Democratic presidential challenger Bernie Sanders has spent the spring railing against the excesses of Wall Street greed while calling for a financial transactions tax and a breakup of the big banks. Nearly four years after the precipitous rise of Occupy Wall Street, the movement so many thought had disappeared has instead splintered and regrown into a variety of focused causes.
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.
Now, many experts say the movement laid the groundwork for the economic platform of the modern Democratic Party. The following is an edited transcript of their conversation. So, the business of social change is tough. Because it did. Meyer: Well, I mean, people come to a demonstration and a project with different ambitions. The idea and language of Occupy came from a guy named [Kalle] Lasn, who ran Adbusters magazine.
He said to get together, occupy a space, agree on a demand and then the world will change. We have to do something. People came with different priorities. Some were concerned with health care, some were concerned with student debt. Some were concerned with just this feeling of angst. Ryssdal: Do you suppose that the impact the progressive wing of the modern Democratic Party is having here in , do you suppose that happens without Occupy? The fact is, even in the most egalitarian of settings, some people are practised in discursive dynamics and others struggle to make their voices heard.
It was amazing. To the academic, it was a theory that had been put into practice. Some of his fellow protesters were committed on a more practical level. A combination of internal tensions, exhaustion and worsening weather began to undermine morale among the occupiers and thin their numbers. Despite several attempts to re-occupy the space and others in the area, the protest effectively came to an end.
It also ended an experiment in social and political organisation. However, Wall Street, and the whole financial and corporate sector, remained almost entirely untouched by the two-month long occupation. It changed no banking practices, brought forth no corporate regulation. By that measure it was widely seen as a failure. In its own way, OWS was adjudged to be equally counterproductive. Micah White, who is mixed-raced with an African American father and a white mother, believes that the links between OWS and BLM are not just an overlap in individual protesters, but also the adoption of a model.
On this, Cantave is in agreement. And I think the Democratic party was forced to speak to that base in a more serious way. White, however, is more sceptical. Gradual change in the future at some unknown period of time.
For all his revolutionary fervour, White has since gone on to address Davos — a decision he justifies with the comparison of Che Guevara addressing the UN — and is now a father and works in cryptocurrency. At the end of her film, when Holmes admits that the Zuccotti Park eviction marked the end of OWS, there is an air of dejection in her narration. Yet both she and Cantave remain firm believers in anarchism. Holmes is currently working on a PhD in media studies and continues to be committed to the ideals that first took her to Zuccotti Park.
Supporters of the document waged a hard-won battle to win ratification by the necessary nine out of 13 U. In , the Enterprise became the first space shuttle to At the White House in Washington, D. The accords were Sign up now to learn about This Day in History straight from your inbox. George Washington prepares a final draft of his presidential farewell address on September 17, Less than a year later, on July 23, , Williams gave up her crown after nude photos of her surfaced.
Despite the scandal, Williams later launched a successful
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