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Tag: Zuccotti Park

Joseph Eugene Stiglitz the 69 year old American economist and professor has published an article on The Daily Beast titled “The 99 Percent Wakes Up” pointing out  that “Inequality isn’t only plaguing America—the Arab Spring flowered because international capitalism is broken.” In the article Stiglitz states “…I met with protesters in Madrid’s Retiro Park, at Zuccotti Park in New York, and in [Tahrir Square] Cairo… The protesters have been criticized for not having an agenda, but such criticism misses the point of protest movements. They are an expression of frustration with the electoral process. They are an alarm. …they are asking for a great deal: for a democracy where people, not dollars, matter; and for a market economy that delivers on what it is supposed to do. The two demands are related: unfettered markets do not work well, as we have seen. For markets to work the way markets are supposed to work, there has to be appropriate government regulation. But for that to occur, we have to have a democracy that reflects the general interests, not the special interests. We may have the best government that money can buy, but that won’t be good enough.

 

Inspired by The Daily Beast http://ow.ly/aS6rW image source http://ow.ly/aS6zP

Sweta Vohra the US producer of FaultLines at Al-Jazeera English from Washington DC has published an article with Jordan Flaherty on the history of an occupation, referencing how the OWS movement went from a small group of NYC protestors to a broader people’s movement. The article states, ”When people gathered in Zuccotti Park on September 17, the anger at corporate greed was a unifying call. This was a protest that in large part was about shifting power from the wealthy to the many. It was a mostly white crowd, but it sought to incorporate a wide range of voices. The economic crisis in the US had made the white middle class question their future. Soaring unemployment rates, suffocating student loan debt, and thousands of foreclosures began to close in. This reality propelled the Occupy movement forward. And many feel that the presence of so many relatively privileged white people brought increased media attention and public sympathy. Organisers told us they immediately saw the next step as needing to raise awareness among the many young people new to activism that came flocking to occupations.”

 

Inspired by Aljazeera http://ow.ly/a82q5 image source twitter http://ow.ly/a82Ep

Mark LeVine a US history professor in an article published by Aljazeera, laments the loss of the OWS Movement’s ‘People’s Library’ at Zuccotti Park NYC during a recent police raid on the encampment. LeVine recounts a discussion with his old friend Alan Minsky the producer of the ‘Axis of Justice’ radio show. “By permanently occupying Zuccottii and other parks, the OWS movement created a space where people could gather, create libraries, share books and ideas, and even meals. Where they could plan for another world, that isn’t merely possible anymore, but the only hope for the survival of humanity as a civilization … The library … reflected the uniqueness and power of the still young 99 per cent movement. From the very beginning, the OWS encampments were not just gestures of protest … but were efforts to build community where people were knowledgeable and participated in informed dialogue.”

 

Inspired by Mark LeVine http://ow.ly/7Vn39 image source meaning.org http://ow.ly/7Vnh6

David Rolfe Graeber the 50 year old US anthropologist and anarchist is being hailed as the anti-leader of the Occupy Wall Street movement. Graeber has been profiled by Drake Bennett  in Business Week as “a key member of a small band of activists who quietly planned, then noisily carried out, the occupation of Lower Manhattan’s Zuccotti Park, providing the focal point for what has grown into an amorphous global movement known as Occupy Wall Street.” Graeber although not the movements spokesperson, provides a favorable voice to the protests comparing them to the Arab Spring. Graeber, having an impressive history of both direct and indirect involvement in political activism, claims the contemporary Occupy Wall Street grassroots protest movement represents “the opening salvo in a wave of negotiations over the dissolution of the American Empire.”

 

Inspired by Drake Bennett http://ow.ly/7dQIO image source David Graeber http://ow.ly/7dRGs

Michael Rubens Bloomberg the 69 year old US businessman Mayor of New York City visited the ‘Occupy Wall Street’ movement at Zuccotti Park. Although the visit was brief, he addressed members of the movement informing them they would need to vacate the park in order for it to be ‘cleaned’. Brookfield Properties the owners of the park had complained to the NYPD that concerned citizens and office workers were reporting lewdness, groping, drinking, drug use, unsanitary conditions and offensive odors, from and around the park. However members of the movement voiced concerns that it was an attempt to evict them from the park and prevent them from bringing back camping equipment. Bloomberg later confirmed the ‘cleaning’ had been postponed and the movement could stay “indefinitely”. Bloomberg has a 2011 personal net worth of $18.1 billion.

Inspired by Max Read http://ow.ly/6ZlfK image source Rubenstein http://ow.ly/6ZlzW

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