How Edinburgh Book Festival found itself in the culture wars

The Herald Scotland

3 days ago

At about the time Noel and Liam were getting ready to kiss and make up last year the EIBF found itself embroiled in controversy over sponsorship, a row which more than a year on has expanded to include funding and platforming.
But how did we get here? And, perhaps more importantly, where does the festival go in the future?
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The controversy goes back to a longstanding sponsorship arrangement between the festival and Baillie Gifford, an investment management firm based in Scotland's capital.
The company came under scrutiny due to its ties to the fossil fuel industry, as well as to companies operating in the occupied Palestinian territories.
In 2023, climate activist Greta Thunberg cancelled a scheduled appearance at the book festival as she accused Baillie Gifford of 'greenwashing' in their sponsorship of the festival, which she said allowed them and other companies "the social licence to continue operating".
She concluded: "I cannot and do not want to be associated with events that accept this kind of sponsorship."
Last year the group Fossil Free Books called for literary festivals to end their relationships with the company unless it divested from such activities, after The Ferret found it had up to £5bn invested in companies which make money from the oil, coal or gas sectors at the end of 2022.
Fossil Free Books also accused the firm of having "nearly £10bn invested in companies with direct or indirect links to Israel's defence, tech and cybersecurity industries, including Nvidia, Amazon and Alphabet".
A 2023 report named Baillie Gifford as one of the top investors in companies involved with illegal Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank.
Baillie Gifford says both of these claims are misleading.
Baillie Gifford and the festival agreed to end their sponsorship The company says it is a "small investor" in three companies "that have been identified as having activities in the Occupied Palestinian Territories", and that only 2% of its funds are invested in companies related to fossil fuels.
Fossil Free Books has said the 2% figure equates to between £2.5bn and £5bn, while Arts Workers for Palestine Scotland said Ballie Gifford holds investments in booking.com, which advertises accommodation in the occupied West Bank; Cemex, which previously operated factories in the occupied territory through a subsidiary and has been accused of supplying materials for barricades and border walls; and Cisco Systems which provides services for the [[Israel]]i military.
In May last year, the Edinburgh International Book Festival announced it would be ending its partnership with Baillie Gifford but made clear they had only done so due to "intolerable" pressure and the risk of the festival being disrupted.
Allan Little, chair, said: 'Our team cannot be expected to deliver a safe and sustainable festival this August under the constant threat of disruption from activists. This was a pragmatic response to that reality.
'Funding for the arts is now in a perilous position and we should all be clear that without the support of our partners and donors, the future of festivals like ours – and all of the benefits these events bring to authors and readers alike – is in jeopardy."
The activists had therefore succeeded in their goal but at the potential cost, according to the EIBF, of the festival itself.
In June though, The Herald revealed that [[Edinburgh]]-based author Sir Ian Rankin had agreed to become a major financial backer of the event alongside fellow author Jenny Colgan, additional funding from the Scottish Government, and money from the People's Postcode Lottery.
So, controversial sponsor gone but the book festival remains – everybody's happy, right?
Well, not quite.
The one-off funding from the Scottish Government, amounting to £300,000 to help the festival pay for its long-running schools programme for the next three years, proved controversial.
The announcement of the funding came just weeks after Liz Lloyd, Nicola Sturgeon's former chief of staff, was appointed as director of the festival.
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There is a key distinction here in that while the announcement was made after the appointment, the decision on funding was made long beforehand, ministers taking the decision on March 28 and Ms Lloyd not being appointed until May.
Nonetheless Lothian Conservative MSP Sue Webber told the Daily Record: "SNP ministers should come clean on how this funding was awarded and if there was any lobbying from former colleagues who were once at the heart of the nationalist government.'
While there is no suggestion of any wrongdoing, the injection of further public money brought further controversy to the festival.
After all, many asked, why should the taxpayer foot the bill for a sponsorship lost because of targeting by activists?
The counter-argument, of course, would be to ask why a cultural institution liked the Edinburgh International Book Festival needs a controversial corporate sponsor in the first place.
There was criticism, too, from the anti-woke brigade who felt that the festival was insufficiently open to debate on various culture war issues.
One given example was a lack of invite for Susan Dalgety and Lucy Hunter Blackburn, who edited the gender critical tome The Women Who Wouldn't Wheesht, released in May 2024.
The narrative was that a bestseller about and by Scots was not being given a platform, which could only be for ideological reasons.
The Women Who Wouldn't Wheesht could accurately be described as such given it debuted at number three on the Sunday Times Bestsellers List, though it dropped off of there pretty quickly and by the imperfect science of Amazon rankings is probably now selling 250-300 copies per month in its various formats a little over a year after its release, a respectable if not earth-shattering number.
It might be tempting to suggest that both the climate campaigners and the gender critics are a small but passionate bunch capable of creating noise beyond their numbers, but then they'd both get very angry, which is probably why no-one has suggested that.
The closest anyone has come is Edinburgh East and Musselburgh MP Chris Murray who told The Herald: "It's getting pelters because people think it's either too woke or not woke enough, or that it's taking money from a big business or the public sector.
'And actually, I think we need to take a step back and remember what the book festival is for; the book festival is supposed to be a festival of, fundamentally, ideas.'
Thankfully organisers can expect things to calm down a bit this year, with the headline event of the festival the launch of [[Nicola Sturgeon]]'s memoirs, dealing with Brexit, Covid, Boris Johnson, Alex Salmond and the independence campaign. No-one and nothing likely to get people worked up in there, surely?
When it comes to the matter of sponsorship and invites there is, clearly, a line to be drawn somewhere.
The author Val McDermid accused those protesting Baillie Gifford on the grounds of climate and Israel of 'virtue signalling', saying: "No-one is saying that Baillie Gifford is white than white. But there is no such thing as a clean sponsor."
That may well be true, but where does one draw the line? It's fair to say most festivals would accept sponsorship from Coca-Cola, which operates in the occupied West Bank, but probably wouldn't from Elbit Systems which produces weapons for the Israeli military.
On the same subject, Viktor Orbán's government banned the group Kneecap from entering Hungary for the Sziget Festival due to the Irish rap trio's comments on Palestine but Chappell Roan will headline despite saying U.S support for Israel was 'genocidal'.
If the Hungarian Prime Minister writes a bestseller should he be invited to the EIBF next year as Sturgeon, Rachel Reeves and Ed Miliband have been? Benjamin Netanyahu is a published author, should he be invited? Yanyha Sinwar, the deceased Hamas leader, wrote a novel in 2004 – what about him?
To move it away from the Middle East, most would agree there should be a platform for diverse opinions but also that a festival which is partially publicly funded shouldn't provide a platform for, say, holocaust deniers.
In all matters of contention a line has to be drawn somewhere, and those on the wrong side of it will be unhappy.
The challenge for the Edinburgh International Book Festival, and others like it, would appear to be how to keep as many as possible on the right side.