Green Shoots: A world in tantrum mode proves dialogue outlasts dogma

The meltdown by the orange ogre this week coincided with issues that have been running through my mind recently.

While channelling the quintessential spoilt brat who takes their ball away from the group because their team is losing, the leader of the US tweeted that he will not invite South Africa to the G20 Summit in Miami in 2026. While this is most certainly intended as punishment for our country’s solidarity with Palestine, it also represents the increasing polarisation of the world that is driven by a conservative agenda that will not – cannot - engage in rigorous debate on issues.

Instead, the pedlars of this ideology of unilateralism and exclusion will brook no dissent or diversity of opinion, preferring fake news (cf Afrikaner genocide) instead of critical debate. So poor Cyril will not be invited to the party next year. 

Sadly, the United States is not alone in this trend. Voters who are convinced by the isolationist and exclusionary rhetoric of nationalism keep returning conservative governments to power. And if you think that the liberal democracies of Western countries hold the line against this trend, you’d be mistaken. 

I was recently invited to record on video my views on democracy, accountability, and the role of the donor community. This would form part of a government-funded and accredited online course for civil servants, donor practitioners, and NGO types working in the field of governance. It was exciting to think people would be influenced by our work, and hopefully, my voice could contribute to opening up a more progressive way of engaging with the world. At the end of the 7-minute recording, I said this as a challenge to the donor nations and practitioners of this world: 

“Money is an important enabler of things, but it cannot come with conditions that say ‘We need you to do A, B, and C in order for you to qualify for the funding.’ No; we have to decolonise this. We’ve got to let people determine the agenda. Otherwise, we play into the hands of a system that continues to replicate relations of power that don’t allow for accountability, that don’t allow for democracy to thrive.”

It wasn’t a direct challenge to any specific organisation or country. It was a challenge for people to think critically about how donors have the power to either maintain and shore up the powerful who run exclusionary political systems, or to be open to a genuine transformation that will begin by listening more closely to those who are often the victims of these systems. It was too much for the apparatchiks, and they censored the video by cutting this bit out. I withdrew the whole thing in principle, and sadly, will not become a celebrity online educator. 

During the week, we launched “Conquest or Leaven”, the book by South African-born Jewish Jesuit David Neuhaus. He shared his incredible journey and how it has shaped his understanding of the issues in his adoptive homeland in Israel/Palestine.

It is essential reading and is full of hope of a peaceful future based on justice and equality for Arabs and Jews. A question from the floor challenged the right of the Jewish occupiers to a future in the region.

David’s response was thoughtful and analytical and he used the analogy of South Africa’s history of settler colonialism. Where would the Afrikaners have gone if the post-apartheid settlement had not included them as part of the solution? They had no colonial home to return to and I don’t think the USA was an option then. This critical question could have generated any manner of emotional response. Instead, a thoughtful and challenging answer came forth. It reinforced my conviction that open, critical, respectful engagement on difficult issues has to be how we live in this world and that diversity of views will always trump the crazed and dangerous certainty that comes from a belief in your superiority by virtue of birth, history or geographical location.