My Latest Column: On the Second Coming of Occupy

[Valin]

NRO/The Agenda:

Reihan Salam

9/14/12

 

My latest column for Reuters Opinion argues that the Occupy movement might have enduring significance, particularly if we’re in for a lost decade. Because I didn’t spent much time attacking the premises of Occupy, I sense that some readers might interpret the column as neutral if not favorable to its broad goals, which is far from the case. Rather, I wanted to explain the movement’s appeal in terms that sympathizers would understand, and to emphasize that its claims about the fundamental unfairness of our economic system would grow more plausible in an era of stagnation.

 

What I failed to reference, however, was an interestingly prescient article Chris Hayes wrote for In These Times in 2005 on how to expand the political left. Long before the financial crisis, Hayes spoke of how moments of personal crisis created “points of access” — i.e., moments during which one might embrace a new worldview, whether religious or cultural or political.

 

(Snip)

 

While Occupy hasn’t had a discernible electoral impact, and while it didn’t brandish a detailed manifesto calling for a financial transactions tax or an overhaul of Dodd-Frank, it created a rallying point for a wide range of “left of liberal” ideas that had been marginalized for decades. Occupy attracted social democratic reformists who would not be out of place in Europe as well as anarcho-syndicalists primarily devoted to creating new ways of living outside of the framework of capitalism, many of whom will remain politically active for years to come. Ideas that were once dismissed as ludicrous as politically beyond the pale are now embraced by influential young left-liberals. The left will seize the political opportunities created by mass unemployment if those of us who believe in the virtues of a market society fail to promote job growth.