Open letter to Bob Geldof

Open Letter to Sir Bob Geldof

(sent to The Guardian and The Observer on 3 June 2005)

Dear Sir Bob

Well done! I empathise with your despair about the state of the world
and your desire to kick the seemingly supine developed nations into
action. The world's current state of socio-economic inequality is
inexcusable, a veritable time bomb threatening us all, and
theoretically not that difficult to fix. I admire the fact that you
have raised the profile of this issue such that only the most wilfully
ignorant could be unaware of it. Where we part company is on the matter
of strategy, and, by inference, on the analysis of the problem.

Your emphasis appears to be on pressurising politicians directly. I
assume from this that you believe they are the main arbiters of power.
In fact, one doesn't have to dig that deeply to come to the conclusion
that it is the multinational companies who are the real powerbrokers,
and politicians, alas, merely their proxies. Many ordinary people
recognise the relative ineffectuality of mainstream party politics, or
at least they sense it, and that is the main reason for the
much-bemoaned state of "voter apathy".

Of course, many on the political left are only too aware of where real
power lies, and are attacking multinationals directly, largely through
boycotts. To some extent such campaigns have been successful. For
example, the oil company BP and the clothing company Gap have both
vastly improved their attitude to human rights in the last few years.
Nonetheless, the left has no cause for self-congratulation while the
bulk of humanity yet languishes in desperate poverty. So why, if their
understanding of the roots of the problem is fundamentally sound, have
left-wing political activists been relatively ineffectual themselves?

Paradoxically, it is the very enthusiasm and ambition of activists
that have thwarted them. They do not appear to have taken account of
human nature, and of the current state/mindset of the vast majority of
mankind. Again seemingly paradoxically, it is arguably because of the
multinationals' stranglehold on our lives that the outpourings of the
left's idealists have not, so far, stirred the relatively inert mass
constituted by western "consumers".

Let me explain. For centuries we have been promised that technological
innovation would give us more wealth and time, and, by extension,
energy and the ability to shape and control our lives. This isn't the
forum to explain in detail why the opposite has happened, but most
people acknowledge that their lives are increasingly fraught, even in
the affluent developed nations. Put crudely, no one has time or energy
for anything other than work, shopping, drink and telly; the French
simplify it to: "metro, boulot, dodo". Given this background, what do
the activists do? They produce numerous ethical and green consumer
guides, vast, exhaustive and exhausting lists of products and companies
to boycott, and screeds of exhortations about how one should live one's
life. Go figure. Can you see the wry smiles appearing on CEOs' faces
every time another such worthy tome is proffered, every time another
campaign is launched?

So what is the answer? Are we doomed? I took years out of earning
money and buying consumer goods to research this problem. The strategy
I came up, and which I expound in my political romantic comedy, "Saving
the World and Being Happy" (ISBN 141371756x, href="http://www.beinghappy.info">www.beinghappy.info), builds on
all the valuable work performed by activists to date (contrary to the
impression I might have given, the information they have uncovered is
vital), and excludes no one. Machiavelli's book "The Prince" spelled
out how to unify a fragmented Italy. This was my muse. The answer that
emerged from my years of Parisian garret-dwelling was to target the
multinationals in a systematic and coordinated way, starting with what
is the insidious propagandising voice of the materialistic and
self-regarding right wing: Rupert Murdoch. He is the keystone in the
grand arch of corruption that dominates us all.

Yes, Sir Bob, it came as no surprise to me to read his scurrilous proxy
attack on yourself in The Times of 1 June. I would like to say that
Murdoch's numerous misdeeds are well-documented, but his tax-dodging
stratagems are so arcane and convoluted that no one can claim to fully
understand them. What is clear are his links with the current UK and US
regimes, and his dread hand behind Iraq. His media (and he all but
controls our popular press) systematically exculpate the rich and
powerful, blaming the weak and voiceless for the world's problems.
Small wonder he blamed Africans for their problems, dismissing the
west's trade barriers, arms sales and propping up of corrupt regimes.
No surprise he went for your jugular. We must neutralise him first if
we are to get anywhere.

Sincerely

R. Eric Swanepoel
Manchester

"Saving the World and Being Happy (The Computer Ager)"
ISBN 141371756x
www.beinghappy.info