Injustice by Daniel Dorling

I heard Dorling on the BBC radio show, Start The Week. I was impressed and he clearly rattled some of the more conservative guests who appeared with him. I work in an industry that doesn't stop very often to wonder about the impact of its existence except to perhaps nervously laugh about its position in the world. RIght now, most of our cynicism is reserved for those who caused the financial crash who seem to have popped up to advise governments (including an entire team from one notably failed bank who, obviously, went to help 'prudently' run the newly government owned banks).

So I opened this knowing he'd have someone like me lined up in both barrels. I wasn't very surprised then to be hit squarely in the chest. Dorling has some very pertinent points, especially about exclusion, wage slavery, class and racial segregation via access to wealth and last but not least, the deleterious impact of income inequality.

However, his rattling away at anyone who wants to make more stuff, or earn more money, or to have the best things in life (be that education, travel, learning or healthcare) is somewhat pointless. His message, when nuanced, is battering enough for people who value 'stuff and more stuff at others' expense' he doesn't need to shout at the top of his lungs about how evil they are. Firstly they probably aren't evil - they simply have a society that has allowed itself to believe these are the unspoken goods to which it is committed. In that sense I'm surprised there isn't more of a focus on why people don't and haven't objected to this shift away from decent wages for the bottom 80% of society over the last 30 years.

Globalisation isn't really mentioned and I was surprised that he wasn't a stronger advocate of some of the more sensible measures for restoring a sense of fairness to societies that have swallowed the 'we can all get richer' lie. Ideas such as higher tax rates for the rich, for inheritance tax, for robin hood taxes on financial institutions and for paying certain sections of government enough to actually do their jobs (such as inland revenue, regulators such as the BoE and the FSA, fraud office etc.). Unfortunately what is based upon strong research and solid moral commitment is undermined by a confusion of the rich with the problem. The rich defend their position (not many can easily declare that they are the problem!) and they necessarily have a loud voice but that's not the end of the story as all of human history has shown us. Indeed as Egypt and Tunisia have shown us recently.

The issue is though, would our government listen to a million people on the streets of London?

Well, we still invaded Iraq on a series of lies didn't we...so perhaps Dorling is right to be so strident. Is the book a call to arms? Nearly but not quite and even though it's helped stir up my own moral centre I'm not sure where to go with it.