A question. If depression is the inability to construct a future, does depression not
appear very like the world?s prevailing mood or zeitgeist right now? As I write, the
immense working majority faces into continued hierarchy, exploitation and polarisation,
characterised by, among other things, ecological catastrophe, austerity without end,
technocratic governance, nuclear annihilation, escalation of war... Compounding these
dilemmas is our collective inability, real or illusory (I am not sure which), to construct
an alternative future. ---- Today, it is easier to imagine the end of the world than the
end of capitalism. And yet. Something else is stirring. 2011 occasioned a shared,
transnational impulse of ?outrage?, ?indignation? and ?enough? against the cruelties of
global financial institutions and the petty thuggery of enthralled states.
The occupation of the world?s squares was simultaneously an impulse of ?hope?,
?solidarity? and ?the commons?, directed towards a dimly perceived yet somehow more just,
more humane future. Tracking their emergence, evolution, fading, and re-emergence around
the world ? now in Cairo, then in Syntagma, here in Zuccotti Park, there in Puerta del Sol
- Paul Mason, BBC journalist and author, has provided an insightful record and (somewhat
more questionable) analysis of these revolts.
Last year?s Why It?s Kicking Off Everywhere (2012) documented the evolving wave of revolt
and revolution from the Arab Spring to riots in Athens and Manila, from the student
occupations in the UK to the emergence of the indignados in Spain and Occupy in the US.
(Andrew reviewed it for WSM) The updated edition, Why It?s STILL Kicking Off Everywhere
(2013) expands on the flowering and repression of revolt in Russia, updates the analysis
of Greece and Spain and revisits Mason's thesis of the ?networked? revolution. The book is
a terrific read, largely because Mason ? while never losing sight of historical, economic
or political context - foregrounds the voices and actions of the discontented and the
dispossessed. And, of course, as even Financial Times journalists will safely admit, much
of what the protestors have to say is worth listening to. This direct reporting is a real
strength: ?Instead of Guy Debord [theorist du jour of London?s art college graduate], the
under-eighteens opted for Anglo-Saxon literalism. They swarmed into Trafalgar Square, off
buses from London?s poorest neighbourhoods, clambered over the lion statues and chanted:
?David Cameron, fuck off back to Eton!??.
Mason?s analysis of why the global uprisings are taking place is also valuable, not so
much for pointing out the ongoing role of a pronounced crisis of capitalism as for
detailing the particular features that make the revolts somewhat unique or special this
time around. These particularities include the intra-elite mechanics of austerity policies
and currency manipulation, the role of speculation in raising food prices (central to the
Arab Spring) and, common to all risings, the potent force presented by ?the graduate
without a future?. But Mason is probably best known for emphasising the role of ?networked
individuals? in the revolts, the increasing numbers of us who use communications
technology such as Facebook and Twitter to socialise and, as occasions arise, to organise.
(The stats are remarkable: Facebook?s user base rose from 100 million in 2008 to 750
million in 2012; Twitter users sent 1 billion tweets between 2006 and 2008; in 2012, 250
million users now send as many every week). Techno-fora users, characterised as people
with ?weak ties, multiple loyalties and greater autonomy?, create horizontal social
networks capable of challenging repressive states on the one hand and closed ideas or
dogmas (rightist or leftist) on the other.
The book?s first weak point relates to its understanding of ?everywhere?. The focus is on
Europe, the US and the Arab Spring. Manila is also analysed to include a section on
slum-dwelling (increasingly important politically in a rapidly urbanising world). But new
student movements in Canada and Chile are not considered. Neither are the networked
rioters in London in 2011. China is barely mentioned, notwithstanding its tentative
?jasmine revolution? or increasing waves of ?mass incidents? arising from peasant, worker,
urban and ethnic struggles throughout the 2000s and 2010s. These include strikes at the
Foxconn Zhengzhou factory plant where the hardware for social networking (such as the
iPhone) is being produced. The most glaring omission though is South America,
particularly the Zapatistas in Mexico or post-financial crisis movements in Argentina. The
horizontal practices that evolved here in the 1990s and 2000s are a vital reference point
for contemporary waves of resistance.
This brings us to the book?s second major weak point: it?s analysis of ?why? it?s kicking
off. To an extent, Mason has hit upon the uptake of social media, emphasised its use as
the new factor and, in doing so, just confirms what he initially expected to find.
Alternative emphases exist. What if the emergence of horizontal forms of revolt is not the
product of communicative/technological change but is actually the last-ditch option for
civil society once the state has been captured, directly and visibly, by international
governance networks (such as the IMF) and the private interests they serve? What is left
for those who want a more equal, more democratic society but to start assembling in
squares, to institute direct democracy? This seems to me to be an important part of the
story in Chiapas, Argentina and everywhere the IMF has ?come to town?, one that the book
omits.
In summing up, Mason draws an uncontroversial conclusion that the economic crisis is here
to stay (for the next five years at least) and so too is the politics of contesting
austerity. Starkly, this means that the possibility of something ?viscerally fearful?,
such as a fascist breakthrough in Greece or Northern Europe, remains. Meanwhile, the
social movements of 2011, having been ousted from the world?s public squares in 2012, are
now faced with a logjam-inducing relationship to existing political institutions. In the
short to medium term, Mason suggests, their questioning of methods and aims will probably
occur alongside a move into ?cooperative economic practices? such as took place with
Occupy Sandy in New York or the local solidarity economies in Spain and Greece. Certainly,
it would be wrong to dismiss the powers and interests arrayed against these movements. But
in 2011, unprecedented in its scale, pace and development, the genie of transnational
solidarity escaped from the bottle. As the conditions for provoking revolt remain, so too
does the potential for that solidarity to evolve into something more potent ? a future
worth constructing.
WORDS: Tom Murray
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» Ireland, anarchist Workers Solidarity #129 - Review of Paul Mason, 2013, Why It?s STILL Kicking Off Everywhere