Brutopia

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Brutopia (a portmanteau word from brute and Utopia) is a fictional country appearing in several Donald Duck stories. It was created by Carl Barks in 1957. Brutopia is a very hostile country, aiming for world domination. It is clearly a caricature of the Soviet Union. In the Scrooge McDuck universe Brutopia occasionally attempts to steal Scrooge's money so as to devastate the American economy. According to Don Rosa, an author of many Donald and Scrooge McDuck stories, Brutopia occupies the eastern third of Siberia. The currency of Brutopia is the peso.

The language of Brutopia looks somewhat Slavic. On some occasions it is written in Cyrillic script. In 1957, their military spending budget amounted to one trillion dollars plus all the kitchen sinks of its happy people (a number that on closer inspection turned out to be five). Scrooge McDuck outbid the Brutopian government by paying one trillion dollars and six kitchen sinks for a sample of the recently discovered substance of bombastium.

According to Peter Lewis Disney stories written and drawn in the post-Barks period, the capital of Brutopia is Brutengrad. The country is no longer a dictatorship, as the former regime was overthrown by a popular revolt, and the tyrant forced to flee.

[edit] In modern usage

The Australian centre-left Opposition Leader, Kevin Rudd, has used the term to criticize the economic policies of the ruling Howard Government, notably in an essay in the November 2006 issue of The Monthly magazine entitled "Howard's Brutopia: The Battle of Ideas in Australian Politics". According to Rudd, a "brutopia" is a place of "unchecked market forces", incompatible with both "fairness" and "the so-called conservative institutions of family, community, church and country". Rudd argues that Australia is becoming such a place due to the Howard Government's "market fundamentalism". For example, he claims that as a result of the Government's labour market liberalization, "Breadwinners are now at risk of working less predictable shifts, spread over a seven-day week, not sensitive to weekends and possibly for less take-home pay. The pressures on relationships, parenting and the cost and quality of childcare are without precedent... Neo-liberalism's core philosophical dilemma is that it has no answer to the relentless march of market fundamentalism into the sanctum of the family itself. The Christian churches should be concerned about where this march ultimately ends." In the essay, Rudd writes that the term "brutopia" was borrowed from British conservative Michael Oakeshott.

The Australian Treasurer, Peter Costello, ridiculed Rudd's use of the term on 8 February 2007 in the Australian Parliament: "We have unemployment at 4.5 per cent. We have had 300,000 new jobs in the last year and we have had 2 million new jobs over the last 10 years. The Leader of the Opposition says that all of this represents free market fundamentalism, and he describes this economy as Howard's Brutopia... There has been some speculation as to what a Brutopia is. I can now authoritatively inform the House that Brutopia is a fictional country which appears in several Donald Duck stories... Labor [is] drawing inspiration for its economic analysis from a Donald Duck magazine, Mr Speaker! This is the evolutionary cycle of the Labor Party. We have now moved from Mark Latham's roosters to Kevin Rudd's ducks, Mr Speaker. Managing the Australian economy, which is a $1 trillion economy, takes experience and commitment -- and you do not get your analysis from Donald Duck comics. It is much more serious than that."[1][2]