By Katya Pollock (PO’21) In March 2019, the U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces announced that they had secured the last ISIS stronghold in Syria, the small town of Baghouz at the eastern border of the country. In the nearly five years since ISIS’s leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, first declared the creation of an Islamic caliphate, the group has controlled a territory as large as Great...
By Katya Pollock (PO ’21) On March 8th, Finland’s center-right coalition government, led by Prime Minister Juha Sipilä, resigned after failing to pass a promised reform of healthcare programs. A dramatic rise in the population’s old-age dependency ratio and recession-level labor force participation rates have tightened financial pressure on the country’s healthcare, pension, child-care, and...
By Katya Pollock (PO’21) Last month, an 11-year-old in Argentina underwent a procedure similar to a caesarian section after officials in the northwestern province of Tucumán obstructed her right to a legal interruption of pregnancy (ILE). The girl, addressed using the pseudonym Lucía, had allegedly been raped by her grandmother’s 65-year-old partner. The case comes less than a year after...
By Katya Pollock (PO’21) At the World Economic Forum held in Davos, Switzerland this January, Dutch historian Rutger Bregman shocked fellow panelists and audience members with his harsh criticism of philanthropic efforts to address inequality. Berman lambasted the global corporate elite for initiating “stupid philanthropy schemes” which, he argues, serve only to distract from the rich’s own...
By Katya Pollock (PO’21) In July 2018, 36 independent California colleges and universities signed an agreement to guarantee admission for California community college students who have completed at least 60 semester units in an eligible major. The agreement, called the Associate Degree for Transfer (ADT) Commitment, aims to reduce uncertainty for students entering community colleges who...
By Katya Pollock (PO ’21) The UN Committee on Torture published a report this Friday urging the Canadian government to launch an investigation into the involuntary sterilization of Indigenous women and girls. The report follows the filing of a class-action lawsuit representing 100 Indigenous Canadian women who allege that they were coerced or forced to undergo tubal litigation, a permanent...
Katya Pollock (PO ’21) This year’s midterm election results have proven historic for women: 117 female candidates, the most in U.S. history, have been elected to serve in either the House or the Senate. The wave of women legislators to Congress is supported by a dramatic increase in political donations made by women. With new women donors overwhelmingly leaning left, shifting donor...
By Katya Pollock (PO ’21) In 2014, the Chinese State Council announced that it would begin pursuing the establishment of an ambitious national credit scoring program. The “Social Credit System” aims to amalgamate previously fragmented data held by governmental agencies and private firms to establish a standardized credit score for individuals, businesses, nongovernmental organizations, and...
By Katya Pollock (PO ’21) The New York University School of Medicine recently announced that it would offer full-tuition scholarships to all current and future students, regardless of need or merit. The school’s associate dean of admissions and financial aid presented the new tuition plan as a move to improve the school’s economic accessibility: “what we want to do is level the playing...
