Why the "Occupy Wall Street" Initiative is Failing

Okay, here are my impressions, that's impressions and not any kind of systematic observations, based on a brief visit of less than an hour to Occupy Wall Street in New York.

(1) The site is terrific: one block east and north of Ground Zero and a couple of blocks north and west of Wall Street itself. The park is a large open space with some trees with Broadway on the east and very tall building to the north and south.

(2) When I was there with my wife, about 4:30 this afternoon, grey skies and kind of cool, there were, I guess, about 4000 people there. There were a large number of tourists and people who work in the neighborhood and a group of about 500 who were engaged in the business of the occupation.

(3) The overall impression of the occupation is very positive. It looks and is very large for such an undertaking.

(4) The occupation itself, remember I'm viewing it from the outside, reminded me of the May Day Tribe demos in Washington in 1971. There was a purposeful, cheerful disorder. There are no tents allowed but there are make-shift one-person shelters (this is an inadequate term; think plastic sleeves with sleeping bags in them).

(5) There was a meeting going on when we were there, being carried out in Amislan (American Sign Language). It was difficult to discern if this was a group of deaf students just temporarily at the site or a permanent group.

(6) The most important communication medium for people there is large numbers of homemade signs on the ground on the north side of the site. People are encouraged to put make their own signs.

(7) There is a media center with a generator that connects the site to the Internet.

(8 ) There are tables, more like long, low platforms, where vegetarian food is served to all comers.

(9) Unfortunately, while we were there, the only group activity besides the Amislan group was a bunch of dancing Hari Krishnas without orange robes. It reminded me of Tompkins Square Park ca. 1968.

(10) There were no cops visible at all. None.

(11) My overall impression was of an activity more turned in on itself at this point. There was no systematic attempt to engage passersby. Since there is no coherent "official" line and not much organization, this is not surprising.

(12) There was no sign of organized leftist activity or organized union presence.

(13) I was surprised at how fast the whole thing has taken on a definite hippy look.

(14) Through my eyes, this occupation is at what I would call a pre-political stage.

I'll try to get back there in a day or two, but I work full-time, and I have a lot of stuff on my plate.

The unions are getting involved now and (Oh my God) they're backing the protesters. Anybody around here that lives in and around New York should join. I just hope the unions aren't joining to run the thing into the ground.

As long as the Democrats don't show, things should go well. This could become our "Coffee Party" if it's organized and gains momentum.

You have your Tea Party, it's time for us to have our Caramel Macchiato.

Coach wrote:That's precisely what the Dems are hoping will happen SOON, and if it starts to look like they have the potential to make this into their own 'Caramel Macchiato' just in time for next year's elections, you better believe the Democrats are going to show up and take charge.

For many casual observers and news consumers, the fledgling Occupy Wall Street movement appears to have come out of nowhere--a spontaneous, loosely knit gathering of protesters who feel disaffection and anger over the financial crisis, dismay over the outlook for the American middle class, and a desire to revive traditions of democratic protest.

That was, in many respects, also the vague impression created by the first wave of tea-party protests against the growth of government in 2009. And while both groups are seeking to achieve goals that are in many ways diametrically opposed, the question on the left end of the political spectrum is whether the protests centered on Zuccotti Park in lower Manhattan might represent the initial stirrings of a tea-party-style rebellion on the left.

Activists on the left say they would be the first to welcome such a development, in a season of growing liberal unease. Certainly liberal activists are showing far less enthusiasm for the Democratic Party's standard-bearer than they did in 2008. President Obama's poll numbers continue to suffer, and his grassroots support (a hallmark of his 2008 success) seems to be on the wane. Former White House energy adviser Van Jones--who has been convening a founding meeting in Washington this week for the American Dream Movement, the Moveon.org project he now runs--is keen to leverage the Wall Street protests into a broader national movement. Jones told Washington Post op-ed writer E.J. Dionne over the weekend, "This is our 'Tea Party' moment--in a positive sense."

Other thinkers on the left are also hopeful about the movement's prospects, as similar actions spread to other cities such as Washington, D.C., Los Angeles and Boston. "I'm very excited!" Barbara Ehrenreich, author of Nickel and Dimed and This Land Is Their Land, responded to The Lookout via email. "So far as I can see, this is what I've been waiting for."

For all the excitement, though, there remains a good deal of confusion--both within and without the movement's circle of organizers--about Occupy Wall Street and its goals. It all began late this summer, when the anti-capitalist magazine AdBusters put out a call for people to occupy Wall Street on Sept. 17. The appeal struck a chord, and the protestors who've assembled at Zuccotti Park are now in day 18 of their occupation, where they have set up everything from a community kitchen to a lending library. The liberal weekly The Nation has published a good breakdown of the movement's structure, which is an admittedly amorphous at this stage: "a horizontal, autonomous, leaderless, modified-consensus-based system with roots in anarchist thought."

On Friday, Occupy Wall Street sought to clarify its aims with the release of a declaration of principles--though the gist of the statement was long on defending the simple process of protest, and short on specific demands. "We come to you at a time when corporations, which place profit over people, self-interest over justice, and oppression over equality, run our governments," the statement reads in part. "We have peaceably assembled here, as is our right, to let these facts be known." As part of its documentary efforts, Occupy Wall Street's has launched an online presence called We Are the 99 Percent, a crowdsourced project on Tumblr showcasing the voices of the movement via handwritten notes explaining individuals' economic situation.

Despite the protestors' murky agenda, their energy and longevity have been enough to attract the backing of more established left organizations. Several unions and community groups, and the liberal grandmother of online organizing, MoveOn, announced that they would join in organizing another march on Wednesday. And in a sign of growing attention to how the protesters can craft a press-friendly message, a major New York PR firm sent out an email blast on behalf of the group. On Saturday, New York police officers arrested more than 700 as the group attempted to march across the Brooklyn Bridge.

Ehrenreich--who is based in Washington and plans to make her first trip to join in the protest later this week--cautions that union support may not be an entirely positive gain for the movement's organizers. "I would actually worry a little bit that if you get too many bureaucratic, institutionalized forces, like the unions, if they get too involved in things, that might have a dampening effect," Ehrenreich said when The Lookout reached her by phone. "I'm sorry, it's a tendency. It's going to be a problem to keep the freshness, the spontaneity as more hierarchical and institutionalized groups come in on the scene."

Some other critics on the left note that, given the beleaguered state of unions these days, they may need Occupy Wall Street as much as it needs them. "Unions jump onto this stuff simply because they're desperate (the way they jumped onto the Seattle stuff years back)," historian Kevin Mattson observed in an email to The Lookout, "But I don't see a focused, defined approach going on here. And because of that, my pessimistic side comes out and suggests: This will crumble."

Ehrenreich says she's intrigued by the movement's similarity to other youth-led protests around the globe, such as those in Spain this past spring. "It's fascinating that this seems to be a very widespread phenomeon around the world. Young, college-educated people who do not see a future."

Ehrenreich is quick to note that you can't compare the U.S. protests with the Arab Spring uprisings, but sees comparable mechanics. "That seems to be the thing, get some space, occupy it, and start a new little culture of protest."

And some of the groups now affiliating themselves with the Occupy Wall Street movement are hoping to build out that protest space--while, of course, also seeking to broaden the appeal of their own agendas. "I think there's been a growing wave around the country of action and protests since Wisconsin of people who are saying that Washington has it all wrong when it comes to our economy and we need sane economic policies that will make our country work for the poor," Justin Rubin, director of MoveOn.org told The Lookout. (Disclosure: This writer worked as a copy editor for MoveOn during the 2006 midterms.)

MoveOn put out an email to its entire list on Sunday calling for members to participate online or in-person in the Oct. 5 march. And MoveOn is echoing Jones' effort to marry up the Occupy Wall Street effort to the American Dream Movement.

Meanwhile, United NY, a New York-based coalition of progressive groups, is also helping to sponsor and organize the Wednesday rally--and to galvanize activists behind its own efforts. The group's executive director, Camille Rivera, told The Lookout that while Occupy Wall Street may not have a list of concrete demands, United NY certainly does: preventing New York state's "millionaire's tax" from expiring, a national jobs plan, and organizing low-wage workers and the unemployed.

"This is larger than just demands . . . . This is about movement, this is an atmosphere where people just don't feel like they are being empowered," Rivera said. "People don't feel like they have a voice. They want action around the country, around the economy."

Is the protest's lack of a clear set of demands preventing it from gaining wider traction in the political conversation? Ehrenreich scoffs. "Who are they going to take them to?" Ehrenreich asks. "To have a clear set of demands, you have to have someone that you're bargaining with. You're not bargaining with Wall Street."

But if this is the left's tea party, how is it fairing in comparison? "The tea party certainly had a tremendous amount of funding from very wealthy people. They had, and have, an entire media apparatus from Fox News to AM radio. They're a little more like astroturf," said Ehrenreich. She adds, however, that both groups are providing a missing outlet for people to express anger over their situation.

Rubin says that such outlets are actually gaining more ground on the left end of the spectrum--noting that the wave of such protests actually dates back to the demonstrations that flared up in Wisconsin this winter in opposition to GOP Gov. Scott Walker's budget cuts and against public unions. But he also concedes that the real political clout of the has yet to be tested. "The tea party has been extraordinary successful at wielding electoral influence that then has given it power over the national debate," Rubin noted. "That's the key task for this movement."

Does Ehrenreich think Occupy Wall Street will succeed? "I have no idea," she said. "I'm a lot more interested in this than I am in the election."

WASHINGTON -- Ben Becker, 27, sat in the back of a police-commandeered transit bus on Saturday night, his hands placed tightly behind his back in plastic cuffs. He'd been marching on the Brooklyn Bridge as part of the Occupy Wall Street demonstrations. And like hundreds of other activists railing against the inequities of the financial system, he had been swept up in a mass arrest by the New York Police Department.

Becker was one of the first placed in custody. His bus filled up fast. They waited, tied up for hours, and did not know their charges, Becker said. For many, this was new: the march, the chanting, the arrest.

"Some of the teenagers on the bus were extremely nervous," Becker said.

But this was a scenario Becker knew well. He was the named plaintiff in the Partnership for Civil Justice's 2001 federal class-action lawsuit against the District of Columbia, known as Becker v. D.C. That case stemmed from the D.C. police department's mass arrest of anti-IMF/World Bank demonstrators on April 15, 2000. Becker was one of nearly 700 people arrested during that march. He was 16 at the time.

On Tuesday, the Partnership for Civil Justice filed yet another class-action lawsuit -- this one again on behalf of Becker and others arrested on the bridge.

"I was telling the young people -- the teenagers -- the people who had been protesting for the first time, when we were sitting on the bus for hours, I was telling them the similarities to April 2000," said Becker, who is currently an adjunct professor at City College of New York and a graduate student studying history.

The mass arrests on the Brooklyn Bridge resemble a clear, premeditated police tactic that has come to be known as "trap and detain," said Mara Verheyden-Hilliard, executive director of the Partnership for Civil Justice. The tactic goes something like this, she said: the police permit and escort marchers to proceed with their activities before suddenly corralling them into a closed off area and arresting everyone in one sweep.

The police will use a side street, a park, or, in the case of Occupy Wall Street, a bridge -- usually an area where the people trapped cannot disperse, and where they end up having to beg the police to leave, Verheyden-Hilliard said. Journalists, tourists and legal observers are often caught up in these dragnets. A reason for the arrests is crafted after the fact, she said.

The NYPD says its officers warned the activists not to take the motorway. “There were claims police had not issued warnings,” Paul J. Browne, the chief spokesman for the police, stated in an email to The New York Times. “In fact, warnings were issued and captured on video.”

The NYPD did not immediately respond to a request for comment from The Huffington Post.

Verheyden-Hilliard said the fact that the so-called warnings were videotaped shows premeditation. She added that the warnings were bad theater -- police were speaking inaudibly into a bullhorn; they were for show only, she said.

Police departments may have popularized the tactic of snuffing out and intimidating protests during the anti-globalization movement a decade ago that criticized corporate capitalism. But Verheyden-Hilliard said the method has gone international in the last couple of years.

More

The mass arrests on the Brooklyn Bridge resemble a clear, premeditated police tactic that has come to be known as "trap and detain," said Mara Verheyden-Hilliard, executive director of the Partnership for Civil Justice. The tactic goes something like this, she said: the police permit and escort marchers to proceed with their activities before suddenly corralling them into a closed off area and arresting everyone in one sweep.

The police will use a side street, a park, or, in the case of Occupy Wall Street, a bridge -- usually an area where the people trapped cannot disperse, and where they end up having to beg the police to leave, Verheyden-Hilliard said. Journalists, tourists and legal observers are often caught up in these dragnets. A reason for the arrests is crafted after the fact, she said.

Kettling, also known as containment or corralling, is a police tactic for controlling large crowds during demonstrations or protests. It involves the formation of large cordons of police officers who then move to contain a crowd within a limited area. Protesters are left only one choice of exit, determined by the police, or are completely prevented from leaving. In some cases protesters are reported to have been denied access to food, water and toilet facilities for a long period. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kettling

Admin wrote:

Professor Wolff's take on the demonstration(s).

Celtiberian wrote:Inviting Richard Wolff to speak at the Occupy Wall Street demonstration is the most substantive action the organizers have taken so far, and it's definitely a step in the right direction. If Prof. Wolff, and others, can shift this movement's attention away from complaining solely about the financial institutions and towards a more serious anti-capitalist direction, these protests will finally start becoming more relevant. They will still have the problem of not possessing an articulated and agreed upon list of demands—to say nothing of the hordes of filthy hippies alienating common working people—but at least it wouldn't leave room for Democratic partisans to co-opt the movement.

These 'Occupy (blank)' protests are starting to expand, so if a large one should form in Florida, I'll attend—if only to promote the RSF and the Socialist Phalanx.

TheocWulf wrote:Good shout Celt id be intrested to see what the faux-masses think of the RSF and this forum

Celtiberian wrote:It will undoubtedly vary on an individual basis. Many of them, to be sure, will completely reject our left-wing nationalism due to their religious devotion to cosmopolitanism. However, I suspect that many open-minded people will appreciate our political philosophy (particularly the more apolitical individuals). I won't be discussing our specific views at the demonstration, but I will handout fliers promoting our forum and so forth.

Once the RSF has completed formulating the foundation of our revolutionary syndicalist ideology—which it almost has—we will begin the process of building political parties in our respective nations. From that point on, our movement will spread until we reach the point wherein there are parties espousing our views internationally. At political demonstrations the world over our presence will be felt, and we will build institutions which not only represent the proletariat, serve the needs of working-class communities.

Celtiberian wrote:Inviting Richard Wolff to speak at the Occupy Wall Street demonstration is the most substantive action the organizers have taken so far, and it's definitely a step in the right direction. If Prof. Wolff, and others, can shift this movement's attention away from complaining solely about the financial institutions and towards a more serious anti-capitalist direction, these protests will finally start becoming more relevant. They will still have the problem of not possessing an articulated and agreed upon list of demands—to say nothing of the hordes of filthy hippies alienating common working people—but at least it wouldn't leave room for Democratic partisans to co-opt the movement.

These 'Occupy (blank)' protests are starting to expand, so if a large one should form in Florida, I'll attend—if only to promote the RSF and the Socialist Phalanx.

Celtiberian wrote:Noam Chomsky's perspective on Occupy Wall Street:

The 99% occupy Wall Street
by John Riddell on October 5, 2011

The following article was written today by Pham Binh, a participant and chronicler of the “Occupy Wall Street” protests in New York. Binh’s account graphically describes the changing composition and broadening social base of the protests. It is republished with his permission. Subheads have been added.

By Pham Binh

Wednesday, October 5, 2011 – The entrapment and arrest of 700 peaceful Occupy Wall Street (OWS) activists on the Brooklyn Bridge has created a huge wave of support for their movement. The number of daytime occupants in Liberty Plaza doubled or tripled from 100 the week prior to 200-300 this past Monday and Tuesday. These people are the core who maintain the occupation of the plaza, making it possible for several hundreds and sometimes thousands to hold rallies in the late afternoon and participate in the open mic speakouts and General Assembly meetings in the evening.

The mood of the crowd is defiant and determined. Quite a few people were still unsure of how exactly they had been trapped by the NYPD, but that did not matter.

What mattered was that OWS made front page news in papers around the world along with its official list of grievances, undercutting naysayers who pretended it was a bunch of ignorant jobless kids without a clue as to what they want.

What mattered was that Transit Workers Union Local 100 backed up Friday’s solidarity speeches with action by filing an injunction against the city for ordering their drivers to bus arrested protesters to jail. The drivers cooperated with the orders, but only because armed high-ranking NYPD officers told them to do so. Who can blame the drivers? You never know which one of [the officers] might be the next Anthony Bologna.

Visit by a ‘one-percenter’

On Tuesday, a brave soul named Steve from the 1% came to talk to the people in the park. He claimed to work for a nearby investment firm, and he certainly dressed, spoke, and acted the part. Many of the activists questioned him and tried to debate him, but he gave them mostly suave evasions, which generated a lot of frustration among the crowd of 5-10 that gathered around him.

A white Viet Nam veteran and hospice nurse (I never saw an old woman with a purple heart until today) asked Steve why should Medicare or Social Security be privatized using a voucher system? Why should the elderly and sick be forced to do with less during these hard times? Steve replied that he does not support these moves and believed in a “strong social safety net” (a direct quote).

Next, a middle-aged black guy named Keith Thomas (who later turned out to be a transit worker injured on the job) asked Steve whether or not Wall Street firms had any type of moral obligation to their employees. (Thomas was laid off from a Wall Street firm prior to his job in the transit system.) Steve agreed they have a moral obligation, but added that no entity, whether it was a corporation or government, had obligations that were set in stone.

When I heard this, I could not keep my mouth shut anymore and interjected, “so what about Medicare and Social Security? Those are obligations, right? And you said you supported them.” I pointed out that “too big to fail” banks enjoy a government guarantee that they would get bailed out again as in 2008. Not surprisingly, Steve did not take well to my line of questioning and left shortly there after. The crowd thanked him for having the dialogue, as did I, and we asked him to come again.

I doubt he will.

A people’s movement

In the course of the exchange, a number of things became clear.

First, Wall Street and Corporate America will try to deflect responsibility for what OWS is upset about in the hopes that it falls for the Tea Party mantra that “government is the problem.” When Steve said we should be protesting in Washington, D.C., demonstrators said Wall Street owns the government; some even went so far to say that Wall Street is the government.

Second, OWS has become what can only be described as a people’s movement. When you go into the park, it really is the 99% that you find there. Thomas later told me he felt like this was “just like 1968.” He said it evoked feelings in him he had not felt for a long time.

There is a feeling of empowerment, like justice is on our side, of good will, and of seriousness of purpose in the air there that is very difficult to capture with mere words. Even pictures and video footage, worth many millions of words, cannot convey it.

You have to come to Liberty Park to experience it. And once you experience it, you cannot stop the inner urge you feel to fight and win, against all odds. It is this feeling that is propelling the movement into the most unlikely of places, like Mobile, Alabama.

I am not old enough to remember 1968, but I imagine this is what it was like.

The occupation in the last few days has become much more multiracial than in the first and second weeks. I saw aging Viet Nam veterans (some of them homeless), union workers, high schoolers, journalists from the corporate media, Laura Flanders, Michael Moore, Hispanic and African immigrants, low-wage workers who work nearby, retirees, disabled people, and college students.

The class and racial breakdown of the occupants looks much more like that of a rush hour subway car in midtown Manhattan than an alternative music concert as it did previously.

If you hear otherwise, you are hearing lies.

The only people missing are the the Steves of the city, the 1%. They are asking their friends in the corporate media, “is this Occupy Wall Street thing a big deal? … Is this going to turn into a personal safety problem?”

Wall Street is worried about what this means.

And they are right to be. We are onto them.

The spirit of the Molly Maguires

The occupy movement is growing roots into all communities among all age groups and races. Everyone is bringing their issue to the table and receiving nothing but 100% support. There is not a progressive cause OWS will not get behind, nor an injustice that it will not try to address in some way.

Union members from New York City’s largest municipal workers union, DC37, held a rally at OWS on Monday, as did the Teamsters who have been locked out by 1% auction dealer Sotheby’s for months. There were quite a few members of the United Federation of Teachers (UFT) there as well (their headquarters is two blocks away).

All of the middle-aged union members I saw were grinning from ear to ear, cheered by the defiant and militant spirit that was once the calling card of the American labor movement. Speaking of which, I ran into a young man at the Monday occupation who said he was a descendant of the Molly Maguires. I never expected to hear that name at a protest in this day and age (they were framed and executed in the 1870s using the same methods the state of Georgia used to kill Troy Davis because they sought to organize Irish immigrant workers in Pennsylvania’s coal fields).

This young man, Mark Purcell, traveled from central Pennsylvania to OWS and said he planned to get involved in whatever occupation happens in Philadelphia. Mark told me he realized the system was totally corrupt when he worked at an Allentown warehouse as a temporary worker. He said the companies took advantage of undocumented immigrants since they have no legal rights or protections. The minute he complained about working conditions, the company he worked for told him to talk to the temp agency that was technically his employer, and the temp agency fired him. He was pissed that companies outsource labor to these agencies and use that to dodge responsibility for working conditions. “It’s bullshit,” he said.

Amen.

The spirit of the Molly Maguires lives on at OWS. On October 5, National Nurses United, 1199SEIU, SEIU Local 32BJ, the New York AFL-CIO, UFT, Communications Workers, Professional Staff Congress-CUNY, the NY Central Labor Council are all mobilizing to rally and march to join OWS. And they have permits.

In addition to the alphabet soup of unions mobilizing, student activists are organizing walkouts from Hunter College, the New School (where professors issued a statement supporting their students’ walkout), and even New York University. Even the children of the 1% support OWS.

The last time the unions mobilized was back in May, when the UFT brought out over 10,000 during its contract negotiations with Mayor Bloomberg. The proceedings were tightly controlled and the messages carefully managed from above by union leaders.

This time, things will be different. The turnout will surprise everyone, and the message will not be handed down to the city’s workers and students from on high. “Students and labor can shut the city down,” we shouted at Friday’s rallies against police brutality.

Perhaps we were prescient.

Pham Binh’s articles have been published by Asia Times Online, Znet, Counterpunch, and The Indypendent. All of his writings on Occupy Wall Street and other topics can be found at http://www.planetanarchy.net/.

The following leaflet was handed out at the Occupy Wall Street demo today in Manhattan:

THEY DON’T GET IT….

When the media talk about Occupy Wall Street, they often do so with disdain: a movement that has no leaders, no set of demands, can’t be taken seriously. In a typical article, the New York Times quoted an ‘expert’ saying, “if the movement is to have lasting impact, it will have to develop leaders and clear demands”, and another one which stated that the passions have to be “channeled into institutions”. (NYT, 10/4) Their message to you is clear: ‘Go back to ‘politics as usual’, follow leaders, work within institutions, become foot-soldiers for the Democratic party and the unions in elections and other campaigns that change nothing at all, that don’t question the power structures that prop up this insane money-system.

They don’t get it that the absence of leaders in this movement is not a weakness but a strength, testifying to our collective determination, to our refusal to remain followers. They don’t get it that the absence of a narrow set of demands that can be recuperated by this or that institution, results from our understanding that the problem lies much deeper. That there are no quick fixes for a system that produces growing inequality, mass unemployment and misery, wars and ecological disasters.

If these problems could be solved by electing wiser politicians, adopting better laws etc, ‘politics as usual’ might be the way to go. But they can’t be solved that way. Politicians everywhere are bound by higher laws, the laws of capital. That’s why governments everywhere, regardless of their political color, are imposing austerity, forcing the working population to sacrifice so that more can be paid to the owners of capital. In fact the harshest cuts in wages, pensions and jobs are implemented by a ‘socialist’ government (in Greece). Politicians on the left may clamor for massive public spending , but that would only mean that we would be made poorer in a different way, through inflation.

There are no quick fixes because the system itself is obsolete. Pain and suffering are sometimes unavoidable but capitalism creates ever more pain that is easily avoidable, that only exists because in this society, profit trumps human needs. Almost two billion people on this planet are unemployed because capitalism has no need for them. Hundreds of millions live in slums, because building decent houses for them is not profitable. Many die of hunger each day because it’s not profitable to feed them. Everyone knows our planet is in danger and yet capitalism is continuing to destroy it in its desperate hunt for profit. Productivity never was higher, yet poverty increases. The know-how and resources are there for every inhabitant of this planet to live a decent life but that would not be profitable. Abundance has become possible but capitalism can’t handle abundance. It needs scarcity. Abundance in capitalism means overproduction, crisis, misery. This is insane. It must stop.

WE HAVE TO THINK OUTSIDE THE BOX

Capitalism is not “the end of history” but just a transient phase. It has changed the world but now no longer fits into it. We have to accept the fact that capitalism offers no perspective, no future. We have to prepare for a post-capitalist world, in which human relations are no longer commercial transactions, in which goods no longer represent a quantity of money but a concrete means to satisfy real human needs. A world in which competing corporations and warring nations are replaced by a human community that uses the resources of all for the benefit of all. We call that communism but it has nothing in common with the state-capitalist regimes that exist or existed in Russia, China and Cuba. Nothing is changed fundamentally if capitalists are replaced with bureaucrats with supposedly better intentions. Those regimes were not only thoroughly undemocratic, they also perpetuate wage-labor, exploitation and oppression of the vast majority of the population. The change must go deeper and must emancipate the oppressed, make them part of a real democracy instead of the sham that exists today.

In 2011, ten years after the attacks on New York that launched a decade of fear and demoralization, a breach has been opened. From Tunis to Cairo to Athens to Madrid to Santiago to New York, a fever is spreading. After taking it on the chin for so long, the working class, employed or unemployed, is beginning to rise up. We’re not gonna take it anymore! Something has changed. True, the Occupy Wall Street movement will not last forever. At some point, it will end, without any clear victory. But it’s just the beginning. This dynamic will continue and will gather strength. Be a part of it!

INTERNATIONALIST PERSPECTIVE

For a Workers' Occupation Movement!

Statement of the Central Committee of the Workers Party in America


NOW IN ITS THIRD WEEK, THE “Occupy Wall Street” movement has quickly become the focal point for all the pent-up anger and frustration that millions of Americans, regardless of their class, have been feeling as a result of austerity and the actions of the corporate welfare state.

What started as a few thousand protesters and a few hundred occupiers of Zucotti Park, near Wall Street, in New York City (with most of them being cranks and opportunists, such as Ron Paul supporters and “9/11 Truth” groupings) has grown into a national movement, with “Occupy” groups coming together across the country and organizing similar marches and occupations.

At the same time, this relatively small protest felt the full force of the state — the armed bodies of capitalism’s “law and order” — bear down on them. Since the occupation began on Sept. 17, nearly 1,000 participants in the associated marches have been arrested by the police, including over 700 during a march over the Brooklyn Bridge. We say: Drop all charges against those arrested!

While the armed forces of the state were doing mass roundups of protesters, most of the corporatist media has treated the movement with contempt and condescension, while other elements have looked to co-opt it and steer it in the direction of the Democratic Party. Both of these approaches start from the same perspective, that this movement needs some “official” sanction to have any real value ... to the ruling classes, that is.

While the “Occupy” movement in New York has struck a chord among millions of people, it is vitally important to examine closely what this movement is, what it aims to do and, most of all, whom it actually ends up serving.


WHEN THE “OCCUPY WALL STREET” movement began, it was thoroughly a creature of the “middle class” — the class of managers, professionals, small business people, the self-employed, artists and so on. However, as the occupation continued, it began attracting the support of workers, passively at first, but then actively.

Workers and young people from the working class not only began to show up at the protests and occupied area, but also brought with them their own slogans and ideas. They marched, they occupied, they fought. Most importantly, though, they began to change the class composition of the “Occupy Wall Street” movement.

It was at this point that the officials of various labor unions began to proclaim their support for the protests and occupation. They did this, not because they were “shamed” into participating, or out of any genuine desire to see a serious working-class resistance to austerity and corporatism emerge, but in order to stop any such development — to prevent the movement from becoming more radicalized and stop the development of an independent working-class political movement.

This is also why liberal Democratic Party politicians and their media mouthpieces, such as MSNBC and The Nation, have been parachuting into the various “Occupy” protests, both in New York City and nationally: to keep the protests from getting “out of control.”

But they are not alone in their efforts to keep this movement under control. Its very structure is designed to insure that the occupations and protests do not go too far. The idea of a “leaderless” movement that makes decisions solely on the basis of “consensus” and raises no specific demands or slogans is designed to allow an unelected (and unaccountable) group to control the politics and activity of the movement in the “general assemblies” that are meant to be decision-making bodies.

In the end, all this serves to do is keep the vision and activity of the “Occupy” movement confined to the narrowest channels. The most conservative and moderate minorities can dictate the political direction by blocking more radical and revolutionary proposals, while unelected, “unofficial” leaders can stage foolish and dangerous actions, without any check by the participants.


THE “OCCUPY” MOVEMENT MAY be thought by many to be a “good start,” but as we’ve seen throughout history, most recently in Egypt, Greece and Wisconsin, it is only the working class that has the power to put an end to the exploitation and oppression that dominates in capitalist society.

However, this power cannot be unleashed as long as workers are bound hand-and-foot to those “middle-class” leaderships — either “official” or unofficial — and are prevented from organizing themselves to fight for their own interests, under their own banners and slogans, and with their own leadership and program of action.

More to the point: We as workers must not allow these “middle class” democrats to use us as either a battering ram or a stepladder in their fight against their corporatist brethren in Washington and on Wall Street! Rather, we should be organizing ourselves, bringing out our brothers and sisters, holding our own mass assemblies and protests, and doing so on the basis of our own slogans and demands.

The working-class movement should certainly coordinate with the “middle class” occupiers and protesters wherever possible, but we cannot allow ourselves to be subordinated to them, either politically or organizationally.

It has taken more than a decade for the “middle class” democrats to regroup and launch their fight to win back some of the power they lost in the rise of corporatism in 2000. But we must not let them use workers as little more than a stepping stone for their return to power.

This is the perspective of the Workers Party. We fight for the overthrow of capitalism and capitalist rule, and the establishment of a workers’ republic as the transition to a classless, communist society. If you agree with this perspective or want to know more, contact us.

The problem is not Wall Street alone! The problem is capitalism! Austerity and the rise of the corporate welfare state are part and parcel of capitalism in its decay and decomposition. Capitalism has to be defeated and overthrown in order to stop these attacks.
Break with the “Middle Class” Reformers! For a Workers’ Occupation Movement! The “middle class” elements leading the occupations only want a capitalism that works for them — a capitalism where workers are still exploited, but bribed into passivity and silence.
For accountability! “No leaders” allows the “middle class” minority to lead with impunity. Democratic elections and the right of immediate recall insure that those making decisions are fully accountable.
For a revolutionary workers’ platform! The working class has no common interests with either the capitalists or the “middle class,” and we cannot share a common platform without subordinating ourselves to the other classes.
For workers’ self-defense against police terror! The cops have made it clear that they will not let any serious challenge to the ruling classes take place without a violent response.
Organize and occupy our workplaces! Workers’ power comes from our role in society and the mode of production. Exercising our power means shutting down production in addition to confronting the ruling classes and their state.
For a workers’ republic! Real majority rule means workers’ control of industries and services, and of society — that is, a workers’ republic, based on workplace and neighborhood/city assemblies and councils.

Isakenaz wrote:As an add on to the above, you want to see the numbers of 'revolutionaries' on that forum arguing that the rhetoric can only cause division and that this is 2011 not 1931. The biggest fear of the majority of those faux-left fools is that there might actually be a revolution. One which may mean they have to put their money where there mouths are.

To a passing observer, the recently launched Occupy Baltimore action looks like what any grad student parrot of Zizek might call an occupation without the occupation. It has the feel of an occupation specially ripened for the consumer, with all its pleasures but none of its messy consequences. No factories, offices, schools, or rowhouses commandeered. No barricades erected, nor bulleted lists of demands plastered on doors. No attempts made to paralyze the everyday operations of power. Its greatest challenge to authority has been its tent-free encampment in a 24-hour public park—something only discovered to be unlawful after the selection of the space. The greatest sacrifices most have made are of warmth and time.

Nevertheless this movement is important – and could help form a new left in the US which is anti-corporate, critical of the government (for the right reasons) and even do for the anticapitalism argument what the Tea party did for the anti-Tax payers argument. What is needed is a clear perspective on the way forward and more people to join and get involved. http://fifthinternational.org/content/wall-street-occupation-new-movement-us

Kaiser_Monsopiad wrote:The Wall Street Protest is kindergarten school compare to the 2011 Chilean Protests. Remember comrade Camila Vallejo? Are there any youth movements in the United States that can compete with Chile's?