Occupy is going back to camping in the summer. Where you ask?
Beginning this May, there will be a resurgence of Occupy. We will occupy the headquarters of the largest Corporations in the world. Then encampments will appear each consecutive week in every major sphere of human activity from the conversion of natural resources to the manipulation of high finance. The 99% will call attention to the supreme concentration of power over the productive resources of our economy. We see nothing good in an economy controlled hierarchically by corporate managers, or by politicians, for predetermined ends. Instead, we want the economy run by the 99% through direct democratic processes free from domination and exploitation. Occupy the Economy!
Yes, instead of establishing base camps for distribution of education Occupy will go in the road as an awareness raising effort as well as an effective halt to corporate business as usual. Bringing attention to the plight of millions was not enough. We have to also bring attention to the great imbalance that has been foisted upon us by uncaring
faceless corporations.
At a time when our society will be feeling the stresses of social dysfunction most acutely. When students graduate and find they will have to work minimum wage part time to feed the student loan monster. These will be great ways to peacefully and creatively express our dismay and educate the public about how we are being lead down a path that is destroying our atmosphere through industrial negligence.
The Solution: Industrial Democracy
The 99% sees nothing good in an economy that is controlled by corporate managers or by politicians. Instead we want industrial democracy – industry run by its workers through direct democratic processes free from hierarchy. The greatest problem facing humankind is not the much-discussed question of production and distribution. It is the problem of power. It never has been and it never will be safe to let a few control the affairs of the many.
The big question for today and tomorrow is this: How is industry to be controlled? Who is to own industry? Who is to say whether industry is to run or stand idle? Who is to decide what is to be produced and where that product is to go? Who is to decide what services are provided and to whom? Who should control industry?
1. Should modern industry be controlled by a handful of business managers?
2. Should politicians administer it?
3. Or should those who do the work run it?
It must be one of the three. The corporate managers through their banks, their control over directorships, and their enormous influence over the public debate through the media they own and the government they control, seek to ensure their complete control over the economic life of the world.
However, we can run industry and thereby solve the problem of power, for all the power that runs this world comes from our own efforts.
Call To Action!
OCCUPY THE ECONOMY would like the 99% to participate in General Assemblies discussing concrete tactics of forming an industrial democracy in the U.S., which would then spread to the whole world. Here are two possible ways to do this that can be discussed right away at General Assemblies.
IWW ONE BIG UNION!
If all the workers in each of the four major corporations in all sectors of industry on the tour join in One Big Union, we can begin to solve the major problems of recession, climate change, social alienation, and working life right now. We would have a significant portion of the economy, from raw materials to public service and finance, under direct democratic control. It is simply up to you to act. Will we form the seed of the new society in the shell of the old? Or will we continue to watch the entire political and economic edifice collapse? It is up to the 99% to take control of its destiny.
Occupy the Economy Facebook Page
Working together we have more than enough votes to create the society that will carry us beyond the 23rd century. But it requires everyone setting aside the partisan bickering and focusing doing what is best for the many instead of the one.