"THE REAL QUESTIONS OF POWER ARE RESURFACING"
Interview with David Bosshart, 29 October 2010 (PDF)
> 1. What is power?
Power is the ability to influence others and, in the next step, to get your own way – if necessary by using force and against the other's will. We had become accustomed to thinking in economic terms, and so power as a factor took a back seat. Everything focused on money and exchange. Money solved all problems. But this functioned only as long the powerful provided enough money. Now, because money is in short supply in a growing number of areas, the real questions of power are resurfacing. By the way, there's nothing intrinsically wrong with power. Indeed we also need it when we want to achieve absolutely reasonable goals – for the benefit of an organisation or community, for instance. Thanks to social networks, mobile devices and total communication, the exercise of power is increasingly taking the form of propaganda and defamation, amounting to a kind of irrational exuberance.
> 2. By what rules does power function?
Until now, we've been able to rely very much on "soft power", i.e. on the attractiveness of brands, culture & lifestyle, shopping, etc. It's been underpinned by judicial fairness, the rule of law and respect for agreements, creating a peaceful environment in which we engaged in trade rather than war – hence the illusion of a world "without history", as in Fukuyama's announcement of "the end of history" after the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. As we now see, nothing can be more naive or mistaken than to think that "the others" will become like "us".
> 3. How have power structures changed in the last ten years?
Because political power is shifting (towards BRIC, Chindia, Next 11, paralleled by the relative decline of France, UK, USA and Japan) and because more and more resources are becoming increasingly scarce (energy, food, talent), soft power is also changing and conflicts are growing. It's no longer the attractiveness of a lifestyle, or agreements and discussions, that bring about solutions. Emerging nations such as China seem to have become convinced that only political power – and hence military power in one form or another – can solve certain challenges. This comes as a shock for consumption-oriented Westerners because the peaceful tools they use – consumer goods, human rights and agreements – are no longer effective.
> 4. Who holds the reins of power? How have they been acquired? And how are they retained?
According to bankers, it's the system. "We're just servants of the system, bringing you the growth you need." According to techies, it's innovations such as iPhone or iPad. Mao said in 1955 that for capitalism to succeed it uses sugar-coated bullets – brands and Western lifestyle. Take away the sugar and what's left in the end is power of enforcement under different conditions.
> 5. In your opinion, which bastions of power should be challenged in order to bring about a change of power?
Ask yourself why everybody is now gearing up for cyberwar. In the 1980s it was Star Wars. Ronald Reagan won because he simply poured in vast amounts of money until the Soviet Union was outinvested. The price was growing indebtedness. The 1990s and the 2000s then brought the illusion that "debt imperialism" was a new form of global dominance. But that, too, has collapsed, and now the game is starting all over again. Financial markets and virtual worlds will play the main role because they are largely "invisible" and defy current developments. The rise of shadow banking in parallel with attempts to regulate banking is a case in point.
> 6. Do you think there is about to be a shift in power? If so, to whose advantage?
No one can predict that. Having moved on from a bipolar view of the world, we now have a world that is not so much multipolar as non-polar, one that is – like a kaleidoscope – constantly changing. Even allegedly peripheral regions can turn prevailing structures upside down. Even niche players can acquire and exploit power. One thing is certain: those on a downward trajectory – France, for instance – are often prompted to engage in romantic behaviour, demonstrating and g0ing on strike – but against whom? After all, the outcome affects the strikers themselves, and decline becomes all the more rapid.
> 7. Do you ever feel powerless?
When technologies fail to function during routine use. When queues at museum exhibitions or airport security checks are endless – and the staff work even more slowly than usual. Or when contemplating megacities such as Calcutta, Mexico City or Wuhan and the unsatisfied basic needs of the vast masses of people who live in them.
On 16 March 2011, the Gottlieb Duttweiler Institute (GDI) in Rüschlikon/Zurich will host the 7th European Consumer Trend Conference entitled "The Return of Power – Who Controls Brands, Media, People?".