0:02

I am so glad you could join us. I'm

0:05

your host, Mo Gaudet. This

0:08

podcast is nothing more than a

0:10

conversation between two good friends sharing

0:13

inspiring life stories and

0:16

perhaps some nuggets of wisdom along the way.

0:20

This is your invitation to

0:22

slow down with us. Welcome

0:26

to Slow Mo. Welcome

0:34

back. Today is one more of

0:36

those last five episodes

0:39

of the It's Not What They Told You

0:42

series. It's not just one

0:44

more episode. It's with

0:46

someone I hold very, very dear, someone

0:49

that I consider a teacher in very

0:51

interesting ways. She didn't know that.

0:54

She only knew that when I met her right now

0:56

because I do spend a lot

0:58

of time following her work and

1:00

I think she's fabulous, honestly,

1:02

in her outlook on life and

1:04

the way she analyzes topics. Then

1:07

I met her in person and I

1:09

was right. It's

1:12

actually quite rewarding when they say, don't

1:14

meet your heroes. No, no, I'm happy

1:17

with this one. My

1:19

guest today is Grace

1:21

Bleke, who is an

1:24

avid economist, journalist, and

1:26

author. She wrote three books on

1:29

the topics of capitalism and how

1:31

capitalism is affecting the world. Her

1:35

latest is Vulture Capitalist,

1:37

which I have to

1:39

say, having lived in California for a

1:41

while, is such an appropriate

1:43

title for the entire genre

1:46

of venture capitalist, if you want. In

1:49

my attempt to get you

1:52

to understand our world a little differently than

1:54

what they tell us our world is like,

1:57

I think Grace truly was the one

1:59

guest that I wanted to sort

2:01

of conclude our conversations around the

2:03

economy with. So

2:06

without further ado, I'm going to enjoy

2:08

my time with my guest today. Thank

2:11

you for being here. Thank you so

2:13

much for that absolutely lovely introduction Mo.

2:15

It means a huge amount, especially coming

2:17

from you. It's quite

2:19

true. So I, no pressure.

2:24

I'm hoping I won't disappoint you now. Let's see.

2:27

I don't think you will. I love

2:29

the way that you take on the

2:31

topics that you analyze. And

2:34

I said several times on

2:36

this podcast, I am a

2:38

recovering capitalist in rehab, basically.

2:41

Because for many, many, many years, I believed

2:43

the promise. I drank the Kool-Aid. You

2:46

know, I had many startups.

2:48

I basically embraced the promise

2:51

of freedom. That

2:54

if you think to the history of capitalism

2:56

and the idea that pre-capitalism,

2:58

there was only royalty and

3:00

feudalism. And there were peasants

3:02

and lords. And

3:05

everyone had to pay to work for the

3:07

lords. And the lords worked for the royalty.

3:10

And capitalism sort of sneaked

3:12

in with the British

3:14

empire and the trades of spices

3:17

and so on, where some of the

3:19

peasants somehow found ways to make money.

3:21

When you sort of take that story

3:23

as like, this is true freedom. Everyone

3:26

now is free. I

3:29

then realized actually partially through your

3:31

work that that's not true at

3:33

all. That we are the furthest

3:35

thing. As the subtitle of

3:37

your latest book says, you know, this is

3:39

the death of freedom. That

3:41

the promise is not at

3:43

all what was delivered. So that's

3:46

all I will say today. The rest of the

3:48

episode is for you. Great. I'll try

3:50

and take up as much time as I can. No,

3:53

I mean, it's so interesting hearing you say

3:55

that, because in a lot of ways, I kind of

3:57

wrote the book for someone like you who was. in

4:01

one way or another taken in by

4:03

the very seductive narrative that we have

4:05

around capitalism and freedom. And it's a

4:08

seductive narrative in a number of ways.

4:11

I think for those who succeed under capitalism,

4:13

it's very seductive because the idea that we're

4:15

all free and that the market

4:18

sorts us into the

4:20

best down to the worst. And wherever you

4:22

end up in the hierarchy is a reflection

4:24

of your natural talents, your natural capabilities. It's

4:27

seductive obviously for those at the top, because

4:29

it kind of legitimizes

4:32

your power and authority and

4:34

wealth. And even for

4:36

those not at the top,

4:38

the idea that the way

4:40

things are is somehow rational

4:42

and justified and fair. It

4:45

makes you almost less angry. It kind

4:47

of makes you just take things

4:50

the way they are and just accept them,

4:52

because you think, oh, well, you know, I'm

4:54

not Jeff Bezos or Elon Musk. I'm not

4:56

as intelligent and those people so no wonder,

4:58

you know, I'm earning a tiny amount of

5:00

money and can barely afford to pay my

5:02

rent because I'm just worth somehow less as

5:04

a person. So this narrative

5:06

that we are all free, we're free to

5:08

shape the conditions of our own existence. We're

5:10

free to work as hard as we like.

5:12

And if we do work as hard as

5:14

we like and succeed and apply ourselves, then

5:16

we will inevitably rise to the top. It's

5:18

seductive for a lot of people. The

5:21

only issue is that it's completely and utterly

5:23

not true. And the way

5:25

I like to talk about this, you know,

5:27

we're told this kind of

5:29

story about the way that society works

5:31

as it almost being like a game. So, you

5:34

know, you're competing against other people to win

5:36

the game and the rewards are money and

5:38

wealth and power and esteem. And those who

5:40

are better at the game get to the

5:42

top and those who are worse, you know,

5:44

fall to the bottom. But the

5:46

issue is that we're all playing this game,

5:49

most of us. And then

5:51

there's a very small category of people

5:53

who are kind of outside of the

5:55

game. And instead of playing the game,

5:57

they're making the rules. The

5:59

game makers. Exactly. And

6:02

these are the people who basically

6:04

plan capitalist economies, the

6:06

institutions and individuals who have so

6:08

much power over the way that

6:10

the world works that they're able

6:12

to basically shape the conditions of

6:15

life for so many people. And

6:17

that power is generally unearned. It

6:20

comes from whether that's a position

6:22

of inherited wealth, often it comes

6:25

from corruption and influence of that

6:27

kind that people are able to

6:29

exert. And it allows

6:32

a small number of people

6:34

to undermine that

6:36

idea of freedom and to

6:38

enclose the world and shape the world

6:41

in the way that they would like

6:44

to see it. And then we're all forced

6:46

to play the kind of the game that they've set for

6:48

us. I use quite a

6:50

lot of examples to illustrate this

6:52

point, you know, this idea that

6:54

we live in a free market capitalist economy doesn't

6:57

really work in practice because of all this

6:59

kind of centralized planning that takes

7:02

place within these free market economies. And

7:04

the one I'd just like to quickly talk about, because

7:06

it's very relevant at the moment, is

7:09

the example of the company Boeing. Oh,

7:11

yes. Yeah, so you might have seen

7:13

Boeing in the news quite a lot

7:15

recently, one of the doors blew out

7:17

of its planes mid flight, there's been

7:19

all sorts of engineering issues with the

7:21

company. And actually, if you look back

7:23

to 2018-19, there were two crashes involving

7:25

Boeing planes, the 737 MAX disasters,

7:29

in which nearly 350 people died. And initially, Boeing tried to kind of blame

7:31

the pilots

7:36

for both of these crashes.

7:38

But investigations later revealed that it had

7:40

been a software flaw that was kind

7:42

of built into the plane that caused

7:44

the planes nose to dive down. And

7:46

the pilot could not really do anything

7:48

to rectify the issue. And

7:51

subsequent investigation from both regulators

7:53

and journalists looking into this

7:56

showed that a big factor in

8:00

kind of demonstrating why Boeing had

8:02

allowed this basically unsafe plane to

8:04

go to market was

8:06

that it had shifted towards

8:09

this corporate culture of

8:11

basically denigrating engineering expertise,

8:15

lionizing senior management, inserting layers and

8:17

layers and layers of management whose

8:19

role it was to cut costs,

8:22

crush unions, kind

8:24

of subjugate workers, ignore whistleblowers

8:26

and just deliver cheap

8:29

planes that could be

8:31

sold to Boeing's various network of

8:33

contracts that exists with governments all

8:35

over the world, not least the

8:37

American state and make massive profits.

8:39

And they did that. They were

8:41

able to achieve massive, massive profits,

8:44

distributed loads of money to shareholders. And

8:46

it was kind of a classic tale

8:49

of corporate greed in which you

8:52

didn't see any kind of competitive pressure

8:54

from the alleged free markets because Boeing

8:56

was in this position of basically kind

8:59

of oligopoly power. It is. Exactly.

9:02

And equally, you know, you have other people who

9:04

might say, oh, well, if the government was able

9:07

to kind of step in and,

9:10

you know, make the market fairer or subject

9:12

this firm to regulation, then this never would

9:14

have happened. There's only one issue with that,

9:17

which is that the government was helping Boeing

9:19

at every step. So it was one of

9:21

the biggest recipients of corporate welfare. That means

9:23

it got money from the government, from the

9:26

US state in terms of taxes, subsidies. It

9:28

had huge numbers of contracts with the US

9:30

state. It was a very integral part of

9:32

the military industrial complex. In

9:35

terms of regulation, at the

9:37

time of these disasters, the airlines, so the

9:39

aerospace manufacturers being regulated in the same way

9:41

as the banks in the run up to

9:43

the 2008 financial crisis. This

9:45

is self regulation. And

9:48

Boeing was being regulated by a

9:50

unit of the federal aviation authority

9:52

that sat inside Boeing and whose

9:54

workers were being paid by Boeing.

9:56

Yes. Congress had just passed another

9:58

round of deregulation for the airlines.

10:00

industry saying that no manufacturer would

10:02

ever release a plane that was,

10:04

you know, unsafe because it would

10:06

damage its position in the market.

10:09

Capitalism would never allow such a thing to happen because

10:12

we have free market competition. And

10:14

then even after all of this had come to light

10:16

and Boeing was charged because of

10:18

all of these failings, it

10:20

still got a massive backdoor

10:22

bailout during the COVID-19 pandemic.

10:25

So there you have this kind of

10:27

cabal of senior

10:29

executives, wealthy shareholders, politicians,

10:33

individuals within a powerful state

10:35

who are brought together in something

10:38

like the military industrial complex and

10:40

who are entirely insulated from

10:43

free market competition and

10:45

also actually quite well insulated

10:47

from democracy as well. So

10:49

they exist in their own little bubble at

10:51

the very top able to make these massive decisions

10:54

that have huge effects for everyone else. And

10:57

yet we're told that we live in this free market system.

11:00

Boeing's workers were subject to

11:02

this ruthless market. Yes. But

11:05

the executives at the top were. Of course,

11:07

you know, Boeing has a very

11:09

important position, let's say, for the

11:11

US economy because the competitor is

11:13

Airbus, which is not American, which

11:16

basically means that if Boeing fails,

11:18

the US economy fails or

11:20

the US position in aerospace fails

11:22

and according or commercial aerospace fails.

11:24

And accordingly, the American government would

11:27

never let them fail if you

11:29

want. Exactly. It's very, very

11:31

similar to the analogy of 2008 and the

11:33

big banks, right? Too big to fail if

11:35

you want. Now, of course, the interesting side

11:38

of this is that basically it means that

11:40

we are asking

11:42

the regulators, we want the

11:44

government, if you want to

11:46

say capitalism is freedom because

11:49

everyone can do what they

11:51

can to succeed without government

11:53

regulation. The Reagan economics,

11:56

if you want, you know,

11:58

what Thatcher allowed to. tried to do here

12:00

in the UK or pretended to do here

12:02

in the UK, is basically

12:05

saying, hold on, no regulation from the

12:07

government is freedom for the market economy.

12:10

And at the same time, now when

12:12

we ask the government to regulate, by

12:14

definition, there is really none of that,

12:16

because the benefits are, there is a

12:19

conflict of interest for the benefits. So

12:21

that's a very, very, there

12:23

is really no freedom, if you want. When

12:26

you think about how we

12:29

end up in places like this,

12:31

so we constantly hear the words

12:33

around those big

12:36

influencers somewhere who

12:38

own all the money or own all the

12:40

wells, who are making all the decisions in

12:43

a way that basically affects every single

12:45

one of us. How

12:48

does that actually play in reality? I

12:50

mean, is there really a backdoor

12:52

meeting where people worth less than

12:54

$100 million are not allowed

12:56

in that meeting, and the others come together

12:58

and say, OK, from now on, we're going

13:01

to start another pandemic. And you know, that's

13:03

going to, right? Is that how it happens?

13:06

No, generally not. Although

13:08

there are moments of

13:10

generally crisis when you

13:12

do see powerful people

13:14

come together, often in a room,

13:16

and make really big decisions about

13:18

what happens next. So the example

13:20

I always think about is the

13:22

financial crisis, when the central

13:24

banks got together with the heads of the

13:27

major banks and basically made

13:29

a plan for the world economy. And

13:31

there was a study that was done

13:33

after that, that showed that those banking

13:36

institutions that had the closest links with

13:38

the American state ended up doing better

13:40

from the bailouts than those that

13:43

didn't. So occasionally, and I

13:45

think this is where the kind of

13:47

conspiracy theory stuff comes from, you do

13:49

see powerful people coming together and actively

13:51

making those decisions in a collective way.

13:54

But the vast majority of the time,

13:56

the cooperation is not that explicit, and

13:58

it's not that open. It

14:01

is the subject of a

14:03

kind of networked organization that

14:06

allows people with similar interests to

14:08

come together to lobby

14:11

and to influence politicians

14:13

and political power. Now there's

14:15

nothing inherently wrong with that. This is

14:17

how democracy works. You know, you have

14:20

different groups of individuals who

14:22

organize within civil society to make

14:24

their interests known and try to

14:26

apply pressure on politicians or whoever

14:28

else they're trying to pressure. The

14:30

issue is that we live in a world

14:33

in which only one set of people have

14:35

the ability to do that. And

14:38

the vast majority of people are

14:40

actively denied the capacity to organize

14:42

in order to demand things of

14:45

politicians and are basically

14:47

repressed and crushed and beaten

14:49

down when they try to demand

14:53

things. Explain. So we

14:55

talked about neoliberalism, right? About Thatcher and

14:58

Reagan and they're coming to power saying

15:00

we want to deliver free markets, right?

15:03

What's very interesting is that the first

15:05

things that neoliberal leaders do when they

15:07

come to power is basically

15:10

go to war with any

15:13

organizations that manifest

15:15

collective power, particularly the

15:17

unions. So in the UK, the

15:19

first thing that Margaret Thatcher does when she comes

15:21

to power is go to war with the country's

15:23

unions. And she wins. She crashes

15:25

the miners who are trying to fight

15:27

for their jobs. Hold on one second.

15:29

So let's define new new liberalism for

15:31

everyone. Oh, sorry. So

15:33

neoliberalism in my in my understanding is

15:36

government will not regulate. This

15:38

is free market economics. Every

15:40

everything happens with the freedom

15:42

and justice of free market.

15:45

Government is a is a is a burden.

15:48

Let's leave everything to nature if you

15:51

want the nature of economic free markets.

15:53

Exactly. So of course,

15:55

Reagan in the US, Thatcher here, were

15:57

basically the leaders. of that idea. Let's

16:00

go back to the unions bit, which

16:02

I think is fascinating when

16:04

you really think about it. No, that

16:06

was immensely well explained because that's exactly

16:08

how they presented their ideology. Exactly. That's

16:11

how they sold the ideology. Yeah, exactly.

16:13

And it was really powerful, I think,

16:15

because people bought into that idea of

16:17

freedom and individual freedom. Yeah, exactly. Yeah.

16:20

But what's interesting is the contrast between

16:22

that promise of freedom, which is we

16:24

will come to power and we will

16:26

promote individual freedom. We will give you

16:28

control over your life. Your pensions. Exactly.

16:31

Yes. And then the actual actions of

16:33

these governments when they come to power.

16:35

And the first thing they do, as

16:37

I've said, is literally

16:39

use the power of the state to

16:42

beat back and divide people who

16:44

are organizing to try and defend

16:46

their interests, first on the list

16:48

of the unions. So

16:50

Reagan famously goes to war with

16:53

PACO in the US. Thatcher

16:55

goes to war with the miners in

16:57

the UK. And then all of this

17:00

anti-union legislation is introduced to make it

17:02

much harder for workers to organize to

17:04

defend their interests. And so you see

17:07

union membership decline quite substantially over the

17:09

course of the next several decades. They

17:11

also dissolve other forms of

17:13

collective power that existed in the

17:16

economy at the time. So Thatcher,

17:18

for example, shut down the

17:20

GLC, the Greater London Corporation. And she had

17:22

been in this kind of battle with the

17:24

GLC because there were lots of kind of

17:26

left wing politicians that were organizing in

17:29

this London metropolitan authority

17:32

to try and do things like Thatcher wanted

17:34

to build the London Docklands, right, where we

17:37

now have Canary Wharf and all of these

17:39

big financial institutions. The people living there at

17:41

the time said, we don't want this. They

17:44

actually put together a document called the People's

17:46

Plan for the London Docklands with

17:48

the support of the GLC. And they

17:50

said, our children deserve to be more

17:52

than lavatory attendants for passing businessmen. We

17:54

want a different vision for this space,

17:56

which is where we live. And

17:59

partly because of its involvement with

18:02

community organizing like that, Thatcher

18:04

shut down the GLC. So,

18:08

any form of community power that it

18:10

had been helping to support was then

18:12

crushed as well. So,

18:15

you see these politicians come to power

18:17

and their first aim is

18:19

to crush any resistance,

18:22

any resistance that comes from the vast

18:24

mass of ordinary people. At

18:26

the same time, they deliver unparalleled

18:28

freedom for those at the top.

18:31

So, suddenly you can literally move

18:33

your money anywhere in the world

18:35

because you have the removal of

18:37

capital controls and exchange controls. Tax,

18:39

especially the taxes that have been

18:41

levied on those at the very

18:44

top of society, were slashed. You

18:46

saw a transformation in regulation. And

18:48

again, this is often cast as

18:50

deregulation, which implies that the

18:52

state is shrinking and stepping back. But

18:55

that isn't what it was really like.

18:57

It was actually a proliferation of regulation,

19:00

but regulation that benefited those

19:02

at the top, particularly the big banks. Banks

19:05

need lots of regulation because they need an

19:07

environment of certainty. Banks always need to know

19:09

that ultimately if anything's going to go wrong,

19:11

then the state is there to bail them

19:13

out. Exactly. So, that's why

19:16

regulation is important to the banking system. And

19:18

you've got in many ways lots of new

19:20

regulation, but instead of regulation to protect workers

19:22

or protect the environment, it was regulation to

19:24

protect the banks. So, what

19:27

all this shows, I think, is that neoliberalism was

19:29

never really about freedom.

19:32

It was about freedom for some, those

19:34

at the very top. And in

19:36

order to protect the freedom, i.e. the

19:38

wealth and power of those at the

19:40

top, they saw it as necessary to

19:43

constrain the freedom of everyone

19:45

else, and particularly their freedom to organize.

19:48

And you see this today with demonstrators

19:50

being put in prison for

19:52

years for peaceful protest.

19:54

This is a continuation of the

19:57

same logic, which

19:59

is... putting people in

20:01

jail to protect freedom. Who's

20:03

freedom? The freedom of

20:05

those at the top. Which is quite

20:08

fascinating when you really think about

20:10

it, because that becomes today really

20:12

the underlying

20:14

current of everything that you see online,

20:16

everything that you see, I mean,

20:19

in a very interesting way, since the

20:22

Reagan Thatcher years, individualism,

20:25

we spoke about this

20:27

briefly before we started,

20:30

becomes truly the dream

20:33

of every now consumer,

20:35

not human. Okay. The idea

20:37

is that as a human

20:40

now in this fair

20:42

world where dog eats dog, but

20:44

dog can become very big and

20:46

I can be Jeff Bezos if

20:49

I really worked hard enough. Suddenly

20:52

you start to

20:54

believe that it's your, that

20:56

you're competing with anyone else rather

20:59

than cooperating with everyone else, which I

21:01

have to admit in my, in my

21:04

blurry years, I used to,

21:06

because I'm raised in the East and

21:08

you know, educated in the West, I

21:10

used to think that this is something

21:12

wrong with the West, that individual freedom

21:14

is highly prioritized above societal

21:17

and community benefit. Okay.

21:20

But now I can get it. I can get

21:22

that this is an agenda that basically says, Hey,

21:24

if all of you guys fight,

21:26

okay, and argue and

21:29

be rude to each other, which now

21:31

is explosive on social media, then

21:33

you're never going to organize and annoy

21:35

the rest of us up here in

21:37

the penthouse trying to just make a

21:39

little more money here. Exactly.

21:42

I literally couldn't have put it better myself. Thank

21:44

you. My, my teacher

21:47

said that. So where

21:49

does that put the politicians then? Because

21:52

interestingly, you'd, you'd look back at the

21:54

Thatcher years and say, Oh my God,

21:56

it's the best thing that happened to

21:58

the UK. You know, She

22:00

was the politician that came and saved all

22:02

of us, right? And you could

22:05

actually back that up with years of

22:07

prosperity in the city of London, if

22:09

you want, where so much money was

22:11

being made for so many people and

22:13

so many Bentleys started to show up

22:15

on the streets. So there are signs

22:17

that things are improving. Was

22:19

Margaret Thatcher or Ronald

22:21

Reagan actually working for the people?

22:24

Were they governments of the people or governments

22:26

of the elite? Thatcher

22:29

and Reagan, and

22:31

Thatcher in particular actually, had

22:33

this ingenious strategy. And

22:36

Thatcher said the method is economics,

22:38

the object is to change the

22:40

soul. She wanted to transform

22:42

the way that people related to

22:44

each other in exactly the way that you said. In

22:47

the 60s and 70s, it

22:50

was in some ways the peak of

22:52

organizing. You had a

22:55

strong labor movement, you had in

22:57

the US the peace movement, the

22:59

protests against Vietnam, the anti-apartheid movement

23:01

that was spreading around the world

23:04

and spreading through the student

23:06

movement. You had the environmental movement, you had

23:08

all of these people coming together to make

23:11

their power known. And

23:13

it was starting to disrupt the

23:16

operation of capitalism because

23:18

these people were gaining political

23:20

power. They were able to

23:23

really present a

23:25

threat to vested interests. And

23:27

neoliberalism was what undid

23:30

that. And it did so through

23:33

a two-pronged approach. The

23:35

first one was to create an

23:37

ultimately unsustainable financial boom. The

23:40

benefits of which would be

23:42

used to incentivize people to

23:45

behave in a certain way. And that's the

23:47

second prong, which is this project of societal,

23:51

sociological and fundamentally

23:53

psychological transformation that

23:56

underpins this transition, which is, as you

23:58

said, about how do we... stop people

24:01

from organizing together in these movements that

24:03

are threatening us and get

24:05

them to start competing against one another. And

24:08

I'm kind of writing a book

24:10

proposal at the moment that looks

24:12

at this exact thing. I'll publish

24:14

it. Great.

24:18

But the three trends that I

24:20

think were most pronounced were

24:23

the shift from workers to

24:26

entrepreneurs, the

24:28

shift from citizens to consumers

24:31

of public services, and

24:33

the shift from communities to

24:36

households. So rather

24:38

than seeing yourself as a worker, as you might have

24:40

done in the post-war

24:42

years, Thatcher's aim was

24:44

to encourage you to see yourself as

24:46

an entrepreneur and an investor entrepreneur. And

24:49

the reason that that is particularly

24:51

beneficial is because workers organize.

24:54

They all have the same interests

24:56

often. If they're not paid well,

24:58

they'll talk to their peers. Exactly. And say,

25:00

hey, are you unable to put food on

25:02

the table too? Yes. Right? Yeah,

25:05

exactly. And that was a problem because these workers

25:07

were coming together and they were organizing and they

25:09

were saying, we're not getting paid enough, so let's

25:11

go on strike. But if you're an entrepreneur and

25:14

you know this better than anyone, you're competing against

25:16

all the other entrepreneurs. It's

25:18

your job to use

25:21

your savvy as an investor to

25:24

invest in your human capital. So

25:26

this comes out with education. Education is now

25:28

something that you pay for and you take

25:30

out a loan to invest in it because

25:32

it's an investment in capital in your human

25:34

capital. Wow. You take

25:37

out a loan to make sure that you're

25:39

able to purchase your own home. And that

25:41

again can provide a source of wealth that

25:43

insulates you from life's risks. You,

25:46

again, get your own private pension and

25:48

you have to invest that in the stock

25:51

market. And when the stock market does well,

25:53

which means wealth is increasing at the top,

25:55

you then think, oh, well, wealth is being

25:57

created at the top, but I'm getting a

25:59

little bit of. it as well. So why

26:01

would I resist? Even if your salary stayed

26:03

the same, if you have assets, then

26:06

you're much more likely to identify with the interests

26:08

of those at the top, because of the

26:10

value of your house, the value of your

26:12

pension is going up, then that means your

26:14

interests are aligned with those kinds of people.

26:17

So that shift is really important. And then

26:19

on the flip side, it's

26:21

the kind of proliferation of asset

26:24

ownership is accompanied by

26:26

this dramatic expansion of debt. Now

26:28

debt is the key here, because

26:31

the unleashing of the financial power of

26:33

the banks is what brings us this

26:35

boom that creates all of this prosperity,

26:38

this alleged prosperity that we get from the

26:40

1980s onwards. It is largely

26:43

driven by the removal of

26:45

exchange controls and the removal of capital controls.

26:47

So money is now free to flow all

26:49

over the world. And banks can now create

26:51

much more money through lending than they had

26:54

been able to do in the past. A

26:56

lot of that lending goes into mortgages. It

26:59

means that you can now take out a

27:01

massive mortgage and use that to buy a

27:03

home. What happens when you have

27:05

more money chasing the same

27:08

amount of stuff, you have more liquidity

27:10

chasing the same number of houses, house

27:12

prices go up. It

27:14

creates a massive financial boom. We

27:16

know what happened from the 90s

27:18

onwards, that boom ends up taking

27:21

over the whole global economy, creating

27:23

massive economic growth and prosperity for lots

27:25

of different people, but ultimately that was

27:28

unsustainable. And in the

27:30

process, you have this beast of

27:32

debt that is released. And

27:34

debt is a really powerful disciplining tool

27:37

for people, because on the one

27:39

hand, you might have some assets, but on the other

27:41

hand, you now have to manage your liabilities as well.

27:43

So if you're relatively wealthy, then you

27:45

always make sure that you try and

27:48

have more equity say in your home

27:50

than your liabilities. You manage

27:52

your debt and your assets. You're

27:54

a good mini-capitalist who makes very

27:56

healthy financial decisions. But if

27:58

you're not paid very well, you might

28:00

find that suddenly the value of your

28:03

liabilities is higher than the value

28:05

of your assets. And instead of saying,

28:07

oh well, you're not being paid

28:09

a high enough wage to be able to afford

28:11

the things that you need to survive, people will

28:14

instead say, you've been irresponsible, you've made bad financial

28:16

decisions and that's how you've got yourself into debt,

28:18

even though they've taken out the debt just to

28:20

be able to pay for things they needed to

28:23

survive. So it's, you internalize that,

28:25

you think I'm a failure because I'm in

28:27

debt, you don't think I

28:29

need to organize with people to try and have a

28:31

higher wage. And actually today,

28:33

financial issues are driving a lot

28:36

of people, particularly young men, to

28:38

self-harm and suicide because they internalize

28:40

that blame, they think it's my

28:42

fault. Because they look at the

28:44

lifestyle of the top guy who

28:48

seems to be so clever and in a

28:50

very interesting way for men,

28:53

that means he's very masculine, right?

28:55

He managed to succeed and become

28:58

the best hunter in the tribe,

29:00

right? And I'm not able

29:02

to do this, so it's not just that I'm

29:04

not able financially, it's basically an

29:06

identity issue that would lead to that.

29:09

It's quite interesting as well when you, it doesn't

29:11

matter as a matter of fact, if

29:14

you're gaining capital in

29:16

your assets that you bought in debt, I

29:18

think the sentence that you said there, which

29:21

is so interesting is

29:23

that is a very

29:25

powerful disciplinary instrument.

29:27

So, you know, where I

29:30

grew up in a developing

29:32

economy, you keep the people

29:34

busy with football and putting bread on

29:36

the table, right? In more

29:39

advanced economies like here, I think

29:41

the idea is if

29:43

you had given people enough, which was

29:45

really what was happening post-World War II

29:47

with the baby boomers

29:50

creating so much GDP, it

29:53

seems that in my mind that basically

29:55

meant they had so much time to

29:57

start pondering stuff that

29:59

could actually harm them. the government, interestingly,

30:02

or the top players, right? Or

30:05

the ones that the government works

30:07

for, really. And in an interesting

30:10

way, to keep people busy, then

30:12

student loans, other loans, mortgages, car

30:14

loans and everything becomes

30:17

the shackles that basically keep

30:19

us restrained. I have

30:21

to say, I've never really discussed this in public.

30:23

Maybe we should have it over coffee. But I'll

30:26

ask you anyway. One of my experiences,

30:29

which most people have never had,

30:32

is I was witness, because of

30:34

my position at Google at

30:36

the time and because of my history

30:38

of being a very prominent

30:40

businessman in the Middle East for a long time,

30:43

so I was very much entangled into

30:45

what was happening with the Arab Spring.

30:48

Not that I had any views on it because I

30:50

had not lived in my home country, Egypt,

30:52

for maybe 20 years at the time. But

30:55

I'd been in a position

30:57

of, I know the internet really

30:59

well, so almost everyone was constantly

31:02

reaching out to me, the previous

31:04

government, the transition government, the opposition.

31:08

Everyone was just talking to me all the time saying, what's

31:10

happening? And I have

31:12

to admit, in my mind,

31:14

I think the Arab Spring seems to

31:17

have been a glitch in

31:19

the system where somehow,

31:21

because Arabs at the time were

31:24

so offline, if you want, you

31:26

gave them a tiny bit of

31:28

online community and suddenly

31:30

they go like, this is shit, right? And

31:33

they organize and they explode.

31:37

And I have to say, I feel

31:39

that leading after the Arab

31:41

Spring into 2019, 2020, that you could

31:45

see quite a bit of organized

31:49

opposition around the world, Hong Kong, here in

31:51

the UK, and so on and so forth.

31:54

And I don't think that this is

31:56

the reason for COVID. I am not

31:58

into that conspiracy at all. Okay. And

32:01

I know you wrote about, you know, the COVID

32:03

economy if you want, but

32:05

it seems to me that somehow

32:07

governments found a massive opportunity

32:09

to say, okay, everyone stay

32:12

home, right? Let's not organize

32:14

in the streets anymore. No more Arab Spring.

32:16

And you could actually recognize very

32:19

quickly that post COVID, everyone's

32:21

silent. Everyone's like, yeah, what

32:24

was that? Right? And do

32:27

you know, let's talk about that era

32:29

a little bit. No conspiracy theory here,

32:32

but two things happened with COVID. One

32:35

is actually society at

32:37

large was disciplined. Everyone was

32:40

ordered to sit home. Nobody

32:42

had freedom to add to do anything,

32:44

but at the same time, massive amounts

32:46

of money were funneled into

32:49

the system through printing money, basically

32:51

more debt. Right? And

32:54

I think that's completely shifted.

32:56

I think this was,

32:58

you know, the one big nail in the

33:00

coffin of freedom, if you think about it.

33:03

What do you think of that? I

33:05

think, yeah, that is a very interesting

33:08

and well thought through analysis

33:10

because you're right. It's not

33:13

conspiratorial to

33:16

say that governments in

33:18

particular, but also big multinational

33:20

corporations took advantage of

33:22

a crisis to strengthen

33:25

their position. And you see this

33:27

happening over and over and over again. You know, Naomi

33:30

Klein talks about the

33:32

shock doctrine and disaster capitalism, the

33:34

way in which the powerful are

33:36

able to take advantage of moments

33:39

of crisis and uncertainty

33:41

to embed and strengthen their

33:43

control. One example that she

33:45

uses, which I find really fascinating, is

33:48

the example of the tsunami and

33:51

the crisis and devastation that took

33:53

place in the Maldives and the

33:55

way in which that was used

33:57

to remove people who had

33:59

been living on the islands in the Maldives for a

34:01

very, very long time, settled them

34:03

all in a very, very small area

34:06

of the capital and

34:08

ultimately sell those islands off to big

34:11

hotels so that they would become

34:13

centers for luxury tourism, basically. Now,

34:15

no one's saying the government caused

34:17

that natural disaster, but they took

34:19

advantage of it to

34:22

basically redistribute power

34:24

and wealth within that economy. And I think that

34:26

you can say the same about

34:28

the pandemic and that

34:30

that takes place both within individual

34:33

societies and at the level of the world

34:35

economy. Now, you

34:37

mentioned there having been born

34:40

in the Middle East and been a businessman

34:42

in the Middle East for a while and

34:44

that that idea of debt as a

34:46

disciplining tool resonates with you. Now,

34:49

you can see that at the level of

34:51

individual consumers, but you can also see that

34:53

at the level of whole states. Nations at

34:55

large, of course. So the name for my

34:58

book, Vulture Capitalism, comes from this

35:01

vulture fund, basically, which was just after the

35:03

2008 financial crisis, Zambia,

35:05

which is a relatively small

35:08

African nation, big copper

35:10

producer. It had nothing to do with the

35:12

financial crisis, but because of the collapse in

35:14

world GDP after 2008, copper

35:18

prices fell, its export

35:20

revenues dried up, and

35:22

its debts started to look unsustainable. So

35:25

there was an Irish fund that bought

35:27

Zambia's debt, knowing that Zambia was going

35:29

to default on that debt so that

35:31

it could sue the government

35:34

of Zambia for failing to pay its

35:36

debts and take vast amounts of money

35:38

out of the pockets of ordinary Zambians

35:40

and suck it back into the rich

35:42

world. Now, this is the kind

35:44

of, what you might call, kind

35:46

of lawfare. It's like

35:48

warfare using international legal systems

35:51

that you see all the time in the world economy.

35:54

And debt is a very powerful

35:56

tool for basically crushing

35:59

the debt. entire nations and

36:01

particularly nations where you're beginning

36:03

to see some resistance to

36:06

the dynamics of global capitalism. And I

36:08

think you're quite right that we did

36:10

start to see that in a really

36:13

big way before the pandemic. I

36:15

think part of the reason for that

36:17

was that we were moving from a

36:19

unipolar world into a multi-polar world. Now,

36:23

you can say whatever you want

36:25

about the dynamics that underpin that,

36:27

but ultimately when you have two

36:30

superpowers, all the other

36:32

countries in the world economy have a

36:34

little bit more leverage, a little bit

36:37

more room basically, because they're able to

36:39

choose. Exactly. Put them off against each

36:41

other. Before it was the Washington consensus,

36:43

which is you follow the rules laid

36:46

out by Washington, or you don't

36:48

get any money and you're kind of ostracized from the world

36:50

economy. Now these countries

36:52

have more than one superpower

36:54

to pick from. They can maybe go to China

36:57

if they want lending for infrastructure. That's going to

36:59

come with a lot of strings attached and a

37:01

lot of problems, but ultimately there is this choice.

37:04

Now, what you see over the course of the pandemic

37:07

is a lot of nations being

37:09

really kind of beaten down using

37:11

the tool of debt, because

37:13

a lot of countries as soon as

37:16

the pandemic hit basically found themselves unable

37:18

to repay their debts. Through no fault

37:20

of their own, the global economy had

37:22

been shut down, the factories that were

37:25

using the resources that they were exporting

37:27

were no longer operating. Suddenly

37:29

they were unable to pay their debts. We

37:31

had a debt moratorium, so a pause on

37:34

debt repayments, but the

37:36

debts themselves kept increasing because

37:39

of interest. Exactly. And

37:41

that has continued to this day, except for the

37:43

fact that it's getting worse because

37:46

of climate breakdown. So you see

37:48

natural disasters, cyclones, hurricanes, we've

37:51

just seen in the Caribbean

37:53

recently that caused massive devastation.

37:56

And Caribbean nations come forward and say, we as

38:00

the international community have agreed that

38:02

small island countries, countries at risk

38:04

of desertification, all of these problems

38:06

that are going to come from

38:08

climate breakdown, we shouldn't be

38:11

the only ones that have to bear the

38:13

burden of climate breakdown. So

38:15

we would like some of

38:17

these debts that we're going to have to

38:19

take out to reconstruct after this natural disaster

38:22

that we didn't cause, that basically you in

38:24

the global north caused, we're going

38:26

to ask for some grace on that debt. And

38:29

what they get is so tiny, it's

38:31

barely enough to allow them to

38:34

recover, let alone put in place

38:36

the conditions for sustainable long-term economic

38:38

growth. Again, I will

38:40

probably repeat your sentence for a

38:42

very long time. It's a

38:45

disciplinary instrument, right? So the

38:47

idea of the fact that

38:49

someone can go to Zambia and take

38:51

out literally, imagine walking into a country

38:53

and taking $10 out

38:55

of every citizen, when their

38:58

income is $2 a month, right?

39:00

How evil is that when you really think about

39:02

it? But that's not the issue. The issue is

39:05

debt is used to discipline a

39:07

country so that they follow the

39:10

agenda and become a peasant as

39:12

a country, right? And I think

39:14

the idea of how the World

39:16

Bank and the Monetary Fund,

39:18

the International Monetary Fund, and so on, and

39:20

the IMF and so on, basically

39:22

used that instrument in

39:25

favor of Western agendas. It's not a

39:27

secret now, I think in the last

39:29

year, a lot more truth

39:31

coming out about how many decisions

39:33

globally that would benefit the entire

39:35

world would be vetoed because of

39:38

Western interests sometimes, because of a

39:40

certain nation's interest. And basically

39:42

those instruments then put the entire

39:44

country and its leaders under pressure

39:47

to comply, right?

39:50

The thing that kills me though, and

39:53

you repeated it several times, is

39:55

that Thatcher would

39:57

then promise freedom. Yeah.

40:00

That Reagan would promise

40:02

prosperity, that, you know,

40:05

the IMF would promise reform,

40:08

that it's almost consistent that

40:10

what the promise is,

40:12

is the opposite of the objective. You're

40:15

walking in to sort of

40:18

break down unions and the very,

40:20

very final bit of freedom that

40:23

the worker has, and you're

40:25

promising the worker freedom. It's

40:29

very skillful the way they do that. And

40:31

I think it comes back to what I

40:33

was saying at the beginning about how alluring

40:35

this promise of freedom is. And

40:37

the allure of that promise comes from

40:39

again, it's the American dream. It's

40:42

like, sure, they're promising freedom

40:44

and that freedom is going to come

40:47

with inequality. It means that we're

40:49

going to have a market, basically. Some

40:51

people are going to rise to the top and some people are going to fall to the bottom.

40:54

But we all convince ourselves,

40:57

I'm effective, I'm talented,

40:59

I'm resourceful. Why should I

41:01

not be able to rise to the top and achieve

41:03

things and become a millionaire within

41:05

this system and within this economy? I

41:08

think in some ways, it speaks to

41:10

the fact that we all know that

41:12

we as individuals and groups have

41:16

immense skills and capabilities and talents

41:18

that are constantly being exploited by

41:20

someone else and taken advantage of

41:22

by someone else. Which, by the

41:25

way, is the actual definition of

41:27

capitalism. It's basically, you know, everyone

41:29

is a commodity. Let's just buy

41:31

them for the lowest possible price

41:33

to produce for the capitalist. Exactly.

41:35

Yeah. And because we know that

41:37

we know that we have these talents and skills that

41:40

are being exploited by someone else, we're sucked in by

41:42

this idea that if all the

41:44

external stuff is taken out of the

41:46

way, then we will rise to the top.

41:49

The problem is that the whole game is

41:51

rigged. You know, as I said, there's

41:53

this class of people who are insulated from

41:56

markets, basically, because they're, you know, in

41:58

monopolies or they're... working

42:01

within governments to kind of get their own

42:03

way. And then even, you

42:05

know, within this hierarchy there's

42:08

a brilliant statistic from Oxfam that

42:10

says that one third of billionaire wealth

42:12

is inherited and one third

42:15

of billionaire wealth comes from crony

42:17

connections to government. So basically two-thirds

42:19

of billionaire wealth comes from either

42:21

inheritance or corruption. So

42:23

the idea of the self-made billionaire is just

42:26

kind of absurd. That other third,

42:28

it comes from exploiting workers exploiting the

42:30

environment. You know, God knows the privileges

42:32

that we afford to billionaires because we

42:34

basically say, well, they have all the

42:36

wealth, we better give them what they

42:38

want. And, you

42:41

know, it just, it really brings

42:43

home this point that the

42:46

freedom that you're promised is

42:49

really the freedom to kind of

42:51

be exploited unless you are

42:53

one of those very few lucky people who is basically

42:55

able to adopt a position at the top of this

42:57

hierarchy and sit around

42:59

making rules for everyone else. And

43:02

I think there's another point here that you

43:04

mentioned earlier which was about the

43:08

implications of this for people's understanding of

43:10

their own masculinity and identity, right? Because

43:13

if you buy into this philosophy

43:15

for understanding the world, which is that

43:18

life is a market, there's a clear

43:20

hierarchy, the capable ones go to the

43:22

top and the useless ones sink to the bottom. But

43:25

you aren't aware of the fact that this

43:27

game is rigged, that actually it's not the

43:30

good that get to the top, it's the lucky that

43:32

get to the top and they stay at the top. Or

43:34

the one of the team, basically. Yes, exactly. If you

43:36

align with the team at the top, then you get

43:38

to the top. Yeah. And

43:40

people at the top never fall down to the

43:42

bottom. That's a key thing about social mobility. It's

43:44

not just that those at the bottom are able

43:46

to go up if they're effective. It should also

43:48

mean that if you're very wealthy and capable and

43:50

you fail, that you should fall to

43:53

the bottom. You shouldn't be bailed out. Do you

43:55

ever see that happening? Absolutely not. So

43:57

if you don't understand that this game is rigged, internalize

44:00

those feelings of shame and

44:03

powerlessness and you think I'm

44:06

not a millionaire so

44:08

I must be worthless. You know I've been

44:11

working really hard but I'm not succeeding that

44:13

must mean that I am not intelligent that

44:15

I'm not capable and

44:18

you see I think particularly among young men

44:20

today where the idea of

44:22

masculinity is as you say tied to your

44:24

ability to provide to have a home to

44:26

have a good salary to feel secure to

44:29

be able to provide a sense of security and you

44:32

are unable to do that because we live in

44:34

an economy that kind of

44:36

manufactures insecurity as

44:38

a way of exploiting people you

44:41

feel like a failure and your

44:43

response to that could be a number

44:45

of different things it

44:47

could be that you feel hopeless

44:49

and depressed and that's definitely

44:51

something that we're seeing with the rise of

44:54

severe mental ill health but it could also

44:56

make you very angry correct it can make

44:58

you feel like you want to

45:00

burn the whole system down like the only reason

45:02

you're not getting to the top is because there's

45:05

people in your way it's the women the

45:07

feminists or it's the migrants and the

45:09

refugees who are getting in your way

45:12

which we can see so much noise

45:14

around exactly yeah so that

45:16

response to this competitive

45:19

hierarchical individualistic culture that

45:22

we've created makes

45:24

us sick or it makes us angry and

45:26

it makes society sick and we've just seen

45:28

that with the riots that we've had across

45:30

this country and of course that's playing to

45:32

the agenda of what is the

45:34

design in the first place it's like

45:37

let the you know the savages sort

45:39

of you know mingle among themselves and

45:41

fight and disagree and and

45:44

comment badly on each other's social

45:46

media posts let them not

45:48

never get together and say it's the whole

45:50

game design that's working against me fascinating

45:53

what do we do I'm

45:57

glad you are I

45:59

think you'll exactly right that

46:01

this division and this

46:03

individualism plays into the

46:06

agenda that we're kind of all

46:08

playing under because

46:10

the narrative of those at

46:12

the top is ordinary

46:15

people are too

46:17

stupid or too selfish

46:19

to be trusted with any real political

46:21

power. We have to have all the

46:23

power up here because if we really had a

46:27

democratic economy if we

46:29

gave workers power in their workplaces if we

46:31

gave communities power then they would abuse it

46:33

and what's the evidence for this? Well it's

46:35

people's response to living in a competitive

46:38

individualistic society where they're encouraged to fight

46:40

one another and they do fight one

46:42

another and then because they're fighting one

46:45

another those at the top say you

46:47

don't deserve power you have to

46:50

be controlled and policed right and

46:52

actually there is another way. So

46:55

throughout history across time across

46:57

space there are

46:59

constant examples of

47:01

people coming together doing

47:03

that thing that I mentioned earlier of recognizing

47:05

that they have these skills and capabilities that

47:07

are being exploited by someone else but instead

47:09

of trying to use those skills to compete

47:11

against each other they pool

47:13

their capabilities and they come

47:16

together and they cooperate and they

47:18

build movements or

47:20

institutions or organizations that

47:23

become really powerful and influential

47:26

and the example I like to use because I think

47:28

it's a really good contrast with the example of Boeing

47:30

is the example of the Lucas plan in the UK. Now

47:32

you might not have heard of this.

47:35

Lucas Aerospace was an aerospace company in

47:37

the UK in the 1970s and

47:40

it came into all sorts of difficulties

47:42

because rising competition from abroad the workers

47:44

were unionized they were paid higher wages

47:46

so it wasn't competitive and

47:49

the workers went to the Labour

47:51

government at the time and said we need you to

47:54

nationalize us because you know otherwise the firm is going

47:56

to go under and we're going to all lose our

47:58

jobs but Tony Ben who

48:00

is my personal political hero, a

48:02

democratic socialist, replied to the

48:05

workers, why don't you come up with a plan

48:07

as to how you can save this

48:09

corporation? And so the unionists

48:12

went back to the workers and initially

48:14

they tried to ask all sorts of

48:16

experts and academics how they could design

48:18

a plan to transform this company. That

48:20

didn't work very well. So

48:22

instead, they asked all the

48:24

workers in the company, you know,

48:26

all of these engineers, all of these, you

48:28

know, people in various different positions throughout the

48:30

company to provide ideas as to how they

48:32

could change it. And what

48:34

they put together became known as the Lucas plan.

48:37

And these workers had basically

48:39

taken stock of the resources within the

48:41

firm. And they had said

48:44

rather than producing weapons, which is what they

48:46

were producing at the time, they said, we

48:48

can use this organisation to produce socially useful

48:50

technologies that will be of

48:53

benefit to society. So

48:55

things like wind turbines, healthcare, tech, kidney

48:57

dialysis machines. This was in the 1970s,

48:59

so it's very forward thinking. And

49:02

here's a plan as to how we can get

49:04

there. They were saying, there's layers

49:06

of management that are telling us

49:08

how to do our jobs and

49:10

what to do. We don't really

49:12

need that. We can work together

49:14

and manage ourselves. We can have

49:17

a democratic publicly owned company where,

49:19

you know, there are worker representatives

49:21

making decisions where there's, you know,

49:23

political representation, societal representation, so that

49:25

we can have this company that

49:27

produces socially useful technologies. And

49:29

this plan was greeted by everyone

49:31

as this amazing thing. You know, all of the

49:33

everyone on the left was like, this is brilliant.

49:35

But even like the Financial Times was like, wow,

49:39

this is a really powerful document. We have no

49:41

idea that workers had so many

49:43

ideas, so many capabilities, so many resources

49:45

that they could use in

49:48

imagining a different kind of world. And

49:50

it became a kind of lightning rod for

49:52

activists everywhere. Ultimately, the guy

49:54

who led spearheaded these

49:56

efforts, Mike Cooley, was fired for his

49:58

union activity. and he

50:00

ended up going to work at the GLC,

50:03

the Greater London Corporation, which I was talking

50:05

about earlier, and he was put in charge

50:07

of their kind of community technology outreach. And

50:10

this was a mechanism for bringing together

50:12

businesses, community organizers, and local government to

50:14

say what technologies can we develop that

50:17

will help your community, that will help

50:19

your business? How can we

50:21

kind of create a supportive environment for

50:24

you to be able to live better lives, basically,

50:26

and using the power of local government to be

50:28

able to do that? Thatcher

50:31

crushed the unions and Lucas

50:34

went under. Thatcher crushed the GLC and the

50:36

GLC went under. And what I

50:38

think is really fascinating is that Lucas

50:40

Aerospace shut down. It was

50:43

carved up in the shareholder value revolution

50:45

of the 1980s, sold

50:47

from one company to another to another. And

50:50

parts of what was once Lucas Aerospace

50:53

ended up being purchased by a corporation

50:56

that produced the faulty sensors that

50:58

went into the Boeing 737 MAX

51:00

planes that crashed,

51:02

killing all of those people. And

51:04

I think that provides us a very clear indication

51:07

of the choice that we have in terms of the

51:09

kind of economy that we create. On

51:11

the one hand, we have workers coming

51:13

together to produce socially useful technologies that

51:16

are of benefit to society. On

51:18

the other hand, we have a

51:21

massive monopolistic corporation working with an

51:23

imperial government to produce planes that

51:25

fall out of the sky. Wow.

51:29

Wow. You know,

51:31

it fascinates me because again, if you

51:34

would look at East and West,

51:36

the way we create barriers

51:39

between people to work together

51:42

while saying that this is for their

51:44

benefit is really, really

51:47

what's killing everyone. I mean, in a very

51:49

interesting way, when the 2008 crisis hit the

51:51

world, my

51:55

home country, where I was born, Egypt,

51:58

was unaffected because we didn't have... any debt

52:00

instruments at all. It wasn't

52:03

part of the economy for us to

52:05

borrow, to buy anything. We

52:07

borrowed from friends when we needed money. We

52:10

borrowed from family members and then paid back

52:12

and so on. And so the crisis hits,

52:14

we're unaffected. When you

52:16

really think of the evolution of

52:19

how the Egyptian society for many,

52:21

many years, we didn't have pensions,

52:23

we didn't have healthcare, we didn't

52:25

have anything, but we had a

52:27

community. When the community was

52:29

basically saying, if my cousin is in trouble, I'll

52:32

help them out. There is no need

52:34

for insurance for that because my cousin will help me out

52:36

if I'm in trouble. And

52:38

I see more and more now as I

52:41

go to Egypt that this is disappearing, that

52:43

debt is everywhere, that

52:45

everyone is now trying

52:47

to say it's externalize the

52:50

dependencies outside the community to others.

52:54

And that basically is the beginning of

52:56

where everyone is as we are. So

52:59

what you're saying is the answer to

53:02

all of this is don't count on

53:04

the government, don't count on the capitalist

53:06

system, connect and create a community so

53:09

that you, as the people,

53:11

actually govern your own life. Exactly.

53:15

I will end it here. I

53:17

think this, I admire

53:19

your thinking. I think you're

53:21

fascinating. I think you're really

53:23

on a very important mission and I really

53:25

support what you're doing. Thank you so much,

53:28

Mo. So grateful that you came today. It's

53:30

been such a pleasure talking with you. It's

53:32

been really fantastic. Thank you for everything that

53:34

you do. For all of you listening, I

53:36

am so grateful for the opportunity, as I

53:38

always say, to speak to

53:40

amazing people because of you. This

53:43

is my episode before last, before

53:46

I take a break on slow-mo. I

53:48

will leave the entire body of

53:50

work for you to revisit with

53:52

so many incredible speakers and so

53:54

many incredible thinkers. So you have

53:56

320 episodes to go back and listen to. Meanwhile,

54:00

I think this message truly

54:02

is probably the core of

54:04

what slo-mo is all about, okay? That

54:07

what we need as people is

54:09

to realize that most of the

54:12

time what we're told is not

54:14

for our benefit, it's for our

54:16

belief so that the benefit of someone

54:18

else is delivered and that the true

54:21

benefit is for us to

54:23

organize together. The true benefit

54:25

if we wanted to create the world

54:27

that we want is to

54:29

create it ourselves, is to stop playing

54:32

to the narratives and

54:34

actually connect to others. I love you all

54:36

for listening and I will see you next

54:38

time.