In the spirit of the G8 protests, an activist that my friend saw in Boston last week carried a sign that said 'Abolish Poverty.' No explanation on how to do it. Just a call to action.

That sign best describes the G8 protests that I saw in Edinburgh, UK last Saturday. Bob Geldorf expressed the event's basic premise on UK radio when he said, "We've never been wealthier, we've never been healthier," so we must be able to abolish world poverty. Although the organizers of the event had a policy agenda (drop the debt/increase foreign aid/make trade just), they emphasized that simply something must be done, because it is the humane thing to do.

The leaders at the protest unabashedly admitted their inexperience in politics, economics, and development. The main speaker told the crowd how he had never thought about the political world until the music of a fellow artist inspired him two decades ago. They made it apparent that the purpose of the event was not to win specific actions from government. They instead stressed that they wanted to demonstrate to the governments of rich countries that their constituents are concerned about world poverty, and that they want their governments to do something about it.

While I appreciate activists who care passionately about broader society and who act to inspire younger generations, I think that Bob Geldorf may have some difficulty in finding someone who does not want to 'abolish poverty.' For the last fifty years, governments of rich countries have tried, and failed, to encourage economic growth in poor countries. I'm not convinced that Geldorf's insistence that governments of rich countries must act will improve the plight of the poor. In fact, I fear that it may make it worse.

As I understand it, the central issue in development revolves around how to effectively do it. Unless Bob Geldorf can bring convincing arguments on how to reduce world poverty to the policy debate, I doubt his efforts will have any impact on the poor.