Walter Brasch: It’s time to retire the 99 percent. Not the people, but the slogan that identifies the Occupy Movement.
Occupy and Organized Labor: Dare to Struggle, Dare to Win
By
Mark Naison: If I dare to dream, I can see where this collaboration between Occupy and Labor might lead—to the unionization of Wal-Mart, to the unionization of McDonalds, to the unionization of financial services workers in the nation’s largest banks.
Does OWS Claim to Have Authority Over the Occupy Movement?
By
Zwarich: History will record — reverently, if we are the ones who write it — that OWS lit the first match setting off the fire of this democratic movement but that does not give OWS any special authority to determine what shape this democratic fire might take as it continues to grow.
Occupy Birmingham
By
Jim Rhodes: The mainstream press has been critical of Occupy’s “failure” to provide alternative solutions, but I assure you they are being developed in spite of the built in mechanisms that guarantee failure.
Will Occupy Spring Forward or Melt Down?
By
Shamus Cooke: Most Occupiers have learned that raw enthusiasm alone cannot bring victory to a social movement; ideas matter too. Action divorced from strategy equals wasted energy, divisiveness, diversions and unnecessary mistakes. Not all tactics push the movement forward.
Why #OWS Needs to Denounce Violent Tactics on Display at Occupy Oakland
By
Tina Dupuy: Nonviolent struggle has nothing to do with how the cops react. In actual nonviolent movements they welcome police overreaction because it helps the cause they’re fighting for.
The Top 10 Best and Worst of U.S. Politics in 2011
By
Randy Shaw: Occupy Wall Street’s emergence in September raised progressive spirits, as has the unexpected rise of Newt Gingrich as the frontrunner for the GOP presidential nomination. Here’s my list of the top ten best and worst political events that occurred across the nation in 2011.
We Are the People of the Year
By
Tom Degan: This week the spokespersons for the plutocracy have been predicting the end of the movement which is now engulfing the world. The joke’s on them.
Activist Kwazi Nkrumah Arrested at Long Beach Port (updated)
By
Sharon Kyle: Kwazi Nkrumah, a long-time civil rights activist, has been arrested in Long Beach where the Occupy Movement was gathering as part of “Occupy the Ports”, a coordinated West Coast port shutdown.
Blacks and Occupy: Dividing the Occupy Movement
By
Carl Bloice: Occupy activists are thinking deeply about how we might incorporate opposition to racism, class exploitation, homophobia, xenophobia, ableism, violence done to the environment and transphobia into the resistance of the 99%.
Useful Examples for Occupy from the Great Depression
By
Mark Naison: The “grunt work” of organizing Depression Era protests — at least until 1936 — was done by radicals who for the most part eschewed, or de emphasized electoral politics.
Occupy Should Stay Unattached to Political Parties
By
Mark Nathan: We need grassroots social movements of such force that it will reinvent what is possible in mainstream American politics. The Occupy movements have started such a process.
“Occupy” Occupies California’s Democratic Party
By
Dick Price: If a meeting this past weekend between representatives from a half dozen Occupy encampments in California and perhaps 200 members of the California Progressive Caucus is any guide, the Occupy Movement has already tapped into older generations of progressive activists who are eager to support, leverage, and amplify the Occupyers’ ground-breaking work.
From Occupy Wall Street to Occupy the Neighborhoods
By
Paul Loeb: Nothing stops the Occupiers and their supporters from can raising their key issues as clearly and powerfully as possible, while reminding people that showing up at the polls still matters.
The Occupy Movement Needs a Good Fight
By
Shamus Cooke: If the national Occupy Movement fought for a massive public jobs program and against cuts to social programs by massively taxing the wealthy and corporations, the vast majority of working people would join the movement until it was capable of actually winning these demands.
Survey Saturday: Occupy Your Mama
By
Survey Saturday: With upwards of ten thousand Occupy protesters flooding through downtown Oakland yesterday to close shipping facilities there and organizers here in Los Angeles planning a full teach-in weekend with the likes of Robert Reich and Robert Scheer, the Occupy Movement has the world’s attention.
The Way Forward for Occupy Portland
By
Shamus Cooke: If the Occupy Movement demanded that the wealthy and corporations be taxed to create jobs and prevent cuts to social programs, the 99% would see a movement built in its own image
Occupy Movement Enlists New Activists for Social Change Struggles
By
Randy Shaw: Occupy has gone beyond the usual suspects and given a new generation of activists a desperately needed vehicle for advancing progressive change.
Occupy Movement Must Resist Pressure for Specific Demands
By
Randy Shaw: You know that Occupy Wall Street and its local, national and international progeny have reached a level of success when everyone is offering advice. Unfortunately, the most commonly offered view – that activists must get specific about their demands – is entirely wrong.
Next Steps for the Occupy Movement
By
Shamus Cooke: The Occupy Movement has more than room for an umbrella of demands from diverse sections of working class people, but now we must focus on what unites the vast majority, since the corporations have focused on dividing us for decades.
Support the Occupy Movement and a New American Spring
By
Brent Budowsky: I believe this new surge of all-American protest could be the beginning of a new American Spring that could rejuvenate the progressive and populist movements and win majority support throughout the nation.
PCL offers monthly Open House Events on the 2nd Saturday at 2pm and 3rd Thursday at 6pm. Click here to learn more.
Labor Must Choose Between Occupy and the Democrats
Shamus Cooke: The labor movement has a foot in both worlds; one in step with the Occupy Movement and the other with the Democrats, who are working to crush Occupy outright.