The Future of the Occupation

“It’s your kids’ future! You’re defending your children. That is a primal and huge thing . . . Families have to be involved in order for this movement to continue.”

—Kirby Desmarais, founder of Parents for Occupy Wall Street

At 6:30 a.m. on November 15, a Manhattan Supreme Court judge, Lucy Billings, signed a temporary restraining order, permitting protesters to return to Zuccotti Park. But city officials ignored the ruling and kept the park clear. When an older woman waved a copy of the court ruling at police guarding the park, a cop punched her in the face.

The park was not reopened until 5 p.m., after the city received a more favorable court ruling that banned tents and sleeping bags from the park. That evening, the public was allowed to enter a defanged Zuccotti, fenced off with barricades, except for one heavily monitored entrance and exit. While the occupation continued, its continued physical presence is tenuous at best.

No one doubted that the loss of Zuccotti Park would have a profound impact on Occupy Wall Street. Some claimed the eviction was a blessing in disguise, as the occupation faced the approach of General Winter, as well as growing burnout, assaults in the private tents, and mental illness–all real problems, but also easily exploited by those looking to discredit the movement. The day before the raid, Adbusters had floated the idea of ending the encampments, declaring victory, and using “the winter to brainstorm, network, build momentum so that we may emerge rejuvenated with fresh tactics, philosophies, and a myriad projects ready to rumble next Spring.”

The police and Mayor Bloomberg claimed victory for the principles of obedience and respect for the status quo. Their raid took part in a national effort by 18 mayors of major U.S. cities in conjunction with federal authorities from the department of Homeland Security–a detail that Oakland Mayor Jean Quan let slip in a November 16 interview with the BBC.

Nonetheless, the takeover and transformation of a corporate plaza had given a physical address to a widespread mood of rebellion. Zuccotti Park had provided a literal home for hundreds and a political one for tens of thousands, perhaps more.

At the time of this writing, it remained unclear how the Occupy movement would evolve without the physical space that defined it from the beginning.

While the eviction’s timing and ferocity caught them by surprise, occupiers and supporters had already prepared alternatives in the event that full-time occupation of Zuccotti Park became impossible. Attempting to evade police crackdowns and to extend the occupation in time and space, protesters sought sites whose owners or managers supported the movement and were willing to be occupied–or, at least, unwilling to remove an occupation with force.

On October 16, a few dozen occupiers tried to expand the occupation to a “friendly” site at the Guggenheim Lab on Houston Street and Second Avenue. A public event at this location almost grew into a full-time indoor encampment, but this OWS satellite collapsed when occupiers resisted the owner’s request that they coordinate security for the site. One month later, hours after the eviction from Zuccotti, a flurry of texts, Twitters and Facebook posts directed protesters to convene at 9 a.m. at Canal Street and Sixth Avenue. They were greeted by a contingent of clergy who supported the movement and its message against inequality. A few hundred occupiers scaled chain-link fences to occupy a disused triangle of land at the mouth of the Holland Tunnel. Trinity Church, one of New York City’s largest real estate holders, owned this property. When the clergy couldn’t negotiate an ongoing occupation with Trinity, riot cops moved in and dispersed the camp.

In conjunction with the November 17 National Day of Action, students coordinated a more successful search for a new, full-time occupation space occurred. The students met for “lunch” at a student rally at Union Square–the destination of citywide feeder marches and speakouts. From there, a breakout march entered and “occupied” a New School University Building on 5th Avenue. Marchers heading to Foley Square saw signs in the window declaring the space “occupied!” The quest for “friendly” hosts briefly succeeded. The New School, founded by left-wing professors fleeing Nazi repression in Germany, initially tolerated the burgeoning All-City Student Occupation–perhaps reasoning that an eviction would mar its reputation as a progressive institution. But relations between the protesters and administration soon frayed over issues like graffiti and fire codes, and when the president tried to persuade the occupiers to move to a new space at the New School, their General Assembly passed the proposal with a 75% majority, though dissenters from the proposal chose to stay and continue the occupation. The question of how to deal with a tolerant host—a problem those still in Zuccotti would love to have—actually split this occupation, and by the end of the Thanksgiving weekend the last holdouts had voluntarily disbanded.

At the time of this writing, Zuccotti remains occupied during the day, but at night protesters must leave. A sympathetic hotel owner in the Rockaways shelters many at night, but it’s a long commute every day, back and forth to the global finance capital. The logistical hassles of the eviction have exacerbated tensions over myriad issues from money to gluten-free food.

Nonetheless, along with efforts to expand to new physical spaces, Occupy’s energy and memes have spread to a wide array of political spaces and campaigns. The movement has contributed bodies and support to many causes. Protesters have “occupied” foreclosed homes and homes facing foreclosure in Minneapolis, Oakland, Portland, Cleveland and other cities. They have occupied the Department of Education in New York, by holding protests, teach-ins and discussions on how to reform the system so that it works for students, teachers and parents and not for the privatization lobby. They have occupied student debt—collecting and sharing stories of debt-related hardship on a Web site and starting a campaign to refuse crippling loan repayments predicated on unjust interest rates. They have held joint rallies with unions and lent their bodies and energy to pickets and labor actions. They have offered assistance to immigrants, in one case helping to fight a deportation by organizing a march and publicizing a rally.

These examples, along with countless others, suggest a wholesale reinvigoration of protest in the U.S. Campaigners who have struggled for years to engage public interest are now receiving extra support and publicity through the eye-catching Occupy brand, its numbers and determination, and last but not least, its irresistibly inclusive “99 Percent” slogan. As Atlantic commentator Alexis Madrigal pointed out, the Occupy concept resembles an Application Programming Interface from a Web site—a kind of framework for integrating the disparate into a whole. No one can deny the tensions within OWS and the broader Occupy movement, but so far a shared analysis and common language has bound the different strands together.

But at what point does integration become co-optation? What would constitute co-optation by the Democratic party and other mainstream liberal organizations, and what would constitute support? Within the first month of the Occupation, Democrats from Al Gore to Nancy Pelosi to the president himself expressed sympathy for the protesters’ concerns. Some Democrat-friendly groups, such as the Center for American Progress, have shown interest in using OWS for voting drives. Not long after Gore’s endorsement, Salon commentator Glenn Greenwald lit into Mary Kay Henry, the president of SEIU (one of the unions most supportive of Obama and the Democrats) for coopting the language and slogans of Occupy to rally support for Obama’s re-election campaign. In an interview with the Washington Post’s Greg Sargent, Henry had promoted the notion of “Occupy Congress” and set up a false dichotomy in which occupiers and unions would side with the Democrats against Republicans. Yet everyone, especially OWS, knows that the Grand Old Party is not the only “party of the rich.” Occupy protesters may well “Occupy Congress”–but not in the way Henry and other Obama supporters imagine. As Greenwald pointed out, what makes Occupy so pertinent is its resolve to work outside of corrupt political institutions. Appropriating the movement for a Democratic campaign would simply make Occupy another voting arm–and either narrow its appeal or kill it.

David Carr contended that getting people elected and pressuring for legislative demands is still how things get done, however unsatisfactorily. Yet, our elite political system, allied with corporate interests, sparked the protests in part. In order to get its messages across and enact change, Occupy will have to use all tools available. Engaging in the existing political process may well be one; yet any involvement in electoral politics must surely be on Occupy’s own terms.

Despite the complex questions of building a broad coalition, the bigger challenge could still be evading the authorities and dealing with increasing police brutality.

As OWS moves forward, changing location, shape and tactics, the militarization of the New York City Police Department, its capacity and willingness to use excessive force, remains a significant obstacle for developing new sites of protest and new tactics.

Sociologist and Brooklynite Alex Vitale describes how YouTube images of NYPD and Davis riot police pepper-spraying peaceful protesters became possible. After a long period of “negotiated management” between protesters and police during the 1970s and 80s, the Seattle Police Department’s perceived failure to stem the 1999 Battle in Seattle, followed closely by the terror attacks in 2001, gave police departments both the motivation and the excuse to militarize. Vitale argues that legacy of New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani’s “broken-windows” policing and “quality of life” can be seen in NYPD’s micromanagement of OWS and related demonstrations. When protesters defy minor rules, NYPD falls back on overwhelming force as it did during the first Brooklyn Bridge march.

It remains to be seen what the balance of physical and political force will mean for the future of OWS and the #occupy movement. Police departments, armed with an array of crowd control technologies, have the capacity to disperse unarmed encampments and crowds. And big-city, mostly-liberal mayors have shown their willingness to work together to try to take on protesters. But harsh tactics have backfired, causing public relations problems for police and politicians. So far the #occupy movement has responded to police brutality, above all, by growing.

Will police and politicians continue cracking down, change tactics, or return to the old days of “negotiated settlement?” Will #occupy remain defiant and grow?

There are many signs that it can. For one thing, the Occupy movement appeals to constituencies far beyond the stereotypical image of “protesters.” One cold day in November, amid the cacophony of unsanctioned drumming and Reverend Billy’s protest against Goldman Sachs, a suburban couple, both pediatricians with three kids, explained that they had come to attend the General Assembly meeting. Though many in their Westchester town had lowered their flags to half-mast when Barack Obama was elected president, Ivanya Alpert and her husband, Dmitri Laddis, see Occupy as a sign that a more promising politics is emerging. They are tired of their kids’ class sizes growing, due to budget cuts, as rapidly as their neighbors expand their McMansions. Their local public pool was sold off to a private bidder because the town couldn’t afford to keep it open every summer. Alpert and Laddis spent their one date night of the year in Zuccotti Park.

A group called Parents for Occupy Wall Street, which began with a Family Sleep-Over in Zuccotti Park in October, quickly became a national phenomenon, reaching as far as Honolulu. Founded by 25-year-old Brooklyn music industry entrepreneur Kirby Desmarais, the mother of a 19-month old daughter, the group will go on tour in 2012, to educate fellow parents about the OWS movement. Desmarais, never politically active before, explained why parents have to be part of OWS: “It’s your kids’ future! You’re defending your children. That is a primal and huge thing . . . Families have to be involved in order for this movement to continue.”

Children and parents weren’t the only unexpected visitors to Zuccotti and its sister encampments nationwide. Oakland police severely wounded a protesting former Marine who’d served two tours in Iraq; other veterans have been a strong presence at Occupy sites, and rightly so, given their high rates of unemployment. Perhaps even more surprisingly, in mid-November, Ray Lewis, a retired police captain from Philadelphia, was arrested in Zuccotti Park, carrying a sign that said, “NYPD Don’t Be Wall Street Mercenaries.” He explained his analysis of police labor: “All the cops, they’re just workers for the one percent and they don’t even realize it. . . . As soon as I get out of jail, I’m coming right back and they’ll have to arrest me again. “ This was a long way from the dream of a revolution in which military and police turn against the state, but it showed that Occupy was hardly, in Dmitri Laddis’s words, “a marginal little protest.”

Occupy Wall Street has consistently defied predictions and surprised self-styled trendtrackers. This summer, as the Adbusters call circulated, most activists and observers laughed at the very idea of occupying Wall Street. Canadians are calling for a camp-out on Wall Street! The police would clear it out within hours! How naïve to think people could get away with such a thing! But so far, history has proven these naysayers wrong. As the protesters declared in face of Bloomberg’s second eviction, “You can’t evict an idea.”