Sustainability and the occupy movement

Following crackdowns on camps in Oakland, Portland and New York, and eviction notices served up to protesters at St. Paul's, time could well be running short for the protesters of the occupy movement. With this looming prospect, it is well worth considering what exactly the protests are, what they have achieved, and whether they will make any lasting impression on politics in the UK and the rest of the Western world.

If there is one thing that the protesters have done extremely well it is to attract and hold the attention of the media. Physical numbers it seems are now a secondary consideration when one has new media tools at one's disposal. Protest today is less about weight of force as it is a challenge to pull off the biggest publicity stunt. This is no criticism, and only serves to illustrate just how innovative and clued up today's protesters are. It does raise questions, and concern, however, when a small group of a few hundred protesters claims to represent the vanguard of 99% of the population.

Media reaction to the protests has been generally pretty uninspiring, and can be broadly separated into two categories. On the right the campers have been described as lacking cohesion in terms of purpose, leadership, and direction. By framing the protesters as Utopian, naive anti-capitalists, commentators dodged the bullet of trying to understand the deep-seated resentment and alienation expressed by those protesting. The left meanwhile seemed to implicitly accept this view whilst dangling the silvery caveat that the protests were opening up a ground for debate. With limited material from which to work, however, this rather bland defence was perhaps the only option available through which to express guarded approval, and it is only in recent weeks that we have seen real efforts from the left-wing media to assist and engage with protesters.

The difficulty with both these rather lacklustre appraisals is that they are both so patently and obviously correct. Which, perhaps inevitably, means they are both extremely unhelpful.

To take the latter view first, it is unreasonable to expect that public sympathy would long endure without a coherent programme and reasonable demands being issued. Whether they wanted to or not, at some point the protesters were going to have to justify their continued presence, and their apparent failure to do so thus far has been a big driver for those who wished to see the camps disappear. When demands were issued, such as the call to democratise the powers of the corporation of London, the power responsible for directly regulating many of the activities of banks within the city, they were not followed up with sufficient clarity or pressed into public consciousness. What has so far emerged has been vague and occasionally absurd.

It is vital to think big, but often that requires starting small with one simple uniting principle. If one looks at the most successful grassroots movements and protests of recent times, they are all united by a single enemy. The tea party movement in America was born of hatred of big government, some would say any government, and it has shaken US politics to the core. Likewise, comparisons are often made between the occupy protests and those brave individuals involved in the Arab spring, but such comparisons are unrealistic because the latter were united by a desire to remove despots and thugs from power who had ruled through intimidation and torture. In the case of the occupy movement, who is the enemy, the 1% that is stunting the growth of the remaining 99?

So is the view of the right to win over? It's pretty clear from my trips down to St. Paul's that the camp is made up of a very diverse bunch of people with different and not always complimentary views. In one short walk you can come across placards and posters, and hear conversations ranging from foreign wars to environmental concerns, fiscal responsibility, bank reform and welfare cuts, reform of the political system, and so on. The LSX protesters themselves happily admit that their numbers are comprised of socialists, liberals, conservatives, and even libertarians. With such opposing philosophies is it any wonder that a coherent programme of reform has not been laid out?

What the right fail to do, however, is properly appreciate the roots of this protest and understand why people from such seemingly different backgrounds have come together in supposedly common cause. The ongoing fluctuations of the world stock markets may have been the catalyst for these occupations, but the disillusionment expressed though them goes back much further to a sense of political disenfranchisement that has been steadily growing for many years across the western world. In the good times this could happily bubble beneath the surface, but it has now boiled over or all to see. So, yes, the protests are against banks, crooked corporations, tax-dodgers, and politicians, but they are more broadly symptomatic of a revolt against an economic and political system that empowers those people. The protesters are fighting against this system, against greed, hypocrisy, laziness, and apathy and those are hard enemies to define and pin down.

I started this blog because I firmly believe that a philosophy of sustainability can underpin any approach to politics, economics or civil society. But how does this relate to the occupy movement? One thing that frustrates and enrages those with an interest in protecting natural resources is the difficulty of exerting pressure and enacting key changes in public policy, the lack of a unified political organisation to lobby, or, even better, to win votes and enact real change. The message I would take to the protesters then is one of organisation, and, though there is signs that organisation is happening, it needs to happen very quickly. What is needed is coherent and accountable statements on economic policy, environmental policy, education, welfare, political, constitutional and legal reform. There needs to be clearly demarcated departments such as you would find within any large business or political organisation that can further develop and coordinate to create a unified message of opposition. I believe that sustainability could form the core ideal of such a party, and could represent a standard bearer for many of the disparate and disenfranchised voices that make up the occupy protests.

In this instance, I think I'd rather be ranked on the side of the Utopians. I'd prefer to join them than beat them.