There are three types of campaigns: the lost causes, the just a little bits, and the transformational.
The lost causes can be great to begin with – the nobility of defeat, the pride in being proved right that things would get worse, the Butch-Cassidy-and-the-Sundance-Kid-final-scene moments. But that can get draining. Which can lead campaigners to the second type.
The just a little bits are calls for changes that don’t really challenge the powerful, but do measurably lessen the suffering of the poorest. The just a little bits bring “quick wins” a-plenty (so good for people who can’t deal with defeat), and bring praise from the establishment (so good for people who need affirmation). And they do help improve lives. But they don’t tackle the causes of poverty and suffering.
The transformational campaigns are those for fundamental shifts which change power relations: the end of slavery; the beginning of democracy; women’s rights; anti-colonialism; anti-Apartheid; drop the debt. Unlike the lost causes, they are winnable – not quickly, not easily, but winnable. And unlike the just a little bits, when they are won they really do change the world.
The struggle against inequality is a transformational campaign we can win. Those worried that no global leader would ever champion the cause can now be reassured to see as our champions President Obama (and Bill Clinton), along with the Pope (and the Archbishop of Canterbury), and the new leaders of New York (and New Delhi). (We’ve also got as champions the really clever economists; the moderately clever ones not yet, but they’ll catch up.) Those worried it was too much for the public can see opinion polls by Pew and others that show overwhelming majorities agreeing that the gap between the richest and the rest has become too wide.
Those worried that it would upset the super-rich … well, they were right. Some of them won’t get it and never will. It’s called Affluenza. It led a rich businessman to threaten to cancel his donations to the church if the Pope didn’t pipe down with all the stuff about social justice. But, encouragingly, even some of the richest get it. As the wonderfully named hedge funder Bill Gross ($2.2bn) puts it in a letter to his peers:
“Admit that you, and I and others in the magnificent “1%” grew up in a gilded age of credit. Yes I know many of you money people worked hard as did I. A fair economic system should always allow for an opportunity to succeed. Congratulations. Smoke that cigar, enjoy that Chateau Lafite 1989. But (mostly you guys) acknowledge your good fortune. You did not create that wave. You rode it. And now it’s time to share some of your good fortune by paying higher taxes or reforming them to favor economic growth and labor, as opposed to corporate profits and individual gazillions.”
Meanwhile our opponents, the defenders of inequality, are all over the place in their response. Some deny that inequality is getting wider. Some admit that it is widening but deny that’s a problem. Some admit it is widening and admit it’s a problem but claim that the way to reduce it is to further roll out all the policies that have made things worse. And then when they have nothing left they call us Communists.
But the struggle against inequality isn’t a claim that it is possible or desirable for every person to earn the exact same income. No, it’s an insistence that every person is precious, that we need each other, and that in a decent society the gap between the richest and the rest is contained. For three decades after the Second World War, that was the global and bipartisan consensus. It can become again.
We’ve got powerful global champions, and public backing, for the strong clear message that inequality has gotten out of hand. There are, of course, powerful and well-resourced forces determined to further increase inequality. But it is not a thing we need the serenity to accept, it’s a thing we need the courage to change.
