Naomi Klein, the poster girl of the anti-globalisation movement, has attacked the “Bono-isation” of protests against world poverty.

Speaking after an appearance at The Times Cheltenham Literature Festival she said that the involvement of celebrity campaigners such as the U2 singer and Bob Geldof had set back the cause of building a fairer world.

“The Bono-isation of protest, particularly in the UK, has reduced discussion to a much safer terrain,” she said as she singled out for criticism the Make Poverty History campaign, which tied into the G8 summit at Glen-eagles in 2005. “It was the stadium rock model of protest – there’s celebrities and then there’s spectators waving their bracelets. It’s less dangerous and less powerful [than grass roots street demonstrations].”

Bono and Klein make a formidably glamorous pair of rival activists. He is the Dublin-born singer who has sold more than 140 million albums with U2 but devotes much of his time to twisting the arms of presidents and prime ministers to help the poor in Africa. He has received an honorary knighthood and been named Person of the Year for his work by Time magazine.

She is the elegant Canadian journalist who became a figurehead for the antiglobalisation movement with the publication of her first book, No Logo, seven years ago. It lambasted the exploitative, brand-driven consumer-ism created by multinational corporations such as Nike and sold more than a million copies in the process.

Klein, 37, describes her new book, The Shock Doctrine, as “much more overtly political”. It sets out to demonstrate that Western politicians of the past 40 years have persistently exploited disasters to push through lucrative, unpopular, free-market economic policies.

It has sharply divided opinion on both sides of the Atlantic and Klein now finds herself more isolated than she did after the release of No Logo.

“The movement has fizzled,” she said. In her view it has been damaged by fear of government coercion in the US after the events of September 11, 2001, and by the rise of blogs and chat rooms. “It’s safer to mouth off in a blog than to put your body on the line. The internet is an amazing organising tool but it also acts as a release, with the ability to rant and get instant catharsis . . . it’s taken that urgency away,” she said.

Then there is the problem of crusading rock stars. “I think it’s fantastic when celebrities engage with politics and stick their necks out. I think more people should do it, in less safe ways.

My problem with Bono is not about him being a celebrity or being rich. It’s that his model of organising is dated.”

“My analysis is that change isn’t popular. It comes because a real counter-power emerges which carries negotiating power, which leads to change.”

This activist model had been replaced by the idea that “we can make this really good argument and get some celebrity to endorse it”.

“In terms of the movement this gen-trification of the protest space by the Bonos and the Geldofs has had a really corrosive effect. I really don’t think it’s a good thing.”

Jamie Drummond, the executive director of Debt, Aids, Trade, Africa (DATA), founded with Bono in 2002 to eradicate extreme poverty and Aids in Africa, said that Klein was “missing the point”, adding that effective change can only be brought about by a combination of outside mobilisation and inside manoeuvring, He added: “It’s a gross simplification to think you can achieve anything without one or the other. It’s not cool to meet President Bush. It would be a much better look for Bono to be wearing a balaclava and lobbing Molotov cocktails. But we want to win, rather than be on the margins moaning about the system.”

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