The Fractured Post-Global--"Prevent Regulatory Overreach from Turning Essential Companies into Targets" (PROTECT USA) Act of 2025"

 

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For years now, the European Union has been struggling to bring to legislative fruition its own Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive (CSDDD), which together with a number of other directives (eg, the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD), and the Taxonomy Regulation) was meant to produce a European version of a "smart mix of measures contemplated by the UN Guiding Principles for Business and Human Rights (UNGP Principle 3 Commentary). The object of all of this legislating was on its face quite straightforward--to develop an integrated system of  managing the way on which at least the largest European companies were to develop systems for preventing and mitigating adverse human rights impacts from comic activities with which they were connected and to address such adverse impacts where prevention and mitigation failed. The operationalization of this system was built around what the UNGP named "human rights due diligence" (HRDD).  Where the UNGP  developed its framework for HRDD as an expectation of enterprises operating in markets across borders (and thus grounded in a so-called social license to operate, roughly evoking the disciplinary mechanisms of markets, the UNGP also made clear that such HRDD strictures could be adapted to suit the times and made mandatory as part of a State's determination that  its own duty to protect human rights required the legalization of HRDD within its legal order.  In addition, the UNGP also noted that such an effort might be undertaken at the international level where the collective of States determined that such transposition of HRDD from market expectation to mandatory requirement might best be undertaken as a binding international legal obligation.

Less straightforward were a number of underlying development trajectories that made this project appealing (especially in Europe and among international elites). The first was a movement toward a more comprehensive public oversight of national and transnational activity. This converged with an emerging appetite toward compliance based systems of administrative oversight, which itself was meant to  transform the understanding of the relationship of private to public spheres. That understanding appeared to suggest a rethinking of the nature and purpose of economic activity from purely financial (the consensus element at least through the end of the first decade of the 21st century) to one that increasingly understood economic activity as an instrument for fulfilling public policy and objectives (within which financial objectives could also be realized). That shift moved especially European elites closer to MarxistLeninist approaches to both markets and economic activities as an instrument of politics (usually identified as public policy or public goals). All of thsi made sense in light of the increasing operation of States ads private actors in markets, and of the governmentalization of enterprises by delegating to them a host of  public objectives, the internalization fo which produced a managerial architecture within the largest forms that began to mirror of those the public administrative organs. Both, in turn, appeared to converge around a set of similar sensibilities.

All of this served as grist for the regulatory mill--at least in Europe.  The United States under both Democratic and Republic Party Presidents continued to privilege the markets driven HRDD framework. Socialist and Marxist-Leninist systems continued to privilege the alignment of core State objectives and ideologies of human rights (and sustainability) with national systems of incorporating both in corporate governance--usually centering in development as the core value. It was in Europe, with the active participation of States in Latin America and Africa, that the project of both national and transnational regulatory structures for mandatory HRDD took hold in ways that embedded the sensibilities and language of the UNGP and used it as a basis for expanding and refining its application. This produced the 2014 effort to concoct a binding international instrument for business and human rights (now including sustainability factors in one way or another), the roughly contemporaneous effort at national transposition (with local characteristics) in mostly European States of the UNGP HRDD framework as a mandatory legal requirement (with potentially significant extraterritorial effect), and lastly the efforts at regional convergence  through the legislative work (well underway since the second decade of the 21st century) for an EU transposition of UNGP HRDD as a mandatory measure with substantial extraterritorial effect.   

In a world generally committed to global convergence of norms and processes, extraterritorial effects  could be understood as instruments of that convergence.  It is in this sense that extraterritoriality, when driven by national application of international law or standards, for example, could be characterized as extra-national efforts rather than as national efforts to project national power or interests abroad.  What is being projected, at least theoretically, are international standards and norms in which all States have a similar interests.  All good. Except when it is not. And it is not when the spin that States give outwardly projected international standards and norms appear to all intents and purposes as a mask within which are national interests and sensibilities. The result can be national countermeasures from those States into which these legislative projects are projected. At least that may be the thinling of States that do not share the same perspectives of the State or international organs that seek to regulate in this way.

That, at its heart, appears to be the stance of at least one U.S. Senator, in the face of the "idea" of the CSDDD. In a Press Release, dated 12 March 2025, 

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United States Senator Bill Hagerty (R-TN), a member of the Senate Banking Committee, today introduced the Prevent Regulatory Overreach from Turning Essential Companies into Targets (PROTECT USA) Act of 2025, legislation to shield U.S. companies from the European Union’s (EU) harmful extraterritorial regulations.

* * *

The PROTECT USA Act extends Senator Hagerty’s record of opposing the CSDDD. In September 2024, Senator Hagerty and Representative Andy Barr (R-KY-06) sent a bicameral letter to the Biden-Harris Administration urging it to oppose the CSDDD. The following month, Senator Hagerty and Representative French Hill (R-AR-02) co-authored an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal that sounded the alarm on the EU’s regulatory encroachment. Most recently, Senator Hagerty joined a bicameral letter urging the Secretary of the Treasury and Director of the National Economic Council to address the CSDDD.

This follows a 26 February 2025 letter from Congressional leaders to President Trump urging the President to

1. Support European calls to indefinitely pause CSDDD.
2. Assert that CSDDD’s extraterritorial application is untenable and detrimental to global
productivity. European firms listing in the U.S. could also face similar regulatory exposure,
which may discourage transatlantic economic cooperation.
3. While Europe is free to create a hostile business climate for companies in their own
jurisdiction, to protect American companies, CSDDD’s Article 29 (civil liability) should be
removed from the Directive and not replicated in future EU regulations.
4. Clarify that U.S. companies are not bound by net zero transition plans akin to those imposed on EU firms. The U.S. has shifted its stance on climate commitments, and CSDDD’s Article 22 on mandatory transition plans should be abandoned. (Letter HERE)

None of this may matter, except as performative politics given the changing state of the European regulatory efforts and the potentially significant contestation of the  European regulatory model, at least in the context of business and human rights. The effort to slow down or reduce the impact of the European measures (the Omnibus) has caused a substantial challenge to what had been seen before the end of 2024 as an inevitable trajectory of European normative policy and administrative cultures that were effectively unstoppable. That no longer seems to be the case (eg here).

 

Just Published: v. 27 n. 67 (2025) Revista de Ciências da Administração

 

Happy to pass along the announcement of the publication of Volume 27(67) of the Revista de Ciências da Administração, the cover of which is of the Muro da Memória, created by Rodrigo de Haro and his assistant Idésio Leal, which is located in front of the Rector's building at UFSC.  

The focus of the issue is on the entrepreneur, social entrepreneurship and enterprise dexterity in the face of changing challenges. 

The table of contents with inks to the articles (all in Portuguese and English) follow below.

President Trump: "Restoring Equality of Opportunity and Meritocracy"--Intent, Effect, and Discrimination

 

 

Until today, the U.S. Justice Department has curated a fairly sophisticated judicial/administrative gloss on what it interpreted as the liability standards around what the U.S. Supreme Court elaborated a  generation or so ago as "disparate impact" as a basis for Title VII discrimination claims (Title VI, 42 U.S.C. § 2000d et seq.) claims. Title VII prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, color, and national origin in programs and activities receiving federal financial assistance).  The question, then, revolves around the focus of the discrimination analysis. The notion of proof of discrimination by evidence of disparate impact, that is by difference in effect from which the effect of discrimination might be found, was developed in the late 1960s and 1970s by the U.S. Supreme Court and then found its way into regulations (e.g., 40 C.F.R. § 7.35(b), (c) and 28 C.F.R. § 42.104(b)(2)).

The U.S. Justice Department described  its approach to disparate impact litigation this way:

Section VI discusses intentional discrimination or disparate treatment as one type of Title VI claim. Another type of Title VI violation is based on agency Title VI implementing regulations and is known as the disparate impact or discriminatory effects standard. While a discriminatory impact or effect may also be evidence of intentional discrimination or disparate treatment, this section discusses disparate impact as a cause of action independent of any intent.

The disparate impact regulations seek to ensure that programs accepting federal money are not administered in a way that perpetuates the repercussions of past discrimination. As the Supreme Court has explained, even benignly-motivated policies that appear neutral on their face may be traceable to the nation’s long history of invidious race discrimination in employment, education, housing, and many other areas. See Griggs v. Duke Power Co., 401 U.S. 424, 430–31 (1971); City of Rome v. United States, 446 U.S. 156, 176–77 (1980); Gaston Cty. v. United States, 395 U.S. 285, 297 (1969). The disparate impact regulations ensure “that public funds, to which all taxpayers of all races contribute, not be spent in any fashion which encourages, entrenches, subsidizes, or results in racial discrimination.” H.R. Misc. Doc. No. 124, 88th Cong., 1st Sess. 3, 12 (1963). The Supreme Court explained in Griggs, 401 U.S. at 429–30, that under Title VII, which was enacted at the same time as Title VI, “practices, procedures, or tests neutral on their face, and even neutral in terms of intent, cannot be maintained if they operate to ‘freeze’ the status quo of prior discriminatory employment practices.” Id. at 430; see also Texas Dep’t of Hour. & Cmty. Affairs v. Inclusive Communities, 135 S. Ct. 2507, 2521 (2015) (noting that “[r]ecognition of disparate impact claims is consistent with the [Fair Housing Act’s] central purpose” as it “was enacted to eradicate discriminatory practices within a sector of our Nation’s economy”) (citations omitted). The regulations task agencies to take a close look at neutral policies that disparately exclude minorities from benefits or services, or inflict a disproportionate share of harm on them.

 

A growing body of social psychological research has also reaffirmed the need for legal tools that address disparate impact. This research demonstrates that implicit bias against people of color remains a widespread problem.[1] Such bias can result in discrimination that federal agencies can prevent and address through enforcement of their disparate impact regulations. Because individual motives may be difficult to prove directly, Congress has frequently permitted proof of only discriminatory impact as a means of overcoming discriminatory practices. The Supreme Court has, therefore, recognized that disparate impact liability under various civil rights laws, “permits plaintiffs to counteract unconscious prejudices and disguised animus that escape easy classification as disparate treatment.” Id. at 2522.

 

In a disparate impact case, the investigation focuses on the consequences of the recipient’s practices, rather than the recipient’s intent. Lau v. Nichols, 414 U.S. 563, 568 (1974). As explained throughout this Section, “a plaintiff bringing a disparate-impact claim challenges practices that have a ‘disproportionately adverse effect on minorities’ and are otherwise unjustified by a legitimate rationale.” Inclusive Communities, 135 S. Ct. at 2513 (quoting Ricci v. DeStefano, 557 U.S. 557, 577 (2009). [2]

 

Twenty-six federal funding agencies have Title VI regulations that include provisions addressing the disparate impact or discriminatory effects standard. [3] (U.S. Dept of Justice  Title VI Legal Manual, Section VII: Proving Discrimination--Disparate Impact) 

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Disparate impact standards have been the subject of a lively debate (see, e.g., here, here, here, here, and here) in academic and media circles. The Trump Administration is not an advocate of disparate impact as a standard for proof of discrimination. President Trump sought to challenge the use of disparate impact during his first Presidency (see, e.g., here and here). That antipathy has carried over to President Trump's second term. Some members of the Trump Administration have expressed the view that intent ought to be a necessary element of a discrimination claim. Toward the end of President Biden's leadership some courts also began to chip away at the principle. On August 22, 2024, the US District Court for the District of Louisiana enjoined the Justice Department from  imposing or enforcing its disparate impact requirements under Title VI and more specifically from “enforcing the Title VI disparate-impact requirements contained in 40 C.F.R. § 7.35(b), (c) and 28 C.F.R. § 42.104(b)(2)" (Louisiana v. US EPA (Case 2:23-cv-00692-JDC-TPL  08/22/24; US DOJ Discussion HERE). 

Now President Trump has entered the field. He issued on 23 April 2025 an Executive Order, Restoring Equality of Opportunity and Meritocracy the objective of which is to eliminate disparate impact for the lexicon of anti-discrimination in the United States. The object was not to abandon anti-discrimination goals bit to re-frame it in a way that his political opponents will likely find less than satisfactory. In place of "effects"--the functionalist approach to jurisprudence that was the hallmark of a generation or more of high level jurists and their supporters in academia and government--Mr. Trump would use a formalist approach, one grounded in textual neutrality and more importantly, on intent. He rejects the normative underpinnings of a test that finds intent a matter of indifference and instead focuses on "effects" or consequences of any act--thus not the individual but the consequence, a form, perhaps, of strict liability  in which the instrument of the harm is burdened with the remedial obligation. Article 1 of the Executive Order makes Mr. Trump's case for the change:

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A bedrock principle of the United States is that all citizens are treated equally under the law. This principle guarantees equality of opportunity, not equal outcomes. It promises that people are treated as individuals, not components of a particular race or group. It encourages meritocracy and a colorblind society, not race- or sex-based favoritism. Adherence to this principle is essential to creating opportunity, encouraging achievement, and sustaining the American Dream. But a pernicious movement endangers this foundational principle, seeking to transform America’s promise of equal opportunity into a divisive pursuit of results preordained by irrelevant immutable characteristics, regardless of individual strengths, effort, or achievement. A key tool of this movement is disparate-impact liability, which holds that a near insurmountable presumption of unlawful discrimination exists where there are any differences in outcomes in certain circumstances among different races, sexes, or similar groups, even if there is no facially discriminatory policy or practice or discriminatory intent involved, and even if everyone has an equal opportunity to succeed. Disparate-impact liability all but requires individuals and businesses to consider race and engage in racial balancing to avoid potentially crippling legal liability. It not only undermines our national values, but also runs contrary to equal protection under the law and, therefore, violates our Constitution.  (Restoring Equality of Opportunity and Meritocracy).

 The tension between functional (effects) and formal (text, intent) approaches is very old in the U.S.. American judges tend to slip between them as the jurisprudence. There is no magic here--just choice--not jurisprudence but policy choice clothed in thee vagaries of the interpretive authority of courts. The question presented is not precisely textual but political: What is it that the political establishment intended for the nation as the baseline approach to protecting against discrimination.  On the one hand, the nation can choose to treat discrimination as essentially grounded in intent to discriminate.. The environment in which these choices are made (to discriminate or not to discriminate) may produce other fields of political action (or agitation) in favor of consequential policies.   But law need not start from the political determination that discrimination is personal (the way crimes are personal) and not collective, and that its adverse impacts must be remedies by reference to the acts that were propelled by intent to harm. Instead the law can start from the proposition that discrimination is actually not personal but collective--or systemic, and further that the object of anti-discrimination laws is not focused on the autonomous individual (who in any case might be re-educated if the political society wishes and compels), but that the measure of discrimination its its negative impact, for which the odd individual is merely an instrument (who ought to be punished as well perhaps) but who, in a sense does not need to have agency to cause what would in any case be caused. Thus, with disparate impact, the individual becomes an instrument (like a hammer), but the predicate for a finding of discrimination is the impact irrespective of any agency of the individual intended to or directed for the purpose of causing harm.  Either works, but each is sourced in quite distinctive ways of approaching both discrimination and in defining the object f protection against it.  That is bit an eddy in the much larger conceptual battles between the effect of an act or the intent to do the act ought to constitute the predicate around which a remedial obligation can be built. And that difference is not jurisprudential at its root--it might better be understood as fundamentally political.

The text of the Executive Order follows.

"Urbi et Orbi", the Final Message of Francis Delivered at Easter 2025; Text and Brief Reflections

 

 

The man Jorge Mario Bergoglio, who took the name Francis on his election to the bishopric of Rome and as pontifex maximus, died in the early hours of 21 April 2025, that is, his spirit then left a body no longer capable of sustaining physical life. He leaves us his last "Urbi et Orbi", delivered for him hours before he passed. It is reproduced below, and may be accessed in a variety of languages from the Vatican website HERE. 

It is a fitting last text for the pontiff. At its most poignant, its text aligns the Christian notions of the passion, death, and resurrection of Jesus (as history, theology, and reality framing signification) with that of humanity. But these, he reminds us, are out of kilter. Where Easter has come and with it the marker of what Christians believes is the resurrection of Jesus, humanity remains in its patior, its condition of enduring, bearing, suffering. That is a condition, it was thought, from out of which the resurrection offered a pathway to something better, to life, Francis suggests, over death. Yet it seems, and in keeping with the choices  made constantly on the human plane, the "great thirst for death, for killing, we witness each day in the many conflicts raging in different parts of our world" continues to overcome this possibility of life. This leaves Francis at the end where her started at the beginning of his ministry--with wonder at the choice, given the alternative, and with the possibility of offering no more than hope--"That hope is not an evasion, but a challenge; it does not delude, but empowers us." That is the hope that empowered the life and the ministry of Jorge Mario Bergoglio, the man. And it is the hope that brought him, as it has his predecessors, to the refuge of hope.   Réquiem æternam dona ei, Dómine. Et lux perpétua lúceat ei. . . . Anima ejus, . . . per misericórdiam Dei requiéscant in pace.

Academic Business and Human Rights Workshop (RMIT City Campus Melbourne 26-27 August 2025) Information and CfP

I am delighted to pass along this CfP for the Academic Business and Human Rights Workshop to be held at RMIT City Campus Melbourne 26-27 August 2025. Information follows:

The inaugural UN Business and Human Rights Regional Forum: Australia and New Zealand (the Forum) will bring together a broad range of stakeholders to strengthen business practices and connect on how businesses manage value chains across our region.

Attendees from government, business, investment, the education sector and civil society will gather to discuss key trends and developments in the business and human rights landscape in our region and globally.

The UN Global Compact Network Australia is proud to be a co-organiser of the UN Business and Human Rights Regional Forum – Australia and New Zealand in collaboration with the UN Working Group on Business and Human Rights, RMIT University’s Business and Human Rights Centre, Macquarie University B&HR Access to Justice Lab and UNSW Australian Human Rights Institute.

RMIT Business and Human Rights Centre (BHRIGHT) is playing host – but it is a team effort to pull this off! We are co-organising the Forum in collaboration with the UN Working Group on Business and Human Rights, UN Global Compact Network Australia, Macquarie University’s B&HR Access to Justice Lab and the Australian Human Rights Institute, UNSW Sydney. The Forum’s website – where further details will be added in the coming weeks and months is: https://unbhrforumanz.org/ You can also sign up there to receive updates.

Reflections on Xia Baolong (夏宝龙) Speech delivered at the Opening Ceremony of the 2025 National Security Education Day in the Hong Kong SAR 15 April 2025-- Ensuring High-quality Development with High-level Security Continuously Composing a New Chapter in the Practice of "One Country, Two Systems" (以高水平安全护航高质量发展 不断谱写“一国两制”实践新篇章)

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If one could reduce the impassioned speech of Xia Baolong (夏宝龙), Director of the Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office, delivered at the Opening Ceremony of the 2025 National Security Education Day in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region on 15 April 2025 and entitled Ensuring High-quality Development with High-level Security Continuously Composing a New Chapter in the Practice of "One Country, Two Systems" (以高水平安全护航高质量发展 不断谱写“一国两制”实践新篇章), it would be this:

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Currently, the practice of "One country, Two systems" has entered a new stage. The good situation in Hong Kong today has come at a great cost and should be treasured. We must consolidate and develop this good situation. However, the struggle is not yet over. Although the social situation in Hong Kong appears calm on the surface, there are still undercurrents, and the security situation remains very grave and complex. Those who are opposed to China and attempt to destabilize Hong Kong have not yet been eliminated. Some have fled abroad to make trouble, while others have whitewashed themselves and disguised as ordinary people, hiding and waiting for opportunities to stir up trouble in Hong Kong. Many people still have confused ideas, some sympathize with those who are opposed to China and attempt to destabilize Hong Kong , some justify them, and some admire, fear, worship, or fantasize about the U.S. Some people believe that as long as the economy develops, there will be no security issues. However, this is a typical case of burying one's head in the sand and deceiving oneself. In fact, countless examples demonstrate that wealth does not always bring security, prosperity or sustainability. Without security, how could Hong Kong have gone through the journey from chaos to governance? Without security, how could Hong Kong have gone through the journey from governance to greater prosperity? Without security, how could Hong Kong have a bright future? We must face the problems related to the development and security in Hong Kong, be vigilant and stay united. Every individual, group, enterprise and organization needs to work together with Hong Kong compatriots and all Chinese people to defend Hong Kong and the country, ensure high-quality development with high-level security, and promote the steady and sustained practice of "One country, Two systems".

當前，「一國兩制」實踐進入了新階段。香港今天的良好局面來之殊為不易，是付出了巨大代價的，大家要倍加珍惜，把這個良好局面鞏固住、發展好。現在，鬥爭並沒有結束。香港社會面看似平靜，實則暗流湧動，安全形勢仍然十分嚴峻複雜。反中亂港分子並沒有被消滅，有些逃到國外興風作浪，有些撕下額頭上的標籤，偽裝成普通市民，隱匿在社會人群中伺機禍亂香港。不少人還有糊塗的想法，同情反中亂港分子者有之，為反中亂港分子開脫者有之，媚美、恐美、崇美、幻美者有之。有的人認為只要經濟發展了，就沒有安全問題了，這是典型的掩耳盜鈴、自欺欺人。事實上，富而不安、富而不強、富而不長的例子比比皆是。沒有安全哪來的香港由亂到治？沒有安全哪來的香港由治及興？沒有安全哪來的香港美好明天？大家要正視香港發展和安全面臨的問題，提高警惕、團結一致，每個人、每個社團、每個企業、每個組織，都要與香港同胞一道、與全國人民一起，保衛香港、保衛國家，打造高水平安全護航高質量發展，推進「一國兩制」實踐行穩致遠。

The importance of this portion of the remarks cannot be underestimated, but not for its rhetorical flourishes, though they do provide a moment of interest in the linguistic turns of articulating state policy and intention. But all of this was anticipated at the start of the 2019 turmoil, during which, and almost from the start, the Hong Kong and Macao Affairs Office took the line that only finds refinement in the speech by its Director today (Discussed Larry Catá Backer Hong Kong Between One Country and Two Systems (2021) Chapter 20: Open-Shut (bai he 稗閤) Strategies: 习近平;止暴制乱 恢复秩序是香港当前最紧迫的任务 [Xi Jinping; Stopping the storm and restoring order is Hong Kong’s most urgent task at present] pp. 255-262).  

What is now more evident is the conflation of anti-chaos strategies and the national security architecture, and with that the closer alignment between the national security architecture and the constitution of "One Country Two Systems." In other words, Official Xia has bluntly restated a proposition that has been more elegantly developed since 2020--that the privileges of "two systems" is entirely dependent on the proper functioning of the national security architecture; that this national security architecture can be understood as a legalized (and bureaucratized) manifestation of the "One Country" principle, and that the One Country principle determines the extent to which it is possible to realize "two systems" within Hong Kong.  Underlying all of this is the continuation of the great patriotic campaigns in Hong Kong in which the elements  of  the fundamentals of the people's democratic dictatorship serve as the framework for the remedial operation of the security apparatus--democracy for patriots, dictatorship for the rest (Mao Zedong, On the People's Democratic Dictatorship  (1949) ("The combination of these two aspects, democracy for the people and dictatorship over the reactionaries, is the people's democratic dictatorship.")). That is both fairly straightforward and easy to understand--"One Country" politically, "two systems" economically." The corollary, of course, is that foreigners have deliberately blinded themselves to this reality, one that has been made quite clear since 2019. That leaves wide open, though, the "as applied" questions--these also touch on the relationship between a national security architecture and the characteristics of "two systems" in the constitution and operation of all facets of life in Hong Kong as applied within its legal, economic, and governmental structures. Only foreigners appear to have failed to have gotten that message.  Perhaps both the bluntness and the speed of the official translation into English were meant to drive home that point.  Having said that, however, foreign powers can respond as they like--including by ramping up their programs of sanctions and propaganda in ways that may further their own interests now may easier by the deliver of the Chinese text.

And that leaves the economic sphere at the very center of the manifestation of "two systems" within the "One Country" principle--especially where, under Marxist-Leninist New Era theory, the separation between politics and economic activity is closely aligned with the CPC Basic Line as expressed in policy. That is, that economic activity is a complement to and the expression of the evolution of public policy in the field of economic activity, and that the variety of forms of economic activity permitted  are both an acknowledgement of the requirements of a united front approach in the formative stages of the Socialist path, and in the longer run a stage in the development of a socialist economy. Official Xia also explained that connection at the end of his speech: 

We believe that the business community and entrepreneurs can make Hong Kong their home, build their businesses, and contribute to both Hong Kong and the country with more practical actions. In the magnificent development history of Hong Kong, many world-renowned enterprises and entrepreneurs have emerged, taking concrete actions to build Hong Kong and serve the country, writing a vivid picture of patriotism and love for Hong Kong, and becoming business legends. In the current situation where the United States is exerting extreme pressure on us, there is a greater need for entrepreneurs to build and take root in Hong Kong with a strong resolve. It is hoped that Hong Kong's business community and entrepreneurs will continue to play a leading role in driving economic development, carry forward the fine tradition of patriotism and love for Hong Kong, correctly understand the relationship between their own enterprises and the development of both Hong Kong and the nation, and always uphold righteousness and never forget national interests.

我们相信，工商界和企业家定能以港为家、倚港兴业，用更有力的实际行动建设香港、贡献国家。在香港波澜壮阔的发展史上，涌现出一大批世界知名的企业和企业家，用实干兴港、实业报国，书写了爱国爱港的生动画卷，也成就了让人津津乐道的商业传奇。在当前美国对我们极限打压的形势下，更需要企业家以“烈火金刚”的坚强品质建设香港、扎根香港。希望香港工商界和企业家继续发挥推动经济发展主力军作用，赓续爱国爱港优良传统，正确认识自身事业与香港发展、与国家发展的关系，永远不舍大义、不忘国家利益。

 What ought to be remarkable is the alignment of the contemporary view of the state of Hong Kong SAR with that of the People's Republic in the first decade after its establishment in 1949, and especially the dynamic element in Mao Zedong's New Democracy theory.  First one recalls the fundamental framework established before the establishment of the People's Republic--Mao Zedong, On New Democracy (January 1940). 

In the new-democratic republic under the leadership of the proletariat, the state enterprises will be of a socialist character and will constitute the leading force in the whole national economy, but the republic will neither confiscate capitalist private property in general nor forbid the development of such capitalist production as does not "dominate the livelihood of the people", for China's economy is still very backward. * * * China's economy must develop along the path of the "regulation of capital" and the "equalization of landownership", and must never be "privately owned by the few"; we must never permit the few capitalists and landlords to "dominate the livelihood of the people"; we must never establish a capitalist society of the European-American type or allow the old semi-feudal society to survive. Whoever dares to go counter to this line of advance will certainly not succeed but will run into a brick wall. * * * Such is the economy of New Democracy.And the politics of New Democracy [peoples democratic dictatorship] are the concentrated expression of the economy of New Democracy. * * * Everybody knows that the Communist Party has an immediate and a future programme, a minimum and a maximum programme, with regard to the social system it advocates. For the present period, New Democracy, and for the future, socialism; these are two parts of an organic whole, guided by one and the same communist ideology.

One Country, Two Systems might then be understood both as a mirroring of the initial approach to the amalgamation of patriotic forces (in Hong Kong through the national security apparatus) sensitive to the need for variation in the movement toward a unified socialist, then then communist, economics. This notion of systemic variability as a starting point for the eventual unification of forces on the socialist path is refined in Mao Zedong's gloss on New Democracy in 1953:

The Right deviation manifests itself in three remarks:

"Firmly establish the new-democratic social order." That's a harmful formulation. In the transition period changes are taking place all the time and socialist factors are emerging every day. How can this "new-democratic social order" be "firmly established"? It would be very difficult indeed to "establish" it "firmly"! For instance, private industry and commerce are being transformed, and if an order is "established" in the second half of the year, it will no longer hold "firm" next year. And changes are taking place in mutual aid and co-operation in agriculture from year to year too. The period of transition is full of contradictions and struggles. Our present revolutionary struggle is even more profound than the revolutionary armed struggle of the past. It is a revolution that will bury the capitalist system and all other systems of exploitation once and for all. The idea, "Firmly establish the new-democratic social order", goes against the realities of our struggle and hinders the progress of the socialist cause * * * We have proposed a step-by-step transition to socialism. This is a better formulation. When we say "step-by-step", we mean that the steps are to be spread out over fifteen years and over the twelve months in each year. Going too fast means erring to the "Left", standing still means erring too much to the Right. We must oppose "Left" and Right deviations and make a step-by-step transition until the whole process is completed.(Mao Zedong, "Refute Right Deviationist Views that Depart From the General [Basic] Line" (June 15, 1953) [Part of a speech at a meeting of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party. Here Comrade Mao Tsetung refuted the Right opportunist views, such as "firmly establish the new-democratic social order", put forward by Liu Shao-chi and others.]

The object, then, is the transition to socialism. The pragmatic realities, for now, is the utility of "two systems" in the service of revolutionary progress and the eventual realization of the Chinese Dream and with it the forward movement toward communism--for all of China. The emphasis then, and now under One Country Two Systems is the same--a necessary transition, one the timing of which is determined by both internal and external factors. And then all of this is bound up in a system differentiating reworking of the fundamental ordering premise of the State system--peoples democratic dictatorship. Official Xia might have been more elegant, but perhaps his audience expected the discursive approach he took.

*       *       *

Pix credit here

But the most provocative, and perhaps the least interesting part of the speech will receive greater attention, if only because it reduces both Chinese and American senior officials to the discourse of toddlers for the amusements of the press organs and their masses:

Pix credit here (Peasant Comrades Temper Your bodies Well)

  It is also a pipe dream for external forces to try to delay or even interrupt the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation and bring us back to the tragic situation of being trampled upon. Washington's repeated attempts to suppress Hong Kong will only accelerate the demise of its proxies in Hong Kong which will ultimately backfire on itself. Let those American peasants wail before the 5,000-year-old civilization of the Chinese nation!

外部勢力妄圖遲滯甚至中斷中華民族偉大復興，讓我們回到過去任人宰割的悲慘境地，那是癡心妄想！美國一而再、再而三對香港進行遏制打壓，換來的只能是其在香港的代理人的加速滅亡，最終必將反噬其自身。讓美國那些「鄉巴佬們」在中華民族五千年文明面前去哀鳴吧！

Of course, discursively it is likely that such a response was necessary after the American Vice President Vance chose to characterize  the financial relations between the United States and China in colorful and provocative ways:  "Vance, appearing on Fox News just weeks ago, had a lot to say about the effects of globalization. But it was one phrase that drew the most attention: 'We borrow money from Chinese peasants to buy the things that Chinese peasants manufacture.'” (Economic Times). The BBC Chinese edition noted the connection (here).

Vance, appearing on Fox News just weeks ago, had a lot to say about the effects of globalization. But it was one phrase that drew the most attention:

“We borrow money from Chinese peasants to buy the things that Chinese peasants manufacture.”

Read more at:
https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/international/us/china-trolls-jd-vance-over-chinese-peasants-remark-retaliates-with-125-tariffs-on-u-s-goods-amid-growing-trade-tensions/articleshow/120383599.cms?utm_source=contentofinterest&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=cppst

Pix Credit here (Hongwu Emperor)

Part of the problem, of course, at least on the American side, is that the American Vice President might no longer adhere to the old rules that separated the sort of speech that one reserved for peers (social, economic, political, status, etc.) at cocktail parties and similar events, and the formal speech meant to be projected  to a wider audience. Of course that sort of speech in peer contexts is critically important discourse within that group--it suggests membership in a status group and an affirmation of the belief in a shared way of understanding the approach of that status caste to its responsibilities, superiority and powers. Part of it reflects a strong shift in the discursive rules of the American political elite who distinguish themselves from the disobedient masses by similar terms--the "basket of deplorables (here); or more recently describing elements of the polity as garbage (here). Yet one must consider whether that meant for internal or external consumption, or was the Vice President persisting in quite another agenda? The other part of the problem, from the Chinese side, is that a communist revolution founded on the backs of peasants and the proletariat ought perhaps to have  a little more pride in both the working class and the peeasants. Indeed, Chinese history owes much to its peasants, for example, the Hongwu Emperor of Ming Zhu Yuanzhang. Official Xia might have been more careful about joining his American counterparts in  insulting peasants in this backhanded way. Indeed, from a Marxist-Leninist perspective, one might have treated the Vice President's purported insult as a great complement, and a sig of both the power and wealth of a peasantry that could only be possible under the leadership of a communist vanguard.  But perhaps Official Xia has a different view.

Whatever the psychology or strategy, the episode provided a moment of naughty delight, of course, for people who enjoy officially sponsored reality TV style discourse. And it provided a moment's relief from the realities that the current global political class has found unusually impossible to either grasp or resolve. Still, perhaps more important was this other bit of provocation tit for tat--a contemporary updating of the rhetoric of China's 19th century troubles and its overturning through the contemporary rhetoric of rejuvenation: 

It is extremely naive to think that you can gain peace, respect and development by fawning on the United States, kneeling before the United States and begging for mercy from the United States. Everyone should give up the illusion. The so-called "sanctions" and "reciprocal tariffs" of the United States cannot shake the determination and will of the central government and the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region government, nor can they scare the 1.4 billion Chinese people, including Hong Kong compatriots. They will only make us more determined to unite and more firmly safeguard national security and Hong Kong's prosperity and stability. Victory must belong to the great Chinese people!

如果以为向美国献媚、向美国跪低、向美国求饶，就能够换来和平、换来尊重、换来发展，那是极其幼稚的。大家要丢掉幻想。美国所谓“制裁”和“对等关税”，撼动不了中央政府和香港特别行政区政府的决心意志，吓不倒包括香港同胞在内的14亿中国人民，只会让我们更加坚定地团结在一起，更加坚定地维护国家安全和香港繁荣稳定。胜利一定属于伟大的中国人民！

 After all, who in China today wants to be perceived as playing or reprising the role of the Dowager empress Cixi (慈禧); rejuvenation has its mandatory discursive tropes, and no official would be foolish enough not to perform them on a national or international stage. But, the heroics of the discursive tropes and the now well worn embrace of the Late Qing as a sort of experiential urtext can also backfire--suggesting anxiety about the triumph of revolutionary Chinese Marxist-Leninism as much as it suggests a triumphalist swagger. In this context, perhaps, it is a necessary dollop of swagger at a time of critical global change essential for internal consumption and the reassurance of the masses; externally it might be read a different way.  But that is not Official Xia's problem; it ought to be for those who were responsible for approving the text of the remarks.  And yet the remarks, coming from Official Xia rather than someone else, might well have been the message and the messenger for a conversation among leadership cores to which we are not privy.

Liberal Democratic Leninism in the Era of Artificial Intelligence and Tech Driven Social Progress: Remarks by Director Kratsios at the Endless Frontiers Retreat and "The Golden Age of American Innovation"

 

Pix credit: Generated by ChatGPT (tech innovation bending space and time under the direction of political leaders)

 The White House has posted a quite interesting speech delivered 14 April 2025 by Michael John Kratsios (Princeton University and a managing director at Scale AI, and Mr. Trump's  chief technology officer during the 1st Trump Administration) and entitled "The Goldern Age of American Innovation--Remarks by Director Kratsios at the Endless Frontiers Retreat."This was an important speech for Mr. Kratsios, one designed to set the tone for his role as the head the White House’s Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) (reported in The Hill here). The speech was reported in Fortune this fairly conventional way:

In his first public remarks since his Senate confirmation, Donald Trump’s newly-confirmed director of tech and science policy, Michael Kratsios, accused the Biden Administration of leading with a “spirit of fear” and laid out a plan for how America could do “more with less” over the next four years. * * * In emphasizing a commitment to the deregulation of business, Kratsios said the “chief barrier” to supersonic aircraft, high-speed rail or flying cars has been a “regulatory regime opposed to innovation and development.” But, he said, another focus of the Trump administration will be making “smart choices” and being “more creative” around how the government allocates its public research and development dollars. * * * Kratsios said the government could make use of prizes, advanced market commitments, and fast and flexible grants like those used during COVID, to multiply the impact of government-funded research and quicken the research process. * * * What Kratsios didn’t mention was how he plans to navigate these academia partnerships as the Trump administration simultaneously cuts grants to universities and makes sweeping cuts across various agencies, including to science departments. (Fortune)

 The remarks are worth reading for what they are--an expression of the aspirational operational coding of his function within the bureaucracy. Nonetheless, the remarks may be of far greater interest for the foundational structural premises and worldview on which they are based.  The following reflections on Mr. Kratsios speech is divided into 8 parts: 1. The Mimetic Character of the Marching Orders; 2. The Mimetic Narrative of Objective, Mimicry as a Return to a Golden Age; 3. Renewal through innovation-modernization; 4. Protecting the Productive Masses Along the American Path Against the Corruption of Left Error; 5. The First American Sutra: We are Capable of So Much More; 6. The Structures of American Modernization;  7. The borders of the Golden Age State Must be Protected; and 8.  The Second American Sutra: There is No Substitute for Victory.

1. The Mimetic Character of the Marching Orders. Mr. Kratsios' remarks ought to be read in the shadow of President Trump's 26 March 2025 "A Letter to Michael Kratsios, Director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy," also posted to the White House website. It also follows below. The marching orders are fascinating if only because of its mimetic character; the President replays the origin story of the last golden age transformation that (sort of) worked--that of President Roosevelt near the end of his leadership, the institutional structures of which, of course, President Trump means to demolish. What is to be saved, though, are the narratives of tech. 

"The triumphs of the last century did not happen by chance. As World War II drew towards a close, President Franklin D. Roosevelt wrote a letter like this one to his science and technology advisor, Vannevar Bush, charging him to explore new frontiers of the mind for the sake of national greatness and pioneer science in peacetime. . . So, just as FDR tasked Vannevar Bush, I am tasking you with meeting the challenges below to deliver for the American people" (A Letter to Michael Kratsios).

The interesting thing here, among others, is the sort of liberal democratic Leninism that also marked Mr. Trump's golden age as engineered by the democratic Party, its leadership and its "brain trust" in the 1930s-40s:  state leadership of strategic economic development towards specific ends for which the market will served as both incubator (and risk bearer) and operational level apparatus for the realization of state policy. At its edges, it is hard to distinguish this from the fundamental premises of Chinese 3rd Plenum articulations of socialist modernization (e.g. here) but with American characteristics. And the framing questions that serve as direction?:

First: How can the United States secure its position as the unrivaled world leader in critical and emerging technologies — such as artificial intelligence, quantum information science, and nuclear technology — maintaining our advantage over potential adversaries?

Second: How can we revitalize America’s science and technology enterprise — pursuing truth, reducing administrative burdens, and empowering researchers to achieve groundbreaking discoveries?

Third: How can we ensure that scientific progress and technological innovation fuel economic growth and better the lives of all Americans?  (A Letter to Michael Kratsios).

Who better to approach these questions from the perspective and interests of the state than the person who might well had a hand in the formulation of both question and preferred approach during the 1st Administration of President Trump, when "we made unprecedented advances in America’s scientific and technological leadership." (Ibid.).

2. The Mimetic Narrative of Objective, Mimicry as a Return to a Golden Age.  Return is necessarily mimetic--it is not just a striving for time traveling back to the past to pick up where  a point of interruption occurred, but also to bring forward the lebneswelt of that time before the interruption. In this case the interruption of the Democratic Party Administration of President Biden and his apparatus of "error" and "deviation." One gets back on the path--not China's Socialist path toward the establishment of a communist society, but the American Path toward "the Golden Age of American Innovation" and progress toward where ever it is that Progress takes us. Mr. Kratsios starts with the invocation of a narrative trope--"the renewal of our nation" (Remarks by Director Kratsios)-- that is almost indistinguishable from a core element of contemporary Chinese policy/principle, “中华民族伟大复兴” the great rejuvenaiton of the Chinese nation tied to what General Secretary Xi had embedded in the more general concept of the Chinese Dream. The resonance between the Chinese and American political elites at least in this respect is unavoidable. Both speak in terms of recovering past glory and returning both states to the proper pathway toward the realization of national perfection. The only difference, and it is a big one, appears to be the path toward perfection--the Chinese socialist path and the American path toward its golden age do not appear to converge at any point (at least as theory) though their objects in terms of national welfare are similar. Renewal is as strong a discursive element of the Trump Administration as it appears to be under the leadership of Xi Jinping. 

3. Renewal through innovation-modernization. In the current era of American historical development, Mr. Kratsios tells us, it is necessary to focus on innovation within the leading fields of economic development.  "I know, and I think you know, too, that such a renewal will require the reinvigoration of American science and industry. Over the last few decades, America has become complacent, forgetting old dreams of building a wondrous future." (Remarks by Director Kratsios). Again, there is a looking back and a springing forward--a return to the ways of thinking of an earlier era ("American pioneer spirit still seeks the exploration of endless frontiers" Ibid.) the pathways of which were disrupted through corruption and misdirection.  And that pathway is marked by the objects that evidence a modernizing  embrace of innovation, and is as inevitable as the Socialist Path toward communism; it is, in Mr. Krastsios' words, a manifested destiny that is unavoidable even in the face of corruption and dangerous deviation ("our technologies, and what we do with them, will be the tools with which we will make the destiny of our country manifest in this century." Id.). And also, like the socialist path is inextricably linked to politics--and therefor to a proper alignment of public power and mass innovative capacity: 

Yet this American hope in the possibility of progress and the power of science and technology does not allow builders and innovators to retreat from politics. Indeed, quite the opposite, which is what brings me here today. A Golden Age is only possible if we choose it. (Remarks by Director Kratsios).

The convergence isn't one of ideology; far from it. But it suggests a convergence of form and objective within quite distinctive cognitive cages. These conceptual cages (the systems for collective shraed meaning and the baseline rationalization of the world through principles of perceiving and knowing) are similarly constructed, and the way in which such cages, when fully articulated, provide the forms, structures, frameworks and approaches both for rationalizing collective challenge, to articulate collective objectives, and to operationalize the principles around which the rationalization of collective realities are structured.  Mr. Kratsios has nicely deployed  the central elements of the American imaginary and pointed it toward quite specific ends which, given his reading, are unavoidable and inevitable if the U.S. is to realize its promise.  But. . . .and this is a big but and the focus of the rest of the remarks--to those ends the masses must be organized ("only possible if we choose it)" within the parameters for such mass management compatible with the American political-economic model-.

4. Protecting the Productive Masses Along the American Path Against the Corruption of Left Error. One way of shining a light on the correct path is to identify error.  And in the case of the United States since 2016 that has become an easier proposition as  its elites have divided themselves, at least at the level of official discourse, between the discursive vision articulated by the Obama-Biden Administrations, and that of the 1st Trump Administration.  For those who hold to the Trump path, the Obama-Biden vision  is painted as the archetype of "left error." For the Obama-Biden camp, the Trump Administration is the epitome of "right error."  The political language is of course much more intemperate, each drawing by analogy on earlier examples of  the apotheosis of  these errors  by invoking the worst characteristics of  the totalitarian regimes of the first half of the 20th century. Mr. Kratsios does not do that; instead he invokes the more traditional and moderate language of error in its theological and perhaps ideological senses, as a deviation which if uncorrected can imperil the immortal soul of the nation. The error is all the more threatening because the masses are free to be guided either toward the light or into darkness in every generation.

There is nothing predestined about technological progress and scientific discovery. They require the efforts and energies of men and women, the collective choice for order and truth over disorder and opinion. The last century was called the American Century, as—despite wars and domestic conflict—the United States stood at the forefront of science and technology, building the future.* * * Today we fight to restore that inheritance. As the failure of the Biden administration’s “small yard, high fence” approach makes clear, it is not enough to seek to protect America’s technological lead. We also have a duty to promote American technological leadership. * * * Stagnation was a choice. We have weighed down our builders and innovators. The well-intentioned regulatory regime of the 1970s became an ever-tightening ratchet, first hampering America’s ability to become a net-energy exporter and then making it harder and harder to build.* * * But we are capable of so much more. (Remarks by Director Kratsios).

Most interesting, perhaps, is the recognition that in a political-economic system driven by markets (understood as the aggregation over time of the individual choices and decisions of autonomous individuals with collective and political-social consequences) some sort of guidance is needed; and that guidance must come, in some form and with whatever level of accommodation is can tolerate, of the core of leadership of the political order.  That is, that the operating system must be coded, and that this operating system, grounded in the choices that give it  form, direction, and analytical power (what is preferred over what is to be avoided) is inherently both collective and political.

5. The First American Sutra: We are Capable of So Much More. Mr. Kratsios very briefly suggests the outlines of operational innovation--the forms that new or high quality productivity will both produce on on which it will move the U.S. to the next stage of its historical development. "Our technologies permit us to manipulate time and space. They leave distance annihilated, cause things to grow, and improve productivity." (Remarks by Director Kratsios). These will be deployed, Mr. Kratsios reminds us, quoting Vice President Vance, toward goals that are meant, in part, to improve the lives of the working masses: "of extending human ability so that more people can do more, and, more meaningful work"(Ibid.). But the fundamental distinction between the correct path and left error now becomes clear in the light of advancing productivity--left error "borrows from the future," the correct path requires "doing more with less"--that is both a fundamentally curious approach to sustainability, and a hint of the objectives of technological innovation within the parameters of the Trumpian golden age ideology. But note the key element here--it is not that innvation has ceased, it is that innovation has gone underground, to other places, or is otherwise misdirected, where direction ought to come from the political-policy center (the latter point one that both the Trump and Obama-Biden visions share): "Advances have not stopped, but something has gone wrong." (Ibid.).

6. The Structures of American Modernization. If, as Mr. Kratsios suggests, the American ideological operating system requires direction (its coders and quality control functionaries) , and that this direction is both collective and political, then analysis can narrow down to the precise expression of that guidance in any stage of national historical development. Here Mr. Kratsios gets down to some directional detail: 

"Our first assignment is to secure America’s preeminence in critical and emerging technologies. This administration will ensure that our nation remains the leader in the industries of the future with a strategy of both promotion and protection—protecting our greatest assets and promoting our greatest innovators. (Remarks by Director Kratsios)

Market driven innovation has political consequences, those consequences are the responsibility of the political hierarchy, the apex hierarchs have a responsibility for developing policy (mandatory and nudging) as a current expression and application of core principles bent toward the realization of ultimate goals. Here the political goal is to shape the market, and the direction of individual or private, activities within it, toward a metrics accessible (assuming agreement on the principles on which the metrics are based and the forms of measurement) goal--(1) preeminence, in (2) critical and emerging, (3) tech, (4) built around, (5)industries of the future, (6) through a national political strategy , (7) of promotion and protection, of (8) the critical factors of its production. It is in this objective that the failures of "left error" become most apparent to Mr. Kratsios:

To the degree it even tried to accomplish this, the Biden administration failed on its own terms, led by a spirit of fear rather than promise. The old regime sought to protect its managerial power from the disruptions of technology, while promoting social division and redistribution in the name of equity. They secured American technology poorly, and failed to strengthen our leadership at all. (Remarks by Director Kratsios)

To overcome this left error, Mr. Kratsios suggests, the state apparatus must be burdened with three responsibilities:  

First, we have to make the smart choices of creatively allocating our public research and development dollars. Second, we have to make the right choices in constructing a common-sense, pro-innovation regulatory regime. And third, we have to make the easy choice to adopt the incredible products and tools made by American builders and to enable their export abroad. (Remarks by Director Kratsios)

Strategic use of research funds by the state, high quality innovation in regulatory regimes bent toward the fulfillment of policy goals, and then the aggressive export f the products of this model elsewhere (both the model of innovation and its products). These then suggest a large range of recent actions undertaken by the Trump administration against officials, institutions, and intergovernmental relations that are viewed as either remnants of left error or that are in the way of the state  undertaking these strategies as they understand them. Mr. Kratsios summarizes with respect to these three State objectives what has already been widely reported in the press: taking back and re-arranging State research funding to align with State objectives; regulatory reform also tied to State objectives and the rectification of the techno-bureaucratic establishment so that its working style will align with State objectives; and the re-invigoration of a re-imaged 19th century form of American merchant diplomacy and integrated economic order.

7. The borders of the Golden Age State Must be Protected.  That this new golden age is not meant to be globally hegemonic is made clear by the focus, a critically important one for the Trump Administration, of borders and sovereignty.  That focus, in turn, is grounded in a cognitive order that sees adverse interests among peer states, and opportunity among the rest. 

First, we must safeguard U.S. intellectual property and take seriously American research security. Second, we must prevent rival nations from infiltrating our infrastructure and supply chains, as well as from embedding themselves in the infrastructure of our allies. And third, we must enforce export controls and other measures that keep American frontier technologies out of competitors’ hands. (Remarks by Director Kratsios)

To those ends, there is an impulse both to project benignly into the rest in well ordered socio-commercial engagements, and to decisively construct well managed borders against the rest. In this case the object is China, the only real peer state at the moment and one which shares the core structural elements of both the rationalization of global spaces and their roles in it). 

China in particular has grown into both a geopolitical rival and technological competitor. This threat requires us to protect our science and technology resources with heightened vigilance, and defend the vital work American researchers do in public and corporate contexts alike from misuse, theft, and disruption. (Remarks by Director Kratsios)

Border, of course, are meant to keep things people, objects, tech, etc. both in and out.  Mr. Kratsios emphasized both elements especially in the context of the Chinese relationship. Chinese products are to be kept out (these are now understood as a form of subsidized dependency--and thus  inverting the core of the project of globalization and its own imaginaries in a world view that now rejects both the possibility and the value of global convergence based in part on the gifting of national advantage as either driver of convergence or reparation). 

8.  The Second American Sutra: There is No Substitute for Victory. Mr. Kratsios ends by bringing this tech based project back to its place within the broader elements of the Basic Line of the Trump Administration. First it requires rectification of the errors of the Obama-Biden error to restore the nation to its march along the American path to the realization and perfection of its political-economic system. That realization is measured, in turn by the strength of its ability to protect the nation and to make the lives of its masses better while perfecting the political-economic system within which, with political guidance, that is made possible: As Mr. Kratsios puts it: "the task ahead of us is to adapt to new realities without destroying the American way of life or dis-inheriting the American worker. We seek, in the most basic terms, to secure our economy, restore our middle class, and uphold America as the planet’s best home for innovators." (Remarks by Director Kratsios). And what is the measure of success? Victory!

But there is no substitute for victory. ** * In a world so shaped by politics as well as technology, we must take action in both of these domains. We need all Americans to continue to rise to the occasion, to make full use of their talents, and to build.(Ibid.)

To those ends the masses must unite under the leadership and guidance of the center to ensure that individual effort can be aggregated, in the fundamental working style of American markets driven organization, to "preserve the inheritance of the American Century to share with posterity, and to ensure that the technologies that give shape to our world help the American people secure the blessings of liberty we received from our forebearers * * * and drive us further into the endless frontier." (Remarks by Director Kratsios). That, anyway, is the theory and its expression.

The text of  A Letter to Michael Kratsios, Director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policyand of Remarks by Director Kratsios at the Endless Frontiers Retreat follow below.

 

Pix credit ChatGPT (instruction: create image protecting the border of an opulent golden age against invadors

For Women Scotland Ltd (Appellant) v The Scottish Ministers (Respondent) [2025] UKSC 16

 

Pix credit BBC here

In For Women Scotland Ltd (Appellant) v The Scottish Ministers (Respondent) [2025] UKSC 16, the U.K. Supreme Court considered the meaning of “man”, “woman” and “sex” in the Equality Act 2010 (“EA 2010”). More specifically, the issue  focused on the legalized politics around the Gender Representation on Public Boards (Scotland) Act 2018 (“ASP 2018”). 

This legislation created gender representation targets to increase the proportion of women on public boards in Scotland. The ASP 2018 and the original statutory guidance defined “woman” as including people: (i) with the protected characteristic of gender reassignment; (ii) living as a woman; and (iii) proposing to undergo / undergoing / who have undergone a gender reassignment process. In 2020, the Appellant, a feminist voluntary organisation that campaigns to strengthen women’s rights in Scotland, challenged this guidance. The Inner House found that this statutory definition was unlawful as it involved an area of law reserved to the UK Parliament (equal opportunities) and therefore fell outside the legislative competence of the Scottish Parliament (“FWS1”). Following FWS1, the Scottish Ministers issued new statutory guidance which is under challenge in this appeal. The new statutory guidance states that, under the ASP 2018, the definition of a “woman” is the same as that in the EA 2010. Section 212 of the EA 2010 defines “woman” as “a female of any age.” The new statutory guidance also states that a person with a Gender Recognition Certificate (“GRC”) recognising their gender as female is considered a woman for the purposes of the ASP 2018. A GRC is a document that allows trans people to change their gender legally. (official case summary )

The issue was one of statutory interpretation--that is key to understanding both the reasoning and limitations of the opinions. At its heart, though were two issues--the first the interpretation of the text, and the second the permissibility of that interpretation within broader constitutional constraints. In interpreting EA 2010 the court then also affected the way that ASP 2018 would be applied. The Supreme Court held "that the terms “man”, “woman” and “sex” in the EA 2010 refer to biological sex. Lord Hodge, Lady Rose and Lady Simler give a joint judgment, with which the other Justices agree." (official case summary )

 The case opinions makes for quite interesting reading. The official case summary follows below.