We Need to Draw a Distinction Between Charity and Justice
We Need to Draw a Distinction Between Charity and Justice: A response to Eamon Delaney
4 March, 2010
“You need to find a way to sell your ideas to people. Make them want to buy into them.”
That was the advice given to me in a little Belfast coffee-shop months ago by a lady whose area of expertise is working with troubled youth. Promoting social justice issues for her is akin to selling brand X toothpaste. Idealism is all well and good, she seemed to be saying, but it is pragmatism that moves toothpaste off shop shelves.
Eamon Delaney’s thoughts on Irish overseas development assistance in Tuesday’s Irish Times reminded me of that conversation. The core of his argument seems to be this: convince me why I should buy into the brand X toothpaste that is overseas development assistance. Given the proclivity of people in the developing world for procreation, given the state’s dire financial circumstances, given also that, most importantly, Ireland has already proved herself as one the world’s most generous nations and benefactor to some of the poorest, most pathetic peoples, what reason can the development sector possibly put forward to justify the continued national purchase of overseas aid?
It’s a terrible question. Delaney conflates two separate issues - global justice and the demographics of places like Ethiopia - and then goes on to frame them in a completely inappropriate manner. But the fault is not his alone; the development sector has a lot to answer for. The fund-raising departments of most aid organisations see themselves as quasi-commercial entities competing for a limited market of potential donors. While they may as well be selling toothpaste, the product they offer is a sense of well-being. They are well aware of the numerous studies indicating that most charitable giving is egotistical. Most aid campaigns are therefore some variant of ‘in return for some spare change, we’ll enable you to become someone’s saviour and you’ll feel fantastic about yourself’. While this strategy is an effective means of getting people to part with their money, it’s natural end is something along the lines of Delaney’s observation - there’s only so much toothpaste that any household needs to buy.
Many people share Delaney’s sentiments. Ireland has done more than enough to feel good about its charity towards the starving little black babies in Africa. If in the end their plight has not improved because of African corruption, tyrannical leadership, an altogether unhelpful male population, or an inability to grasp the folly in reproducing like rabbits, well then… There are plenty of ways to purchase well being through doing good domestically. There are poor people here, school children who are being educated in unsatisfactory conditions, addicts without access to detox programs, and an economy which needs all the help and resources the state can muster. And as we all know, a rising tide lifts all boats. Besides, charity begins at home, so why not get Ireland sorted out first and then return to the problems of the developing world? A rising tide, don’t forget…
If the regular Irish citizen owes her Ethiopian counterpart nothing but charity, nothing that is, but whatever flows from the goodness of her heart, then there is something to be said for the argument above. The question then that must be answered to the satisfaction of Delaney and others like him, is whether the Irish citizen has a duty or obligation to people in places like Ethiopian, Bangladesh or Nicaragua.
A case can be made for that obligation on multiple grounds, the simplest being the set of arguments put forward by Thomas Pogge, who has written extensively on global justice. He challenges the notion that poverty in a place like Ethiopia is due to purely, or even primarily to domestic issues. Historical harms have put many places at a great disadvantage in terms of providing for their people. While Ireland has clean hands in that regard, and was even a colony herself, the country has still benefited indirectly from the wrongs of that period, if only by accident of geography.
Over and above that, the global economy is structured in such a way that people in wealthy countries benefit at the expense of those from poor ones. The World Trade Organisation rules, for example, are such that rich country tariffs on manufactured goods from poor countries are four times higher than those on the same goods from rich countries. Similarly, the nature of the global order is such that my ability to buy cheap clothes comes from the poor wages and working conditions of people on the other side of the world. Worse, war in the Congo probably subsidised my smartphone. Pogge argues that most of the world is interconnected through various institutions, government and commercial, and if an institution that I am involved with harms others, then I have an obligation to those people.
Whatever one makes of those arguments, the point remains that a distinction needs to be drawn between charity and justice. Charity, by definition, is a tap that individuals can open and close as and when they see fit. The dictates of justice, on the other and, are not subject to our circumstances or convenience. Plonking Ethiopia and countries like it into the box marked charity is convenient for just about all the parties involved with global poverty - aid groups can raise money by selling self-actualisation; the state gains an impressive international reputation for a proportion of GDP that is incomparably smaller than what any large company would set aside for its marketing department; and citizens are safeguarded from the burden of further taxation which might have the unthinkable effect of making us actually pay for ideals we claim to hold dear.
In Leviathan, Hobbes wrote,
Those words have an ominous resonance.
4 March, 2010
“You need to find a way to sell your ideas to people. Make them want to buy into them.”
That was the advice given to me in a little Belfast coffee-shop months ago by a lady whose area of expertise is working with troubled youth. Promoting social justice issues for her is akin to selling brand X toothpaste. Idealism is all well and good, she seemed to be saying, but it is pragmatism that moves toothpaste off shop shelves.
Eamon Delaney’s thoughts on Irish overseas development assistance in Tuesday’s Irish Times reminded me of that conversation. The core of his argument seems to be this: convince me why I should buy into the brand X toothpaste that is overseas development assistance. Given the proclivity of people in the developing world for procreation, given the state’s dire financial circumstances, given also that, most importantly, Ireland has already proved herself as one the world’s most generous nations and benefactor to some of the poorest, most pathetic peoples, what reason can the development sector possibly put forward to justify the continued national purchase of overseas aid?
It’s a terrible question. Delaney conflates two separate issues - global justice and the demographics of places like Ethiopia - and then goes on to frame them in a completely inappropriate manner. But the fault is not his alone; the development sector has a lot to answer for. The fund-raising departments of most aid organisations see themselves as quasi-commercial entities competing for a limited market of potential donors. While they may as well be selling toothpaste, the product they offer is a sense of well-being. They are well aware of the numerous studies indicating that most charitable giving is egotistical. Most aid campaigns are therefore some variant of ‘in return for some spare change, we’ll enable you to become someone’s saviour and you’ll feel fantastic about yourself’. While this strategy is an effective means of getting people to part with their money, it’s natural end is something along the lines of Delaney’s observation - there’s only so much toothpaste that any household needs to buy.
Many people share Delaney’s sentiments. Ireland has done more than enough to feel good about its charity towards the starving little black babies in Africa. If in the end their plight has not improved because of African corruption, tyrannical leadership, an altogether unhelpful male population, or an inability to grasp the folly in reproducing like rabbits, well then… There are plenty of ways to purchase well being through doing good domestically. There are poor people here, school children who are being educated in unsatisfactory conditions, addicts without access to detox programs, and an economy which needs all the help and resources the state can muster. And as we all know, a rising tide lifts all boats. Besides, charity begins at home, so why not get Ireland sorted out first and then return to the problems of the developing world? A rising tide, don’t forget…
If the regular Irish citizen owes her Ethiopian counterpart nothing but charity, nothing that is, but whatever flows from the goodness of her heart, then there is something to be said for the argument above. The question then that must be answered to the satisfaction of Delaney and others like him, is whether the Irish citizen has a duty or obligation to people in places like Ethiopian, Bangladesh or Nicaragua.
A case can be made for that obligation on multiple grounds, the simplest being the set of arguments put forward by Thomas Pogge, who has written extensively on global justice. He challenges the notion that poverty in a place like Ethiopia is due to purely, or even primarily to domestic issues. Historical harms have put many places at a great disadvantage in terms of providing for their people. While Ireland has clean hands in that regard, and was even a colony herself, the country has still benefited indirectly from the wrongs of that period, if only by accident of geography.
Over and above that, the global economy is structured in such a way that people in wealthy countries benefit at the expense of those from poor ones. The World Trade Organisation rules, for example, are such that rich country tariffs on manufactured goods from poor countries are four times higher than those on the same goods from rich countries. Similarly, the nature of the global order is such that my ability to buy cheap clothes comes from the poor wages and working conditions of people on the other side of the world. Worse, war in the Congo probably subsidised my smartphone. Pogge argues that most of the world is interconnected through various institutions, government and commercial, and if an institution that I am involved with harms others, then I have an obligation to those people.
Whatever one makes of those arguments, the point remains that a distinction needs to be drawn between charity and justice. Charity, by definition, is a tap that individuals can open and close as and when they see fit. The dictates of justice, on the other and, are not subject to our circumstances or convenience. Plonking Ethiopia and countries like it into the box marked charity is convenient for just about all the parties involved with global poverty - aid groups can raise money by selling self-actualisation; the state gains an impressive international reputation for a proportion of GDP that is incomparably smaller than what any large company would set aside for its marketing department; and citizens are safeguarded from the burden of further taxation which might have the unthinkable effect of making us actually pay for ideals we claim to hold dear.
In Leviathan, Hobbes wrote,
Seeing every man, not only by Right, but also by necessity of Nature, is supposed to endeavor all he can, to obtain that which is necessary for his conservation; he that shall oppose himself against it, for things superfluous, is guilty of the war that thereupon is to follow.
Those words have an ominous resonance.
The Plight of the Post-Celtic Tiger Irish Child
The Plight of the Post-Celtic Tiger Irish Child
28 September, 2009
One of the most beautiful novels that I have read is The African Child by the late Guinean author, Camara Laye. This autobiographical work retraces his childhood, ending with the author on a flight to France, having won an academic scholarship.
Set during the colonial period, one of the things that stand out in the novel is the benefit of privilege. The South African author, William Plomer, claimed that Laye’s ‘natural ability and enterprise … enabled him to benefit by a French education’. I do not doubt that. However, Laye himself makes it clear that wealth contributed to the development of that ability and made fruitful his enterprise. His family could afford to make the sacrifices necessary to put him through the school in his village, and after that, a more advanced institution in the capital. This distinction meant that Laye was not bound to the path laid out for most of his age-mates. Were it not for his family’s relative wealth, Camara Laye would probably never have become the Camara Laye who played an instrumental role in the advancement of African literature.
I recognise that pattern. The education system that I went through was not too different from a post office processing department. Depending on what one was willing, or more importantly, able to pay, one’s child was put on a certain life path. The best, and most expensive path, began at the gates of private schools. These children, almost regardless of their grades, were the social ‘A-students’. With membership of that group came access to fast track management positions in multinational corporations, and if you played your cards right, the ability to travel abroad and induction into the global middle-class.
At the bottom of the barrel were the rural poor. Statistically, their fate was probably sealed from birth and whatever education they managed to obtain was little more than a formality. At best, it was a means by which society made sure they would be useful tools of labour should the need arise.
In-between those two extremes, the vast majority worked, fought, and did all they could to ensure that they got as close as possible to the most privileged, weary of sinking into the realms of the disadvantaged. There were no illusions about the existence of any sort of equality of educational opportunities. The state had limited resources and those individuals who invested the most personal wealth into their children, it was thought, were entitled to their dividends. Looking back, I suppose the majority did not mind the country’s glaring structural inequalities so long as there was the possibility, no matter how remote, that they could one day be the beneficiaries of that system. In that context, education served as perhaps the most significant locus for national social and economic engineering.
I’m not convinced that the plight of the post-Celtic Tiger Irish child is entirely different. For instance, what is the Irish education system’s raison d’être? A reasonable answer may be that it exists in order to bring about a ‘knowledge-based economy’ (KBE). That, at least, is the manner in which it is most often referred to in public discussion - be that with respect to the analysis of leaving certificate results, or debates on the reintroduction of third level fees. Alternatively, it could be said that the purpose of an education system is to teach people how to think. These ideas are not mutually exclusive, but depending on which is given the greatest priority, the outcome will be very different.
If the primary purpose of education here is to produce a KBE, then does it really matter if vast inequalities exist within the schooling system? Even in a KBE, there is only ever going to be the need for so many scientists and engineers. Rather than deal with the social problems associated with the underemployment of large numbers of highly skilled young people, education could just be viewed as a predominantly private good for social mobility. The children of those who can afford to live in neighbourhoods with the best schools, or pay fees for primary, secondary and tertiary education, can reap the benefits of their good fortune. As for the rest, whatever education the state can afford to offer, utilising its limited resources efficiently, can be made to serve them too. ‘…the secret to happiness and virtue’, wrote Aldous Huxley in Brave New World, lies in ‘liking what you’ve got to do. All conditioning aims at that: making people like their unescapable social destiny.’ Under the education for the establishment of a KBE model, inequality is actually a good thing as it plays an important conditioning role which contributes to social harmony and cohesion.
If, on the other hand, the education system predominantly exists to teach people how to think, efficiency cannot be the only consideration. It is not enough to just teach the most pupils at the lowest cost. Nor is the investment into the education of children based on social status justifiable. Education, under this model, is not a private good but a public one, like policing or health care. In which case, one expects a fairly wealthy country like Ireland, even in times of recession, to do all that is possible to ensure universal access to universal standards.
UCD’s Professor Kathleen Lynch once wrote, ‘to claim that one is promoting equality in education without addressing economic injustices is to engage in an act of educational and political delusion.’ The question for the Irish child is whether equality in education is really a value that is held by the majority, or is it just a nice-sounding platitude?
The answer lies in our beliefs about the purpose of education, and more broadly, our values.
28 September, 2009
One of the most beautiful novels that I have read is The African Child by the late Guinean author, Camara Laye. This autobiographical work retraces his childhood, ending with the author on a flight to France, having won an academic scholarship.
Set during the colonial period, one of the things that stand out in the novel is the benefit of privilege. The South African author, William Plomer, claimed that Laye’s ‘natural ability and enterprise … enabled him to benefit by a French education’. I do not doubt that. However, Laye himself makes it clear that wealth contributed to the development of that ability and made fruitful his enterprise. His family could afford to make the sacrifices necessary to put him through the school in his village, and after that, a more advanced institution in the capital. This distinction meant that Laye was not bound to the path laid out for most of his age-mates. Were it not for his family’s relative wealth, Camara Laye would probably never have become the Camara Laye who played an instrumental role in the advancement of African literature.
I recognise that pattern. The education system that I went through was not too different from a post office processing department. Depending on what one was willing, or more importantly, able to pay, one’s child was put on a certain life path. The best, and most expensive path, began at the gates of private schools. These children, almost regardless of their grades, were the social ‘A-students’. With membership of that group came access to fast track management positions in multinational corporations, and if you played your cards right, the ability to travel abroad and induction into the global middle-class.
At the bottom of the barrel were the rural poor. Statistically, their fate was probably sealed from birth and whatever education they managed to obtain was little more than a formality. At best, it was a means by which society made sure they would be useful tools of labour should the need arise.
In-between those two extremes, the vast majority worked, fought, and did all they could to ensure that they got as close as possible to the most privileged, weary of sinking into the realms of the disadvantaged. There were no illusions about the existence of any sort of equality of educational opportunities. The state had limited resources and those individuals who invested the most personal wealth into their children, it was thought, were entitled to their dividends. Looking back, I suppose the majority did not mind the country’s glaring structural inequalities so long as there was the possibility, no matter how remote, that they could one day be the beneficiaries of that system. In that context, education served as perhaps the most significant locus for national social and economic engineering.
I’m not convinced that the plight of the post-Celtic Tiger Irish child is entirely different. For instance, what is the Irish education system’s raison d’être? A reasonable answer may be that it exists in order to bring about a ‘knowledge-based economy’ (KBE). That, at least, is the manner in which it is most often referred to in public discussion - be that with respect to the analysis of leaving certificate results, or debates on the reintroduction of third level fees. Alternatively, it could be said that the purpose of an education system is to teach people how to think. These ideas are not mutually exclusive, but depending on which is given the greatest priority, the outcome will be very different.
If the primary purpose of education here is to produce a KBE, then does it really matter if vast inequalities exist within the schooling system? Even in a KBE, there is only ever going to be the need for so many scientists and engineers. Rather than deal with the social problems associated with the underemployment of large numbers of highly skilled young people, education could just be viewed as a predominantly private good for social mobility. The children of those who can afford to live in neighbourhoods with the best schools, or pay fees for primary, secondary and tertiary education, can reap the benefits of their good fortune. As for the rest, whatever education the state can afford to offer, utilising its limited resources efficiently, can be made to serve them too. ‘…the secret to happiness and virtue’, wrote Aldous Huxley in Brave New World, lies in ‘liking what you’ve got to do. All conditioning aims at that: making people like their unescapable social destiny.’ Under the education for the establishment of a KBE model, inequality is actually a good thing as it plays an important conditioning role which contributes to social harmony and cohesion.
If, on the other hand, the education system predominantly exists to teach people how to think, efficiency cannot be the only consideration. It is not enough to just teach the most pupils at the lowest cost. Nor is the investment into the education of children based on social status justifiable. Education, under this model, is not a private good but a public one, like policing or health care. In which case, one expects a fairly wealthy country like Ireland, even in times of recession, to do all that is possible to ensure universal access to universal standards.
UCD’s Professor Kathleen Lynch once wrote, ‘to claim that one is promoting equality in education without addressing economic injustices is to engage in an act of educational and political delusion.’ The question for the Irish child is whether equality in education is really a value that is held by the majority, or is it just a nice-sounding platitude?
The answer lies in our beliefs about the purpose of education, and more broadly, our values.
Book Review: The Revolution Will Not Be Televised
Book Review: The Revolution Will Not Be Televised
2 June, 2009
At the heart of Rod Stoneman’s book lie questions about power. Specifically, the power to construct reality, and to create both ‘knowledge’ and ‘truth’.
My first tangible encounter with apartheid was probably Richard Attenborough’s 1987 film, Cry Freedom. The moving images brought to life my incomplete, abstract knowledge in powerful ways. Apartheid, for me, was to a large extent the 157 minutes that Attenborough had put together. But about 20 years later, that view was challenged while reading Mamphela Ramphele’s autobiography, A Life. In it she describes factual inaccuracies in Cry Freedom. She also writes about her desire to have them corrected and the way the ANC, the political organisation that came to ‘own’ the anti-apartheid movement, prevented that from happening. As far as they were concerned, Attenborough had provided an effective tool with which they could further their cause. Details of fact, even if Dr. Ramphele regarded them as ‘the truth’, were a secondary concern.
Chavez - The Revolution Will Not be Televised: A Case Study of Politics and the Media is an interesting work. Film, be it fiction or documentary, is at heart about telling a story. The subject matter in reality is often little more than a backdrop - the context within which the narrative is told. This book is similar. The documentary The Revolution Will Not Be Televised serves as the backdrop for an important discussion on the interaction between politics and the media.
Having been involved with the financing of The Revolution Will Not Be Televised, Stoneman, who heads a film school, provides an interesting perspective on the filmmaking process. His is an eye-opening account of the difficulties of raising funds as an independent filmmaker. The thinking and constraints on individuals who decide what eventually makes it onto television are also well laid out. But most important is the discussion on the criticism that was landed on this documentary and his thoughts on its political significance.
It is unfortunate, though perfectly understandable, that the history of Venezuela’s political environment is not tackled in greater detail. That feat would almost certainly require it’s own volume. But based on this account, one gets the impression that the opposition to The Revolution Will Not Be Televised essentially came from those Venezuelans opposed to Chavez. That group tends to be more light skinned, more likely to be of European descent, and wealthier and than the chavistas. One also gets the impression that the anti-Chavez section of society is used to having the local media create the world in its own image. And that makes sense. Positions of influence within the media sector, as in most other sectors, are generally staffed by people who belong to the middle and wealthier classes. This is more so in the context of the developing world where income and power gaps tend to be exaggerated. It should not be too controversial to come to the same conclusion as Stoneman - control of the means of transmitting a message endows one with some degree of power over people’s perception of reality.
That is where things get messy. Representation. Stoneman clearly shows that the intention of the filmmakers went beyond creating a visual record of the events surrounding a coup somewhere in Latin America. Documentary, like other genres of film, is about ‘entertainment’. Even a documentary on the life cycle of the housefly will seek to keep the audience engaged. In the case of an already exciting story about the fall and restoration of a self-styled socialist leader, things are made all the more thrilling by the clever use of editing and background music, for example. One of the many apt quotations in this book comes from Emilio de Antonio, “Only God is objective and he doesn’t make documentaries.” Kim Bartley and Donnacha O’Briain obviously saw the events in Venezuela from the chavista point of view. As neither of them is God, bias was inevitable. Stoneman cautions that though bias will exist, it doesn’t negate the existence of truth. He is right, but it is impossible to know the extent to which that bias affects the audience’s perception of truth.
Not only that, their film may have had a similar effect to Steven Spielberg’s Schindler’s List. For many, Spielberg’s film, through no fault of his, came to define not just that particular story of the holocaust, but the sum total of the holocaust. Bartley and O’Briain may come to define Venezuelan politics in general for many living outside Venezuela and the Americas. Reading Stoneman’s account, one wonders if the filmmakers realised the full significance of this fact. One gets a sense of their commitment to truthfully tell an entertaining story, but not so much an appreciation of the disempowering effect of that story on some of its subjects.
Stoneman is in some ways incredibly gracious to those who have criticised the documentary. He acknowledges the fact that decisions taken by the filmmakers, even in the absence of a political agenda, portray Venezuela’s opposition in a less than flattering light. However, he does a good job of defending those decisions. An important aspect of that defence revolves around media control in Venezuela. That a group who fiercely oppose and undermine a man who has the support of the majority complain when stronger forces undermine them is more than ironic.
Postcolonial theorist, Gayatri Spivak, posed the important question, “Can the subaltern speak?” This book touches on the same question. In a local context, the poor do not set the media agenda. Internationally, even local elites do not have the kind of power to define how they are perceived in the global metropolis. Without having to cross into the domain of conspiracy theories, Stoneman shows that these questions are not just abstract. They have the power to determine political realities just as much as politics has to influence the media.
Chavez - The Revolution Will Not be Televised: A Case Study of Politics and the Media is an excellent, thought provoking work. It was written by someone who has obviously given a good deal of thought to his industry. Put in simple language, using sentences that flow easily and fortified with the thoughts of filmmakers and philosophers, it is a pleasure to read. I cannot recommend this book highly enough.
2 June, 2009
At the heart of Rod Stoneman’s book lie questions about power. Specifically, the power to construct reality, and to create both ‘knowledge’ and ‘truth’.
My first tangible encounter with apartheid was probably Richard Attenborough’s 1987 film, Cry Freedom. The moving images brought to life my incomplete, abstract knowledge in powerful ways. Apartheid, for me, was to a large extent the 157 minutes that Attenborough had put together. But about 20 years later, that view was challenged while reading Mamphela Ramphele’s autobiography, A Life. In it she describes factual inaccuracies in Cry Freedom. She also writes about her desire to have them corrected and the way the ANC, the political organisation that came to ‘own’ the anti-apartheid movement, prevented that from happening. As far as they were concerned, Attenborough had provided an effective tool with which they could further their cause. Details of fact, even if Dr. Ramphele regarded them as ‘the truth’, were a secondary concern.
Chavez - The Revolution Will Not be Televised: A Case Study of Politics and the Media is an interesting work. Film, be it fiction or documentary, is at heart about telling a story. The subject matter in reality is often little more than a backdrop - the context within which the narrative is told. This book is similar. The documentary The Revolution Will Not Be Televised serves as the backdrop for an important discussion on the interaction between politics and the media.
Having been involved with the financing of The Revolution Will Not Be Televised, Stoneman, who heads a film school, provides an interesting perspective on the filmmaking process. His is an eye-opening account of the difficulties of raising funds as an independent filmmaker. The thinking and constraints on individuals who decide what eventually makes it onto television are also well laid out. But most important is the discussion on the criticism that was landed on this documentary and his thoughts on its political significance.
It is unfortunate, though perfectly understandable, that the history of Venezuela’s political environment is not tackled in greater detail. That feat would almost certainly require it’s own volume. But based on this account, one gets the impression that the opposition to The Revolution Will Not Be Televised essentially came from those Venezuelans opposed to Chavez. That group tends to be more light skinned, more likely to be of European descent, and wealthier and than the chavistas. One also gets the impression that the anti-Chavez section of society is used to having the local media create the world in its own image. And that makes sense. Positions of influence within the media sector, as in most other sectors, are generally staffed by people who belong to the middle and wealthier classes. This is more so in the context of the developing world where income and power gaps tend to be exaggerated. It should not be too controversial to come to the same conclusion as Stoneman - control of the means of transmitting a message endows one with some degree of power over people’s perception of reality.
That is where things get messy. Representation. Stoneman clearly shows that the intention of the filmmakers went beyond creating a visual record of the events surrounding a coup somewhere in Latin America. Documentary, like other genres of film, is about ‘entertainment’. Even a documentary on the life cycle of the housefly will seek to keep the audience engaged. In the case of an already exciting story about the fall and restoration of a self-styled socialist leader, things are made all the more thrilling by the clever use of editing and background music, for example. One of the many apt quotations in this book comes from Emilio de Antonio, “Only God is objective and he doesn’t make documentaries.” Kim Bartley and Donnacha O’Briain obviously saw the events in Venezuela from the chavista point of view. As neither of them is God, bias was inevitable. Stoneman cautions that though bias will exist, it doesn’t negate the existence of truth. He is right, but it is impossible to know the extent to which that bias affects the audience’s perception of truth.
Not only that, their film may have had a similar effect to Steven Spielberg’s Schindler’s List. For many, Spielberg’s film, through no fault of his, came to define not just that particular story of the holocaust, but the sum total of the holocaust. Bartley and O’Briain may come to define Venezuelan politics in general for many living outside Venezuela and the Americas. Reading Stoneman’s account, one wonders if the filmmakers realised the full significance of this fact. One gets a sense of their commitment to truthfully tell an entertaining story, but not so much an appreciation of the disempowering effect of that story on some of its subjects.
Stoneman is in some ways incredibly gracious to those who have criticised the documentary. He acknowledges the fact that decisions taken by the filmmakers, even in the absence of a political agenda, portray Venezuela’s opposition in a less than flattering light. However, he does a good job of defending those decisions. An important aspect of that defence revolves around media control in Venezuela. That a group who fiercely oppose and undermine a man who has the support of the majority complain when stronger forces undermine them is more than ironic.
Postcolonial theorist, Gayatri Spivak, posed the important question, “Can the subaltern speak?” This book touches on the same question. In a local context, the poor do not set the media agenda. Internationally, even local elites do not have the kind of power to define how they are perceived in the global metropolis. Without having to cross into the domain of conspiracy theories, Stoneman shows that these questions are not just abstract. They have the power to determine political realities just as much as politics has to influence the media.
Chavez - The Revolution Will Not be Televised: A Case Study of Politics and the Media is an excellent, thought provoking work. It was written by someone who has obviously given a good deal of thought to his industry. Put in simple language, using sentences that flow easily and fortified with the thoughts of filmmakers and philosophers, it is a pleasure to read. I cannot recommend this book highly enough.