A message from Mattia Fosci to subscribers of OccupyLondon@groupspaces.com
Friends,
Have you ever noticed how many times we told each other, talking about Occupy, things like ‘this is just the beginning’, ‘we will be here for years’, ‘soon everyone will wake up to the madness of this system’ and ‘comes spring there will be massive support for Occupy’? Note how these statements were never really questioned: we were quite obviously exorcising our own worries - we wanted to believe Occupy is a solid fixture of the political panorama, and growing. Well, this may or may not be the case.
Ultimately, whether Occupy will expand or fizzle out (at least in its current form) will depend on what each of us can give the movement in this crucial moment. I still see working groups carrying on their discussions as if nothing had happened on the early hours of 28 February. We assume that when we will find the solution the world problems, Occupy will still be there - ready to give voice to our revolutionary ideas. But Occupy would not exist, already, if it weren’t for those who keep it together, organising GAs and discussing strategies for the future, and direct actions, and events and all the things that make this movement something more than ‘a chat at the pub about the world’s problem’ (I am in the pub chatter category, by the way).
My feeling is that Occupy needs WG members to get involved with process, engage in the mundane discussion of what will be of the movement, join the GAs, fundraise and . If you don’t have time to do WG and GAs, prioritise GAs – put on hold the non-essential WGs discussions. Urgent things need to be decided and executed now. And obviously I couldn’t go without telling everyone my 5 cents on what I think should be our priority:
1) Find a new base à We know how important the camp was to the cohesion of the movement. [Occupy is a movement based on ‘PLACE’, the spatial identification of the camp as the safe platform where all of us (full-time occupiers as well as occasional supporters) could meet and generate ideas was crucial, as it was the St Paul’s camp in terms of visibility.] The camp is gone and it is about time to think ahead. I fancy the idea of a building that we legally rent, our new HQ where WG meet and direct action is planned, events are run etc.
2) Fundraising strategy à We’ve had it easy so far thanks to the generosity of the 99%. But long-term financial sustainability requires a serious fundraising effort
3) Reform the process à Are we here to run a sociological experiment or are we here to bring about change in the real world? If the latter is what you think, then you must consider that our decision-making structure is dysfunctional and ineffective. This is controversial but there you go: consensus needs reform (e.g. maybe we need qualified majority voting when it fails). In general, we need to invest in governance in such a way that allows the movement to grow and still retain effectiveness. There is scope to improve our effectiveness while remaining true to our guiding principles of inclusivity and fairness – by contrast, being entrenched on an ideological position of ‘consensus or nothing’ is morally and intellectually wrong
4) Find a direction à I see, not so distant, a long list of difficult questions that we will have to answer – and they are so crucial that we will only be able to do so if we have an efficient process. I guess the overarching question is: what do we want Occupy to be like?
(A) a political movement that works within the political process (e.g. gay rights, anti-apartheid, Tea Party);
(B) a grassroots political movement that works mainly outside party politics (e.g. civil rights, feminist movement);
(C) a multi-issue platform that supports organisations that campaign on issues we care about
(D) a grassroots movement focused on awareness raising at the community-level (e.g. some religious movements)
(E) you name it
5) Action! à Once we find a direction we will be in a position to identify concrete goals, and find a way towards achieving them (remember the concrete steps?). Again, there is plenty of scope to be focused and systemic at the same time. To those who don’t like the idea of having ‘one direction’ and specific goals, free to wander around but I will not get lost with you. Sorry.
Well done if you made it till here.
Respect,
Mattia
PS: kudos to all those organising the May events; we still have the hot potato of ‘what next’?
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