This book raises fundamental questions about nature and effects of marketisation in this age. Almost everything in this world is being marketed. In the last 25 years each and every object and activity has been monetised and marketed as a commodity. Whether everything can be traded or sold has not remained a question anymore. World has already seen it happening. This book is based on research and therefore empirical.
Line
standing is a business in the US.
Standing in a line for someone else for a payment or fee has become for
the norm even for entering such institutions as Supreme Court or Congressional
hearing. Even if an event is free and
people can obtain it by standing in queue, there are people who on hire stand
in the queue and obtain the entry tickets for others for a fee upto 125
dollors. This is for an event like shakeshere’s play. There are websites offering their services
for standing in queue.
Body
parts are for sale. Kidneys are sold
like cakes. Even services of Doctors can
be obtained by paying for his services without waiting time. He would come and attend you on call his
services are paid in advance on yearly basis.
There are speech writing companies who write heart rending three to five
minute speeches for a fee and there are others who seek apologies on your
behalf.
You
can skip the queue at the airport for security or entry by paying extra
amount. Exclusive spaces are reserved
for you if extra payments are made, for watching baseball matches. Even naming rights of teams, stadia, Railway
Stations are marketed. Now commentators
are told to tell the name of the brand or company while commenting on the
performances. A New Zealand company
marketed spaces on the heads of individuals for advertising products/brands. University
admissions are marketed for a price.
The
author points out that the spaces meant for public have been marketed for those
with money. This deprieves the citizens
their right to use the resources of the community. The question is What kind of society we want
to live in. At the time of rising
inequality, marketisation of everything means that people of affluence and
people of modest means lead increasingly separate lives. We like and work and shop and play in
different places. It is not good for democoracy
nor is it a satisfying way to live.
Democracy
does not require perfect equality but it does require that citizens share common
life. What matters is that people of
different beckgrounds and social positions encounter one another and bump against
one another in the course of every day life.
For this is how we learn to negotiate and abide by our differences and
that is how we come to care for the common good.
In
the end, as the author says, the question of markets is really a question about
how we want to live together. Do we want
a society where everything is up for sale? Or are there certain moral and civic
goods that markets do not honour and money cannot buy?
An
interesting take on the current madness for making everything saleable.
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