Professional Documents
Culture Documents
LO ST
THREE ARTISTS CAPTURE
THE DESTRUCTION OF
EARTHS BEAUTYAND THE BEAUTY
OF ITS DESTRUCTION.
$2 billion
to develop low
10
million
people
with better
access to
to receive
quality
education
been instrumental in spearheading progress on important
measures such as infrastructure, education, human security,
agriculture, and health (see next page), especially in terms of
carbon energy water African ownership of these initiatives.
As progress in Africas transformation accelerates, it will be
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040
Above and Below
Visual commentaries
on the Earths resources
by three artists.
by BENJAMIN GRANT,
BERNHARD EDMAIER,
AND ALEX MACLEAN
essay by BINA VENKATARAMAN
056
Every Move
You Make
Over eight years, U.S. President
Barack Obama has created
the most intrusive surveillance
apparatus in the world.
To what end?
by JAMES BAMFORD
064
The Thrill of
the Hunt
Chinese customers paying
hundreds of dollars per pound
of wild Appalachian ginseng
are feeding a digging frenzy
that threatens to decimate
the revered root for good.
by SUZY KHIMM
ON THE COVER
PHOTOGRAPH BY Benjamin Grant
ARLIT URANIUM MINE, NIGER
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contents 09|10.2016
Observation Deck
074
MAPPA MUNDI
Sightlines How Not to Be a
Civilization
by DAVID ROTHKOPF
028
THE THINGS THEY CARRIED 080
The Abortion Doctor BOOKS & CULTURE
interview by ANNACATHERINE
BRIGIDA Man of the World
by ADAM KIRSCH
030
VISUAL STATEMENT
082
THE FIXER
The Beast of Misogyny
by RICK SEALOCK Out and About in
Ljubljana
interview by VALERIE HOPKINS
034 DECODER
Keynote Cosmos
by KATIE PEEK
036 INNOVATIONS
A Chinese Mega-
Telescope, Super Speedy
Submarines, and More 009 Contributors
by ELIZA STRICKLAND 084 The Final Word
David Rothkopf
CEO AND EDITOR, THE FP GROUP
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FOREIGNPOLICY.COM 9
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Recently, Russia Direct Editor-in-Chief Pavel NEWSPAPER, ROSSIYSKAYA WHAT IS THE FORMAT OF
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The moment you think youve understood something to the letter, youre finished. | P. 32
The Underworld
Venezuela is in the middle of an
economic collapse. With hyper-
inflation projected to reach 480
percent by the end of this year,
severe food shortages and riots
have shaken the nation. Condi-
tions in prisons are particularly
desperate. According to human
rights groups, 50,000 people
live in complexes designed for
less than half that number.
Where conditions languish,
though, prisoners sometimes
claim authority. Since 2014, Ven-
ezuelan photographer Oscar
B. Castillo has been document-
ing life in a convict-controlled
detention facility in San Juan
de los Morros. Gang members,
not guards, enforce de facto
rules. A church, pictured here
in 2015, is a prison within a
prison, where men go for steal-
ing or not paying debts.
The culture can be violent, yet
Castillos project shows inmates
leading dynamic lives. Despite
being enclosed in an incredi-
bly dangerous place, he says,
[they] are looking to find cul-
ture and community.
FOREIGNPOLICY.COM 21
aperture
FOREIGNPOLICY.COM 23
aperture
SIGHTLINES
aperture
FOREIGNPOLICY.COM 27
2
The Abortion 1
Doctor
Germn Cardoso
3
5
1 2 3 4 5 6
Cell phone Syringe Gloves Forceps Curette Photo of father
Women can call me I administer local These are a basic These pull out Now I mostly I was a general
at any time. Some anesthesia pre- sanitary measure the fetus. Prior use an aspirator, surgeon, but it
have called during surgery through a for a clean clinic. to becoming an but sometimes a wasnt until my
emergencies, often syringe to numb Underground clin- abortion doctor, I curette is still nec- father died in
when they are hem- the pain, but ics, which can be in mostly performed essary when the 2001 that I began
orrhaging from a patients remain garages, are gross. abdominal sur- embryo or pla- performing abor-
miscarriage and conscious during The problem is big- geries. When I was centa isnt com- tions. Women who
dont know what to the procedure. ger, though; some performing stom- pletely removed. were his patients
do. I always try to Many women women come in ach, colon, and Id use it to scrape started coming
convince them to are anxious, so I after trying an liver operations, the uterus clean to me for advice
hang up the phone try to talk to them unsanitary DIY I didnt think Id because otherwise, on reproduc-
and get to the near- the whole time, technique, such as someday work as the remains could tive health, and I
est hospital even if to calm and putting parsley into a gynecologist to cause an infection decided to follow
they are ashamed. distract them. their vaginas. extract fetuses. or hemorrhage. in his footsteps.
FOREIGNPOLICY.COM 29
visual statement
by RICK SEALOCK
I am consistently saddened
and angered by the lack of
educational opportunities
that meet tens of millions of
girls because of early marriage,
war, migration, trafficking,
forced labor, and poverty,
to name but a few reasons.
The results? Repeating cycles
of poverty, little sustainable
development for families,
communities, and countries,
and increased security risks
felt on every level, from the
personal to the national.
While some girls, like my own
daughter, are born into a world
that rewards learning, others
are barred by a beast of neglect,
disparagement, exploitation,
violence, even death. Simply
because they are girls. In this
image, blindfolds represent
barriers to education, and the
creature symbolizes the ways
girls suffer as a result. Some,
though, have ripped theirs off
and are striving for a better
life. If more girls arent able to
do the same, it will be a failure
of and for all.
THE ARTIST
would be the philosophical level. What drives me most rather than needing to have, in order to
is the fact that I dont believe we should tell a story claim any meaning, a philosophical com-
just for the fact of telling a story. If I dont have any- ment? In a sense, I think the answer is yes.
thing that I feel is crucial or pressing to say, together Ive always been completely convinced by
with that story, I dont even attempt to tell it. TS: That the storytelling itself, as well as the beauty
makes sense. I wouldnt say my novel, though, asks of the language. Perhaps Im discovering
questions about immigrant families. Its asking ques- right now that what moves me is something
tions only about one immigrant family. For better or entirely different than what moves a more
worse, Ive staked a very different claim: to look very philosophical novelist. CO: My ideas about
what a novel should do come from what my TS: Nation is one of the greatest stories ever grown up in a small town in Nigeria, I relate
expectations are as a reader first, before told: The mythology of the country and more to having that sense of ownership
those as a writer. When I watch movies, I the fantasy of the unified state are wildly towards a particular province, provenance.
generally dont look beyond what the actors successful acts of narrative. Whats inter- Im Igbo and I grew up in a Yoruba-speak-
are doing or saying. When I read books, I esting to me is how the nation functions ing place; I started speaking the language
look beyond what is on the page. I always at the levels that you describe the novel of other people before that of my own.
hope that whatever I write, even if its a functioning: the personal, the conceptual, I do believe, especially in Africa, that
short story about a woman who is fetch- the philosophical, and then theres what the nation-state as a Western concept is a
ing water at a well, we can look at it and I think is the most pressing and perhaps problem. We need tribe nations that can
apply it to something bigger so it can be most tragic level, which is the physical. form organic nations on their own, and
a microcosm for the exploration of some- Because the nation kills, right? CO: Having then if they want to merge into orders
thing deeper. TS: Reading brings me much and form actual states, they can do that.
more unadulterated joy than writing ever Western culture is very foreign, and weve
can, because reading is easy and delight- not found a way to form coherent nations
ful, and writing is delightful and hard. I was out of that, so we need to reinvent some-
about halfway through your book before thing. I see myself as an Igbo man, as a West
I realized I was resisting the idea that it African. I dont know whether I believe in
was an analogy. I felt the need to defend Nigeria, but I have a Nigerian passport,
its wholeness as a story not about broth- so I have no choice but to see myself as a
ers, but a story about these brothers. Then Nigerian also. TS: I was drawn to what you
I thought: This is absurd. As a reader, you just said about ownership. It is something
are insisting that a text do one thing, and the immigrant can come to know, but it is
thats not your place as a reader. Let the almost always an abstraction developed
text do every damn thing that it can pos- through what I call ritual and relation-
sibly do and luxuriate in the multiplicity ship. You also say African countries have
of its effects and its aims, which is very not been able to make a success of the West-
different, of course, than what happens ern nation-state, and I would argue that
when were writing. absent slave labor in the New World and
empire in the old, neither has the West.
TS: I love this phrase: Write what you The nation-state is not exactly working
know. I once had the pleasure of speak- out as well as it may appear. The question
ing with a very great novelist who said, I becomes: How can human beings orga-
think its inane to tell young writers, Write nize themselves? It is our nature to cluster
what you know, because you know noth- together in groups. How can we under-
ing. What Ive discovered through writing take that project in a way that is in some
fiction, as distinct from writing nonfiction, sense affirming to human life, rather than
is that the novelist writes because of what the opposite? Q
we dont know. Whats actually compelling
us to soldier on in our quest is an answer This conversation has been condensed for
to the questions that we cant answer, the publication. Go to FOREIGNPOLICY.com to
knowledge that we dont already have. CO: read the extended version, or listen to the
That is true. I dont think that knowledge discussion by subscribing to FPs Global
can be absolute. The moment you think TAIYE SELASI Thinkers podcast on iTunes.
FOREIGNPOLICY.COM 33
decoder
by KATIE PEEK
DONALD TRUMP
$200K+
GEORGE W. BUSH
FORMER PRESIDENT
OF THE UNITED STATES
$100K+
JEFF BEZOS
ELLEN JOHNSON SIRLEAF
CURRENT PRESIDENT OF LIBERIA
$50K+
CSAR GAVIRIA $100K+
FORMER PRESIDENT
OF COLOMBIA
$30K$50K GRO HARLEM BRUNDTLAND
FORMER PRIME
MINISTER OF NORWAY LEADER LISTED BY
$33K+ THREE TOP BUREAUS
LEADER NOT LISTED BY
THREE TOP BUREAUS
JOHN BRUTON
FORMER PRIME
MINISTER OF IRELAND
$20K$30K $50K+
ELON MUSK
HILLARY CLINTON
OPRAH WINFREY
TIMOTHY GEITHNER
JON STEWART
GEORGE W. BUSH SERENA WILLIAMS
SHERYL SANDBERG
DEEPAK CHOPRA
SARAH PALIN
SHAQUILLE ONEAL
SNOOP DOGG
NANCY PELOSI
JODIE FOSTER
ANNEMARIE SLAUGHTER
JANE GOODALL
RuPAUL
PATCH ADAMS
JOHN KASICH
JACKIE JOYNERKERSEE
FOREIGNPOLICY.COM 35
innovations
by ELIZA STRICKLAND
Blowing
Bubbles
SUBMARINES ARE still stuck in
the slow lane. Because they
have to push through resis-
tant water, even the fastest
subs top out at about 40 miles
per hour. But thats without
supercavitation, in which a
bubble of gas, produced in
the nose of the ship, envelops
the entire submarine. This
eect protects the watercraft
from drag and allows it to
achieve high speeds. The rst
supercavitating torpedo was
designed by the Soviet Union
back in the 1960s and report-
edly blasted at 200 miles per
hour. That missile was only
about 27 feet long, however.
No navy has succeeded in
developing a bubble system
FOREIGNPOLICY.COM 37
GMAP is more than a masters degree it is a global
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First Secretary Embassy of Indonesia in Brussels
For the past 15 years, GMAP has set the standard for international
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CLASSES START JANUARY AND JULY.
the resources issue
A mote of dust suspended in a sunbeamthats how Carl Sagan once described the world. Like it or not, he added,
the Earth is where we make our stand. Sagan was calling for perspective: a shared understanding that set against the
universes immensity, the Earth is nothing, but to the species living here, it is everything. A quest for perspective also
guides FOREIGN POLICYs Resources Issue. Benjamin Grant, Bernhard Edmaier, and Alex MacLean take to the skies to
reveal Earths beauty at its most abstract, including the designs and patterns of human destruction. Suzy Khimm travels
to Appalachia, where ginseng is being overharvested because Chinese customers pay exorbitant sums for a pound of the
root. James Bamford oers an experts view of the colossal surveillance state that U.S. President Barack Obama has built
on the premise that private data are vital to national security. Whether the resource is digital information or clean water, a
question of viewpoint remains: Who decides whats worthy of protection on this mote of dust, and how? THE EDITORS
BELOW
PREVIOUS MANIFA OIL FIELD, SAUDI ARABIA | With a pumping capacity of about 900,000 barrels of crude per day, this field is the fifth-largest operat-
ing in the world. The U.S. Energy Information Administration estimates that daily global oil consumption grew by 1.4 million barrels in 2015.
FOREIGNPOLICY.COM 43
RESOURCES EXTRACTION
There needs to be a
dramatic shift in the way
we look at our planet
for us to protect it. When
we are removed from
our usual line of sight on
the Earths surface, we
can better understand
the sheer enormity,
intricacy, and impact of
the extraction systems
weve constructed. If
we embrace this new
perspective, perhaps we
can create a smarter,
safer future.
Benjamin Grant
an additional billion
as annually belching
try had been burning
some 17 percent more
tons of coal are trans-
LEFT QINHUANGDAO COAL
be extracted to produce
waste, metallic dust, and
FOREIGNPOLICY.COM
EXTRACTION BENJAMIN GRANT
47
R E S O U R C E S WAT E R
Bernhard Edmaier
with conservative
oration of coral by
ICELAND | Icelands
longest river is fed
light, or nutrients,
lagoons in one of 26
Pacific to disappear.
temperature increases, scientists
is due to interaction
is covered by saltgrass
Maldives archipelago.
287 billion metric tons
become submerged by
Bleachingthe discol-
local swampland. Gla-
Soil is dwindling
needlessly because of
poor stewardship and
industrial agricultural
practices. Flying is
a great way to look at
the effects. You cant
see over a hill from
the ground, but from
an airplane, you can:
Vegetation patterns
pop out on a larger
scale, showing just how
complex agriculture
has become.
Alex MacLean
tions of up to 50 PERCENT. In
FOREIGNPOLICY.COM 57
THE FOUNDATIONS of Obamas shadow state
date back to the immediate post-9/11
FOREIGNPOLICY.COM 59
In 2009, not long after Obama had taken that, on cables that could transfer upwards The $286 million, 604,000-square-foot
office, the NSA gained access to Bahamian of 21 petabytes of information daily; this facility has more than 2,500 workstations
communications networks by subterfuge. included a large slice of the internet, which and 47 conference rooms, and it employs
The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administra- could be stored for three days before being more than 4,000 eavesdroppers and other
tion got legal permission to plant moni- replaced by new data, and some 600 mil- personnel who focus on the Middle East.
toring equipment in the nations telecom lion telephone events every 24 hours. Earphones on, facing their computers,
systems by convincing the islands govern- In 2010, not long after becoming oper- employees sit in cubicles and listen to
ment that the operation would help catch ational, the program grew to be so suc- cuts, or intercepted conversations. Its
drug dealers. Really, though, it opened cessful that the GCHQ boasted it had very near real time, Adrienne Kinne, a
a backdoor for the NSA so that it could the biggest internet access of any Five former intercept operator at the complex,
tap, record, and store cellular data. [O]ur Eyes member. This is a massive amount told me a few years ago. We would just
covert mission is the provision of SIGINT of data! acknowledged an agency Pow- get these thousands of cuts dumped on
[signals intelligence], a document leaked erPoint later made public by Snowden. us [from] Iraq, Afghanistan, and a whole
by Snowden stated. The host country was Another leaked document declared, We swath of area. We would get [calls in] Tajik,
not aware. are in the golden age. Uzbek, Russian, Chinese.
Within two years, SOMALGET would To sift through everything, 250 NSA As of 2013, the NSA had spent upwards
achieve its goal of 100 percent surveil- analysts joined forces with about 300 of $300 million to expand a former Sony
lance in the Bahamasall without legal from the GCHQ. Using computer sys- chip-fabrication plant near San Antonio
warrants. This included spying on the cell tems, they searched for data containing and turn it into the agencys principal lis-
phones of some 6 million U.S. citizens who any of 71,000 selectors, such as key- tening post for the Caribbean and Cen-
visit or reside in the country each year; words, email addresses, or phone num- tral and South America. About 900 miles
notable celebrities with homes there are bers. Internally, this work was dubbed northwest, it was also constructing a new
Bill Gates, John Travolta, and Tiger Woods. Mastering of The Internet (MTI). A leaked operations building at Buckley Air Force
The NSA didnt stop with the Bahamas, 2010 GCHQ document stated, MTI deliv- Base near Denver. The mission was to col-
however. It eventually deployed SOMAL- ered the next big step in the access, pro- lect intercepted communications from
GET in Afghanistan, which brought the cessing and storage journey. In a single spy satellites, including Advanced Orions,
total number of conversations recorded
and stored by the program to over 100
million call events per day, according to
leaked agency files. It also began collecting
metadata from phones in the Philippines, INTO THE NSAS BLUFFDALE, UTAH FACILITY
Mexico, and Kenya. NSA planning docu-
ments in 2013 anticipated further uses in
other countries.
WOULD FLOW
EMAILS,
TE XTS, TWEETS,
FINANCIAL RECORDS, FACEBOOK POSTS,
In some cases, the Obama administra-
tion cooperated with foreign governments
to expand its reconnaissance capabilities.
YOUTUBE VIDEOS, AND
TELEPHONE CHATTER.
This included members of the Five Eyes, a
clandestine alliance of intelligence agen-
cies in the United States, the United King- day, the file continued, a GCHQ surveil- and ground stations like Menwith Hill,
dom, Australia, Canada, and New Zealand lance operation known as Tempora had then transmit the data through fiber-optic
that dates back to the Cold War. During captured, stored, and analyzed some 39 cables to analysts at their desks near Savan-
Obamas first three years in office, the U.S. billion pieces of information. nah, San Antonio, and at other NSA out-
government paid the British equivalent of posts. Meanwhile, in January 2012, the NSA
the NSA, the Government Communica- THE ACCELERATION of surveillance required opened a $358 million listening post on the
tions Headquarters (GCHQ), at least $150 a construction boom of a scale unprece- island of Oahu targeting Asian and Pacific
million to enhance surveillance. Because dented in the history of U.S. intelligence. countries. Upon its debut, Alexander said
undersea fiber-optic cables from North On March 5, 2012, Alexander opened what in a news release that the facilitys goal is
and South America transit the United is likely the worlds largest listening post, to produce foreign signals intelligence for
Kingdom on their way to Europe and the about 130 miles north of Savannah, Geor- decision-makers as global terrorism now
Middle East, the GCHQ was in an ideal gia; members of the press were warned jeopardizes the lives of our citizens, mili-
position to place taps on them. It did just not to bring cameras within two miles. tary forces, and international allies.
FOREIGNPOLICY.COM 61
tee, the general backtracked. Alexander The NSA has at least considered sextillion bytes, the NGA states. Described
cited only one instance when an intercept employing similar tactics in the United in more familiar terms, this is the equiva-
detected a potential threat: a Somali taxi States. In a top-secret memo dated Oct. 3, lent of every person on the planet having
driver living in San Diego who sent $8,500 2012, Alexander raised the possibility of 174 newspapers delivered daily. Viewed
to al-Shabab, his home countrys notorious using vulnerabilities discovered in mass another way, thats more data than 7 billion
terrorist group. That winter, a panel set up dataviewing sexually explicit material Libraries of Congress could hold.
by Obama to review the NSAs operations online, for instanceto damage reputa- In the surveillance state Obama has built,
concluded that the agency had stopped no tions. The agency could, say, smear indi- this deluge threatens to bury the few nee-
terrorist attacks. We found none, Geoffrey viduals it believed were radicalizing others dles that might existwarnings of attacks,
Stone, a University of Chicago law profes- in an effort to diminish their influence. signals of radicalizing groups, rallying cries
sor and one of five panel members, bluntly Obama, meanwhile, has taken virtually of extremist recruiterseven deeper in the
told NBC News in December 2013. Since no steps to fix what ails his spying appa- proverbial haystack. So, too, does encryp-
then, despite mass surveillance both at ratus. After the Snowden revelations, the tion: Once a tool used mostly by spy agen-
home and abroad, shootings or bombings president called for ending the NSAs col- cies and militaries, encryption is becoming
have occurred in San Bernardino, Califor- lection of metadata from phone calls by commonplace in everyday digital chatter to
nia; Orlando, Florida; Paris; Brussels; and U.S. citizens. But this represents a rare keep government eyes and ears out. Gmail
Istanbulto name just a few places. tremor in the surveillance state. More con- offers it. WhatsApp began providing its bil-
Beyond failures to create security, there sistently, Obama has limited oversight. In lion-plus users with automatic encryption
is the matter of misuse or abuse of U.S. his first year as president, he threatened to in April. In July, Facebook announced that
spying, the effects of which extend well veto a bill from his own party that would it would soon give the option of end-to-end
beyond violations of Americans con- have required him to brief all members encryption on its Messenger app. More ser-
stitutional liberties. In 2014, I met with of congressional intelligence committees vices will surely follow.
Snowden in Moscow for a magazine about covert operations, as opposed to the Speed is a critical component in break-
assignment. Over pizza in a hotel room much smaller Gang of Eight, made up of ing encryption because most codes are
not far from Red Square, he told me that top-ranking party and committee leaders based on factoring extremely large prime
the NSA puts innocent people in danger. and created in the Bush era to shield ille- numbers. Conducting whats known as
In his experience, for instance, the agency gal activities from scrutiny. Gang brief- a brute force attacktrying every pos-
routinely had passed raw, unredacted ings, former White House counterterrorism sible combination of digitsusing even
intercepts of millions of phone calls and czar Richard Clarke told Rachel Maddow the most powerful computers in operation
emails from Arab- and Palestinian-Amer- in 2009, were often a farce. would take centuries or longer to succeed.
icans to its Israeli counterpart, Unit 8200. While keeping critics at bay, the Obama Obama, though, signed an execu-
Once in Israeli hands, Snowden feared, this administration has gone after people blow- tive order in July 2015 urging the cre-
information might be used to extort infor- ing the whistle on intelligence abuses. The ation of an exaflop supercomputera
mation or otherwise harm relatives of the Justice Department has charged eight machine about 30 times faster than any-
individuals being spied upon. leakersmore than double the num- thing in existence. It would be capable
That September, after my interview with ber under all previous presidents com- of conducting more than a quintillion
Snowden was published, 43 members of bined. [T]his trend line should be going (1,000,000,000,000,000,000) operations
Unit 8200 quit their posts in moral pro- in the opposite direction, an ACLU lawyer per second. The presidents charge to build
test. They charged publicly that Israel used argued in a 2014 blog post. The modern was mostly targeted at the scientific com-
intercepted communications, like those national security state is more power- munity; behind the scenes, however, the
sent to it by the NSA, to inflict political ful than evermore powerful even than NSA has been preparing to breach the exa-
persecution on Palestinians. They said during the Cold War. It demands demo- flop barrier since 2011.
data were gathered on sexual orientations, cratic accountability. That year, the agency secretly built a
infidelities, money problems, family med- 260,000-square-foot facility at the Oak
ical conditions, and other private matters THE NATIONAL Geospatial-Intelligence Ridge National Laboratory in Tennes-
and then used as tools of coercionto force Agency (NGA) released a report in June see, the same place where the Manhattan
targets into becoming Israeli collaborators, detailing what it calls a data tsunami. By Project developed the atomic bomb. Its
for example. [T]he intelligence is used to the end of this decade, there will be any- research focuses on hitting the computing
apply pressure to people, to make them where from 50 billion to 200 billion net- speed that would not only give the agency
cooperate with Israel, one member of the worked devices on a planet of some 8 billion an edge over encryption, but also provide it
dissenting group, who asked that his name people. For the intelligence community, with better cataloging capabilities to tackle
not be used, told the Guardian. this equates to 40 zettabytes of data, or 1 the ocean of data already arriving daily at
FOREIGNPOLICY.COM 63
64 SEPT | OCT 2016
BY SUZY KHIMM
CHINESE CUSTOMERS
PAYING HUNDREDS
OF DOLLARS
PER POUND OF WILD
APPALACHIAN GINSENG
ARE FEEDING A
DIGGING FRENZY THAT
THREATENS TO
DECIMATE THE REVERED
ROOT FOR GOOD.
in the weeks leading up to the 2014 har- tently, ginseng may make the body light being harvested and dried for one to two
vest season. Thats compared with just 30 and prolong life. This restorative repu- weeks, ginseng can last up to seven years
pounds in a typical year, according to the tation spurred widespread harvesting in under ideal conditions: in nonhumid air
Wall Street Journal. Everyone will tell you China and later earned ginseng the basis of kept just above freezing, sealed off from
that ginseng90 percent is illegally dug its scientific name, Panax, from the Greek rodents and pathogens like mold.
somehow, one way or the other, Cornett word for cure-allthe same linguistic American ginseng entered the interna-
says on a stormy May afternoon as we drive origin as that of panacea. Modern studies tional economy in the early 18th century.
along the picturesque Blue Ridge Parkway. have found that chemical compounds in A Jesuit cleric named Joseph-Franois
The fear among growers and dealers ginseng can reduce inflammation, relieve Lafitau living in Quebec read an article
is that Appalachias ginseng, traded with extreme fatigue in cancer patients, and about the plant written by a fellow priest
Asia since the earliest days of the Ameri- help treat diabetes. Contrary to longstand- dispatched to China. He became convinced
can republic and now among the last wild ing beliefs, however, theres limited proof ginseng was also in the New World, based
roots on Earth, may soon be gone for good. that it enhances sexual performance or on the description of the plants habitat,
Cornett, who keeps his energy up by chew- athleticism. and searched the woods near his home.
ing on a gnarled ginseng root he stashes in For all its mythos, ginsengs life cycle is Lafitau found the root he was looking for.
his truck, says the situation is dire. Out lethargic. Seeds enter the soil in the early (Scientists believe ginseng is native to both
in the country, its gone, he tells me. Its fall, when ginseng berries ripen, but take East Asia and North America because some
been raped. Its just not there anymore. up to two years to sprout. It can then be 70 million years ago, the two land masses
a year or more before the infant plant were part of a single megacontinent known
of grows another prong of leaves, and so on. as Laurasia, according to David Taylors
T HE FIRST WRITTEN ACCOUNT
ginseng is a Chinese manu- Wild plants can live for up to 50 years, in book Ginseng, the Divine Root.)
script called The Divine Farm- rare cases longer. (There are apocryphal Lafitau detailed his findings in a report
ers Materia Medica, penned tales of 1,000-year-old ginseng.) Roots that set off a flurry of foraging and trading
about 1,800 years ago. It heralds a litany of become long and aromatic as time passes, in Canada, and the quest for wild ginseng
the roots supposed health benefits, from a and believers say the older ginseng is, the soon spread south into Appalachia. After
quiet mind to sharp senses. If taken consis- more powerful its medicinal qualities. After the Revolutionary War, George Washington
FOREIGNPOLICY.COM 67
wrote in his journal that a survey party in popular buyer was Wilcox Drug in down- different environments. Among them
West Virginia met with many mules and town Boone, then home to a cluster of trade was Paul Hsu, a Taiwanese immigrant
pack horses laden with ginseng going east, and supply stores catering to locals. People in Wausau, Wisconsinfar from Appa-
bound for ports such as New York; Phila- came to the family-run business from the lachiawho claimed that ginseng had
delphia; Charleston, South Carolina; and Blue Ridge slopes with burlap sacks full of alleviated his mothers chronic pain from
Savannah, Georgia. In 1784, the first U.S. ginseng, as well as ginger, sassafras, and arthritis and diabetes. He started planting
ship to sail directly to East Asia, Empress other medicinal plants. Since the plant crops in 1978. Today, Wisconsin produces
of China, carried nearly 30 tons of ginseng matures in the fall, ginseng roots were 95 percent of farmed American ginseng,
out of New York. Investors netted a fat 25 often sources of Christmas money, says and Hsu, with more than 1,000 acres, is
percent profit on the haul. Jeff Van Hoose, a friend and business part- one of the countrys biggest single growers.
Some American icons also cashed in on ner of Travis Cornett. Wilcox Drug, in turn, As states registered dealers and com-
ginseng. John Jacob Astor became the first sold roots to brokers in New York, whose piled their names on public lists, overseas
U.S. multimillionaire because of real-estate clients were mostly buyers in Hong Kong. buyers began contacting them directly
interests and a fur business, which began Yet ginseng wasnt profitable enough much to the chagrin of New York export
exporting to China in the early 1800s. But to encourage intensive poaching. When companies that had guarded their Asian
he also used his contacts in Asia to trade theft happened, no one tended to make a contacts closely. Wilcox Drug was one ben-
ginseng, reportedly earning $55,000 on fuss. Wild ginseng grew on Clint Cornetts eficiary. In 1982, Tony Hayes, an herb-pur-
his first shipload. Daniel Boone, the epon- land, and local boys knew when to pounce. chasing agent, joined the business and
ymous frontiersman of the North Carolina Wed go to church on Sunday, so theyd helped it build a network of international
mountain town, supplemented his own come out, help themselves, he says. Yet buyers. Within a year, Wilcox Drug tri-
fur business by digging ginseng out of the he didnt think to call the law. pled the amount of wild ginseng it sold,
Appalachian wilderness. The foraging culture began to change according to Hayes. Twelve years later, it
Between 1821 and 1899, an average of 190 after the United States joined the Conven- was acquired fully by the Zuellig Group, a
tons of U.S. ginseng were exported every tion on International Trade in Endangered Swiss company that has global interests in
year, according to the journal Economic Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) pharmaceuticals and agribusiness.
Botany. It wasnt just harvested by wealthy in 1974. Along with lions, mahogany, and Other Appalachians, including Tra-
entrepreneurs: Hunting ginseng became alligators, wild ginseng falls under Appen- vis Cornett, would jump into the ginseng
a routine way for Appalachian families, dix II of the treaty, which includes species game. First, though, China had to get rich.
who lived far from ports and other com- on the verge of becoming endangered.
mercial centers, to earn cash. According For the first time, states that wanted to INSENG BECAME MORE lucrative
to Kristin Johannsen, author of Ginseng export wild roots were required to issue
G than ever in the 1990s, thanks
Dreams: The Secret World of Americas Most broad regulations on hunting. They des- to economic reforms under-
Valuable Plant, mountain forests at higher ignated specific digging and trading sea- taken by Chinese leader Deng
elevations than most settled lands were sons; some mandated permits to forage on Xiaoping. As China privatized industries
seen as commonsplaces where anyone public lands. Dealers were instructed to and opened its markets to foreign invest-
could graze their livestock, cut trees, and register their businesses and certify that ment, personal wealth surged. Between
gather ginseng. roots were harvested legally. The federal 1991 and 2002, the countrys middle class
Around Boone, old-timers say other cus- government had to clear inspected gin- jumped from less than half to almost three-
tomary hunting rules lingered into the 20th seng before export. (In the late 1990s, rules fourths of the population, according to the
century. People could only harvest plants were tightened to stipulate how old har- Asian Development Bank. This boosted
that were old enough to reproduce, and they vested plants had to be; five years became demand for all manner of commercial
needed to replant ginsengs berries to ensure the minimum.) goods, including ginseng, a symbol of her-
new growth. They could forage on private CITES had practical shortcomings, itage and health. People wanted it however
land unless it was fenced off or had signs though. Dealers could do little more than they could get it: whole, sliced, powdered,
telling people to keep out. If I wanted to take diggers at their word about ginsengs packed into pill capsules, infused in cos-
go up on [someones] property and hunt, provenance: In appearance, a root is a root metics, steeped in beverages.
they didnt care, says Clint Cornett, Traviss is a root. Rangers, meanwhile, were hard- Expensive wild roots, in particular,
85-year-old uncle, who started gathering pressed to patrol vast forests. If anything, became emblems of newfound prosper-
ginseng after he quit school as a teenager the new regulations expanded Americas ity. The Asian kind wasnt readily available
to cut timber. ginseng market as people turned to farm- because authorities had never prioritized
Diggers sold roots to herb stores and ing roots, which wasnt subject to as many replenishing it, focusing instead on farm-
traveling traders known as sang men. One bureaucratic hassles and was possible in ing ginseng of lower value in massive
FOREIGNPOLICY.COM 69
the roots on offer, sent them to his boss, steal anything they can convert quickly In the Far East, ginseng is used for just
and quickly closed the deal on a purchase. into cash, from chainsaws to copper wir- about everything, from fighting off illness
Cornett hopes selling his homegrown crop ing to ginseng. Its as good as money on to lifting libido. Large ginseng roots
will eventually be so easyif he can get it the streets, says Lucas Smith, a deputy dangle in the frame suggestively before
safely to market. sheriff in Boone. Recently, local officers the camera cuts to thick wads of cash. But
found a load of roots when they arrested for Appalachians, its a chance to make
starts a meth cook. They suspected that it was a ton of money. The slickly edited pro-
D AVID PRESNELLS STORY
much like that of the man he being used for trade, Smith explains. In gram featured poachersanti-authority
stole from. As a child in the eastern Tennessee, a prescription-drug types with bushy beards, bandanas, and
1970s, his truck-driver father trafficker named Johnny Grooms, who ran camouflage gearpursued by gun-toting
taught him to find ginseng in the woods. a poached-roots-for-pills operation outside landowners.
We used to hunt it all the time, says Pres- Great Smoky Mountains National Park, was The show, along with National Geo-
nell, standing outside his trailer smoking a convicted by a federal court in 2011 and graphics Smoky Mountain Money, pro-
cigarette. He looks older than his 52 years, sentenced to more than 24 years in prison. duced a flood of interest in wild roots.
with unruly grayish-brown hair, a deeply Hayes, formerly of Wilcox Drug, now Ginseng experts were inundated with calls
lined face, and ice-blue eyes that stare out runs his own herb-dealing company, Ridge and emails from would-be diggers who said
from under a faded baseball cap. My dad Runner Trading. He describes jittery and they saw the TV show, says Jim Hamilton,
used [ginseng] to buy clothes, foodthats
how we survived, Presnell tells me.
Ginseng became a matter of survival
again decades later. Presnell ran afoul of
CHINA,
the law; he was convicted of murder in 1983
and was incarcerated for 24 years. When IN
EXTREMELY VA LUABLE
he got out on parole, he was hurting for
AMERICAN ROOTS ARE
money and coping with post-traumatic
stress disorder from his prison term. At HIGH END LUXURY ITEMS SOLD IN
most, in hunting ginseng, I felt I did a lit- SWANK BOUTIQUES, WHERE THEYRE
BEHIND GLASS.
tle bit of wrong, Presnell says. Its just a SOMETIMES KEPT
wild plant, he adds.
Research shows that Presnell isnt the
only one who thinks this wayand acts on
it. Jim McGraw, a conservation biologist at
West Virginia University, studied 30 wild nervous addicts showing up at his ware- an agricultural extension agent in Boone.
populations of ginseng across seven states house with ginseng. Ive seen em come Janet Rock of the NPS remembers one man
over 11 years, ending in 2010. He found that in twice a day. Theyll be there when you who called a ranger for help because he
65 percent were poached from land where get in in the morning, because they dug it heard coyotes and wanted to be rescued.
hunting was forbidden, 20 percent were late the night before, he says. Some come He admitted at the time that he had been
dug up outside of legal harvest seasons, bearing young roots that arent worth very trying to poach ginseng after watching one
and 82 percent were uprooted before they much. They tear them out of the ground, of the shows, she says.
were 5 years old. McGraw calculates that Hayes says. If theres a lot of damage, that Because of theft, the first rule of growing
just over 1 percent of the plants he tracked means they were in a hurry. ginseng is: You do not talk about growing
were gathered in accordance with the law. He claims not to buy roots from people ginseng. Registered dealers cant escape
The methamphetamine and heroin epi- he suspects use drugsDont cater to it, being on public lists, but for people with
demics have increased poachings allure. dont want it, dont want em aroundbut wild plants growing on their property, the
According to the Centers for Disease Con- other local dealers dont draw a line. I know best thing is just not to tell anybody, says
trol and Prevention, in 2014, West Virginia one very well that caters to em, Hayes says. Hayess son, Josh, who works in the fam-
and Kentucky had the countrys highest Hes pretty dependent on that crowd. ily business. (Any ginseng they dont sell
and fourth-highest rates of drug over- None of this has been helped by poach- in-season they stow in a temperature-con-
doses resulting in death. The same year, ings recent glamorization in pop culture. trolled vault the size of a large closet, with
in Tennessee, more people died from opi- On an episode of Appalachian Outlaws, a Pentagon emblazoned on the door.)
oid overdoses than in car accidents. Police reality show that ran on the History Chan- Another source declined to be named,
say people who need money for drugs will nel from 2014 to 2015, the narrator intones, fearing thieves would come for his roots
FOREIGNPOLICY.COM 71
standup2cancer.org
#reasons2standup
#su2c
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*(5*,9:;,4*,33*65:69;0<43033@65*636.@-(99(/-(>*,;;-6<5+(;065.,564,*(5(+(3(<9(A0:205-(403@;9<:;
5(;065(36=(90(5*(5*,9*6(30;06565;(90605:;0;<;,-69*(5*,99,:,(9*/6=(90(5*(5*,99,:,(9*/-<5+(330(5*,
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;/,(4,90*(5(::6*0(;065-69*(5*,99,:,(9*/((*90::;(5+<7;6*(5*,9::*0,5;0-0*7(9;5,9
MAPPA MUNDI ECONOMICS BOOKS CULTURE THE FIXER
When it comes to Negative interest England heralds Matic Zorman on
climate change, rates make the Shakespeare as where to nosh
nature is speaking markets look like a beloved son, but on a horse burger
loud and clearbut a version of Alices his plays also reso- and witness
how carefully are Adventures in nate from Zanzibar unrequited love in
we listening? | P. 74 Wonderland. | P. 76 to Korea. | P. 80 Ljubljana. | P. 82
How Not to Be a
Civilization
Mother Nature is
using her words.
Are we smart enough
to heed them?
FOREIGNPOLICY.COM 75
economics OBSERVATION DECK
by GILLIAN TETT
Introducing
the Alfa Fellowship Program afords exceptional young American, British, rates to zero to offset economic stagna-
tion after the financial crisis; this spring,
and German leaders the opportunity to receive meaningful professional
the ECB levied a negative 0.4 percent yield
experience in Russia.
on funds stored overnight.
r Build Russian language skills A second explanation is that structural
r Learn about current afairs through meetings, seminars, factors are prompting investors to gobble
and regional trips up an abnormally large quantity of bonds,
lifting prices and depressing market rates.
r Work at prominent organizations in Moscow
(Bond prices move in an inverse direc-
Program provisions: monthly stipend, program-related travel costs, tion to yields.) Since 2008, a host of new
housing, insurance regulations, including in the United States,
have been introduced that encourage,
To be eligible, candidates must have relevant professional experience if not force, big financial institutions to
and a graduate degree, or the equivalent, as well as demonstrate buy more bonds. Supposedly, this gives
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Deadline to apply for the 2017 2018 program year: December 1 better withstand financial shock. Mean-
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The third reason, and perhaps the most
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PEACE AND SECURITY imagine anything else that would offer
3URYLGLQJ2SSRUWXQLWLHVIRU7RPRUURZV/HDGHUVLQ3HDFHDQG6HFXULW\
78 SEPT | OCT 2016
OBSERVATION DECK
FOREIGNPOLICY.COM 81
the fixer
interview by VALERIE HOPKINS
Ljubljana, Slovenia
Matic Zorman on where to find a
rave and eat dormouse.
WHERE TO HONOR
A LYRICAL HERO
The 31-foot statue
of our national poet,
FRANCE PRESEREN, is
worth seeing. His
muse was a woman
named Julija
Primic. She didnt
love him back, in
part because her
family considered
him lower class. LOGISTICS
Preseren wove his
sorrow into poems LAST CALL
more broadly For bars, its usually
about emotional around midnight,
pain and Slovenias but some clubs stay
political struggles. open until 5 a.m.
PRESERNOV TRG
SPENDING
On average, peo-
ple spend 20 to
30 euros, which is
about equivalent in
U.S. dollars, a night.
A beer is usually
about 3 euros.
TRANSPORTATION
Downtown, you
can take one of the
free kavalirs,
buggies similar to
golf carts that run
on electric batter-
ies. The cars regu-
larly loop the city
center. You can just
hop in.
WHERE TO EMBRACE WHERE TO SPOT POWER
COUNTERCULTURE BROKERS
ROG was a bicycle Youll find ministers
factory during the in one of two places:
Yugoslav days. After the subsidized
it was abandoned, government cafe-
artists squatted terias or the posh
there. In 2006, it restaurant inside
FAUX PAS
became a cultural WHERE TO Ljubljana Castle.
center run by crafts- FEEL HISTORY STRELEC is named
Many people here
people. They have The 15th-century after the medieval for the first time
workshops by day LJUBLJANA CASTLE, archers who used to talk about Yugosla-
and underground built over Roman be stationed in the via as a strong com-
parties until the and Illyrian set- fortresss central munist system, but
wee hours. The tlements on a hill security tower it wasnt like that.
graffiti-covered overlooking the city, exactly where the We were not behind
METELKOVA complex, is the place to go restaurant is today. the Iron Curtain,
once used as mili- back in time. A por- WWW.KAVAL GROUP.
because President
tary barracks, offers tion of the castle SI/STRELEC
Josip Tito broke
a few blocks worth has been converted ,,RESTAVRACIJA
with Joseph Stalin
of galleries, cafs, into a museum, and shortly after World
and nightclubs. it also offers the War II.
ROG best view of the
WWW.TOVARNA.ORG capital. You can get FP (ISSN 0015-7228) September/October 2016, issue number 220.
METELKOVA there by walking up Published six times each year, in January, March, May, July, September,
and November, by The FP Group, a division of Graham Holdings Com-
WWW.METELKOVA the hill or riding the pany, at 11 Dupont Circle NW, Suite 600, Washington, D.C. 20036.
MESTO.ORG glass funicular. Subscriptions: U.S., $59.99 per year; Canada and other countries,
$59.99. Periodicals Postage Paid in Washington, D.C., and at addi-
WWW.LJUBLJANSKI
tional mailing offices. POSTMASTER: Send U.S. address changes to: FP,
GRAD.SI/EN/THE LJU P.O. Box 283, Congers, NY 10920-0283. Return undeliverable Cana-
dian addresses to: P.O. Box 503, RPO West Beaver Creek, Richmond
BLJANA CASTLE
Hill, ON L4B 4R6. Printed in the USA.
FOREIGNPOLICY.COM 83
the final word
by CLAUDIA RANKINE
CLAUDIA RANKINE
IS THE FREDERICK ISEMAN PROFESSOR OF POETRY
AT YALE UNIVERSITY AND IS THE AUTHOR OF
FIVE COLLECTIONS OF POETRY.
HER LATEST BOOK, CITIZEN: AN AMERICAN LYRIC,
IS THE FIRST POETRY COLLECTION TO BECOME A NEW YORK TIMES
BEST
SELLER FOR NONFICTION.
asiafoundation.org