But owing to its private status, it afforded a certain protection from immediate eviction. Among that first group who did go there were Marisa Holmes, then a year-old anarchist film-maker who had already visited Tahir Square, and Graeber, who would go on to write the influential Bullshit Jobs , which contended that most jobs were needless and meaningless, before his premature death last year.
That first night Holmes organised a general assembly. At the time I was not prepared. But even though the gathering was nowhere near that size, it was still bigger than any earlier efforts at protest in the area. General assemblies, food committees: this is the language of organised protest.
But OWS prided itself on its leaderless principle — a stance that would bring much criticism — and on reaching decisions by public debate and group consent. A speaker would shout out a few words, which would then be chanted by those close by, and then rechanted by everyone else. Almost immediately a strategic schism emerged. White drafted a resolution outlining the demand, which he emailed to Holmes, but it was gently rejected. The failure to create the demand was a strategic error that was unavoidable based on the prevailing prefigurative anarchism in New York City at that time.
In that idealised society, debate would replace demands. White wanted to gain momentum by organising around a single overwhelming demand that would engage universal popular support.
Holmes wanted to set up a makeshift society that would be a model for the future. It was Holmes who slept out in the square. It was an approach that called for an awful lot of meetings. Many activists love meetings. White is not one of them. Holmes, however, is a meetings person. And she was not alone.
Income inequality is the crisis du jour—a problem that all presidential candidates must grapple with because they can no longer afford not to. Inequality and the wealth gap are now core tenets of the Democratic platform, providing a frame for other measurable gains spurred by Occupy. The camps may be gone and Occupy may no longer be visible on the streets, but the gulf between the haves and the have-nots is still there, and growing.
What appeared to be a passing phenomenon of protest now looks like the future of U. In , numerous cities and states including four Republican-dominated ones—Arkansas, Alaska, Nebraska, and South Dakota—voted for higher pay; will see more showdowns in New York City and Washington, D.
The grassroots movement composed of fast-food workers and Walmart employees, convenience-store clerks, and adjunct teachers seized on the energy of Occupy to spark a rebirth of the U. This renaissance was most recently visible on April 15, when tens of thousands of workers marched in hundreds of cities to demand better pay and conditions. We have an entire world to win. It takes a long time to change the world.
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Skip to content. Kai Ryssdal and Richard Cunningham Sep 14, Heard on:. Listen Now. Share Now on:. Many experts believe the economic justice movement has had lasting influence.
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