Noam Chomsky on Occupy

In the US this collection of three interviews with Noam Chomsky and a transcript of his talk at Occupy Boston was published as a pamphlet by Zuccotti Park Press and that makes perfect sense. My version is a Penguin Special for the international market and it feels as if Penguin is trying to make a few bucks by selling you a bounded copy of things that are already online and that partly overlap. 

Chomsky remains a cryptic figure: on the one hand he is a linguist who turned the discipline into a modern science but who refuses to allow for the idea that language can be social, on the other hand he is one of the fiercest critics of American politics, one who never kowtows to anything or anybody. On Occupy I like him. Of all the famous people endorsing it I find him the most enthusiastic. Where Noami Klein feels the need to offer advice and where the Hegelian harlequin couldn't resist urging OWS to force an allegiance with the tea party, Chomsky doesn't profess to know what 'we' should do and he stays away from condescending advice and smart-ass contrarianism. Instead he gives a clear and concise of picture of the way financial institutions came to own the political institutions and how they purposely marginalized everybody else. Insecurity (about jobs, about debts) keeps people too afraid to protest. He says the importance of Occupy is twofold: 1) it has changed the agenda by making class war a theme, 2) Occupy camps created collective spaces and social networks that enable people to overcome their isolation. In the same way the most important aspect of 1968 was the fact that everybody for the first time started to talk with everybody else. 

Another thing I like about Chomsky is that he stays away from using the 99%, he refers to it, but he doesn't embrace it. It has become a co-opted term and I think Chomsky believes it to be a useful image but not a truly important as a statistic.

If you are already into Occupy this book will not be earth shattering but if you want to recommend something on it to your teachers, your parents, your children, your students this might be a good introduction.

The first history of Occupy Wall Street reviewed

The occupation of Zuccotti Park began in mid September and by December at least three books had been published about it. If that is not showing the way it captured the imagination of a great number of people what will? 

"Occupying Wall Street” tells the inside story of the occupation from the original Addbusters call to the eviction in November and a little beyond that. A large group of writers contributed material but the book speaks with one assembled voice. This means that while the book mostly reads well is it is written without style or literary embellishment. It sears through the history of OWS with the finesse of a transportbike at rush time. This is a sympathetic but detached account meant to be the first history of the movement. It attempts to represent the various and sometimes conflicting viewpoints and positions of the people involved as objective as possible by including a lot of interviews. As it documents the occupation from its humble, unsure beginnings to an unexpected mass movement it captures the key media moments like the 700 arrests on Brooklyn bridge as well as the evolving organizational structure of councils, working groups and caucuses. This turns this book into a how-to-occupy manual of sorts.

The chapter that discusses what it was like to actually live on Zuccotti does a good job explaining how the mass of occupation stratified into in smaller, often non-communicating groups with a rough division between the smart side and the down and out side. It takes you through the birthing pains of the formation of a city within a city with astonishing detail with all the social tension but also with all the bustle and excitement. The book shows what a bit of good will and energy can do: OWS did manage to provide good on-site services from daily mails, to book lending, to laundering and medical and legal assistance.

In the long run the use of this book will probably fade as better books telling the story of OWS come out but for now I will rate this book for the fact that it provides a huge amount of information that I had never encountered before. Great stuff.

PS: The Economist called this book self-congratulatory and boosterish but that can easily be explained because this book lacks the cynicism that the editors of the Economist mistake for integrity.

Occupy changes everything, the second Occupy book does not

'This changes everything' is the second book on Occupy. It's slim and flimsy like a print-on-demand and comes from the offices of Yes Magazine. There are three sections, one deals directly with the organization and motives of Occupy Wall Street, the other two sections deal with what has to change in the US and how this could be done. For geographic reasons I have little use for the last two section while two articles in the first section also appear in the first book on Occupy. There are a few additional interesting pieces here but overall I feel that the editors of this book are ideologically far removed from OWS. While they go to great lengths to defend the consensus model of OWS you can't help but think that it's an appreciation based more on the success of OWS to capture attention than on any real sympathy for the model itself. There is just too much talk on the need for new leaders and to much emphasis on power. While the first book doesn't bother to address the way OWS changed the political agenda and gave a 'voice to the voiceless', the editors of this book can't stop salivating over this sudden mass eruption of anger and indignation. If only all those people would unite under their banner! Or at least got a subscription!! The ultimate aim of this book is to drain some of the energy of Occupy into their own fold and that makes this a dishonest book with a small number of good pieces.

Wonderfull scenes from Occupied America

My own ever expanding drivel on Occupy attempts to document its rise and development from the afar and inactive position of a stay-home psychogeographic enthusiast. Occupy is the most exciting development in anarchist inspired protest and civil disobedience in my lifetime and I feel the need to bear witness (as Ezra Pound would say), to record the excitement and interpret the various positions as if each camp represents a game of chess, each player earning points for human progress.

Occupy Wall Street took Zuccotti park on 17 September 2011, by December 2011 Verso published 'Occupy!: Scenes from Occupied America'; it also bears witness, but from up close. The book begins and continues with diary-like reports on the atmosphere of camp and marches, the deliberations during general assemblies, the internal strife between the drummer circle and the rest, the problems of camps not being truly representative of the 99%, the doubts and insecurities that slowly creep in, the mayhem of eviction and of course the logistical nightmare of the laundry. There are 28 authors beautifully edited with each new author adding a new perspective, historical essays on China town, labour unions and consensus decision making, some writers are celebrities like that Hegelian Harlequin (rousing) and Angela Davis (short but strong), unknown writers drop in narratives from other occupation sites. Oakland, Atlanta, Philadelphia each finding a way to deal with the problems generated by local historic and political circumstances. The book is consistently intelligent (there are only two contributions that I like less for being abstract) and well-paced, all the more remarkable for the immediacy of its subject and speed of its production. The design also gets top marks.

Perhaps Michael Sayeau is right when he writes in the Guardian that the picture of Occupy that emerges from this book is a little too educated, too well-argued and too clear to do justice to the more prevalent attitudes of confusion, anger and irrationality. Personally I'd like see the best qualities of Occupy be saved for next generations rather than the mediocre ones. Another criticism one could give about this book is that it is too busy conveying the excitement, adventure and, later, the daily sorrows of camping out that it fails to properly address it's goals, aims and experiences as a protest. Which is a way of saying that Occupy is just another middle class vehicle for personal growth. There may be a point and maybe not; if the citing of violence is the way the 'system' tries to discredit a protest movement, calling everybody who appears to be slightly better of then you 'middle class' is the surest way for protest movements to discredit each other.  

Surely this book, the first book, will be referenced for as long as Occupy will be studied. It focuses on the US only and in fact doesn't even suggest that it has gone world wide. I can only hope that in other countries and on other continents people will want to turn their bearing witness into books as lively and as well produced as this one. OWS is the mother ship of Occupy but the smallest camp you can think of in the obscurest part of country is just as important, and I want to read about it. 

The majority of the authors presented here are affiliated with the Nplusone magazine which published three issues of the Occupy Gazette, all available online, from which this book is compiled.