Occupy Wall Street and The Global Hegemony of Money
On September seventeenth, 2011 a few hundred protesters gathered in New York City as a part of what became known as Occupy Wall Street. “Protesters arranged to meet and discuss their goals at the iconic Wall Street Bull statue at noon, as well as at a “people’s assembly” at One Chase Manhattan Plaza at 3 p.m.” (Cnn Money). The protesters gathered in an attempt to bring attention to the illegal activity of Wall Street executives and bankers that crashed the U.S. economy in 2008, in a series of protests that garnered international attention and laid the groundwork for protests to follow. The tensions leading to the Occupy protests are inherently connected to globalization, specifically the period of Neoliberal economics from the late 1970’s to present. For this essay, I will be focusing primarily on the initial Occupy protests in 2011 and the recent Democracy Spring protests of 2016 within the context of a reaction against the globalization of money. Additionally, I will be discussing the pieces A Brief History of Neoliberalism by David Harvey, A New Paradigm for Understanding Today’s World by Alain Touraine and The Globalization of Inequality by Francois Bourguignon in relation to the two protests and the circumstances leading up to them.
When the Occupy demonstrators arrived in New York, they arrived in reaction against the power of international corporations that crashed the world economy in 2008. As organizer Kalle Lasn of Adbuster Magazine phrases it, “We thought, why isn’t there a backlash here?… We need to shake up the corporate-driven capitalist system we’re in. To do that, we needed something radical.” (Cnn Money). On the official Occupy site, the movement writes of its own origins, stating:
“2011 will be remembered as a year of revolution, the beginning of the end for an unsustainable global system based on poverty, oppression, and violence. In dozens of countries across the Arab world, people rose up against broken economies and oppressive regimes, toppling dictators and inspiring the world to action. Popular rejection of austerity measures and attacks on worker’s rights brought millions to the streets in Greece, Iceland, Spain, Portugal, Italy, the UK, Chile, Wisconsin, and elsewhere” (OccupyWallSt.org).
Occupy appears to be placing itself at the center of a conflict against not only a national system, but a world system that inherently provides an unequal opportunity for the masses across nations.
The issue of Inequality in the modern era, a central issue for Occupy, is thoroughly discussed in Francois Bourguignon’s The Globalization of Inequality. Bourguignon states that “There has been a great deal of debate around the subject of globalization…. Some believe it has contributed to the “wealth of nations”… Others feel it has caused the majority of humanity to sink into poverty in order to benefit a privileged elite” (Bourguignon 1). Certainly, the protesters who assembled at Liberty Square in 2011, who were “Fueled by anger at the growing disparities between rich and poor, frustrated by government policies that benefit a tiny elite at the expense of the majority, and tired of the establishment’s failure to address fundamental economic inequalities” (OccupyWallSt.org) would agree with the second point raised about globalization. Bourguignon works to shed light on two different types of inequality: inequality within nations and inequality between countries. According to Bourguignon, “inequality in standard of living between countries has started to decline… On the other hand, inequality within many countries has increased, often following several decades of stability” (Bourguignon 2) This increase in inequality, coming on the heels of trade deals and the outsourcing of low skill labor to developing nations, is certainly a central issue for the occupy protesters, and the issue of inequality brought forward by Occupy in 2011 proves to resonate to this day. Notably, inequality within nations has been a central issue for the insurgent presidential campaign of Senator Bernie Sanders, who has railed against the power of Wall Street and the widening of inequality in America.
However, Occupy Wall street is not merely concerned with inequality, but, as Kalle Lasn indicated, but with the economic system that brought us to this point of potential cataclysm. This economic system, Neoliberalism, is often considered the root of inequality within nations and the hegemony of monetary policy. Neoliberalism rises to power in 1979 when “Paul Volcker took command at the us Federal Reserve… the Fed thereafter took the lead in the fight against inflation no matter what its consequences” (Harvey 1). By 1980, with the election of Ronald Reagan, Neoliberalism is the predominant socio-economic force. Neoliberalism, which asserted that, “the social good will be maximized by maximizing the reach and frequency of market transactions” (Harvey 3), has been the dominant ideology fueling trade partnerships, increase in CEO pay, the repealing of Glass-Steagall and reduction of top tier taxes, all of which have led to the increasing power of Wall Street firms that Occupy has rallied against. As Fox news reported, in a perhaps uncharacteristically non-reactionist style, of Occupy when they first emerged, “Most of the Occupy Wall Street protesters aren’t opposed to free market capitalism. In fact, what they want is an end to the crony capitalist system now in place, that makes it easier for the rich and powerful to get even more rich and powerful while making it increasingly hard for the rest of us to get by. The protesters are not anti-American radicals. They are the defenders of the American Dream, the decision from the birth of our nation that success should be determined by hard work not royal bloodlines” (Fox news.com)
It appears, looking at the phenomenon that Occupy reacts against, that they are reacting against the supposed rules of our new era, rules defined by Alain Touraine in A New Paradigm for Understanding Today’s World. As Touraine writes, “Those who sung the praises of globalization most loudly in fact wanted to impose the idea that no mode of social or political regulation of a globalized economy was any longer possible or desirable” (Touraine 21). Here, Touraine defines an issue of globalization, which is that it creates a sort of unstable capitalism that violently asserts itself. The violent assertion of capital forces over individual rights is seen throughout history, manifesting recently in the violent suppression of the Occupy protests, Guatemalan water protests and others. The global hegemony of finance has also led to a decline in national sovereignty and influence, as “the only powerful institutions at a global level- banks and especially the International Monetary Fund and World Trade Organization- seek to impose an economic logic on states, rather than social and political objectives on economic actors” (Touraine 21–22). The force of banks and trade organizations across national borders draws the ire of Occupy and other protest organizations, and has been a central talking point for Senator Sanders, the first presidential candidate endorsed by occupy. As inequality grows, and the autonomy of nations falls, movements of individuals, like Occupy, increasingly rise to draw attention to issues governments refuse to or are unable to address.
At the heart of the issue, Occupy, and movements like them, are fighting against the culmination of Neoliberalism, financialization and globalization, which result in what Touraine defines as the end of the social, a shift away from nation states and citizenship towards corporate power and consumerism. Occupy, who have staged protests across the nation, in many ways call for a return to the social, and a renewal in power of citizenship moving forward into the 21st century. Whether these movements will come to fruition or not is unclear, but it is made clear by Touraine, Bourguignon and Harvey that movements like Occupy are going to be increasingly necessary as the hegemony of money advances and the decline of the social and the nation state continues.
Bibliography
Bourguignon, François. The Globalization of Inequality. New Jersey: Princeton UP, 2012. Print.
Touraine, Alain. A New Paradigm For Understanding Today’s World. Cambridge: Polity Press. 2007. Print
Harvey, David. A Brief History of Neoliberalism. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2005. Print
Pepitone, Julianne. “Hundreds of Protesters Descend to ‘Occupy Wall Street’”CNNMoney. Cable News Network, 17 Sept. 2011. Web. 06 May 2016.
“2011: A Year in Revolt.” Occupy Wall Street. Occupy Wall Street, 3 Jan. 2012. Web. 06 May 2016.
Kohn, Sally. “’Occupy Wall Street’ — It’s Not What They’re For, But What They’re Against | Fox News.” Fox News. FOX News Network, 14 Oct. 2011. Web. 06 May 2016.
