Governments and the lobbyists who advise them have a problem. Many of the things done by large corporations are good ways to make money but bad for voters. In a democratic country, with a well informed population, it would be simple: people would insist that their elected representatives pass rules preventing corporations from doing these things.
Now it’s a little naïve to assume that politicians are in the job of doing what’s best for their constituents. By and large they get elected by means of large amounts of money, so their first priority is to keep their donors happy. That’s not to say they can afford to ignore the people altogether – voters who feel they’re being ignored can turn nasty. It’s not as if they have a real choice (Tweedledee is probably just as ‘bought’ as Tweedledum) but an angry mob can stir up a lot of trouble, and no one wants it to become obvious just how cosy the corporate-government relationship really is.
Luckily there are a number of effective solutions. One of these has proved particularly useful lately for distracting attention from the environmental damage corporate capitalism is doing to the world.
The technique is to turn a macro issue into a question of personal morality. It reverses the sensible perspective on an issue – dealing with the biggest problem first – by making each individual who might complain seem personally guilty because of their own, tiny, contribution to the problem.
- There is a world-wide water crisis. Some of it is caused by climate change and a lot of it is caused by deforestation. It’s made from a problem into a crisis because of the amounts of water used in irrigation. In Australia, which has been hit each recent decade by serious drought, there are rice and cotton farmers who use hundreds or even thousands of litres of water for each dollar value of crop they produce. Industry and agriculture combined use ten times the water of all households in the country. Just the same the media and the government focus on how long my shower is and whether I have a dual flush toilet.
- Greenhouse is the big one for this, of course. Unlike water it’s actually got an element of truth to work with. It does matter whether I drive a big car with one passenger on my daily commute. So many other things matter a lot more, though. Like clearfelling rainforest in the Amazon and Borneo; soil degradation due to increased use of oil-based fertilisers (soil microbes are a big carbon-sink); the lack of effective co-generation and power efficiencies in industry; transport inefficiencies in our food system. There’s a big list like that and it all might – just might – affect the profitability of some corporations so it’s in the too hard basket. Meanwhile we’re worrying about whether I have low-wattage bulbs installed or whether Al Gore offsets his air kilometres. Get real!
This technique has been used from pollution to oil-usage to recycling. Anything where blame can be laid at the feet of the concerned citizen and let industry off the hook. It should be a transparent scam but people have a natural tendency to fall for it – perhaps becuase religion has taught them guilt, but also because the media is very bad at keeping things in perspective. Something personal, like the number of light bulbs turned on in Al Gore’s mansion, is easier to talk about than something impersonal like co-generation or food transport.
The mantra on K-Street must be “keep it local, never think global”. We need to look past this and see that we tackle the big causes without getting tied down by the unimportant ones. Sure – sponsor a child or buy a Prius. It will help. But don’t lose track of the fact that real issues (of trade with the developing world and the pricing and availability of public transport and renewable energies) are in the end the core of the solution. Don’t let moral arguments about what individuals do or do not do allow industry and government off the hook from the big solutions which are required.