BLUNDERING ON

Being in Greece - the birthplace of democracy - set me thinking about people who have sought to challenge (and change) our perception of collective human responsibility.

Shortly before the assassination, in 1948, of India's one-time spiritual and political leader, Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, the old man gave the his grandson, Arun Gandhi, a piece of paper on which he had written down what he considered the Seven Blunders of the World:

Wealth without work

Pleasure without conscience

Knowledge without character

Commerce without morality

Science without humanity

Worship without sacrifice

Politics without principle

Arun Gandhi later added an eighth blunder to his grandfather's list:

Rights without responsibilities

Sixty years on, it seems, many of those blunders are still being made...