Economic, Financial Markets, Government, Politics, Society, United States

Surprise at the Fed’s decision to maintain an economic stimulatory programme…

ECONOMIC RECOVERY

…The Federal Reserve maintains its quantitative easing programme, but the implications of a taper were felt around the world

The spectacle and irony of the world’s financial markets shooting upwards in response to reports that the global economy is in less than rude health than had been thought appears paradoxical.

The surprise decision this week by the Federal Reserve to maintain its monthly $85 billion quantitative easing programme – the process by which money is artificially printed – indicates that U.S. monetary policymakers are far from convinced by the incipient American recovery. Whilst Washington has reported a much improved unemployment rate of 7.3 per cent, that is still considered to be too high, and more needs to be done before the recovery can be deemed sustainable. The uncertainty of rate-setters on the Fed’s Open Market Committee is undeniable as evidenced through their downgraded growth forecasts up until the end of 2014. Yet, from baulking at the downbeat assessment, investors from Tokyo to London have remained in bullish mood.

Their relief is perhaps not entirely irrational. The implications of Ben Bernanke’s suggestion in June that the Federal Reserve would start ‘tapering’ its Q.E. programme and stimulatory bond-buying some time before the end of the year were felt around the world. Emerging economies, for instance, particularly in Asia, saw their currencies plummet as money was pulled out in favour of newly rising, and much safer, US markets. Nor was the developed world any more insulated. Even though the Fed has not yet done anything, just the prospect of a U.S. taper has sharply sent long-term interest rates upwards in anticipation.

There are two lessons to be taken here. First, for all the new-found economic optimism, whatever green shoots there are (either here or elsewhere in the world), remain about as fragile as they can be. And secondly, the route from where we are now back to (unstimulated) pre-crisis normality will be an uneven and bumpy journey.

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Arts, Books, History, Society, Spain

Book Review: ‘The Life and Death of the Spanish Republic’…

SPANISH CIVIL WAR

Following the bombing of a London warehouse in 1940 during the Blitz, copies of a book awaiting distribution of Henry Buckley’s eyewitness account of the Spanish civil war nearly never saw the light of day. A handful, however, did survive, and this posthumous publication of The Life and Death of the Spanish Republic should go some way to establishing his reputation as one of the finest foreign journalists to write on Spain.

Buckley died in 1972, but was the Daily Telegraph’s foreign correspondent in Madrid from 1929. For a decade he furiously filed dispatches from all corners of the country as its young democracy sparked, and eventually ignited and burst into full-scale civil war. With Spain’s current economic crisis in the forefront of global news, it would be fascinating to see what a reporter of Henry Buckley’s stature would have made of its present predicament.

Following a posting in Berlin, Buckley arrived in Madrid to find Spain about to be ripped apart by its own unresolved social and economic tensions. Through countless meetings and conversations with politicians, generals and workers he paints and depicts a vivid portrait of a country where ‘the mass of the people were solid in their desire to fight for their independence and for the future of the Republic as opposed to feudalism’, even though the military superiority of General Franco was to crush the country’s first experience of democracy.

In 1940, Daily Telegraph correspondent Henry Buckley published his eyewitness account of his experiences reporting form the Spanish civil war. The copies of the book, stored in a warehouse in London, were destroyed during the Blitz and only a handful of copies of his unique chronicle were saved.

In 1940, Daily Telegraph correspondent Henry Buckley published his eyewitness account of his experiences reporting form the Spanish civil war. The copies of the book, stored in a warehouse in London, were destroyed during the Blitz and only a handful of copies of his unique chronicle were saved.

Buckley’s reportage is not only of significance and great historical value, but is a model for foreign correspondents to follow. He offers passion and detailed knowledge on several leading political figures of the Republic, many of whom he knew personally, but who remain deeply controversial to this day in a Spain still struggling with the legacy of the civil war. In his collation, for instance, Buckley recalls with energy and vigour his conversations with José Antonio Primo de Rivera, the charismatic young leader of the fascist Falange movement. Whilst he is highly critical of the thugs hired by the young lawyer and parliamentarian, Buckley refers to him as ‘one of the nicest people in Madrid’, and makes narrative on the revolutionary leader’s ‘charming’ English accent.

Henry Buckley’s greatest quality as a correspondent is his sensitivity to both the human suffering and the broader significance of the conflict – his accounts are rich in colour and historical detail, as well as portraying a deeply personal tone.  As a pious and devout Christian, coupled with being a reporter for a British broadsheet newspaper, he faced multiple internal conflicts. He is clearly dismayed by the position taken by the Church, and angered by British and French non-intervention, as Franco’s better armed and organised troops gain advantage over the internationally isolated Republic. Buckley notes how the outcome of the war ‘depended almost entirely on Paris and London’, and how foreign-based financiers backed Franco over the Republic with their credit.

Journaling events with honesty and humility, often in chaotic circumstances, he openly admits when he cannot verify things, but rigorously doing so when he can. The chronicled entry concerning the vastly exaggerated Nationalist claims about the number of dead in Madrid ahead of the fall of the capital is a pointed example.

Prior to his eventual escape over the Pyrenees with the defeated Republican forces in 1939, Buckley wearily noted how democracy’s fight against the forces of Franco appeared doomed from the outset, gloomily writing that the Republic’s disadvantages were in ’everything but manpower so overwhelming that it was inadequate to try and regard it as an equal struggle’.

The Spanish civil war is a subject that has been widely covered in the last 50 years, but Buckley’s work is a rare account which generates much excitement. Its re-emergence is a reminder – to both the specialist and general reader alike – that the best frontline reporting endures long after the final shot has been fired.

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Britain, Government, Legal, Society

Proposed changes to libel law would inhibit the free press…

LIBEL LAW REFORM

The Ministry of Justice has announced that the Government will back Lord Justice Leveson’s proposals for ‘costs protection’ in defamation and libel cases, making it easier for individuals to sue media companies. Under the current rules, if someone brings a case for libel and loses, they have to pay the defendant’s legal costs as well as their own. If proposals by justice minister, Helen Grant, go through, a judge will be able to impose a ‘one-way’ costs order. The effect of this will mean the poorest claimants will not have to cover the defendant’s bill for legal costs if they lose their case, and those on average incomes may only have to pay a proportion of it.

Taken in isolation, the perceived notion of changing the law to ensure that victims of libel (whatever their means) can take on powerful media organisations will be a good one. For one may argue that legal protection from defamation and invasion of privacy ought not to be restricted to the wealthy and well-heeled. In practical terms, though, its effect upon the free press would be iniquitous. The floodgates would be opened as individuals – aided by no-win, no-fee lawyers – freed from the risk of having to pick up the tab for losing a weak case, would sue media organisations on the flimsiest of pretexts. By removing the restraint imposed by the danger of losing, the plan opens the door to any number of opportunistic and vexatious claims.

If the proposals are adopted, journalists and editors might be dissuaded from reporting stories that they fear could trigger a legal battle. Even if they believe that they have right on their side (and could easily win the libel suit), knowing that they would have to cover the costs of a losing litigant would, undoubtedly, make them think twice before reporting the story, however legally defendable they might be.

The Leveson inquiry was set up in response to real and serious abuses by a handful of journalists, the consequences of which are now working their way through the criminal justice system. Whilst there is no-doubt that the newspaper industry requires better, tougher and reactive self-regulation, a free press is a critical part of our democracy and civil society. It would hardly be conducive to investigative journalism, or even equitable, if media organisations have to pay out every time a false charge of defamation is raised against them.

There is no question that libel cases cost too much, and that action’ of libel, defamation and invasion of privacy cause real suffering. But one-way costs are as disproportionate as they are fraught with unintended consequences.

It is both unjustifiable and unfair to allow the criminal misdeeds of a tiny minority of corrupt journalists to crimp the activities of journalism as a whole.

A vigorous and unfettered press is as important as ever, and it must be preserved and protected. The Ministry of Justice must go back and revise its proposals on libel law reform.

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