The BBC are appealing for messages. Here's mine:
"Who are you and where did you come from? Or rather, who elected the leaders of these eight countries to make decisions that so deeply affect the whole world.
But if you're going to be here, it's about time you did something useful. Start by bringing about a truly transparent and effective debt cancellation process, that applies to all of a country's debts (not 100% of some arbitrary portion) and channels funds to its poorest people."
As this blog approaches its third birthday, I've decided its time to change things around again. I'm working on a new design which should be a bit cleaner and easier to work with, and I'm going to be emphasising categories more strongly.
I've also long wanted to use this blog as a place to gather bits and pieces I've contributed to other sites — such as reviews of books on amazon and the like — but not wanted to make them front page entries. Today I began doing that.
As part of that change I've moved the news feeds around a bit too. Gone entirely are the RSS2 feeds as I'm not a big fan of the format, and Atom and RSS1 should cover most bases. I've put in place redirects from the RSS2 feeds to the new locations, so any well-behaved newsreader should update automatically. All feeds are now full-content and for each format there are two options: you can get a feed which only lists the content I've chosen to appear on the front page of the site, or you can get a rather more narcissistic feed that draws in everything posted here, wherever it appears. The options are in the right-hand menu bar.
Look out for more changes before long...
I contemplated reading Hertz's book a few years ago but passed on it, fearing it would simply retread the same ground as so many others emerging in the wake of the "anti-globalisation" protests. In some ways, I was right, but coming to it four years after publication I found it a useful summary of many of the issues barely-fettered capitalism presents to society, and a fair-handed exploration of the strengths and weaknesses of the corporation-based society we find ourselves in.
Hertz is unabashedly a believer in capitalism, though (in the tradition of such eminent predecessors as Keynes) believes that it should be embedded in a stronger civil society/democratic framework than has been the case since the Thatcher-Reagan revolution. She details many of the ways major corporations (particularly media corporations, but also others from a wide variety of areas) have begun replacing many roles which were formerly those of government.
She points to numerous positive examples of the social contribution of corporations and of the wealthy individuals benefitting from them, but encourages the reader to reflect on the wisdom of ceding so much power to unelected bodies. While consumers retain some power due to the fact that they can set their spending priorities, the distribution of such power is uneven, disenfranchising the poor and favouring those who can shout loudest.
As Hertz clearly demonstrates, a new democratic framework will differ significantly from those of previous times, but if we are to ensure ongoing social support programs and care about long-term community development, democratic oversight is desparately needed. This is not an academic work (those looking for such from Hertz would be better off looking elsewhere) but it is a powerful summary of serious issues confronting global society.
Tags: Noreena Hertz | The Silent Takeover | Capitalism | Globalization
One last post to wrap up the New York stories...
I had been to New York twice before. The first time I was seven years old, and while I remember loving the experience, the memories are rather hazy and it didn't leave me with much of a sense of the city. The second time was so brief as to barely count: a cab ride between JFK and La Guardia en route to Nashville (and from there for my first visit to Grand Rapids).
This visit followed quickly in the wake of my reading Jane Jacobs' fantastic "The Death and Life of Great American Cities." It's been a long time since a single book had such an impact on how I approach a topic (in this case, urban planning and the broad cross-section of life it touches upon); many of the insights were already familiar from other related work, but the scope, significance and completeness of Jacobs' seminal work was quite astounding. And most of the examples in it are drawn from New York City.
Staying in Brooklyn was a treat (thanks Sara!) as it drew us out of Manhattan. Our time was spent in the Park Slope neighbourhood, which we both loved. It was dense and diverse, with more than enough within a few blocks' radius to keep us occupied for quite some time had our schedule allowed (as it was we passed two pleasant mornings at The Tea Lounge (panoramic photo)). In balance, I probably preferred this area of Brooklyn to any one Manhattan neighbourhood. The pace was a touch slower and it felt more "real" — as if the residents' were making a longer commitment to their community than in the more transient neighbouring borough.
But for someone who has found the slower approach to life much in evidence in Grand Rapids to be quite an adjustment after so many years in close proximity to London, the bustle of Manhattan was almost a salve. I'm not someone who heads for tourist attractions when I visit a city, heading instead for its coffee shops and movie theatres, and it was a shame not to have longer to indulge more in the latter. There's a certain reassurance, though, in just knowing that so many options are within reach.
And naturally, the time with friends was good. Despite numerous emails and blog comments, I'd not met Sara in person before. I met another of Kari's cousins (and his family) for the first time, and got to know another a little better. As well as seeing Susan play, we got to spend time with both her and Rachel Zylstra at the rather wacky Beauty Bar, which was great.
It's easy to see why Jacobs was so attached to the density and diversity of her New York neighbourhoods when writing back in the 50s and 60s, and great to see that many of them retain some of that vibrancy (though that couldn't really be said for the ridiculously gentrified Greenwich Village). Another personal highlight was visiting Bryant Park and seeing a stack of books laid out for visitors to read, tables reserved for games players, and the space overflowing with users. If this post by Dan Hill is anything to go by, London could learn a few lessons there.
With three more boroughs to explore, not to mention far more hanging out to do in these two, hopefully we'll make it back soon, and perhaps this time we'll remember the camera and/or have a cameraphone that takes decent pictures...
Tags: New York City | Park Slope
Today was another day that didn't leave time for much blogging. But I have been wanting to highlight Martin's ever so appropriate comment (which was in fact his guess as to my response to the Iranian elections):
Ahmadinewhatsit is exactly the kind of leader the US has been imagining Iran has for some time now...
Former US Deputy Secretary of Defence, now President of the World Bank Paul Wolfowitz has recently begun making his first big pronouncements in his new role. Sharing the strong emphasis on Africa that most big players are adopting in the run up to the G8 Summit, he has been touring the continent and making some very promising calls.
According to this piece in the Christian Science Monitor, Wolfowitz is keen to support equal rights for women (because of their focal place in many developing world communities and families, women often play a more crucial role in development than do men), and harmonize the bank's relationship with aid agencies "to reduce the administrative burden." In other contexts he has been speaking of the need for western governments to practice what they preach in terms of free trade.
Those are good statements, insofar as they go, but possibly speak most clearly in what they leave out. The appearance of working for consensus is to be applauded, but the Bank clearly needed a visionary new president who would radically reform its workings to be more democratically responsible, and less dogmatic in its imposition of economic policies.
So-called-Free trade is where that is likely to be played out. If the free trade songbook continues to rule the melody then it is entirely right that rich countries open their borders as widely as they insist their poorer neighbours do. But Wolfowitz's statements coincide with the publication of a new report from Christian Aid, "The Economics Of Failure," that adds still more fuel to arguments that "free trade" as presently conceived costs more than it provides.
Christian Aid employed an expert in econometrics (Egor Kraev) who used economic modelling techniques, along with data from the World Bank, IMF, United Nations, and various academic studies, to explore the impact of "free trade" policies on sub-Saharan African economies, and found that "imports tend to rise faster than exports following trade liberalisation" (the reason such countries are given for enforced liberalisation is that export income will help stabilise their economies), and that "this results in quantifiable losses in income for some of the poorest countries in the world."
Overall, the model suggests that since liberalisation, African countries have lost US$272 billion as a result of "free trade." That's twice as much as they received in aid; enough to have paid off all their debts, and to spin off many more benefits beside.
The evidence against one-size-fits-all approaches to economic development is already overwhelming, but such is the power of the ideological commitment to neoliberalism that free trade continues to be regarded as a panacea, to be applied with no consideration of local contextual issues. Despite his more-positive-than-expected rhetoric, the prophetic acts that are needed are not going to come from Paul Wolfowitz. They need to come from his apparent masters in western governments.
Juan Cole's commentary on Middle Eastern issues over at Informed Comment remains essential reading. I was particularly amused by his response to Ayatollah Khamenei's suggestion that the Iranian public had, by voting for the hardline candidate, "humiliated" Bush: that in some ways Presidents Bush and Ahmadinejad are soul mates.
For those of us who have been hoping for a gradual opening up of Iranian society, the election result is rather a blow and, despite the similarities Professor Cole points out, is only likely to increase aggression between Iran and the West in the short-term.
The election outcome is a clear demonstration that the goals of the 1979 revolution — which was driven largely by the increasing economic, social, and political divide between the general populace and the ruling elite — have not been met, and that future candidates need to both appeal to the liberal middle class and the impoverished millions.
Tags: Iran | Juan Cole | Ahmadinejad
Capping off a walking tour of New York, our second night in the city saw us at two concerts: Susan Enan at Rockwood Music Hall, and Bell X1 at Sin-e.
Susan moved to New York earlier this year, but the way she greeted almost every member of the crowd assembled in Rockwood Music Hall made it very clear that she's settled in quickly. Rockwood sits right on the edge of the East Village and has been operating for about six months, hosting intimate musical gatherings in a bar-space that will accommodate maybe 50 people.
Joined by an upright bass player who will be joining her to record in Vancouver this summer, Susan delivered an assured set that demonstrated the strength and breadth of her writing. Most of the songs were familiar, but a couple of newer pieces were also evident and I'm definitely looking forward to hearing the new recording.
From Rockwood Music Hall it was a quick dash (with Susan, and a few of her friends) over to Sin-e to catch the debut New York performance by Bell X1. The Irish band recently had a song featured in The OC and were making a quick trip to the US to capitalise on that. We were deeply impressed.
A five-piece, the band made good use of the variations their membership allowed, basing themselves somewhere in the 80s-revival, but bringing in a touch of punk, and on at least one track, some great harmonies. We weren't quite so impressed with the song that had brought them to these shores (their most generic) but the tune they announced as being from their forthcoming album was delightful, and is likely to make a top-notch single.
To top it all off, the New York City live music experience is blessedly smoke-free.
Tags: Susan Enan | Bell X1 | Sin-e | Live Music | Rockwood Music Hall
There was a qualifier clearly missing from my recent posts on the G8 announcement on debt cancellation. It's not quite so clear what that qualifier should have been, but 'public' is probably close to the mark. The G8 announcement of "100% debt cancellation" only applied to those debts owed to a few multilateral bodies which are, effectively, extensions of rich governments. Debts that are effectively owed to the taxpayers in the world's richer countries.
Not covered were debts owed to private organisations, whether that's standard loans to banks or from bond issues. For that matter, neither were loans to the Inter American Development Bank which is one of the major creditors of Latin American countries.
Nick's posting "Debt, lies and statistics" is well worth reading for anyone seeking to understand the on-the-ground impact of this new package. He analyses the impact on Bolivia and finds that in the case of that country "100% cancellation" only means "41%" when loans to "other international banks such as the Inter-American Development Bank or Government creditors such as Spain" are taken into account.
I continue to feel that the new announcement is an important one. It goes further than previous announcements and it's good to see anything new on the table, but as Nick rightly points out the rhetoric of "100% cancellation" is becoming tiresome. While there is always an argument as to why the latest announcement can be called "100%" without previous "100%" announcements being lies, every new 100% announcement at best undermines the power of government rhetoric, and at worst appears a deliberate strategy to discredit ongoing campaigns for further debt cancellation.
There is significant further work to be done, and unfortunately it may be made all the harder by this new announcement. While cancelling debt will not solve all poverty, international debt is an essential lynchpin holding many countries in poverty and subject to the whims of the World Bank, IMF, WTO and G8. To really cancel it will require at least one paradigm shift in how debt cancellation is approached.
The first paradigm shift required is for rich governments and their servant institutions to relinquish control of the debt relief process, replacing it with some form of bankcruptcy court independent of both creditors and debtors. If rich countries are really committed to transparent debt relief they have nothing to lose by handing over control, and if they are not committed to it, then it is in the interests of their citizens to have their governments' interests and spending laid bare through a new process.
Even then, a second paradigm shift (or maybe it's just one very significant one) is still required. At present, there is a severe reticence on the part of governments to regulate the international financial sector. While individual bankcruptcy within an individual country applies to all creditors, on the international stage there is little to no effort being made to rein in the private investment banks, vulture funds, and others who own significant amounts of developing country debt.
Our governments need to realise that the power of these transnational organisations is undermining their efforts to alleviate poverty and that effective regulation is needed. If they truly believe that debt cancellation is an important part of poverty reduction (as the recent G8 announcement indicates) then that debt cancellation needs to apply across the board. For some, such controls would be heretical, questioning the supreme power of the financial markets, but at some point a choice must be made between economic dogma and the demands of democracy.
Links: Jubilee Plus have also published a statement on the recent announcement. They have also published their debt database, providing useful breakdowns on the status of debt relief initiatives and total debt stocks.
Tags: G8 | debt cancellation | jubilee plus
Our time in New York prevented me from following the first round of the Iranian Presidential elections in the detail I might otherwise have indulged, but I'm glad to be able to follow the run-offs a little more closely.
It was disconcerting to wake up this morning to hear NPR continually referring to former President Hashemi Rafsanjani as 'moderate.' It's the same sort of political spin that left this European bemused at the attacks on the "liberal", "left-wing" Democrats in last year's US Presidential election. When your opposition is quite that conservative, almost anyone can look moderate and liberal.
The high turnout in the first round was surprising, but it's no surprise that it is the conservatives who are in the ascendency. Many of the middle-class voters who went for Khatami last time around have become disillusioned as his attempts at reform have been blocked time and again. Positive changes have come, but they are subtler than many would have liked, and that has led to considerable electoral apathy amongst those of a reformist bent.
For those looking to get a more personal account than the media is offering, this article about Hoder is a good starting point. The apparent initiator of Iranian blogging has just been back to Tehran and is writing at length about the candidates and the political forces at play.
Arnaud Desplechin's Kings and Queens has been attracting a considerable share of critical attention. It's not often that you get reviewers like Salon's Andrew O'Hehir making statements like:
A lot of filmmakers talk about bridging the gap between high-gloss pop spectacle and independent auteur cinema, but "Kings and Queen" is one of the best, and most alive, attempts to do that in at least a generation.
The film tells the story of two ex-lovers. At the outset their paths are clearly divided, with Desplechin's deft style-shifting providing most of the insight into who they each are, and the forces that drove them apart. As their stories unfold and become once more entangled, the style becomes more uniform, but the deftness remains.
We see layer upon layer of artifice stripped away as the characters' self-perception and status in the eyes of their acquaintances are gradually laid bare, often in shocking ways. The film was not shocking and its twists and turns are never nail-biting, but the surprises are deeply felt. The exploration of identity is not novel, but it is allowed to unfold in a wonderfully sympathetic manner.
It provided a fine way to spend our first night in NYC.
Tags: Film | Kings & Queens
The intention to blog has been with me all week, but yet again it hasn't turned into action. Tomorrow, we set off for Rhode Island for Kate and Nathan's wedding. From there we'll head to Long Island and NYC for a few days' break, visiting Sara, Susan, and others. The intention to blog while we're away is here. Time will tell whether it turns into action.
T Longren trackbacked to my last entry on debt cancellation. I've never been fond of trackbacks from entries that don't in turn link to me, but this post got my attention because it seemed to misunderstand the origin of the debts which the G8 has announced plans to cancel.
The debts which are to be cancelled are not the result of overseas development aid. While it's true that some of what rich governments describe as 'aid' is in the form of loans, most of the debts are the result of loans (explicitly described as such) granted in the 60s and 70s. Those loans were granted on terms derived from an economic situation which quickly deteriorated and many argue that they were only granted because the west was at the time cash-rich and wanted to turn much of that cash wealth into investment wealth.
There are some terrible stories of loans being granted without any apparent vigilence on the part of lenders, such as one granted to the Phillipines to build a nuclear power station on a tectonic fault line (it could never be switched on) and many granted to governments (such as that of Mobutu) that lenders knew to be deeply corrupt. The simple checks which any domestic bank would make before granting a mortgage, considerations of the risks involved and the financial stability of those taking the loan, were not applies.
Most of those debts are now owned by the IMF, World Bank and various regional development banks. Many countries are spending many times their aid income in debt service, but because of the interest rates no progress is being made towards paying them off. Nigeria, for example, borrowed $17 billion, has now paid back $18 billion, but still owes $34 billion ("In The Balance", JDC, Action Aid, Christain Aid June 2005).
Until now debt cancellation has only ever been partial, meaning that debts quickly got out of control again in situations where the countries granted that 'relief' could not afford the interest payments, let alone any payment on the debt stocks. Assessment of relief to be granted was often made many months (and even years) before the relief materialised and in the meantime the debts had escalated still further. The new agreement is for complete cancellation, which should prevent that problem from recurring in those countries which qualify.
Further development aid will not lead to a new build up of debt if the money is, in fact, aid. And the moneys freed up from debt servicing can be invested in vital infrastructural improvements. But there are problems. First among them is that the debt cancellation is currently granted based on promises to adopt certain financial models, regardless of whether they are appropriate for the countries in question. And the second is that there is not yet a solid process in place to independently arbitrate any future loans that may be taken out. Some countries may still need loans in order to invest in their infrastructures, but before that can happen there should be sensible rules managing that.
Tags: debt relief | development aid
Salon is carrying a piece (reprinted from the Guardian) about philosopher, novelist, and Canada's Vice Regal Consort, John Ralston Saul, largely focussed on his new book, "The Collapse of Globalism and the Reinvention of the World."
The interview provides some interesting insights into the formation of the G7 (now G8) and why its focus has so long been on seeing the world through economic eyes, laying the blame at the feet of former French President Giscard d'Estang (notable of late as the writer of the proposed EU constitution).
Naturally for such a piece, there is a faulty conflation of the title 'anti-globalisation' with those who are opposed to the current form which globalisation is taking. Many of us are definitely in favour of globalised society, but deeply uncomfortable about the premises on which globalisation is currently based. But that misgiving doesn't prevent the article being well worth a look, and it rather leaves me wanting to add yet another book to the 'find time for' list...
I'll leave with a quote from Saul:
"A lot of those guys I have spoken to in NGOs will say, 'What's the point of being a backbench M.P., a minister or even a prime minister? The power isn't there anymore.' So you have this bizarre situation where there are more people in public life than ever before, but only a small proportion of them are democratically elected."
At long, long last, we are beginning to see some real progress on debt relief. Every year, a few weeks before the G8 heads of state/parliament meeting, finance ministers from the G8 meet to hold some discussions which will inform the agenda for the later meeting. This year, the focus was heavily laid on poverty reduction initiatives and reports are that a deal has been reached for enhanced debt relief.
Larry Elliott's coverage in the Guardian is worth a look and Jubilee Debt Campaign have a good breakdown of the deal, but in simple terms what has been agreed is total debt cancellation for countries reaching completing the HIPC process. Until now, completion of HIPC only led to a reduction of the debts to 'sustainable levels' (often anything but sustainable) and many of the highly publicised 'debt cancellation' deals were in fact little more than deferments of loan repayments.
This is the first significant progress on debt relief for nearly five years. At the G8 summit in Cologne in 1999 a package of debt relief was announced, but it has been slow to come through. In 2000 a number of countries announced cancellation and/or deferment of 'bilateral' debts (owed directly to governments rather than through organisations like the World Bank, IMF, the Inter-American Development Bank, and the African Development Bank). But since then, despite rumblings about an international bankruptcy process, changes have not been forthcoming.
It won't come as a surprise to anyone who's been following the situation that this deal does not go nearly far enough. Immense as it is, the deal appears to be limited to those countries eligible for HIPC and not the increasing number of developing countries with unsustainable debt loads. Jubilee 2000 called for the cancellation of debts owed by 52 countries. Jubilee Debt Campaign is now reporting that the number urgently needing debt cancellation (in order to reinvest in healthcare, education, and essential public services) has risen to 62. Only about 38 of those meet the stringent HIPC conditions, and getting through the process can take some time.
Controversially, much of the money being used to fund debt cancellation will come from funds that were to be used as development aid for the countries who will benefit. While it is likely that the money is better spent on debt cancellation (poor countries pay out in debt service many times the amount they receive in aid) but it will have major repercussions. On a more positive note it does look as if the money for cancellation of debts owed to the IMF will be paid from sale of gold reserves or other internal funds, a move campaigners have long been calling for.
For those of us who have been campaigning on the debt issue this move comes as a significant endorsement of our arguments and this new deal has the potential to have a huge impact on the economies of many countries, and the lives of their people. As we saw in the aftermath of Cologne, however, this is definitely not the time to lift the campaigning pressure: we must ensure that the deal is quickly extended to cover more countries through a fairer process, and most of all to ensure that promises are rapidly delivered on. The Finance Ministers have made the most significant announcement yet to come from a G8 meeting, hopefully the national leaders won't allow their thunder to be stolen and will raise the stakes still further.
Tags: G8 Jubilee 2000 Debt Gleneagles Finance Ministers HIPC
I think I'd taken the BBC far too much for granted until I left the UK. The current podcast trial that lets me listen to The Today Programme's (by no means to be confused with NBC's Today Show) key interview at my leisure each and every day is ever so welcome, where once I rarely tuned in as I expected to hear the key points repeated ad nauseum throughout the day.
Via Dan Hill's excellent City of Sound I came across this transcript of a speech new Director General of the BBC Mark Thompson made recently at the Churches Media Conference. It's proof that careful quoting of Desmond Tutu will lend any speaker a degree of gravitas, but it also displays an encouraging grasp of the breadth of issues confronting mainstream media. Think what you will of the departure of his predecessor, or the drastic measures he's tried to take (and I'm still not sure what to make of either of those) but he's clearly worth listening to.
Tags: BBC | broadcasting
One of the many things keeping me busy of late has been the process of transferring the many tapes (!) of the various talks at this year's Festival of Faith and Music into a digital form. We're going to be making them available for download over the next few weeks.
You can find the first three installments -- David Dark's first keynote, David and Sarah's joint workshop, and Steve Stockman's contribution on "U2 and Justice" -- at the Calvin Student Activities Blog.
You can call it podcasting if you excuse the fact that we're not using RSS enclosures to facilitate downloading...
Tags: David Dark | Sarah Masen | Steve Stockman | ffm2005
One of the key arguments regularly levelled against anyone who openly critiques capitalist structures is that viable alternatives are hard to come by. While this argument is often poorly targetted as there is a legitimate role for many in calling out the failings of existing systems, one strong theme in much anti-capitalist activity over recent years has been that a single overarching alternative is not what is needed. Instead, many argue, we should be looking for a finer grained approach to socioeconomic structures that empowers communities to find what works best for them, and then thinking how those systems can work together.
But despite the deficiency of the charges levelled against 'anti-capitalists,' there is always space for more exploration of what new (or at least transitional) structures we can put in place to help society transition to more life-affirming ways of being.
I was pleased to read on Francis Irving's blog about a new business structure being added to the UK's legislative structure next month. Community Interest Companies will be similar to Limited Liability Companies (LLC) but with various criteria to measure whether their work is in the interest of 'community' (however that may be defined) and protections to ensure that the core values on which the company is founded are protected even in the case of corporate buyout or floating on the stock exchange.
Francis asks:
So is this thing useful? It allows normal competitive trading, and has a light regulatory touch. It doesn't prevent corporate buyout or floating on the stock exchange. But it makes sure that if either of those things happen, the goals of the company have to stay the same, and any profit can't be sucked out of it. Perhaps this is the new corporate form to take over the world. A cautious thumbs up.
I'd have to agree. While we have yet to see how they work in practice, how effective the criteria are, or what loopholes predatory corporations can find, CICs seem like a giant leap in the right direction.
Perhaps the most interesting aspect of this for me is the move away from the dominant mantra in recent years that responsibility to shareholders is the most sacred notion in business, an idea that generally leads to single-bottom-line profit being the sole goal. The existence of stock exchange-floated organisations who do not have responsibility to shareholders as their central tenet, but who must balance that responsibility with responsibility to a broader (less wealth-defined) community is something of a paradigm shift and is long overdue.
Tags: politics | corporations | community | DTI
It's been too long since Anne Lamott last had a column up at Salon, and the new book, while wonderful in parts, was largely recycled material. So I'm deeply grateful to Josh Marshall (Talking Points Memo) that he's included Ms. Lamott among the participants in his new project, TPMCafe ("Politics, Ideas & Lots of Caffeine"). You can find her three entries to date right here.
This brings me to a second point about which I care passionately: How does a nice Christian girl like myself help foment revolution?
Tags: TPMCafe | Anne Lamott | Revolution
One of the many strands of discussion that has surfaced since Bob Geldof officially announced the Live 8 events to highlight anti-poverty discussions at this year's G8 summit and called for a million people to march in Edinburgh has been focussed on police fears about the event. We should probably be used to police scaremongering in advance of a major summit by now.
Past summits of this sort have been the scene of some violence. From the Seattle WTO ministerial in 1999 through to the G8 summit in Genoa in July 2001 there was a sense of escalation, with each summit bringing new waves of protest and increasing casualty figures. Events culminated in Genoa with the brutal killing of a protestor by a young police officer, numerous police injuries, and thousands of peaceful protestors being tear-gassed. Sadly but unsurprisingly, the violence grabbed the headlines and quickly became amplified out of proportion.
It usually seemed that the violence at these summits was a self-fulfilling prophecy. The tabloid press was filled with poorly substantiated stories of 'training camps' for 'violent protest' (most training that did take place was in methods of nonviolent direction action) and police spokespeople talked of the heightened security measures they were preparing, expecting violence and designing flash points months in advance.
I had held out some hope that the Scottish police would be more thoughtful than their brutal (on that occasion, at least) Italian counterparts. This reaction would seem to hint otherwise. While it is unlikely that the scale of force used by the Italian Carabinieri in Genoa will be repeated in Scotland, hysterical responses like those we've been hearing this week hint that these police too have failed to realise that the best way to defend against violence at protests is to facilitate the democratic exercise of free speech by those looking to protest peacefully.
While any large event will have its trouble spots, protests do have a tendency to be self-policing. On the other hand, when protestors already angered at the reticence of their elected leaders to engage with them on crucial world issues are blocked from giving voice to that anger, tempers will be tested.
In this case, it seems like what's mainly lacking is some common sense. Geldof is calling for a million people to go to Edinburgh. The people likely to respond to such a call are generally middle-class, middle-aged people such as those who made up the majority at the 1.5 million-strong anti-war demonstration in London in February 2003. He's not calling for a Black Bloc, or even for a return to the high spirits of early Reclaim the Streets events.
Surely when we see ongoing low participation in ballot-box democracy, a peaceful demonstration over a crucial issue is something to be encouraged?
Regular readers of this blog will have heard me talk about Local First before. In short, it's an organization that seeks to encourage people living in and around Grand Rapids to support locally owned businesses.
Local First will be hosting a street party outside Bistro Bella Vita tomorrow (Saturday 4th) from 2-10pm, alongside the annual Festival of the Arts. We're hoping to be there early on. With Bistro Bella Vita supplying food and drink it should be well worth stopping by.
Tags: Grand Rapids | Local First
Sometimes it can be tempting to think that there's some contest between heads of government to see who can be the most callous without raising a major outcry. If there is, George W Bush has almost certainly taken the lead by claiming that the USA couldn't support Gordon Brown's proposed International Finance Facility because (as the BBC reports him saying) it doesn't fit our budgetary process
.
The International Finance Facility is part of a package of proposals Brown is looking to take to the various G8 meetings due to take place in the next few weeks, culminating with the main G8 summit in Scotland next month. Brown is proposing 100% debt cancellation funded by a sell-off of some of the IMF's gold reserves (which have increased in value of late due to the rising price of gold), a significant increase in development aid from the richest countries, removal of trade subsidies by which rich countries flood poor country markets with cheap goods (destroying indigenous business), and the International Finance Facility that would allow poorer countries to borrow money against promised future aid (in effect allowing them more control of the flow of aid facilitating more strategic use).
Brown's proposals are far from perfect. Details are still sketchy on the conditionality that would be attached to that 100% debt relief, which has long been one of the key issues. The current system is equivalent to a credit card company deciding whether its customers can declare bankruptcy. Independent arbitration of a country's eligibility is long overdue.
The proposals are, however, a significant step forward and could mark the beginning of a sea change in development aid. Some form of IFF would allow the world to move away from the economic serfdom currently experienced by its poorest inhabitants. If our budgetary processes stand in the way of providing relief for the world's very poorest inhabitants, then those budgetary processes must be changed. It's the only real way to begin spreading freedom across the world.
Tags: IFF | G8 | Gordon Brown | George Bush | IMF | International Debt | Jubilee
Trevor posted a link at sarahmasen.com to this piece by Rowan Williams in the Independent. As should be expected of Williams it's both a powerfully succinct summary of the degree of the problem and a source of wonderful soundbites such as
An economics that ignores environmental degradation invites social degradation - in plain terms, violence.
and
Religious belief claims, in the first place, that I am most fully myself only in relation with my creator; what I am in virtue of this relationship cannot be diminished or modified by any earthly power. In the environment there is a dimension that resists and escapes us: to reduce the world to a storehouse of materials for limited human purposes is thus to put in question any serious belief in an indestructible human value.
Williams goes on to outline a few strategies that could begin to redress the balance and to talk of the new governance structures which are needed. I was reminded a little of the segment of Channel 4 News we caught last week which featured Thom Yorke (Radiohead) and Tony Juniper (Friends of the Earth) talking about FoE's new campaign "The Big Ask." The campaign is calling for a 3% reduction per year in carbon emissions, and, significantly, proposing a 3% reduction in government ministers' wages should that target be missed.
Tony Blair spent considerable time during the furore over his litany of mistakes, lies, and failings over the Iraq war insisting that the electorate would deliver their verdict on him through the ballot box. He insisted that that was how democracy ought to work and received little challenge.
As a skillful politician he must have realised that this was a very narrow approach to electoral politics, and one that would work out for him. While most voters do focus on a small number of issues, the only way for voters to responsibly deliver a verdict on a single issue through the ballot box is in a referendum. Blair effectively demonstrated that there is a need for a new way to hold government to account, and FoE's campaign is a beginning in that.
While I have significant concerns about the concept of performance related pay, it may well turn out to be a strategy that encourages government ministers to set realistic targets and to make them a reality, rather than a platform. It is vital that climate change is recognised as more than a political football, and maybe sensible summaries like Williams' and campaigns with teeth like FoE's are a good direction?
Tags: Climate Change | Friends of the Earth | Rowan Williams | Democracy | Big Ask
Having had some problems using the Four Friends network this morning, I decided to have a go with one of the areas being used to trial the service of a possible Grand Rapids Citywide WiFi vendor. Since I was close to the 60 Monroe Centre location for FreedomNet's service that was my first port of call.
The range was good (I discovered I could actually detect the network from outside Four Friends), but unfortunately I wasn't able to use the service. My laptop picked up the network and (after quite a while) directed me to the FreedomNet homepage to log in, but on trying to log in I was presented with the message:
Your MAC address is undefined. Problem with the gateway?
Since the problem persisted for several minutes, I gave up. Hopefully future attempts will be more successful.
Tags: Grand Rapids WiFi | FreedomNet
We arrived back in Grand Rapids yesterday evening after a long, cramped, but uneventful journey. The time in England was certainly worth the travelling and while every meeting was too short, we were glad to be able to catch up with so many friends and family members. Steve and Jude even blogged the occasions.
I'll be back for Greenbelt and hopefully we'll both be back in September. And since email catchup went remarkably well today, I may even have new content for this blog tomorrow!
