[lbo-talk] South Ossetia

B. docile_body at yahoo.com
Mon Aug 11 07:10:39 PDT 2008


Anyone seen the documentary _Power Trip_ (besides me)?

The 2003 film is about an American energy company's (AES Corp.) attempts to privatize Georgia's electric grid, and the difficulty they encounter in trying to convince folks that they should individually pay for electricity. The people generally won't have it and are quite ingenious in their means to bypass the gatekeeper role in which AES Corp. tries to situate itself. 90% of the documentary is set in the Georgian capital of Tbilisi and it provides a stark & vivid account of daily life there, the culture, etc. The American company's officers assume a role no better than debt collectors and hire locals to try to convince the "customers" to pay. There is something ike a 90% non-compliance rate in payment for electricity.

Also, I mention this documentary because in the "Special Features" on the DVD there are bonus scenes where a digression is made to discuss the ethnic conflict in Abkhaz -- in Georgia -- in 1992-93, and what seems like ethnic cleansing.

-B.



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