50 People Who Matter 2010

The New Statesman’s list of individuals with global influence and the power to change our world.

By Staff blogger Published 27 September 2010

What do Lady Gaga and David Cameron have in common? Julian Assange and Steve Jobs? Jacob Zuma and Angelina Jolie? They all have world-changing potential. And they are new entries in our annual list of the individuals who have global influence – for good or ill.

The New Statesman 50 People Who Matter 2010 are:

1. (2) Rupert Murdoch
2. (1) Barack Obama
3. (-) Mahmoud Ahmedinijad
4. (10) Xi Jinping
5. (-) Steve Jobs
6. (26) Pope Benedict XVI
7. (24) Ashfaq Kayani
8. (12) Angela Merkel
9. (4) Eric Schmidt, Larry Page & Sergey Brin
10. (44) Hugo Chavez
11. (-) Binyamin Netanyahu
12. (12) David Petraeus
13. (-) Sarah Palin
14. (-) Craig Venter
15. (-) David Cameron
16. (13) Bill Gates
17. (-) Felipe Calderon
18. (-) Khaled Meshal
19. (25) Warren Buffett
20. (7) Vladimir Putin
21. (8) Osama bin Laden
22. (-) Angelina Jolie
23. (-) Julian Assange
24. (-) Lloyd Blankfein
25. (-) Hillary Clinton
26. (-) Mark Zuckerberg
27. (-) Ratan Tata
28. (-) Stephenie Meyer
29. (31) Sonia Gandhi
30. (-) James Cameron
31. (28) Ingvar Kamprad
32. (-) Stephen McIntyre
33. (-) Moqtada al-Sadr
34. (-) Aung San Suu Kyi
35. (-) Margaret Chan
36. (-) Jacob Zuma
37. (-) Bob Diamond
38. (35) Oprah Winfrey
39. (-) Paul Krugman
40. (36) Mohammed Yunus
41. (34) Simon Cowell
42. (-) Zaha Hadid
43. (22) Amartya Sen
44. (-) Lady Gaga
45. (6) Malalai Joya
46. (-) John Lasseter
47. (-) Julia Gillard
48. (-) Han Han
49. (14) Paul Kagame
50. (-) Caster Semenya

Previous year's ranking in brackets, with (-) denoting a new entry.

Entries compiled by Caroline Crampton, Ollie Cussen, George Eaton, Sophie Elmhirst, Mehdi Hasan, James Macintyre, Patrick Osgood, Nick Petrie, Duncan Robinson, Samira Shackle and Daniel Trilling.

All photos by Getty Images.

43 comments

Tue, 2010-09-28 15:06 — Say no to Younus (not verified)

im a bangladeshi, I know Dr. Yunus is a great fraud. He did nothing for the economic development of Bangladesh. He is doing a business like as garments industry and earning money using the poor people in Bangladesh. He is increasing his business company one by one using the strength and power of the poor people of Bangladesh. He did nothing for the poor people of Bangladesh. This list is absolutely bogus. What is the basis of making this list? What kind of indices you used to make this list? Absolutely bogus list. he has no credibility in banladesh. do you know the interest rate of grameen bank- its about 35% and just horrible.

Tue, 2010-09-28 16:30 — Adrian Ashfield (not verified)

Not hard to believe the New Statesman would list Lady Gaga as more influential than people like Jon Stewart. So it is not clear it is any honor to be on a list that included people like that.

Your last line put-down of Steve McIntyre is offensive and again proves the scientific illiteracy of the media. In this world of posturing fools and money grubbing frauds, Steve McIntyre stands out like a shining beacon of truth and honesty. Your bias shows you are “believers.” Why did you not call him a “denier” while you were at it? As there is no proof for your smear, you owe him and us an apology.

Tue, 2010-09-28 16:31 — Oliver K. Manuel (not verified)

The eventual impact of #32 - Stephen McIntyre - will exceed that of many that are now higher on the list.

The Nobel-Prize winning story of CO2-induced global warming was world-wide, BIG.

McIntyre revealed the BIGGER story: Biased selection and manipulation of experimental data.

The impact of McIntyre's finding is vibrating through the entire scientific community - from astronomy to cosmology, nuclear, particle and solar physics!

How many fields of science have been compromised?

McIntyre's careful audit of the experimental evidence for CO2-induced global warming exposed an unholy international alliance of world leaders, scientists and publishers:

Al Gore, the UN's IPCC, the Norwegian Nobel Prize Committee, the US National Academy of Sciences and the research agencies that NAS controls through budget review - NASA, DOE, EPA, NOAA, etc. - the Royal Society, science journals, public TV stations, and the news media.

With kind regards,
Oliver K. Manuel
Former NASA Principal
Investigator for Apollo
http://www.omatumr.com/

Wed, 2010-09-29 12:51 — Daniel (not verified)

GAGA FTW! We love you mommy monster!!!!

Wed, 2010-09-29 13:17 — Luís (not verified)

Kind of interesting to see the warm welcome to MacIntyre's inclusion. It is perhaps bewildering to some journalists the little public support the anthropogenic warming cause has. Funny thing is: this support is even shakier among Academia, especially when financing is not at stake.

Sat, 2010-10-02 16:05 — GrantB (not verified)

Meanwhile, while we debate SM, children are exploding as a result of climate change.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xx4yr0FFhMQ

CS Lewis said it well:

Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience

Fri, 2010-10-01 01:16 — chek (not verified)

I'd like to see some of McIntyre's fabled transparency that his diehard supporters keep praising.

He could start by releasing all emails and communications connected with Republican Joe Barton's partisan attack on climate science, aka the Wegman Report of 2006.

It would look better for him if that happened before an investigation into that exercise in partiality, plagiarism and obfuscation which was a continuation of the Republican War on Science we see now now in full tea party swing, promoting corporate interests and deregulation of environmental controls.

That's McIntyre's contribution to the world, and what he'll be remembered for.

Fri, 2010-10-01 01:24 — NK (not verified)

Puzzled: Perhaps you should have read the entry under 'Julia Gillard' in order to discover who she is. As for the rest of your post, what a load of rambling, nonsensical rubbish. Maybe your contributions to public discussion will improve when you are discharged from CrazyTown.
Frustrated: I appreciate your rebuke of Puzzled, but as Richard the Kiwi noted, Gillard is not the world's first female Prime Minister, only Australia's.