26.10.2011

Finding a wide resonance

Simon Wells is impressed by what he has witnessed outside St Paul's cathedral

Nearly two weeks on and the occupation at St Paul ’s is still going strong. What started out on October 15 as a gathering of 1,500 has become a permanent encampment at the foot of the cathedral. There are now 150 tents, including a large kitchen, a mini-cinema, a small temple, a music room … the list goes on. Suffice it to say, the occupants look set to be in it for the long haul.

This will be no mean feat, as the weather gets increasingly colder and the constant noise of city life rumbles on. Just maintaining the site as a community of activists takes hard work and organisation. There are issues of food, waste, security, alcohol, legality and the media to be handled and the requirement to communicate them to the whole camp. These things have evolved over the past two weeks, as each mini-crisis has provoked a response.

However, there was already a framework for overcoming these issues learnt through historical precedents of direct action. These are the action groups, spokes-councils and general assemblies, where decisions are arrived at by consensus. For example, one of the issues raised was alcohol on the site. Three proposals were put forward at the general assembly: a ban, ‘drink but be discreet’ and a libertarian approach. All views were expressed and after a long discussion a decision was made to drink discreetly.

The general assemblies are not just restricted to those camping on site - anyone can join in: the tourist, banker or Starbuck’s worker from across the site can have a say. There is no three-line whip or democratic centralism - it is as if there is a common-sense approach to the assembly. The prohibition of alcohol would have failed anyway.

What has slowly come into being is a community which does not need the state to support it. David Graeber, anthropology lecturer at Goldsmiths University, has been involved from the start with the Occupy Wall Street movement. His ethnography of central on the people of Betafo showed that the state had withdrawn because people made decisions through consensus and not through the state apparatus. This is the description given to direct action, where people do things for themselves, and what is experienced around the site is a constant buzz of activity where anything is possible without the tyranny of the minority.

The majority, the 99%, hope to build a “better world”. If there is a programme, then it is the collectively agreed statement issued on the first day of the occupation, which includes an alternative to the current system of democracy, a refusal to pay for ‘their’ crisis, an end to global tax injustice, regulators to be independent of the industries they regulate, resources for the care of the planet and an end to oppression. ‘This is what democracy looks like’, the ninth point, was a common refrain at Democracy Village, last year’s encampment at Parliament Square, and was chanted by protestors at the World Trade Organisation talks in Seattle in 1999.

This gives hope that perhaps the anti-globalisation movement is reviving following the failure of the ‘war on terror’ that ‘disappeared’ the movement from people’s consciousness. Even though the protestors failed to camp at their original target of Paternoster Square, the intention to locate the occupation at that symbol of injustice, the London stock exchange, is finding a resonance.

A British tourist I talked to was not disappointed that she could not enter St Paul ’s. She was sympathetic to the aims of the occupation and felt something had to be done to make people aware of aware of the issues. Her view was that the cuts were necessary, but were too much and too fast. She could remember the civil service as it was, where it took four people to open an envelope and deliver the letter, but now she and her fellow workers are fed up with the cuts and shared the activists’ view about taxpayers donations going to the bankers. If this woman is representative of the 99%, then the occupation will have struck a chord.

Anti-capitalist

The attitude of the activists is demonstrated by the slogan on the conspicuous banner hanging over the camp: ‘Capitalism is crisis’. I noticed this kind of vague anti-capitalism with the Spanish activists I talked to - the comrades from Spain involved in the 15M movement or Real Democracy Now. This anti-political viewpoint is characterised in their manifesto as the ordinary people who “get up every morning to study, work or find a job” and who can be progressive, conservative, socialist or a believer in laissez faire. Such activists decry ideology: they say they are ‘neither of the left nor right, neither up nor down’.

When I pointed to the message on the banner to one young activist, he said that he too was anti-capitalist, but did not know what the alternative was. This is the first time he has taken part in anything you could call political - he said that all the parties are the same: whoever you vote for, they push through the same policies in the interests of the bankers. He said he would stay for however long it takes to “change things”. He felt something had to be done, but whether the answer lies in the regulators being independent of the industries they regulate is another question. I don’t think the bankers have much to fear yet. But the banner remains and the debate continues.

That debate also continues in the daily newspapers, and as such the occupation media action group is working hard to rebut the constant criticism and black ops. The latest controversy is over the decision by the dean of St Paul’s to close the cathedral on October 21, citing fire, health and safety risks. Those issues had been debated at the previous evening’s assembly, and measures were put in place to comply with the regulations following an earlier inspection. As such the occupiers are mystified why the cathedral remains closed, now that the barriers cited in the dean’s statement have been removed. The cathedral authorities have failed to provide any evidence for their continued ‘concerns’.

One contributor to the following day’s packed assembly thought he had the answer: seven of the trustees of the St Paul’s Foundation, the fundraising arm of the cathedral, can be described as part of the ‘one percent’. These include a former City lord mayor, the deputy president of the Confederation of British Industry, the former chief risk director at Lloyds TSB and Lord Ian Blair, the ex-commissioner of the Metropolitan Police Service. To a crescendo of cheering and clapping, he said it was about time we got the money lenders out of the church. But the problem remains getting the message out to the media.

Walking around the site, I can only say it feels alive. You can go to the kitchen for hot food and drink, stop by the cinema, listen to someone playing the piano in the music ‘room’, browse a book in the library or take part in the numerous daily activities, such as a homelessness workshop, a land work group or a process meeting. The pillars of the small shopping arcade next to the cathedral are festooned with posters and slogans, including ‘Sex workers demand decriminalisation’, ‘Now is the winter of our discontent’, ‘More to life than money’ ... There are also the numerous posters for upcoming actions, including the October 31 Dancing on the Grave of Capitalism event, the November 9 student demonstration and the November 30 pensions strike. People wander around taking photographs and reading the signs. They sit on the steps and just watch.

It cannot be said that life for the activists revolves only around the site: there have been solidarity marches to the electricians’ picket line at Blackfriars, and UK Uncut actions against the head of the HMRC, David Hartnett. A second camp has been set up in Finsbury Square opposite Moorgate tube - about a mile from St Paul’s.

Observing the general assembly of this camp in action, you can see people grapple with common issues that are often taken for granted - organising a water supply, cooking a decent meal, not to mention questions such as waste recycling and getting out the message to the media. Activists are learning from organising themselves but also from debating ideas. And in the present period it is the ideas that have to be debated - about the state, capitalism, party and programme