'The long walk to justice doesn't end at Gleneagles,' Noreena Hertz warned protesters just before the recent G8 summit. 'It only begins there.' The official parade was in fact to end with a scamper, rather than a flourish, bearing an artfully prepared set-up into oblivion. As for the great anti-globalist parade, white-band-wearers ended up marking time more or less where they began in the Meadows, in familiar frustration. Make Poverty History half joined hands with the global establishment, and couldn't help half sharing the latter's fate: abrupt down-staging by the old world of bombs and counter-terror. So many forms of display were crammed into a single week that general theatre criticism is difficult. One conclusion may be that the société du spectacle itself is in serious trouble. It has become infinitely less dependable than the assorted VIP impresarios believed back in June. After six months of star preview, G8 July was launched amid horizon-beckoning packages; by the seventh day of the month, it was Baghdad-style wreckage.

LRB 4 August 2005 | PDF Download