Like many movements, Occupy Wall Street inspires me with its level of civil engagement but leaves much to be desired. I won't be the first to point out that it could benefit from narrowing its scope to a concrete, productive goal. Indeed, if it doesn't its sole legacy may be disillusionment. My main goal here though is to address a couple aspects of the discourse unraveling around it.
I got around to checking out OWS's declaration and what really drew my attention were the characterizations, both from the side of the protesters as well as their critics.
Who are the corporations?
Corporations are made up of individuals. Just like any organization, they're heterogeneous, consisting of people whose views vary widely. Just as there are individuals who don't have the interests of society at heart in these settings, there are also individuals who share the values embodied by this protest in certain respects. I am one of them.
Any view can dominate at a given level in an organization and thus inform the direction corporations take. Even in their capacity as legal entities corporations differ. I'll give just a couple examples of how corporations don't hold to how they're being portrayed here.
The first is Calvert Investments, which specializes in socially responsible investments and thus helps businesses that don't place profit over people get ahead in the market. The second is Whole Foods, which helps to promote more sustainable lifestyles. Though there's arguably some greenwashing involved in their operations, they're renowned for the treatment of their workers and are certainly an improvement upon the preexisting status quo. Like churches, nations and book clubs, you'll find both good and bad corporations and you should always be wary of letting the whole come to represent its constituent parts and vice versa.
Who are the activists?
There's a tendency in American society to identify a movement with one political extreme or another the moment it strikes the slightest semblance and to caricature its participants accordingly. Critics of Occupy Wall Street and related movements have described their participants as lazy, uneducated, voluntarily unemployed, irresponsible, spoiled and financially supported by their parents. Hippies and hipsters.
There are some to be found who satisfy those definitions, of course. What concerns me though is an incapacity I frequently observe for anything but gross generalizations. I doubt anybody's saying all the participants fall into these categories, but I'm skeptical that even the majority does, in the same way that I'm skeptical that the Tea Party consists mostly of selfish, racist, gun-wielding evangelicals.
To be sure, there are people at the Occupy movements who drive me up the wall, but there's a whole world out there and you can find anything you're looking for. As a case in point, I take myself. I'm interested enough in Occupy Wall Street to at least attend, but I'm educated (I received no funding from my family) and hold a professional job at a corporate entity that I happen to find morally irreproachable.
The Targets
Targeting groups of people whose morals can't be accurately and consistently characterized is bigotry. As I elaborated above, there are both good and bad corporations. There are also both good and bad rich people, with Warren Buffett and Bill Gates immediately coming to mind as examples of wealthy individuals who render a service to society commensurate with their extraordinary affluence.
Even if we can pinpoint the "bad" corporations or the "bad" people in them, is that the appropriate target? There will be exceptions, but I think the main factor behind the frustrations expressed at OWS is preferential treatment of people and organizations that are already so clearly empowered. The enemy here is not big business or the rich, but the mechanisms in place that allow some of them to live with less accountability than their smaller counterparts. It's the arrangement that allows the largest banks to benefit from bad business decisions and taxes billionaires less than the middle class.
As preferential treatment has its roots in political corruption, if the movement is to adopt policy goals, campaign finance reform should probably be one of them.
The Collusion
This movement couldn't have been precipitated without the financial crisis. And the financial crisis couldn't have been precipitated without three culprits, which Raghuram Rajan outlines so clearly in his book Fault Lines: government, corporations (banks), and the consumer.
Government's to blame for pushing better access to credit through Fannie Mae and other organizations as a fix for growing wealth disparity and thus distorting returns in the securities market; the financial sector for responding to those distortions and pursuing unsustainable business models for a quick buck (then pursuing them further to establish systemic importance and thus ensure their longevity despite their decisions); and those consumers who overborrowed to live a life they couldn't afford.
There are improvements to be had in the private sector, as well as in the private sector's relationship to the government and the public. Nevertheless, there are also issues we need to address outside of it, with our government and with ourselves. To be more concrete, I'll advocate here what I have so often elsewhere: leverage what power you have, however small, as an economic actor.
Companies and people don't grow rich on their own; someone has to give them the money. By refraining, or more effectively, opting for or providing a better alternative, people can shape fates and behavior. Disagree with a bank? Move your account to a more responsible one. Keep your money in a sock. Leverage your power as a friend or family member to increase the likelihood that those you come in direct contact with will do the same. Expose wrongdoings and commend good deeds as you see them in conversation and on the internet.
But don't be an imposing jerk because that never works.
It's through this feedback that we can hope to transform an existing foundation into something better, instead of uprooting the establishment with potentially nothing to fill the vacuum. Take the lessons of failed revolutions and shock therapists to heart: it's easy to destroy something, but it's much more difficult to create something better out of it.
I got around to checking out OWS's declaration and what really drew my attention were the characterizations, both from the side of the protesters as well as their critics.
Who are the corporations?
Corporations are made up of individuals. Just like any organization, they're heterogeneous, consisting of people whose views vary widely. Just as there are individuals who don't have the interests of society at heart in these settings, there are also individuals who share the values embodied by this protest in certain respects. I am one of them.
Any view can dominate at a given level in an organization and thus inform the direction corporations take. Even in their capacity as legal entities corporations differ. I'll give just a couple examples of how corporations don't hold to how they're being portrayed here.
The first is Calvert Investments, which specializes in socially responsible investments and thus helps businesses that don't place profit over people get ahead in the market. The second is Whole Foods, which helps to promote more sustainable lifestyles. Though there's arguably some greenwashing involved in their operations, they're renowned for the treatment of their workers and are certainly an improvement upon the preexisting status quo. Like churches, nations and book clubs, you'll find both good and bad corporations and you should always be wary of letting the whole come to represent its constituent parts and vice versa.
Who are the activists?
There's a tendency in American society to identify a movement with one political extreme or another the moment it strikes the slightest semblance and to caricature its participants accordingly. Critics of Occupy Wall Street and related movements have described their participants as lazy, uneducated, voluntarily unemployed, irresponsible, spoiled and financially supported by their parents. Hippies and hipsters.
There are some to be found who satisfy those definitions, of course. What concerns me though is an incapacity I frequently observe for anything but gross generalizations. I doubt anybody's saying all the participants fall into these categories, but I'm skeptical that even the majority does, in the same way that I'm skeptical that the Tea Party consists mostly of selfish, racist, gun-wielding evangelicals.
To be sure, there are people at the Occupy movements who drive me up the wall, but there's a whole world out there and you can find anything you're looking for. As a case in point, I take myself. I'm interested enough in Occupy Wall Street to at least attend, but I'm educated (I received no funding from my family) and hold a professional job at a corporate entity that I happen to find morally irreproachable.
The Targets
Targeting groups of people whose morals can't be accurately and consistently characterized is bigotry. As I elaborated above, there are both good and bad corporations. There are also both good and bad rich people, with Warren Buffett and Bill Gates immediately coming to mind as examples of wealthy individuals who render a service to society commensurate with their extraordinary affluence.
Even if we can pinpoint the "bad" corporations or the "bad" people in them, is that the appropriate target? There will be exceptions, but I think the main factor behind the frustrations expressed at OWS is preferential treatment of people and organizations that are already so clearly empowered. The enemy here is not big business or the rich, but the mechanisms in place that allow some of them to live with less accountability than their smaller counterparts. It's the arrangement that allows the largest banks to benefit from bad business decisions and taxes billionaires less than the middle class.
As preferential treatment has its roots in political corruption, if the movement is to adopt policy goals, campaign finance reform should probably be one of them.
The Collusion
This movement couldn't have been precipitated without the financial crisis. And the financial crisis couldn't have been precipitated without three culprits, which Raghuram Rajan outlines so clearly in his book Fault Lines: government, corporations (banks), and the consumer.
Government's to blame for pushing better access to credit through Fannie Mae and other organizations as a fix for growing wealth disparity and thus distorting returns in the securities market; the financial sector for responding to those distortions and pursuing unsustainable business models for a quick buck (then pursuing them further to establish systemic importance and thus ensure their longevity despite their decisions); and those consumers who overborrowed to live a life they couldn't afford.
There are improvements to be had in the private sector, as well as in the private sector's relationship to the government and the public. Nevertheless, there are also issues we need to address outside of it, with our government and with ourselves. To be more concrete, I'll advocate here what I have so often elsewhere: leverage what power you have, however small, as an economic actor.
Companies and people don't grow rich on their own; someone has to give them the money. By refraining, or more effectively, opting for or providing a better alternative, people can shape fates and behavior. Disagree with a bank? Move your account to a more responsible one. Keep your money in a sock. Leverage your power as a friend or family member to increase the likelihood that those you come in direct contact with will do the same. Expose wrongdoings and commend good deeds as you see them in conversation and on the internet.
But don't be an imposing jerk because that never works.
It's through this feedback that we can hope to transform an existing foundation into something better, instead of uprooting the establishment with potentially nothing to fill the vacuum. Take the lessons of failed revolutions and shock therapists to heart: it's easy to destroy something, but it's much more difficult to create something better out of it.
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