People keep wanting me to pick up a fight with the Praire Dog. This time it is Lakshmi who wants to know what I think of the post by her that starts off with:

Globalisation’s cheerleader, The Economist, really hates Naomi Klein. I was very surprised at the language used to denounce her …very unlike anything I’ve ever read in the economist before

For one, the Praire Dog is wrong about the Economist. Its opinion pieces are, well… opinionated. The easiest way to make it violate its own style guide is to criticize free trade.
The harshest piece I have read was titled Clueless in Seattle (Link requires subscription) which was on the WTO summit that was disrupted by protesters:

It is hard to say which was worse-watching the militant dunces parade their ignorance through the streets of Seattle, or listening to their lame-brained governments respond to the “arguments”. No, take that back: the second was worse. At least the rioters had a good time. It was the politicians who made the biggest hash of things. Bill Clinton wants to invite the protesters indoors. France’s trade minister says here is the proof that economics and politics cannot be kept apart: statism lives! Britain’s trade minister doubtfully insists that “free trade can be fair trade”, as if to concur that it quite often isn’t (but never fear, he is on the look-out for any sign of unfairness). God help us.

Placid, even-tempered liberals (among whom we would normally count ourselves) will deplore our exasperation. Governments must live in the real world, they point out. Concerns about trade and globalisation are real, and can be legitimate: they deserve to be addressed. Indeed they do. So here’s an idea: let governments start addressing them. Let them explain that trade is first and foremost a matter of freedom-that if a government forbids its citizens to buy goods from another country it has infringed their liberty. (Why were there no anarchists among all those “anarchists”, by the way?) Let them explain that trade makes people better off, especially the poorest people in the poorest countries. Let them explain that trade improves the environment, because it raises incomes, and the richer people are, the more willing they are to devote resources to cleaning up their living space…

It is hard to stay placid when Arundhati Roy says with a straight face “The only thing worth globalizing is dissent”, by which she presumably means that only she has the right to write stupid articles in the Guardian and get paid for it in pound sterling, while an ordinary Indian should be prohibited from buying Diwali lamps from China.

I haven’t read “No logo”, so I can’t comment, but the same Economist has mounted a powerful defence (Once again, Link requires subscription) of brands. Excerpt:

Now a change is taking place in the role of brands. Increasingly, customers pay more for a brand because it seems to represent a way of life or a set of ideas. Companies exploit people’s emotional needs as well as their desires to consume. Hence Nike’s “just-do-it” attempt to persuade runners that it is selling personal achievement, or Coca-Cola’s relentless effort to associate its fizzy drink with carefree fun. Companies deliberately concoct a story around their service or product, trying to turn a run-of-the-mill purchase (think of H?agen-Dazs ice cream) into something more thrilling.

This peddling of superior lifestyles is something that irritates many consumers. They disapprove of the vapid notion that spending more on a soft drink or ice cream can bring happiness or social cachet. Fair enough: and yet people in every age and culture have always hunted for ways to acquire social cachet. For medieval European grandees, it was the details of dress, and sumptuary laws sought to stamp out imitations by the lower orders; now the poorest African country has its clothing markets where second-hand designer labels command a premium over pre-worn No Logo.

The flip side of the power and importance of a brand is its growing vulnerability. Because it is so valuable to a company, a brand must be cosseted, sustained and protected. A failed advertising campaign, a drop-off in quality or a hint of scandal can all quickly send customers fleeing. Indeed, protesters, including Ms Klein’s anti-globalisation supporters, can use the power of the brand against companies by drumming up evidence of workers ill-treated or rivers polluted. Thanks, ironically enough, to globalisation, they can do this all round the world. The more companies promote the value of their brands, the more they will need to seem ethically robust and environmentally pure. Whether protesters will actually succeed in advancing the interests of those they claim to champion is another question. The fact remains that brands give them far more power over companies than they would otherwise have. Companies may grumble about that, but it is hard to see why the enemies of brand “fascism” are complaining.

I posted my own take on ads long back