Qui bono?

Column What does the anti-poverty activist from U2 have in common with the owner of capitalism central Forbes? Besides the preacher pose, a business partnership. Who benefits from it? After one of those wildly romantic open
Airs in the mid-80s, I think it was St. Gallen, we knew that the
not like coming home on Sundays. So thumbs up and
into the first car that took pity on us. It was some
but inside, "Sunday Bloody Sunday" by U2 was blaring, which
the (to my mind at the time) disgustingly elegant driver almost
made him likeable. His missionary work, which soon began
Praise for earning and spending money aroused more curiosity than
Contradiction. Because the guy believed what he was saying, and that alone
appealed to me as a passionate skeptic.

When I found out 20 years later, or more precisely three weeks ago, that
U2 frontman Bono buys into the US business magazine Forbes
the opening lines of the above-mentioned
youth anthem through her head: "I can't believe the news today, I can't
close my eyes and make it go away." The pop politician, charity founder
and Africa lawyer as a partner in the "capitalist tool" of all things
(self-promotion), whose rankings of the richest and most powerful show greed,
Envy and the whole glamor of money made it socially acceptable!
The closer I looked at the SDA message, the further it looked
back.

The irritation increased when it became known a few days later that
the leather-jacket diplomat has taken his holding company U2 Limited out of the
Ireland to the Netherlands, where income from copyrights is quasi
are tax-free. However, in light of the fact that Steve Forbes, CEO
of the media conglomerate of the same name, in his two failed
candidates for the US presidency each emphasized the advantages of a
national "flat tax", Bono's tax evasion at the same time gave rise to the first
Recognize points of contact between the two antipodes.

Paul Hewson (alias Bono Vox), for whom the rock stage is a moral institution
and the Wall Street apostle Steve Forbes are men with
diametrically opposed messages. What unites them, however, is their
Opportunism in forging coalitions that suit the respective
are conducive to achieving goals. Forbes sought fresh capital and
Bono - together with five private equity partners - generates good returns,
but also another media ally in the
Awareness campaign against poverty and for his aid organization "Data"
(Debt, Aids, Trade, Africa).

So who benefits whom more seems to be quite predictable: assuming,
Forbes continues to flourish and will be beating the advertising drum for Data in the future,
the mésalliance ends 2:1 for the U2 icon. With his ambiguous investment
at the same time, however, the agile world interior minister is risking his
entire credibility capital. Especially with
average ideologues who indulge in black-and-white thinking and do not
may tolerate gray areas.

But it is precisely here, between the traditional front lines, that
Bono at his best. He demonstrates this with his annual presence
at the Davos World Economic Forum, where he also spoke to Forbes - significantly
main media partner of the WEF - and came to appreciate it. "I
respect Forbes' consistent worldview and values. We will
have a lot of fun trying to convince each other," he said.
the New York Times from one of his financial partners.

For the rock star who has mutated into a grasshopper, the belief in his own
So it's a matter of self-worth. At least now I know why I have to give
guy on the drive home back then. Today I would
might even do business with such an offender.
And yet continue to dream that guitars will change the world
can.

> Oliver Classen is press spokesman for the
development policy organization Berne Declaration. Previously
he worked as a media journalist, including for Werbewoche.