Occupy Wall Street - where's the second act?

A common feature of movements that arise seemingly out of nowhere is anger.  It reflects a very human reaction to injustice and long held grievances.

Anger was certainly what drove the Occupied Wall Street movement which arrived without warning and spread from Wall Street to other states of the US and then elsewhere around the world, as public places were occupied in New York, Washington, Melbourne, Rio de Janeiro, Kuala Lumpur, Frankfurt and many other places around the world - over 95 cities across 82 countries - underlining the fact that even protests against globalization are themselves globalized.

The underlying theme below somewhat confused cacophony of complaints voices from those participating is that capitalism and its offspring globalization is inherently unfair, favoring the 1% over the majority – the 99%.  Not surprisingly, anyone looking in on the movement from outside and trying to decide whether it is worth supporting or not and confused.

The very nature of the protest has been both its strength and its weakness.

By occupying public spaces protesters have been able to attract public attention and media coverage. This was okay for a couple of weeks but then police and municipal authorities moved in to try and clear protesters out of public spaces.  This changed the story, for the media.  It is now about the war between the protesters and their evictors.  For the protesters, they became obsessed about their right to occupy, rather than seeing it as a means to publicize a broader agenda. 

Another problem of depending on street demonstrations is that the Occupy Movement has found itself also the target of anarchists, intent on you inciting violence to radicalize the movement and co-opt it. 

When New York mayor, Michael Bloomberg ordered police to remove protesters occupiers out of Zuccotti Park on November 15, he told protesters that, “Now they will have to occupy the space with the power of their arguments.”  It was not surprising when his advice was laughed at by protesters.  After all, a billionaire several times over and the 12th-richest person in the United States, Bloomberg is one of the 1% against whom they are raging.  However, in this instance his advice was sound.

Instead of taking Bloomberg’s advice, what followed was an ongoing battle in which occupiers returned to the park and were then evicted again time and time again.  

Rather than doing the hard yards, and providing an analysis of what is wrong with globalization – and there is no lack of targets to hit out at – the Occupy Movement became a farcical debate over whether banning camping of public land infringed free speech. 

Perhaps, for the occupiers, this was the easy way out.  It allowed the anger to continue and put off the day when they would have to go on to craft a second act - its own narrative on what is wrong with globalization and capitalism.  This is harder work than coming up with a few simplistic slogans and offering up bloodied faces to TV cameras, and police drag them out of their tents.  

It's interesting to compare the Occupy Movement with that of The Tea Party Movement in the US.  

The Tea Party Movement also came out of anger and frustration of the bailouts of the banks in the US and the nationalization or partial takeover of major businesses by the government.

In the case of the Tea Party Movement, however, there was a second act and there is every reason to believe that it is even moving onto a third act.  

The second act was nurtured in by the right wing think tanks, which have a strong presence in the US.  They were able to provide the tea party movement with a ready menu of reforms – small government, deregulation and support of capitalism although not necessarily crony capitalism.  What started out as colorful street protests, with participants dressing up in colonial garb, turned into a serious narrative about the problems of big government, unsustainable welfare programs and crony capitalism.

This platform has in turn been translated into political action as Tea Party candidates not only dominated the mid-term elections in the US that now find that presidential Republican candidates vied for their support.

The Occupy Movement, which broadly covers all left, does not have the same luxury of a network of progressive think tanks ready to supply it with the narrative and solutions that will take it on to a second act.  This is both a lost opportunity and tragedy, as there is much wrong with globalisation as it has been corrupted through special interests during its post-war history

While the Occupy Movement stays on the street and engages in running battles with municipal police for the right to occupy public spaces and parks it won't achieve that critical second act, let alone move onto a the third act in which they achieve real change.