Towards the end of each year columnists such as myself find ourselves handing out our best of the year awards. We do it partly because rating people is our stock in trade, and partly because for writers distracted by the thought of a seaside holiday best-of pieces are relatively undemanding. So readers are presented with namings of the best sportspersons, the most significant public figures, writers, actors and even people in the street.
This exercise is of interest less for the people who are chosen than for the criteria by which they are chosen. For some commentators the deciding factor is clearly how much money the chosen ones have earned or have made for their promoters. Understandably the bankers, business moguls and property holders of this world feature regularly.
For other publications the criterion is the size of the effect, good or bad, that the person chosen has had on the world. Pope Francis might win the award one year, Donald Trump the next. Sometimes, too, the standard of judgment is which person represents the cultural spirit of the year. One year might be assigned to Pauline Hansen, and another to Jacinda Ardern.
The people chosen by these criteria rarely surprise. They may delight, horrify or bore, but once we understand why they were chosen they become fairly predictable. The criteria match the expectations of society.
The exercise becomes much more interesting however, if the criterion is how far candidates behave in ways that cut against conventional wisdom. Preference then is given to people who are direct and not diplomatic, avoid weasel words when speaking of their principles, prize being good over looking good, do not tolerate a large gap between professed ideals and way of living, and are consumed by a cause that matters deeply for society. People who meet those criteria will certainly provoke dissent, and perhaps even lively conversation.
From that countercultural perspective the stand-out person during 2019 was surely Greta Thunberg. The cause she represents is the most pressing for the future of the world as we know it, namely the need to take seriously the reality of climate change and to respond to it with corresponding seriousness
The ways she addresses this issue are simple. She speaks uncompromisingly about it, mobilises young people of her own age to take it equally seriously and to organise in support of their convictions, addresses political leaders and world gatherings with stern judgment and not