I'm listening to the Live8 concert from London as I write this.
It may be the spirit of the occasion that has taken me, but I think that if the G8 summit does not get a result next week - and by that I mean a substantial and immediate improvement on the commitments made to date regarding Africa - the nature of the relationship between the people of the G8 countries and their governments will be radically altered.
Trust of the politicians is already at a pretty low ebb. Failure of the G8 to deliver a result on poverty could fatally damage what trust we have, leading potentially to an effective failure of the current democratic system.
Turnouts at elections will fall away further, leading to a collapse in the mandate (already pretty flimsy) that our politicians have to do their thing.
Saturday, July 02, 2005
Europe: why don't the politicians get it?
In the wake of the recent French and Dutch votes against the proposed EU constitution, it looks like the politicians are running around wondering what went wrong, who they can blame, and what to do about it.
I sense they are missing the point.
As I see it the people voted 'No' not because they necessarily disagreed with the constitution, but simply because they have not been included in the process that has got us to where we are. They see the EU as remote, bureaucratic, and unrelated to their daily lives and concerns.
The way forward surely has to be a major shift in how our elected representatives and national governments relate to the people they govern. The key word here must be 'participation'. If governments want the support of their people, they must be open, honest and enable real participation.
The rise in popularity of things like blogging and citizen journalism is not unrelated to this. We the people simply want to be involved, engaged and consulted over stuff that affects our lives. That's not too much to ask,is it?
We are no longer content to be passive consumers of government and big media spin. If they want our trust, they need to earn it. They do this by being open, honest, and placing some trust in us.
The sooner our elected politicians wake up and smell the coffee, the sooner we can get some real progress.
I sense they are missing the point.
As I see it the people voted 'No' not because they necessarily disagreed with the constitution, but simply because they have not been included in the process that has got us to where we are. They see the EU as remote, bureaucratic, and unrelated to their daily lives and concerns.
The way forward surely has to be a major shift in how our elected representatives and national governments relate to the people they govern. The key word here must be 'participation'. If governments want the support of their people, they must be open, honest and enable real participation.
The rise in popularity of things like blogging and citizen journalism is not unrelated to this. We the people simply want to be involved, engaged and consulted over stuff that affects our lives. That's not too much to ask,is it?
We are no longer content to be passive consumers of government and big media spin. If they want our trust, they need to earn it. They do this by being open, honest, and placing some trust in us.
The sooner our elected politicians wake up and smell the coffee, the sooner we can get some real progress.
Tuesday, June 14, 2005
Michael Jackson Media Circus
What a joke! Watching TV last night we had nothing but wall-to-wall journalists boring everyone (including themselves) stupid trying to fill long chunks of time with guff in between the announcement that the verdict on the Jackson trial had been reached, and the point where it was acutally made known to the world. we were treated to long tedious shots of the Jackson convoy as it made it's way from his home to the courtroom; endless bollox diatribes on the case and the people involved and the speculation on the impact of the verdict and impact of the trial on Michael's career (to say nothing of his mental state) and the decroations around the gates to his ranch and the media frenzy itself etc etc. All a huge waste of time and energy and of incredibly low news value.
With so many 24 hour news channels avialable to us, they are scrabbling for content, at all times steering well clear of any real in-depth analysis of any of it. And they ownder why the Internet is powering a huge boom in citizen journalism and community ownership and control of news.
With so many 24 hour news channels avialable to us, they are scrabbling for content, at all times steering well clear of any real in-depth analysis of any of it. And they ownder why the Internet is powering a huge boom in citizen journalism and community ownership and control of news.
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