As outcries against corporate executive bonuses in crisis-embroiled advanced economies are reaching a crescendo, a new clash of values is stirring social debate. On one corner of the ring are the so-called ?populists?, i.e. lay publics and politicians in the US and the UK who are outraged that bankrupt financial companies can have the cake of government bailouts and eat it too by spreading joy among a few unscrupulous individuals. They are lambasting the ?culture of greed? with a tenacity that is unprecedented in American or British memory.
Some critics of bailouts being siphoned off for bonuses are transcending verbal condemnation and resorting to physical attacks on symbolic targets. The head of AIG, which is in the eye of the storm, revealed recently that the company?s email, snail mail and phone lines are being flooded with death threats. American politicians joined the melee by taking pot shots at AIG?s managers, with one senator saying he would feel better if they ?go commit suicide.?
Across the Atlantic, the home of the former CEO of Royal Bank of Scotland was vandalised and his car windows smashed this week by unidentified persons, apparently as a mark of protest against his drawing exorbitant pension even though the Bank was taken over by the British government. Expecting a rise in incidents of hate speech and actions against former financial titans, security is being tightened for honchos at the centre of the ongoing meltdown.
Perturbed at the souring of the public mood against big business in general, leading liberal and conservative intellectuals in Western economies have decided to join battle and defend capitalist values. David Brooks of the New York Times wrote in a column that the ?elemental nature? of America is entrepreneurship and pursuit of wealth. Arguing that commercial ambition and risk-taking are fundamental American traits, Brooks lamented the current social revulsion towards ?how-to-get-rich enthusiasm.? He hoped that the sullying of the corporate image was a temporary blip after which Americans would revert to admiring and emulating the ?gospel? of the commercial spirit.
Mainstream Western news outlets are consistently producing commentaries to argue that the brouhaha over AIG bonuses is a ploy that panders to emotions and passions in a time when people naturally seek scapegoats. The charge that ?populism? is an irrational diversion from the urgent need to resurrect the financial system is being widely disseminated in the print and electronic media. Interviews of optimistic captains of industry are reminding radio and television audiences that depressions bring out sparks of rare entrepreneurial wizardry that will render a rebound ever-so-sweet for everyone. The examples of Walt Disney during the Great Depression and of Bill Gates during the 1982 recession are being bandied about to counter a perceived smear campaign against capitalist values.
Yet, as human suffering intensifies in the US and the UK, an alternative sentiment is coalescing around mass beliefs that defenders of capitalist values are ?elitists? who want the poor to bear all burdens. For this camp, distinctions between AIG?s insurance side, which is reportedly healthy, and its financial services side, which sank, are technical quibbles that do not matter when millions of commoners are losing livelihoods. Hard pressed persons in the US are displaying placards around their necks reading ?where is my bailout??, an obvious pun on the Obama administration?s strategy of reposing faith in financial gamblers.
The clash of values between ?populism? and ?elitism? has extraordinary significance for the future of the global economy owing to its closet class warfare symptoms. Unless policies are framed at the global and national levels to reconcile the two opposing streams, the coming summer could be hot and hellish.
The author is a researcher on international affairs at the Maxwell School of Citizenship & Public Affairs in Syracuse, New York