When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a (wo)man, I put away childish things.

–1 Corinthians 13:11

This woman’s brother having been arrested the day before, this November 17th photo from Occupy LA brought to mind the rite of passage so many young people have experienced over the past few months. If organizers are savvy, the movement will evolve. Even still, young people have grown.

PHOTOGRAPH by Jonathan Gibby/Zuma

In a Nutshell

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Occupy Wall Street is a people-powered movement that began on September 17, 2011 in Liberty Square in Manhattan’s Financial District, and has spread to over 100 cities in the United States and actions in over 1,500 cities globally. #OWS is fighting back against the corrosive power of major banks and multinational corporations over the democratic process, and the role of Wall Street in creating an economic collapse that has caused the greatest recession in generations. The movement is inspired by popular uprisings in Egypt and Tunisia, and aims to expose how the richest 1% of people are writing the rules of an unfair global economy that is foreclosing on our future.

Occupy Wall Street is a horizontally organized resistance movement employing the revolutionary Arab Spring tactic to restore democracy in America. We use a tool known as a "people's assembly" to facilitate collective decision making in an open, participatory and non-binding manner. We call ours the NYC General Assembly and we welcome people from all colors, genders and beliefs to attend our daily assemblies. To learn more about how you can start a people's assembly to organize your local community to fight back against social injustice, please read this quick guide on group dynamics in people's assemblies.

Occupy Wall Street demonstrators at Zuccotti Park in downtown New York City this week.

The occupiers are actually forging a robust micro-society of working groups, each one developing new approaches -- or reviving old approaches -- to long-running problems. In just one example, Occupy's General Assembly is a new, highly flexible approach to group discussion and consensus building. Unlike parliamentary rules that promote debate, difference and decision, the General Assembly forges consensus by "stacking" ideas and objections much in the fashion that computer programmers "stack" features. The whole thing is orchestrated through simple hand gestures (think commodities exchange). Elements in the stack are prioritized, and everyone gets a chance to speak. Even after votes, exceptions and objections are incorporated as amendments.

This is just one reason why occupiers seem incompatible with current ideas about policy demands or right vs. left. They are not interested in debate (or what Enlightenment philosophers called "dialectic") but consensus. They are working to upgrade that binary, winner-takes-all, 13th century political operating system. And like any software developer, they are learning to "release early and release often."

It's the new style.
It's no revolution.
It's 'learning by doing'.

Occupy Wall Street Hackathons Produce Digital Tools and New Activists

Groups of programmers gathered in three cities this weekend to build digital tools for the Occupy Wall Street movement. Several of those tools have already launched, and in many cases they’re being maintained by activists who’ve never held a sign in a park.

“I was waiting to see how I should be involved,” says Jake Levitas, who attended the San Francisco hackathon. “In the last week, I thought, ‘I know I’m going to dedicate a lot of time to this movement. I don’t know how, but I know I want to be involved.’”

When he found out about the hackathon through Facebook, he knew how he wanted to participate. Levitas, working with a small team at the event, started a design library called OccupyDesign. It’s a database of Occupy Wall Street protest placards, logistical signs and icons — with a strong focus on infographics. The idea, he says, is that it is harder to argue with facts presented visually than it is a talking point, and that a centralized visual library can help the protests make a strong impression. And he hopes this project will get more designers like him involved.

“Especially if they don’t think they can sleep on the street for a while,” he says, “they don’t know how they can plug in.”

19th October 2011

I am the 99%