center of political attention, gradually introducing fascist ideals of hierarchy and domination by physical power to the public sphere.

I don't mean to suggest that the imbibers of Bud Light or the Republican lawmakers of Montana are necessarily fearful for their manhood. But they may lean more toward hierarchy and domination than the typical American (Montana Governor Greg Gianforte famously punched a reporter who asked him a question about a Republican health-care bill).

Notably, Republican lawmakers now eagerly enacting restrictions on transgender youth across the nation have not moved to alleviate economic anxieties at the root of much of this. Why not? Because those anxieties fuel the anger that animates these politicians' most ardent supporters. Scapegoating a minority group based on sexual orientation or gender identity gives these supporters even more fuel.

A similar blind anger found expression in the attack on the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021—which was a genuine insurrection, unlike this week's chants in Montana's legislature. A similar anger propels Trumpism to this day.

If the rest of us want to stop America's slouch toward fascism, we must do two things: First, speak out loudly and forcefully against sexual bigotry. Second, push lawmakers to restore some degree of economic security to the nation's large and increasingly precarious working class.

© 2021 robertreich.substack.com


ROBERT REICH
Robert Reich, is the Chancellor's Professor of Public Policy at the University of California, Berkeley, and a senior fellow at the Blum Center for Developing Economies. He served as secretary of labor in the Clinton administration, for which Time magazine named him one of the 10 most effective cabinet secretaries of the twentieth century. His book include: "Aftershock" (2011), "The Work of Nations" (1992), "Beyond Outrage" (2012) and, "Saving Capitalism" (2016). He is also a founding editor of The American Prospect magazine, former chairman of Common Cause, a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and co-creator of the award-winning documentary, "Inequality For All." Reich's newest book is "The Common Good" (2019). He's co-creator of the Netflix original documentary "Saving Capitalism," which is streaming now.
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