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Ban Ki-moon Stepped on the Stage On January 1 Ban Ki-moon， the new secretary-general, moved into the office on the 38th floor of United Nations headquarters in New York. Most of the talk has focused on whether it is appropriate that the world’s regions should “take turns” in holding such a key post. But the more important issue is what consequences will flow from having an Asian in the top job at the precise moment that Asia emerges into the geopolitical sun. A certain historical distance has always existed between the Asian region and the international organization. Most of New York’s energy is consumed by the Middle East and Africa， not Asia. The UN is Atlanticist in structure and sometimes in orientation. There have been several signs in recent years, however， of a quickening of interactions between the UN and Asia. First, the end of the cold war broke the superpower deadlock in the Security Council， conjured up new confidence about the organization’s place in international relations and was followed by the establishment of two of the UN’s largest and most complex peace operations, in Cambodia and East Timor. Second， the emergence of new and interconnected security threats in the region, including infectious diseases， resource scarcity, environmental catastrophes such as the 2004 tsunami， trafficking in drugs and people, and state failure， has demonstrated the advantages of international cooperation. As these threats escalate, so will the work of the UN and its agencies. Third， as the focus of international power moves towards them, Asian states are stepping up their engagement with the world body. The top five contributors of peacekeeping personnel are all from the UN’s Asian regional group. Both Japan and India remain intent on permanent membership of the Security Council. Most striking of all is China’s increasingly practical behavior in New York. China was once poorly represented， defensive in the Council and uninterested in peacekeeping: now it is ably represented， confident and skillful in the chamber and before the media, and deploys more peacekeeping personnel than any other permanent member. This is the stage onto which Mr. Ban stepped.

Parliamentary Elections in Afghanistan For the first time in three decades Afghanistan is holding parliamentary elections. It’s a momentous time for a country still trying to emerge from years of war. There’s been much criticism that these polls will only consolidate the power of the country’s powerful commanders， the warlords with dubious histories. But Lyse Doucet, who’s been covering Afghanistan since the late nineteen eighties， has discovered that in a nation where a new political culture is only slowly taking shape, the very existence of an election process has brought new energy to a lung-stagnant political life： Now there is a veritable forest of signs at every square and roundabout in Kabul and other cities, billboards selling luxury watches， promoting national unity the new Afghan army. But, for the past month billboard， walls and fences across this land have been telling another story. Everywhere you look there are the faces of election candidates, middle aged men in suits and ties， men with turbans and long thick beards as dark as the night or as white as the first Afghan snow, hardly anyone is smiling. Tradition says photography is serious business. Even. wedding photographs here barely coax a smile. And in a country where only 4 years ago， women were largely confined to their homes under an oppressive Taliban rule, there are their faces too： candidates like young Sabrina with a fetching canary yellow headscarf, Shukda with finely penciled eyebrow， gazing into the distance, cradling a pen in her hand. The faces are plastered everywhere， on every available bit of space, sometimes on top of each other. It’s led to Afghan cartoonists sketching someone’s face on top of someone else’s legs. At first glance， these walls are just an unsightly mess of photographs. But, like the carpets of old， if you know this nation’s history, you can read meaning. into what seem like random patterns. These layers of paper form a bright new canvas of a nation’s dark history. General Ulumi who once worked with the Soviet Red Army is running for parliament. There’s also Mullah Khaqsar who used to execute the writ of the Taliban. But there’s also Malalai Joya， the young woman who, a few years ago， bravely condemned the warlords in public. In this election, candidates must run as individuals， not as members of parties. But Afghans know who everyone is. They know their past. They know their father, their grandfather， or at least, they do in most cases. But what if they don’t？ In the last month of campaigning, in towns and villages across this country， Afghans, from village elders with wizened faces， to wide-eyed teenagers too young to vote, have sat cross legged in the shades of mulberry tress， or in air-conditioned rooms cooled with electricity powered by generators. They’ve pondered and argued and debated the questions of this time. One dimensional photograph, after all， only tells part of this new story. As one Afghan friend put it, in real life， many candidates with a past are two-faced. If elected to Parliament, it’s still not clear which face they will show. But whatever happens， the opening of Parliament will be the start of a new chapter. And no one here can say with certainty how that Afghan story will unfold.

Treading the world stage Yet this is not a time for the usual Brussels name game. The idea of a permanent president of the European Council was resisted by many smaller countries. But now it is being created， it would be ludicrous to fill it with a minor figure; a Juncker or a Schüssel. To the outside world—India or China， say—the president will speak for Europe. If the EU wants to be a serious global actor, that points to a world figure. Unless Ms Merkel steps forward， which is improbable, the only such person in the running is Mr. Blair. And there are two other arguments for him. First， he would disprove the notion that senior EU people must come from countries that join in all EU policies, including the euro， defence and justice and home affairs.This line was used to block Chris Patten as a commission president in 2004. But in an increasingly multispeed Europe, it would rule out nominees from more than half the EU countries. The EU president will not represent his government—indeed， though Mr. Brown says he backs Mr. Blair, few believe he is wholly sincere. If the criterion is “Europeanness”， France, Italy and Germany should be disqualified as they are the worst offenders when it comes to breaching EU rules. Europe might end up being run only by Belgians and Luxembourgeois. Mr. Blair has a second advantage： he would remind the notoriously sceptical British that they are important players. This worked only up to a point with Roy Jenkins as commission president in the late 1970s. Three decades on, a British EU president would give pause to those who maintain that Britain never has any influence in Brussels. As one top Eurocrat sums it up， “the boldest choice for Europe would be the three Bs: Blair， Barroso and Bildt.” If it works in classical music, why not for Europe？

The relationship between politicians and the press In the seaside town of Brighton in southern England the ruling Labour Party’s annual conference is getting underway. It’s a time for both Mps and grassroots members to take stock of how the party is doing， to discuss policy and to hear, hopefully inspiring speeches. The party delegates will be hoping too for plenty of coverage from the media assembled there. Newspapers in Britain have long had great influence over Governments， much to the resentment of the politicians. Almost seventy-five years ago, the then Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin accused the two big press barons， Lords Beaverbrook and Rothermere, of running their papers as “engines of propaganda” for the “personal wishes and personal dislikes of two men”. He famously accused them of seeking “power without responsibility—the prerogative of the harlot throughout the ages.” It’s hard to imagine the current Prime Minister Tony Blair attacking the tabloid press so publicly. The former editor of the Daily Mirror Piers Morgan claimed earlier this year that he met the Labour leader no fewer than fifty-eight times for lunches， dinners or interviews, a statistic which astonished many in Government and the media， who thought a party leader and Prime Minister should have had better ways to spend his time. But Tony Blair has good reason to court the press. In Britain, Labour， left-of-centre governments, have always had problems with national newspapers， most of whose owners traditionally supported the right-of-centre Conservative Party. This came to a head on Election Day in 1992 when Labour seemed set to win power for the first time in eighteen years. In those days, Britain’s biggest-selling daily paper， the sun, part of Rupert Murdoch’s media empire， was no friend of Labour, indeed it had been Margaret Thatcher’s biggest cheerleader. That morning， on its front page, it depicted the bald head of the then Labour leader Neil Kinnock as a light bulb. Alongside ran the headline： “If Kinnock wins today, will the last person to leave Britain please turn out the lights？” Labour lost. By the next election, Tony Blair was the party’s leader and determined to win over， or at least neutralize, The Sun and its owner. He succeeded， moving the Labor Party towards the center ground, and gaining The Sun’s endorsement at the last three elections. Once in Government， Labour played hardball with the media, relishing its power， and aware that if it did not take charge of the agenda, the media would. Its key figure was the former political editor of the Daily Mirror， Alasdair Campbell, who took charge not just of the Prime Minister’s press office but all government press officers， trying to ensure the Government spoke with one voice. Journalists who reported favorably were given privileged access; those who didn’t were frozen out. Mr. Blair maintained his close links with R Murdoch and his newspapers； doing everything he could to maintain their support. Lance Price claims in his diaries that the Government assured the tycoon and his editors that it wouldn’t change its policy on Europe without asking them.

Folklore and Festivals in Sweden Sweden is a land of contrasts； in the north, where forests fade into frozen ground， the influence of tradition and folklore is strong. In the milder, more fertile south， the customs are basically those of continental Europe. In Sweden, legends exist in people’s everyday life. Hunting legends， for example, tell how men have been turned into beasts by magic. It is thought unlucky to see a hare in the morning but to meet a wolf or a bear is an omen that hunting will be good. And there are some ancient customs about birth. When a child is born， the women of the family must carry it three times around its parents’ hearth and then examine it for birth marks. If a child is covered in the membrane, that means it will always be accompanied by a guardian spirit. It is feared that children who lack the protection of a guardian spirit may be stolen by witches and turned into disembodied spirits. A country wedding in Sweden is also very interesting. It is celebrated with traditional festivities~ The bridegroom must formally ask for the bride’s hand in the barn， because this is where the dowry is stored. On the wedding day the women of the family help the bride to dress in national costume, which includes silver jewelry and a bridal crown. Meanwhile friends and male relations wait in the kitchen， drinking beer. When the bride is ready, all the relatives and guests form a procession， which is led by young men on horseback. They meet the groom’s procession at the church and greetings, symbolizing the kinship which now unites the two families， are exchanged. When the wedding service ends, the guests go to the bride’s house for the marriage feast. The Swedes have many traditional festivals. The first of the great Swedish festivals is celebrated from April 30 to May 2. The night of April 30 is named Walpurgis Night and during it the forces of Life and Spring are said to triumph over Death and Winter While the festival lasts， bonfires are lit each evening—-first on the hilltops and then, in answer， in the valleys. These fires are a signal for the festivals to begin. They continue until dawn. In southern Sweden, poetry and singing competitions take place around the bonfires， and the winners receive prizes and kisses from the prettiest girls. Besides the Walpurgis Night, there are other festivals： for example, the Feast of the Sun is the great summer festival in June. The Blessing of the Lobsters is a festival in August in which people enjoy lobsters. While the Festival of the Goose is in the bleak November. On that day it is customary to serve a soup with goose blood. Even Christmas in Sweden is rich in tradition and folklore. It has absorbed the customs of the ancient festival of the winter solstice and new year. The Swedes do not have Santa Clause. What they have is Christmas Gnome. Children welcome his arrival by putting out generous helpings of Christmas cake for him to eat. And in the country districts， people throw gifts through the open windows of houses, together with straw figures of men and animals， for good luck.

The Kingdom of Denmark The smallest and most southern of the Scandinavian countries， Denmark offers an interesting mix of lively cities and rural countryside, Ancient castles， ring forts, jazz festivals， the sleekest modem design you’ll ever see and the people who invented Lego-who could ask for more? Danish Vikings once took to the seas and ravaged half of Europe， but these days they’ve forged a society that stands as a benchmark of civilization, with progressive policies， widespread tolerance and a liberal social-welfare system. Copenhagen has been Denmark’s capital for 600 years and is the largest city in Scandinavia. It’s an appealing and largely low-rise city comprised of block after block of period six-storey buildings. Church steeples punctuate the skyline, with only a couple of modem hotels marring the view. No matter what your interests， Copenhagen has a whole lot of sightseeing and entertained on offer. Historic or modem, sleek shops or cozy cafes-it’s all-nestled fight in the heart of a compact city and presented with typical Scandinavian assurance and flair. Hans Christian Andersen wrote a fairly tale about her； Disney produced the movie; and Copenhagen maintains a statue in her honor， which continues to be the largest tourist attraction in Denmark and the most photographed statue in the world. New York has the Statue of Liberty, Pads has its Eiffel Tower and Copenhagen has this pretty， charming maiden who stars dreamily out across the water, just as her Danish countrymen have done for thousands of years. The Little Mermaid is just small enough and close enough to the water to be an excellent symbol of Copenhagen and Denmark. The sculpture stands 165 centimeters tall and weighs 175 kilograms. The original one， cast in bronze, was presented to the City of Copenhagen on August 23， 1913 by Carl Jacobsen. The Nationalmuseet (National Museum) is a mustsee for anyone who wants a comprehensive grounding in Danish history and culture. Tree to its name, it has the biggest collection of Danish historical artifacts in the country. On Sundays during summer the ambience is enhanced by free chamber music concerts. The Nationalmuseet has dibs on virtually every antiquity found on Danish soils， whether it was unearthed by a farmer ploughing his fields or a government-sponsored archaeological dig.

Post Hurricane Katrina The southern United States is again being battered by a tropical storm Rita， three weeks after Hurricane Katrina. This time the warnings to leave seem to have been heeded and roads leading away from the threatened areas have been choked with traffic as more than two million people head inland. Following the devastation in New Orleans, the authorities were criticized for not doing enough for those least able to help themselves： the poor, the sick and those without transport. Though this time more provision was made to evacuate people ahead of the hurricane， but in the long term, whether there will be any real change in the US social system？ As the event of massive force, Katrina swept away an awful lot， but the ghastly failure of the authorities to prepare and to rescue those at risk seems to have done more than the physical damage. Bill Clinton is among many eminent Americans who wonder whether Katrina’s biggest impact might be psychological, political. The real question， putting is baldly, is whether there is going to be a revolution. Will the American social and economic system， which creates the wealth which pays for billionaires’ private jets and the poverty which doesn’t allow for a bus fare out of New Orleans, be addressed？ It’s been tinkered with before of course, sometimes as a result of natural disasters. There were for instance plenty of buses on hand for this week’s Rita evacuation. But the system’s fundamentals， no limit on how high you can fly and little limit on how low you can fall, remain as intact as they were in the San Francisco gold rush. As Charles Wheeler wrote， one of the tragedies of the Vietnam War had been "the dismemberment of America’s infant welfare state". "The war, " he said， "stopped social reform in its tracks and today, with the budget deficit huge and growing， there is no prospect that a windfall of money released by the war can suddenly be applied to the needs of the poor in the cities." Charles was writing in 1973. America did recover. The economy was rescued. Money was made in very large amounts. But the poor still did not receive that windfall; they were never going to. Americans are cross with the government and disappointed with the response from Washington， but they have not sat on their hands and waited for the government to sort itself out. Much the opposite, Americans have given with unbridled enthusiasm and generosity. They give money to victims of Katrina； drop off teddy bears they no longer want; dispatch cloth for which they have grown too fat etc. Hurricane Katrina has encouraged an outpouring of charity on a scale never seen before. "Isn’t that something governments do？" Americans don’t think so and never will. This is unquestionably a source of strength and spine in troubled times, but it is just charity that puts a dampener on revolution. Charity ameliorates， it softens blows, it pours oil on troubled waters. It does not lead to social change. Inequality is a part of American life and so is self-reliance， nothing alters that. After the weekend’s devastation, America is little changed.

George Soros the Financial Crocodile “The US governs the international system to protect its own economy. It is not in charge of protecting other economies.” Soros says. “So when America goes into recession， you have anti- recessionary (反衰退的) policies. When other countries are in recession, they don’t have the ability to engage in anti-recessionary policies because they can’t have a permissive monetary policy. because money would flee.” In person， he has the air of a philosophy professor rather than a gimlet-eyed (目光敏锐的) financier. In a soft voice which bears the faces of his native Hungary. he argues that it is time to rewrite the so-called Washington consensus—the cocktail of liberalization, privatization and fiscal rectitude which the IMF has been preaching for 15 years. Developing countries no longer have the freedom to run their own economies， he argues, even when they follow perfectly sound policies. He cites Brazil， which although it has a floating currency and manageable public debt was paying ten times over the odds to borrow from capital markets. Soros credits the anti-globalization movement for having made companies more sensitive to their wider responsibilities. “I think ［the protesters］ have made an important contribution by making people aware of the flaws of the system, ” he says. “People on the street had an impact on public opinion and corporations which sell to the public responded to that.” Because the IMF has abandoned billion dollar bailouts(紧急融资)for troubled economies， he thinks a repeat of the Asian crisis is unlikely. The fund’s new “tough love” policy—for which Argentina is the guinea pig—has other consequences. The bailouts were a welfare system for Wall Street, with western taxpayers rescuing the banks from the consequences of unwise lending to emerging economies. Now the IMF has drawn a line in the sand， credit to poor countries is drying up. “It has created a new problem-the inadequacy of the flow of capital from center to the periphery(外围), ” he says. The one economy Soros is not losing any sleep about is the US. “I am much more positive about the underlying economy than I am about the market， because we are waging war not only on terrorism but also on recession.” he says. “I have not yet seen an economy in recession when you are gearing up for war.” He worries that the world’s largest economic power is not living up to its responsibilities. “I would like the United States to live up to the responsibilities of its hegemonic(霸权的) power because it is not going to give up its hegemonic power, ” he says. “The only thing that is realistic is for the United States to become aware that it is in its enlightened self- interest to ensure that the rest of the world benefits from their role.”

Is More Growth Really Better？ A number of writers have raised questions about the desirability of faster economic growth as an end in itself, at least in the wealthier industrialized countries. Yet faster growth does mean more wealth， and to most people the desirability of wealth is beyond question. “I’ve been rich and I’ve been poor—and I can tell you, rich is better，” a noted stage personality is said to have told an interviewer, and most people seem to have the same attitude about the economy as a whole. To those who hold this belief， a healthy economy is one that is capable of turning out vast quantities of shoes, food， cars, and TV sets. An economy whose capacity to provide all these things is not expanding is said to have succumbed to the disease of stagnation. Economists from Adam Smith to Karl Marx saw great virtue in economic growth. Marx argued that capitalism， at least in its earlier historical stages, was a vital form of economic organization by which society got out of the rut in which the medieval stage of history had trapped it. Marx believed that “the development of the productive powers of society... alone can form the real basis of a higher form of productive powers of society”. Marx went on to tell us that only where such great productive powers have been unleashed can one have “a society in which the full and free development of every individual forms the ruling principle.” In other words， only a wealthy economy can afford to give all individuals the opportunity for full personal satisfaction through the use of their special abilities in their jobs and through increased leisure activities. Yet the desirability of further economic growth for a society that is already wealthy has been questioned on grounds that undoubtedly have a good deal of validity. It is pointed out that the sheer increase in quantity of products has imposed an enormous cost on society in the form of pollution, crowding， proliferation of wastes that need disposal, and debilitating psychological and social effects. It is said that industry has transformed the satisfying and creative tasks of the artisan into the mechanical and dehumanizing routine of the assembly line. It has dotted our roadsides with junkyards， filled our air with smoke, and poisoned our food with dangerous chemicals. The question is whether the outpouring of frozen foods， talking dolls, radios， and headache remedies is worth its high cost to society. As one well-known economist put it: The continued pursuit of economic growth by Western Societies is more likely on balance to reduce rather than increase social welfare... Technological innovations may offer to add to men’s material opportunities. But by increasing the risks of their obsolescence it adds also to their anxiety. Swifter means of communications have the paradoxical effect of isolating people； increased mobility has led to more hours commuting; increased automobilization to increased separation； more television to less communication. In consequence, people know less of their neighbors than ever before. Virtually every economist agrees that these concerns are valid， though many question whether economic growth is their major cause. Nevertheless, they all emphasize that pollution of air and water， noise and congestion, and the mechanization of the work process are very real and very serious problems. There is every reason for society to undertake programs that grapple with these problems.

Effect of the Great Depression It is difficult to measure the human cost of the Great Depression. The material hardships were bad enough. Men and women lived in lean-tos made of scrap wood and metal， and families went without meat and fresh vegetables for months, existing on a diet of soup and beans. The psychological burden was even greater： Americans suffered through year after year of grinding poverty with no letup in sight. The unemployed stood in line for hours waiting for relief checks, veterans sold apples or pencils on street comers， their manhood—once prized so highly by the nation—now in question. People left the city for the countryside but found no salvation on the farm. Crops rotted in the fields because prices were too low to make harvesting worthwhile; sheriffs fended off angry crowds as banks foreclosed long overdue mortgages on once prosperous farms. Few escaped the suffering. African Americans who had left the poverty of the rural South for factory jobs in the North were among the first to be laid off. Mexican Americans， who had flowed in to replace European immigrants, met with competition from angry citizens， now willing to do stoop labor in the fields and work as track layers on the railroads. Immigration officials used technicalities to halt the flow across the Rio Grande and even to reverse it; nearly a half million Mexicans were deported in the 1930s， including families with children born in the United States. The poor—black, brown， and white—survived because they knew better than most Americans how to exist in poverty. They stayed in bed in cold weather, both to keep warm and to avoid unnecessary burning up of calories； they patched their shoes with pieces of rubber from discarded tires, heated only the kitchens of their homes， and ate scraps of food that others would reject. The middle class, which had always lived with high expectations， was hit hard. Professionals and white-collar workers refused to ask for charity even while their families went without food; one New York dentist and his wife turned on the gas and left a note saying， “We want to get out of the way before we are forced to accept relief money.” People who fell behind in their mortgage payments lost their homes and then faced eviction when they could not pay the rent. Health care declined. Middle-class people stopped going to doctors and dentists regularly, unable to make the required cash payment in advance for services rendered. Even the well-to-do were affected， giving up many of their former luxuries and weighed down with guilt as they watched former friends and business associates join the ranks of the impoverished. “My father lost everything in the Depression" became an all-too-familiar refrain among young people who dropped out of college. Many Americans sought escape in movement. Men, boys， and some women, rode the rails in search of jobs， hopping freights to move south in the winter or west in the summer. On the Missouri Pacific alone, the number of vagrants increased from just over 13，000 in 1929 to nearly 200, 000 in 1931. One town in the Southwest hired special policemen to keep vagrants from leaving the boxcars. Those who became tramps had to keep on the move， but they did find a sense of community in the hobo jungles that sprang up along the major railroad routes. Here a man could find a place to eat and sleep, and people with whom to share his misery. Louis Banks， a black veteran, told interviewer Studs Terkel what these informal camps were like： Black and white, it didn’t make any difference who you were， cause everybody was poor. All friendly, sleep in a jungle. We used to take a big pot and cook food， cabbage, meat and beans all together. We all set together， we made a tent. Twenty-five or thirty would be out on the side of the rail, white and colored： They didn’t have no mothers or sisters, they didn’t have no home， they were dirty, they had overalls on， they didn’t have no food, they didn’t have anything.