Sep 9, 2006 10:00:00 AM cite

Fernando Solanas:

by Fernando Solanas

Sep 9, 2006 10:00:00 AM cite

Fred Matser: Well, I think it is important to first address what power is. I think many questions are around the issue of power. Power, first of all, is I think in time and space something that resides in each of us, and we can use our power in a functional or a dysfunctional way. That is to say one can use it in harmony with the cyclical evolutionary laws of nature, or when we can use it against these laws. So, if the question is, are brands more powerful than governments, I think it's more the issue of what are the players in the brands aiming at. Brands are often represented, are representation of companies. And governments, both governments as well as companies consist of people. And it's just their willingness in which way they really want to work together, to work together against or with one another. So, as you see, I am a little bit getting into it, making several mistakes. But, the bottom line for me is, as we see it now that the companies that, especially the multinational companies have a big hold over the media as well and the governments do. And it really depends on the situation, in which case one is more powerful than the other one. Of course, many of the players in the companies have a bigger, have an advantage over the governments because they are often much more trained in using the psychology in order to get the attention of people and in that sense are more powerful.

by Fred Matser

Sep 9, 2006 10:00:00 AM cite

Galsan Tschinag: Apparently yes. But this is due to the fact that the affiliated groups, whose brands are meant in this context, infiltrate their representatives into governments and those people then represent the interests of the profit - oriented societies, instead of representing the interests of the countries and the peoples whose names they mention every day.

by Galsan Tschinag

Sep 9, 2006 10:00:00 AM cite

Giora Feidman: Well, I guess there are many people like me there we don’t understand so much why this kind of matter, probably perhaps because I am an artist. But how much I know, many times there are the brands they decide who will be our governments and they depend on us no question about. To have control of this kind of situation, we speak about democrat systems a lot, but in this case also the meaning of democracy depend of one, all of one of us. After we see the results, for instance, of an election, we the people elect, I don’t see the -- as the moment to discover what are the result. We must do the process of day to day to build the result, for instance, of an election and to learn to follow the process of development of our society.

by Giora Feidman

Sep 9, 2006 10:00:00 AM cite

Gladman Chibememe: Yeah. The brands for me I will refer to multinational companies and TNCs, transnational companies, from my own perspective, sometimes these brands become too powerful especially when we look at their relationship with Third World countries. They control the economy, they control the technology, they also control most of the economic sectors of the country. And, at the end of the day, they end up sort of dictating almost everything. And, in most countries like in developing countries -- in Africa, for example countries such as Zimbabwe, Mozambique, South Africa and Malawi, they will end up even with growing support and withdrawing their effort. So, the problem is that sometimes that too actually even compromise the way in which governments should work. Governments are forced to do what they don’t want to do because corporate worlds or the corporate world industry threatens to withdraw their service, and in that case that will compromise the whole system and in this case they become too powerful than governments. But, at the same time, governments also have got the power to control through their policies. But, their main problem is that they don’t have the economic muscle to control that and even their policies might be abused by these financial heavyweights. So, it is really a real real problem.

by Gladman Chibememe

Sep 9, 2006 10:00:00 AM cite

Govindaswamy Hariramamurthi: I think so. It seems to be so, brands are cutting across continents. For people, brands relate to their needs. The governments often are unable to do that. But the only thing is whether the brands are meeting the real needs is a question. If the brands are able to provide answers to the real needs of people then they will become yet more powerful. I do not know the brands are able to stay on. If they are able to stay on, it shows they are able to address the needs of the consumers. So, it is also possible for some of these brands not to be there when they are unable to relate with the users. The brands are expanding, expanding to regions beyond on that what we see as nations, as cultures.

by Govindaswamy Hariramamurthi

Sep 9, 2006 10:00:00 AM cite

Hans-Peter Dürr: Yes. If we identify brands with economic power, we could really say that today’s economic power is more powerful than governments. Brands lead to simplification of the problem. We are overflowed with information and people depend on this simplification. They can be controlled by introducing to them something what they already know. That’s flattening and it leads to great difficulties. The questions that the society and the governments pose are too abstract. They have nothing to do with everyday life and that’s why are not comprehensible to the people who are used to this simplification. We must once again start to point out the issues in a more complicated form, in order they start thinking themselves and making their own decisions in their favour. And that is being hindered. To a certain extent, economic power is an enslavement of the people by simply making them ignorant.

by Hans-Peter Dürr

Sep 9, 2006 10:00:00 AM cite

Harry Wu: No, I don’t think so. I don’t think that brands are powerful than the government.

by Harry Wu

Sep 9, 2006 10:00:00 AM cite

Helena Norberg-Hodge: I would say that brands are more powerful than governments particularly when it comes to destructive power. And more importantly, the multinational corporations that are imposing images of consumer products on young children around the world are wielding more power than governments. Together, they form in effect, a new empire. An empire that is invisible. An empire in the sky of an interconnected web of banks and corporations that now dominate our elected, supposedly elected, democratically elected leaders who at the moment are following to the tune of the corporations instead of listening to their voters. Everywhere in the world, we now see that governments are going against the wishes of their people, and that the commercial hegemony, the commercial empire that is imposing brands on three-year-old children, making these children feel inferior in terms of their own identity, in terms of their own language, in terms of their own food and culture, this empire at the moment is gaining more and more power over the people of the world. But, there is also a counter trend. So, there is now a movement for the last five years when more and more people are aware that through the process of trade deregulation, these corporations have gained more power over us in our lives and that this process needs to be reversed. So, the majority of people on the planet do actually have the power in their hands if they wake up to the real issue of corporate power, and the power that is at the moment greater than that of governments.

by Helena Norberg-Hodge

Sep 9, 2006 10:00:00 AM cite

Homero Aridjis: I think that brands are more powerful than governments. Brands are not only better known than the presidents of the states, they are the icons of globalization and modern era.

by Homero Aridjis

Sep 9, 2006 10:00:00 AM cite

Irina Yasina: Business should be stronger than government if we work in a democratic country in terms of business as producing structure or power, and the government as regulating power. With t his in mind industry is stronger, it produces. The government is stronger in the sense that it regulates. If both of them do their corresponding concerns then they are both strong. But we just don’t know what is better, and we cannot choose as it seems. Yet we should understand that if either business or politicts starts to do something it is not competent for, it weakens not one, but both of them. At least I have no examples of business interfering in politics. But if the government starts to interfere in business then it is very harmful and we see it happens Russia all the time. I just can say we cannot compare brnads and government because these are different powers. These are people and institutions that should exercise their own functions. If we are going to measure them and talk about who is stronger and who is weaker then it means that we are on the wrong way. We should change it. Let us try to do this. Business has to produce and it is stronger in this field while the government has to regulate and it is stronger in it. Thank you.

by Irina Yasina

Sep 9, 2006 10:00:00 AM cite

Jerry Mander: Answertext will be available soon.

by Jerry Mander

Sep 9, 2006 10:00:00 AM cite

Jesper Green: I don’t think brands are more powerful than governments because of the fact that brands cannot fight wars and, but then again brands can’t fight wars. They can sponsor governments; they can bribe government officials; and in that way they can fight wars. So not unless it is easy to relate the brand to that fact then I don’t think that brands are more powerful than governments. And then again when I think about it, maybe governments are brands in itself. Religions are brands for themselves, and the religions is a base for many governments in the world, so maybe governments and brands are the same when I think about it.

by Jesper Green

Sep 9, 2006 10:00:00 AM cite

Jodie Evans: So, brands aren't more powerful than governments because governments have armies. But governments are brands. The thing is is that a brand has to respond because there's a bottom line, because you can destroy it easily by defaming it, by exposing it, where governments aren't so easily toppled as brands.

by Jodie Evans

Sep 9, 2006 10:00:00 AM cite

John Gage: Brands are ideas. Governments are ideas. Ideas vie in the global marketplace for acceptance. If a brand usually representing a product seizes people’s imagination, those that created the brand are successful. But, they are only successful insofar as the brand represents an integrity, a truth, a simple graspable way of summarizing what that product is about. The same for governments, the same for politicians, who become brands. The question, can brands be more powerful than governments really should be, can ideas of justice, ideas of equality, ideas of community be more powerful than any single governmental idea. This is the fundamental issue that confronts all of us, as we try to summarize in one word, one brand, one symbol, one easily graspable identifier, but something neat. And every government must realize their integrity, their reputation, their ability stand for something depends upon the integrity of their actions, which at the end, human action is all that can make up the meaning of an idea of a government, of a brand.

by John Gage

Sep 9, 2006 10:00:00 AM cite

Jonathan Granoff: There are some brands that are more powerful than governments. Ah, the brands of religion for example, that claim the singular explanation of the great mystery that brings us here, why we're born, why we die. Some of those brands are extremely powerful. Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism. These are brands in a way that claim a franchise on truth and on mystery. Then there are brands that are really very very superficial, they are doorways to products and services. Those brands are certainly not as powerful as governments. They may have cultural influence but it's only on the surface. Governments create the economic entities that are able to own those brands. But the brands that come from the aspirations of people out of their primal questions, and that brand answers to those primal questions, they are more powerful than governments, because they create a stimulus within people for which people are willing to die. The brand of the nation, the nation-state, is a kind of brand. The United States, Italy, Germany, these are brands that divide the human family. And people are willing to sacrifice their children, sacrifice their wealth, sacrifice their lives, and limbs, and everything, for those brands. So, to say are brands more powerful than governments, governments to some extent are themselves, brands. Religions are brands. To only talk about the superficiality of consumer culture as branding really misses the dynamic of social identification. So, the question, are brands more powerful than governments? Some brands are, and some brands are governments.

by Jonathan Granoff

Sep 9, 2006 10:00:00 AM cite

Jonathan Meese: I am the most unpretentious person and I don't know anything. I don't know what a brand is, nor what power is, nor what a government is. That's why this question is too complex for me to answer. Let government be government, let power be power, let a brand be a brand. The things should arrange in a way they want to. Everything is a game, everything is connected and that is just fine. We should not interfere with the game.

by Jonathan Meese

Sep 9, 2006 10:00:00 AM cite

Jonathan Stack: I guess it depends on the brands and the governments. But, there are governments that are more powerful. But, I guess the question is, is it worse that a brand being powerful than a government? Maybe the brand is the future. We just have to come out with better brands, like government is a brand, the United States is a brand, America is definitely a brand, or maybe we need to transcend national brands and start thinking kind of in conceptual brands like hope or love. And so, I see that it's not -- it's going to be that way; we are going to end up letting go of national boundaries and embrace more transcended ideas like brands. Now, at the same time it is that it could be surely seen on the negative. But, I am looking on the positive here.

by Jonathan Stack

Sep 9, 2006 10:00:00 AM cite

José Manuel Prieto: I think that some brands have achieved great power to a high degree, but I don’t believe that the point has been reached, where those brands have become more powerful than the governments. Nevertheless the power of those brands and its impact, not only on global economy but on the design of political and economic agendas, is noticeable. But honestly I don’t believe that a level has been reached, where the brands have become more powerful than the governments. In any case, it’s a necessity for the people, for society to control and to keep an eye on them, so that those brands know that they have puplic responsability and know their limits. And also in the case that their power is certain, they should understand that they could use this enormous power to carry out campaigns and help the entire society. This is what I think about this question.

by José Manuel Prieto