Global Risks And Resilience

Question 1

Geopolitical Tensions 1

Answer 1

Brexit
- Leading to tension on a global scale die to the reach of the UK’s trade links and migration.
- Households living on less than 20,000 a year are more likely to vote to leave.
- Older, socially conservative and less educated more likely to vote to leave.
- Brexit has led other nations to rescind their political, legal, and economic arrangements.
- A key pullback to trade openness, as it leads to new border frictions and higher transport costs which pose new barriers to trade.
- Affected labour movements.
- Reduced FDI inflows.
- Reduced immigration growth

Question 2

Geopolitical Tensions 2

Answer 2

Boko Haram
- A civil society militant group based on northeastern Niger and Northern Cameroon.
- Set up in 2002 with the aim to “purify Islam in northern Nigeria”.
- They have bombed UN buildings and mass abducted school children.
- They oppose the Western education system, believing it has “taken a position against God and made materialism and hedonism the ultimate in life”
- As of now, they have been technically defeated, and by March 2015 they had lost all towns under their control as a regional coalition.
- However, some 2000 children still remain in captivity.
- The region’s chronic poverty and poor education systems are still helping it to gain new recruits.

Question 3

Environmental Organization

Answer 3

Greenpeace
- Various advertisements and video campaigns
- e.g. A YouTube clip showing a Lego arctic scene being drowned by oil addresses oil drilling by Shell in the Arctic. Lego announced in 2015 it would not renew it’s contract with Shell.
- Campaign against Mattel using a huge banner on the head office in California, addressing deforestation for paper packaging for Mattel toys. Mattel did not change their packaging
- Exposed big brands like Nestlé and Mars for using palm oil associated with forest burning practices, prompting outcry from people around the world.
- Palm oil petition with 1.3 million signatures

Question 4

International Civil Society Organization

Answer 4

Clean Clothes Campaign
- Campaigns against exploitation of garment workers in LICs like Bangladesh and India.
- Public education campaigns to raise public awareness of worker exploitation and promote ethical sourcing.
- Lobby companies and governments who directly or indirectly fund garment factories engaging in unethical practices
- Lend financial assistance to workers who feel disempowered by their working conditions.
- When 2800 PT Izone workers in Indonesia were denied payments after the closure of their factory, CCC supported said workers and made Adidas pay what the workers were due.
- Taken up more than 200 legal cases of discrimination against union members and officials.

Question 5

Identity Theft

Answer 5

US
- In the US, a lot of people have reported unauthorized persons taking advantage of their personal data and withdrawing funds.
- Biggest case happened in Georgia in 2000.
- Credit card employee, Philip Cummings, stole thousands of credit reports and stored them. He was working for TeleData Communications Inc., a Long Island software company that serves banks with computerized access to the credit information database.
- He obtained credit card information using passwords of the company and sold them to other people.
- The scam victimized 300,000 people and victims suffered significant losses in terms of financial terms and reputation.
- Signs of theft surfaced when Ford Motor Credit realised they had a billing by TCI for thousands of credit reporters they had never ordered.
- Cummings was arrested, charged in court and finally sentenced to serve time in jail.
- The Department of Defense prosecuted cases of Identity theft and fraud.

Question 6

Tax Avoidance

Answer 6

Apple
- buys iPhones from China through Irish subsidiary, which sells them to Apple’s own distributors at a markup.
- They sold intellectual property rights to sock puppet subsidiaries in a Ireland.
- In 2016, the EU ordered Apple to pay 14.5 billion dollars in back taxes.

Question 7

Transboundary Pollution

Answer 7

Haze in Southeast Asia
- Regional problem since the 1970s
- Occurs during the monsoon season and is exacerbated by severe dry weather conditions due to El Nino
- Caused by illegal agricultural fires in Indonesia.
- Farmers clearing land for agriculture and for palm oil and pulp and paper plantations.
- Fires are on peatland which is highly flammable and releases carbon into the atmosphere
- Air pollution causes lung diseases, eye irritation and skin problems