No one to turn to and nowhere to hide

June 2007

No one to turn to and nowhere to hide

Disaster is upon us. We are entering a new era. All hail our new leader. Gordon Brown is about to become prime minister and I am scared. The next two years promise to be the age of government by diktakt supported by his trusted assistants, comical Ali and Joseph Goebbels. Countless reports have brought attention to the fact that while Blair's was a government of clique, Brown's will be of a lone soldier. Perched at his desk, assuming the weight of his people on his shoulder, GB will rule alone, because as he knows, he is the only one capable of ruling this fine nation of his.

Perhaps to counter the claims of a dictatorial approach, GB, in a stroke of Machiavellian madness, which has many people wondering if he has lost his mind, invited the Lib Dems to take a place in his future cabinet. Not content with neutralizing his own party, he sought to incapacitate the Liberal Democrats and in so doing decapitate the headless. Was it worth it? Probably not. But it certainly entertained. He will claim the moral high ground, of course. He will argue that he tried to modernise and create a new era of consensus government. Who needs proportional representation, when everyone has a place in his cabinet.

The fact is, the cabinet will be even more pointless than under Blair, because not only will the treasury and so domestic policy be in the hands of Chairman Brown, but so will the rest of Whitehall. But fear not. Whitehall will not be shrouded by a red cloud, but a black one. We will not see it, but we shall feel it. Like another force, acting on our lives without hope of redress.

Perhaps Blair saved us by signing up to most of the new EU treaty comprised of at least 90% of the failed constitution. Perhaps this is his gift to the British people. We are safe from Brown's poorhouse. Our rights will be protected from on high in Brussels.

As a young person, naturally I am disenfranchised. I feel no connection with the existing political parties. The Chameleon reminds me of a bad game show host. Lightweight, smarmy, lacking policies, open to ridicule, hardly someone who could represent Britain on the Global stage, at the EU or at the UN and form good relationships. Is he an environmentalist? Is he a socialist? Flailing around trying to be a populist! Is he really there, maybe he's IDS in disguise! A Blair clone? Not quite, he is too silly and far from charming. The Conservative party is deeply divided, but that is ok, except that they can't seem to discuss their differences in public. So we see spin, counter spin, leak, the whip, offensive, counter offensive, misquotes, reprimands and so on and so on, into the night.

Mr Merciless? The decline has been so fast we haven't seen it. Who is in charge of the not so liberal but ever so democratic socialists? A single issue party, yes! Of course, Iraq. So now the media don't give them time. It must be because they have nothing constructive to say and are competently uninformed. While there is obviously some capability in the party, they still lack the ability to govern and as the Conservatives ascend, they are becoming increasingly irrelevant. Bring back Charles! He had personality and guile.

And so back to Labour, how is my life after 10 years of a Blair/Brown dis-government. I can't find a doctor, a dentist or have confidence when I go to a hospital. I have university debts, no chance of buying a house and seem to be surrounded by a break down in social cohesion. I'm told inflation is low, and yet the cost of living has risen considerably in the last few years. We've trashed Afghanistan and Iraq and muddled everywhere we could. It seems that to sustain this state of affairs, we have to screw over the developing world so that trade is in our favour and no one can compete with us. I know immigrants are not to blame, because they keep prices down and do the jobs we either don't want to do, or can't do, but someone always wants to blame them. For all our wealth, our children have the worst existence in the west. So miserable, in fact, that they are sleeping around and binge drinking to incredible levels. I can't get a seat on a train to work and everybody seems so so tired.

Is Gordon, going to turn this around? I doubt it. He has been in charge of welfare, health, education and the treasury for the last 10 years. He had the purse strings, so if he didn't like it, it didn't happen. His madcap schemes have got us to where we are today. He wanted to encourage us to work, but would not pay for a transport system to get us there. He wanted to give us skills, but didn't know which skills were most appropriate. He has given us new school buildings, but the lessons inside remain unsuited to the modern world. He wants everyone who needs help to get it, but you need a degree to know how to get it. He wanted us to be able to afford housing, but they have been bought by property speculators who rent them out. He wanted us to be charitable, but he increased taxes on charities, and he wanted us to be secure in later life while he destroyed pensions and our means to save effectively.

Will I vote at the next election? Of course, it's my democratic "right and responsibility" (a favourite Brown sound bite). The problem is who to vote for.

Damned if I do and damned if I don't, it is a terrible dilemma. At least I know one thing. I didn't vote for Brown.

Does anyone know what they are talking about?

Editor's note: This post may offend the unreasonable and the illogical

I have not had time to write an entry lately because I was on holiday, but at the moment I can't say I have wanted to try. The main reason is that I am too angry, frustrated and disillusioned with what I have been seeing on television, reading in newspapers and reading on the internet.

The main BBC channels, up until last night for instance, in the current middle east crises, seems to have lost the power to provide any factual information that helps form a contextual picture of the roots of the crisis. Everyone from politicians to newspaper columnists seems to either have a complete lack of knowledge or is biased to the extreme. I wonder, on issues like this one, is everybody an extremist?
Anyone who thinks that the draft UN Resolution is fair and practicable is quite frankly, an idiot. As with everything, the devil is in the detail and in the detail of the resolution is unmistakeable bias, that actually sets up a chain of events that could lead to an invasion of Lebanon that would be legitimated by the UN. A few minutes going over the most likely scenarios to occur from the moment the resolution is agreed will demonstrate this.

Our??? politicians, seem to have lost their balls and their sense of humanity. Do they really believe what they are saying, do they think it will help, if so, I would like some of what they are taking. And to those who say it is a step in the right direction, I ask them to think again. Does it really help to show the Lebanese government and people that they are not worthy of equal justice and that they should not expect even-handed treatment from those who hold council over global affairs.

Oh, and what happened to Iraq, 6000 dead in two months and barely a hint of the chaos in the news. Do they really think that the public have heard enough, or is it just too unpalatable. The elections in DRC? Darfur? Somalia - This will be in the news soon when it becomes part of the war on terror no doubt? Indonesia? Domestic news?
Where has it all gone? Do we even care?

Anyway, an interesting comment in the Guardian by George Monbiot provides some more information about the cross border activities by Hiz'bollah and the Israeli Defence Force since the 2000 withdrawal. Illegal fly overs, missile attacks, violations of the blue line, kidnknappings, sonic booms etc. as monitored by the UN.

Two extremes come face to face in this SkyNews interview with George Galloway.
Despite not being a fan of George Galloway, in this interview his tone was unacceptably rude, and unsure about his agenda, I found his comments thought provoking.

“Hello, I am here to develop you.”

Must read: “There you go!”, a brilliant and witty online cartoon book highlighting some of the issues when “Development” is imposed on tribal peoples.

Working in the NGO sector, I am exposed to a number of NGO workers, with serious God complexes, whose attitudes I often find bewildering. The kind of people who believe that developing countries are hopeless and pitiful and that the way of life of many people is inferior. Therefore, they feel justified to just dive in and tell them how to “improve”, believing that they can make their lives fantastic, by telling them how to develop as if these countries are pet projects.

There still seems to me, despite calls for change, to be a lack of local knowledge and an over-use of ready-made packages, I call them “flat pack” solutions, for tackling development issues. One of the ones I find most annoying is the imposition of structures of governance, generally in a hurried fashion, that show no understanding of or even attempt to be compatible with the systems and governance methods that have developed historically within a country.

Often, I have to justify to myself, why I want to continue working in a sector that I think has no right to exist in its current form. Not because its aims are not “noble??” or because it can’t do some good, but because the relationship between “developing” and “developed” countries renders it a futile task often bordering on farcical.

I often wonder, if development is meant to empower, why does it so often seem to do the opposite:

“We will provide you with schools, so long as you include these “things” in your curriculum and promote our value system, not that your values are inferior.”

“We will help fund hospitals, so long as you source all your equipment from us and follow these budget plans for the next few years, not that we think you can’t manage your resources.”

“Does your government still want direct budget support? Oh I thought so, well, we want access to your services markets then please.”

Then there is the competition between development agencies in a rush to plant a flag.

“We installed 10 wells for this village”

“Yeah, well we provided skills training courses for this village so everyone can make rugs and gave cash handouts to the next village on the condition that they used them to buy rugs.”

“Yeah well, we provided HIV awareness treatment and these guys are going to practice abstinence and being faithful so that they can save money on condoms.”

“Whatever, beat you to the next province.”

Sometimes I think aid agencies must be viewed as misguided marauding moral evangelists uncovering every stone to offer somebody a skills training course or some such useful thing.

“Hello, I have come to develop you, tell me what you want… oooh that’s a toughie, well what you need is a better job, my NGO has come up with a brilliant idea, you can be a skills trainer and train others to be skills trainers and they can train others to be skills trainers and then when everyone is trained, you can change skill and start again. It’s like a giant pyramid scheme, but you only have to suffer in poverty every 1 in 4 years. Or when it is no longer fashionable with the donors.
But don’t worry, everything will be fine, here is some promotional material and I have left a little present in your draw. It looks like a bible, but don’t worry it isn’t, but if you want promotion and a white 4x4, they’re are cool aren’t they, you better learn it back to front.”

Don’t get me wrong; I don’t think all development agencies are bad, or that all of the programmes are bad, I just think that many are a law unto themsekves and that the whole thing needs re-evaluating including the driving force behind them, the power balance between Southern and Northern NGOs and a re-examination of how development fits within the wider context. But please, not in the form of another DfID (Department for International Development) White Paper.

Anyway, the point of this rant was to promote a brilliant, witty online cartoon book; “There you go!”, highlighting some of the issues when “Development” is imposed on tribal peoples. Please read it! It is worth the time.

Doha Talks Stumble to Suspension

It was hardly surprising that the recent round of WTO talks has been suspended following a stalemate between the negotiating parties. The reality, is that the developed countries who continue to talk about establishing a global trading regime that is fair and will support the growth of developing countries have neither the courage nor the will to stand up for the very principles they espouse and reject the pressures of special interest groups back home in their countries.

As with debt relief, aid and every other aspect of the global war on poverty, action on trade seems to be taken on the basis of two principles. One, to minimise the cost of any action taken, and two, to maximise the press coverage and plaudits for being seen to take a stand on global injustice. However, there are only so many empty grand gestures that can be withstood before developing country governments disengage themselves from the current systems of international global governance and look to others for assistance. To those who are not going to tell them that they want to help; giving with one hand while taking away with the other.

It is not the fact that rich countries bow down to domestic economic and political pressures (lobby groups etc.) that is so annoying, but the pretence that they were going to do otherwise. After all, it is the votes at home and the success of the domestic economy that keep governments in power. Therefore, developing countries need to bring more bargaining power to the table and I think there is room for countries to be represented by regional trading blocs, an idea I need to explore further.

This move was tried more recently with cotton growing nations coming together and middle-income nations coming together at the beginning of the Doha round. However, these countries often proved to be direct competitors without any other strong ties except a few key tradable goods. They were too ready to undermine each other or ignore the interest of those not present. There might be more hope for the other more established regional trade blocs such as MERCOSUR (Southern Common Market (Latin America)), ECOWAS (Economic community of West African States), ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations), EAC (East African Community), etc., but this is by no means certain.

Of course, regional blocs are not without their problems, but, there is a need for a shake-up in the way developing countries negotiate with rich ones and in particular the way in which rich countries bypass delegates and go to the leaders of countries to secure agreement on a deal, if there is to be any real success at levelling the playing field, not free but fair, for all.

For more information and background information, check out the WTO, the World Development Movement and Oxfam.

Contemporary African Photography

The quote below is from an introduction to an article written by Okwui Enwezor about an exhibition of contemporary African photographs, click for a sample slideshow and for the whole article.

"Photography has maintained a vital presence in African culture for over a century. But the recognition of African photographers and their unique visual language has come about only recently. When western photography engages Africa, it seems often to evoke pathological images of disease, corruption and poverty. The global media almost never depict contemporary Africans in "ordinary" situations; images of crisis frequently eclipse other representations."

I wonder

Max Farrar: Some thoughts on capitalism

...the alienation that capitalism produces in individuals is real: "it cleaves the soul of anyone, for one reason or another, is dissatisfied with tawdry pleasures and who experiences the divisions [capitalism engenders] between us and them, self and other, as a painful process which depletes our human-ness"

http://www.maxfarrar.org.uk/



Picture: Frida Kahlo, the love embrace of the universe

Fairtrade products

Being a total cynic, so people say, I have always tended to think that when a business decides to manufacture or sell Fairtrade products it is because they are trying to earn extra profits off the back of a new fad, rather than it being an act of genuine concern for workers' rights in exporting countries.

However, if they are paying suppliers a fair price and I can afford to pay a little bit more, I do tend to buy Fairtrade products, when I can.

With this in mind, I would like to describe my favourite Fairtrade product, Hot chocolate from CafeDirect. Anyone who is a hot chocolate fan has to try it, it is too good. The packaging alone is so tempting, just seeing the rich dark chocolate brownie on the box looking so delicious immediately reminds me of just how good it tastes. No need to add sugar, yet it contains a high percentage of cocoa solids without being at all bitter, a mark of its quality. It is so far from train station hot chocolate (brown coloured milk) that I wonder if you can call them the same thing. I bet you want some now! Hot chocolate from CafeDirect, sensual, invigorating, warming and comforting. Ok, enough now, damn....

If you have tried it, what do you think? Are there any other Fairtrade products you would recommend or is buying Fairtrade a waste of time?

Disclaimer: I do not work for CafeDirect, related companies etc. etc. I don't recommend their instant coffee, it tastes synthetic.

World Trade and the G8

With the meeting of the G8 countries upon us once more and the release of a new white paper by the UK's Department for International Development (DFID), I thought I would put up an article I wrote following the conclusion of the World Trade Organisation meeting in New York, back in Decemeber, just to remind myself how bad the outcome was for develping countries before the technocrats start spinning and talking about "positive steps forward" and "progress". Whatever, here you go.

The WTO Ministerial Conference in Hong Kong concluded with the production of an agreement on current trade rules.
Whether or not the trade talks and the subsequent agreements made are viewed as a success, seems to depend on which side of the equator you live on, and on whose side you were rooting for.
The stark reality is, that the pretence that this trade round was focussed on the needs of developing countries and a will to combat poverty has been thoroughly exposed.
If developed countries were serious about pursuing the Doha Development Agenda then at the very least developing countries should have received net gains rather than losses. On the key issues, developed countries led by the EU, USA and Japan gave very little away.

On agriculture, the WTO made much of the EU guarantee to eradicate its export subsidies by the year 2013. This, however, constitutes only a very small proportion of the EU subsidy budget. The World Development Movement highlighted that in 2004 EU export subsidies amounted to 3 billion Euros out of a an agricultural subsidy budget of 58 billion Euros. The numbers speak for themselves.

Other contentious issues included the support that the US provides to its farmers. The decision to eradicate export subsidies by 2006 has been portrayed as a major concession on the part of the US by themselves and the leading figures of the WTO. However, the US had already been compelled to eliminate these subsidies following a WTO panel ruling.

The measures above highlight the US and EU strategy of appearing to make significant sacrifices in order to appease those who doubt their willingness to tackle trade injustices head on and in order to encourage developing countries to make similar sacrifices in other areas.

In return for small concessions on agriculture and promises of more assistance implementing the trade agreements, developing countries have been further locked in to the aggressive liberalisation agendas in services and industrial products.
The final agreement includes radical cuts in industrial tariffs, thereby reducing the industrial policy options of developing countries, despite some provisions being made to allow them to reduce their tariffs at an as yet undecided slower rate.

One of the successes of the WTO talks concerns duty and quota free market access for Least Developed Countries (LDC). As one of the Millennium Development Goals, it was crucial that this became a reality. Unfortunately, many developed countries sought exemptions for some of their LDC imports, effectively protecting some of their domestic sectors.

In conclusion, it would be fair to say that the potential to redress the global economic balance at these talks has been largely unrealised. Whilst some groups see a positive in the fact that an agreement has finally been made, after several high profile failures, others believe that it would have been better for the talks to fail rather than see developing countries sign up to something that, in some ways, weakens their position rather than strengthens it. However, the current round of talks are not scheduled to conclude until the end of 2006, so it is important that we keep development at the top of the agenda, raising awareness and exerting pressure so that the eradication of poverty and underdevelopment are tackled fairly and effectively.