“if you're a human rights group, or a political group that they don't like they freeze your bank account, this is becoming prevalent and obvious and normal. So the normalization of financial repression has really made the need for Bitcoin much more dire.” – Alex Gladstein
Human rights activists under authoritarian regimes face a daunting fight, but new tools like Bitcoin are making a difference. I hosted Alex Gladstein for an interview yesterday, April 24, 2024 to provide details about the fight for freedoms by human rights activists under authoritarian regimes.
The fight for human rights remains an uphill battle. Activists are facing an intensifying struggle for power where the improved weaponry has been matched by fiendish usage of financial technology where those in power can erase effective protestors by eliminating their money rather than by killing or imprisoning them.
The optimism surrounding the rise of liberal democracies from the 1980s through 2010 has waned as a number of countries have moved towards authoritarianism and many liberal democracies have been implementing more restrictive policies as well.
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The Human Rights Foundation Mission: (https://hrf.org/about/)
We exist to unite the world to stand against tyranny.
We partner with world-changing activists in creating innovative solutions to unite the world against tyranny.
We advance freedom and challenge authoritarianism
Some of the tools that the HRF has been using:
Internet access
Encryption technologies
Exposure of conditions and crimes
Boycotts
Impact litigation
Support for dissident artists
Direct funding - Very few organizations want fiat currency
Bitcoin has become a critically important tool because for the following reasons:
Financial sensorship resistance: can hold and transfer funds without relying on traditional banks that can be pressured by the regime.
Borderless transactions: important for external fundraising.
Pseudonymity; makes tracking and monitoring difficult for regimes
Portability.
Hedge against debasement: This can be a very important attribute in countries with hyperinflation.
Convertibility into fiat currency: plentiful opportunities to convert in most areas.
Bitcoin is bad for dictators. Dictators need censorship, confiscation, and closed capital markets. Bitcoin is free speech, property rights and open capital markets. “So its just a disaster for dictators.” Bitcoin gives financial resources to individuals, which at the grassroots level leverages into disproportionate power.
Gladstein points out in this discussion that converting Bitcoin to cash has become an easy exercise as willing traders have proliferated.
How do governments fight back against Bitcoin? The most important characteristic of Bitcoin is that the network itself allows for transactions that cannot be cancelled or interrupted in any way. “Freedom of speech without freedom after speech.” There are ways that governments can learn later the connections between public wallet addresses and personal identities, or where transactions lead, but they cannot prevent them.
One chilling and monumental development occurred just prior to our discussion on April 24 which Gladstein raised; the arrests of William Hill and Keonne Rodriguez and the closure of Samourai Wallet. This was a service that created anonymity and privacy for Bitcoin users. It is services like these that are the lifeblood of most dissident funding for the obvious reason that “inside dictatorships, privacy is life or death.”
Such an act makes privacy illegal, and that means all legitimate uses of privacy gives too much power to all governments and undermines the power of dissidents.
CBDCs are another form of government control that are being implemented globally and the HRF and the Cato Institute have created a CBDC Tracker that is tracking the development and launches of CBDCs by country around the world.
Stablecoins are competing with Bitcoin for use as a store of value in many developing countries as a hedge against currency debasement, but it does not compete with Bitcoin for dissident usage. Stablecoins are centralized and accounts have been frozen in response to government requests, so HRF recipients do not view Stablecoins as an alternative.
The fight for human rights in the digital age is ongoing. While authoritarian regimes employ sophisticated tactics, Alex Gladstein highlights the potential of Bitcoin and other tools to empower activists. The Human Rights Foundation remains a vital force in this struggle.
I hope you are inspired by our discussion and choose to get involved. Please visit www.hrf.org and learn how your contributions can save lives, empower voices of dissent, and curb the power of tyrants ruling over 5.4 billion people, 72% of the earth’s population.