Occupy x

Articles on the M15 and Occupy movements from Wall Street to Dame Street & beyond

Occupy Cork Marches Against Austerity

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Occupy Cork staged a "Parade of Defiance" against the austerity programme of the government on Saturday December 3rd in Cork. Cork Community artlink provided many props and floats for the march , a samba band gave the march an noisy and energetic flavour beyond the usual sloganeering. 

Spectacle of Defiance & Hope parades through Dublin

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Saturday saw the 2nd Spectacle of Defiance & Hope take place in Dublin, just ahead of the budget cuts that are expected to further devastate community organisations & services. The Spectacle describes itself as a "broadly based alliance of community organisations from Dublin and beyond" and also represents an attempt to break from the standard pattern of demonstrations in Dublin to create something more fun, participatory & engaging.

Disappointing turnout for DCTU anti-cuts demonstration

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In the region of 2,500 people took part in Saturday's Dublin Council of Trade Unions demonstration in Dublin. Although this made it the biggest anti-austerity demonstration in the city since the massive ICTU demonstration of last year the small number attending was a wake up call for anyone on the left or in the unions who is optimistic about significant resistance to the crisis emerging in the short term.

Occupy Wall Street offer of election observers for Egypt shocks us

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Comrades from Cairo explain why they are puzzled by the offer of Occupy Wall Street to send election monitors to Egypt for the elections when "Our struggle—which we think we share with you—is greater and grander than a neatly functioning parliamentary democracy; we demanded the fall of the regime, we demanded dignity, freedom and social justice, and we are still fighting for these goals. We do not see elections of a puppet parliament as the means to achieve them."

Occupy Movement, the Zapatista's and the General Assemblies

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The General Assemblies of the Occupy movement are creating a global experience in Direct Democracy.  But this model did not come from nowhere - among other sources of influence is the Zapatista rebellion of southern Mexico, soon to enter its 18th year. Over almost two decades hundreds of rebel communities in Chiapas have used a General Assembly model to decide on how all aspects of life in the liberated zone will be organised.  Despite their different circumstances to those faced by the majoity of the Occupy camps (in urban built up locations) there is still much that can be learnt from that experience.

This piece written for the Irish Mexico Group by a WSM member a few years after the start of that rebellion looks at how the Zapatistas organise themselves in great detail, what some of the problems they had faced are and how they overcame them.  It also looks further into the history of General Assemblies and Direct Democracy in Mexico and around the globe. [Note: This long text is also available as a PDF file in a number of different formats suitable for distribution]

Occupy - the assembly process is the revolution

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As we prepare to enter the 3rd month of the Occupy movement a commonly heard criticism targets both the lack of clear demands and the related complex and often drawn out decision making processes being used at Occupy General Assemblies. These criticisms however miss the point, against the traditional left with its package of pre-set answers (best before 1917) what makes Occupy different is that process of decision making through assembly. The assembly form is not just a way of making decisions but also a different form of doing politics.  The Assembly is in embryo the different world we seek to create.

Eyewitness Oakland General Strike - analysis of post N2 controversy in Occupy Oakland

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This eyewitness account of the build to and events of the 'Occupy' Oakland General Strike of Nov 2 describes how momentum developed in the aftermath of the violent eviction of Occupy Oakland, the events of November 2nd itself including the shut down of the port, the attempted occupation of the Traveler's Aid Society building and the black bloc's attack on bank buildings. The author looks at the controversy around these last two actions in the aftermath of November 2nd and warns that "If the Oakland Commune does not continue to accelerate the process of communization, it will fall back into either pure symbolism, or assume the counterrevolutionary form of reformism (two processes already in progress)"

Debate on the Occupy Oakland General Strike

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Yesterday in Oakland, California the Occupy X Movement took a major step when Occupy Oakland called a general strike which shut down the port of Oakland (5th busiest in the US ). The call for the General Strike emerged from the Oakland General Assembly in the aftermath of the police shooting of Scott Olsen on 25th October. The strike could not (for legal reasons) have the formal support of the Oakland unions but we understand that in particular the radical ILWU which organizes the docks had given a 'nod and a wink' that if a large protest was at the port gates work would be halted for 'health & safety' reasons as had happened during the US invasion of Iraq in 2003.

Anarchist Economics and the Occupy X Movement

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There’s a lot of folks taking to the streets (and a Park) in the capitol of capital right now—Wall Street—and all over the world in response. The general sentiment seems to be that folks are fed up with a tiny elite controlling the lives of the rest of us—now on an unprecedented scale. This is made possible, in part, by a system of economics and government designed to enrich a few folks at the expense of the majority of us. That is, the social systems we’ve collectively built, and that we collectively maintain and reproduce, allow for this state of affairs.

The occupiers of Tahrir Square are with you - violence, defense & police repression

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This statement from 'Comrades from Cairo' expresses solidarity and a sense of common struggle with the Occupy movement that has sprung up across the globe. It explains that the movement in Cairo was not non-violent but rather when police tried to evict Tahir square "Barricades were erected, officers were beaten back and pelted with rocks even as they fired tear gas and live ammunition on us. But at the end of the day on 28 January they retreated, and we had won our cities."

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