The Politics of Privacy

We’re looking forward to our next event scheduled for Tuesday May 13 at 7:30pm at The Highlander.

THE POLITICS OF PRIVACY

How Snowden, the NSA and Wikileaks have redrawn the line between government confidentiality, public information and personal privacy in the digital age

Edward Snowden pulled back the veil on the NSA as Big Brother, revealing how far it goes to gather information from both public citizens and foreign governments, in pursuit of both terrorists and America’s international agenda.

Julian Assange created Wikileaks as a safe-haven for whistleblowers like Snowden to help uncover how governments operate in unprecedented secrecy and unrestrained power, issues he feels have been woefully covered by the press.

Are Snowden and Assange truly heroes of our day, Robin Hoods stealing from the all powerful to inform the powerless? Or are they fighting a desperate battle against the unstoppable and at times even proper role of government to gather information and maintain secrets? Can we still support the motives of government (whether pursuing terrorists or geopolitical interests) while attacking the method (whether hoarding our phone and internet data or listening in on foreign leaders’ phone calls)? 

Ironically, the same digital age that makes it so easy for people like Snowden and Assange to reveal secrets and bring confidential information public also allows the NSA to mine and analyse information like never before. Each is trying to stay one step ahead of the other on the digital highway, and this tension may well define the future of the debate about privacy and confidentiality. But what happens if personal privacy no longer exists? And if all things stamped confidential are revealed? With a nod to Jack Nicholson as Colonel Jessup in A Few Good Men, can we handle the truth? 

Unfortunately, neither Snowden nor Assange will be able to join us. However, that shouldn’t stop us from asking ourselves how we feel about privacy and confidentially in the digital age, at both a personal and a geopolitical level.

We look forward to seeing you there!

You say you want a revolution…

A RE-CAP, AND A NIGHT CAP

April Fools Day, 2014

Our guest Prof. Oleg Kobtzeff opened the evening with an engaging history of the Ukrainian people that took us from the Middle Ages, when Tatars ruled and the Cossacks appeared, through the early and late twentieth century, focusing on Ukraine’s complicated relations with Russia, up until the collapse of the Soviet Union. He described post-Soviet Ukraine as a veritable Dodge City, where euphoria and freedom gave way to a general free-for-all and corruption.

With no strong leader (such as Putin) to establish a rule of law, the 2000s brought the Anti-Kuchma Revolt and the Orange Revolution, before climaxing with the events of this winter that spiraled into a larger geo-political crisis. It has entangled Russia, the United States, the EU and NATO, with ramifications for everything from the civil war in Syria to China sitting on the sidelines.

And then the hands went up!