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Tomorrow, a General Strike in Oakland
The details are familiar to many by now.
Occupy Wall Street protesters yell towards police in Oakland, California. (AP Photo/Darryl Bush)
On October 10, hundreds of members of Occupy Oakland descended on downtown to take over Frank Ogawa Plaza. Twelve days later, occupiers marched through the city in their first action. Then, in the pre-dawn hours of October 25, Oakland police—aided by officers from seventeen other agencies—raided the camp, employing tear gas and flash-bang grenades. That afternoon a protest rally and march was held, leading to a violent nighttime confrontation with the police in which Scott Olsen, an Iraq war veteran, was hit in the head with a projectile and suffered a skull fracture. The following night an overflow crowd filled the plaza, with nearly 1,500 voting to hold a general strike on November 2. In the words of a widely circulated flyer, “All banks and corporations must close down for the day or we will march on them."
To review: in less than two weeks, Occupy Oakland went from its first public action to calling for a city-wide general strike. That’s one hell of an escalation. In my previous life as a community organizer, our campaigns were launched with the understanding that they would be long, drawn-out affairs—weeks of door-knocking, the initial meeting, our first collective action—with the butcher paper taped to the walls measuring the progression in months.
So what accounts for the breathtaking speed of the events in Oakland? The sketchy record of the Oakland Police certainly deserves some credit, especially with the injured Olsen and the video footage showing an officer tossing a flash-bang grenade into a crowd of people trying to help him. And then there’s Mayor Jean Quan, who has also been a key if unwitting ally. Absent during the raid, she has attempted to explain her shifting positions with remarkable incoherence, and was recently booed when attempting to speak at a general assembly. At meetings of Occupy Oakland, many of the people I spoke with watched the unfolding occupation with sympathy—but just watched. It took the raid, the images of tear gas clouds and a bloodied Scott Olsen to get them into the streets. As Saul Alinsky wrote, all action is in the reaction. A former organizer, Quan will not soon forget that axiom.
Organizers have taken the openings created by the city’s response and doubled down, using the anger over police behavior and growing distrust of Quan and channeled it back into the original targets of the Occupy movement. And let’s admit it: marches and rallies are tired tactics, at least when spent listening to official leaders mouthing approved lines while holding signs in which those approved lines are written. By calling for a general strike, Occupy Oakland has gone into the deep end of the left’s swimming pool, navigating imaginative and uncharted waters.
“Everyone was really receptive,” said one woman after spending the afternoon handing out strike flyers (nearly 20,000 were passed out during the first two days). “Just that the term ‘general strike’ is being discussed in the American public…” her voice trailed off. “We’ll see what happens Wednesday.”
That no one knows what will happen is a key source of motivation and excitement. We’re taught to dream big, but often when I’m shuffling along at a protest I feel those dreams shrinking to the size of the sign I’m holding, like a cog in someone else’s grand machine. In Oakland we are still cogs, but the machine belongs to us, and it’s moving in a direction that’s not entirely clear. They’re something liberating about an uncertain future.
Of course, it’s easy to argue that calling for a general strike is foolish overreach. “It’s not possible to organize a general strike in one week,” said a member of the California Federation of Teachers during opening comments at the first strike-planning meeting. His was a reasonable statement. Even as Occupiers like to remind people that Oakland was the site of a general strike in 1946, it’s hard to imagine something similar happening today.
Still, there have been numerous signs pointing towards November 2 as being a success, even if plenty of people still show up for work. Each day brings news of another union joining the cause. An organizer with Unite-Here, which represents restaurant workers, spoke of union members preparing a giant feast for strikers. The Executive Board of the Oakland Educational Association, whose 2700 members teach in the city’s schools, has endorsed the day of action, with teachers at one elementary school telling parents the school will be closed for the day. Meanwhile, SEIU Local 1021, which represents 1,750 city workers, has encouraged its members to take a leave of absence for the day and come to the protest.
“We’re the one’s losing our homes and having city services cut because of what bankers and Wall Street have done,” said Dwight McElroy, President of 1021’s Oakland chapter. “Occupy Oakland is out there taking baton blows and tear gas to protest what has been happening, so it is incumbent on the labor movement to protect them.”
And for sympathetic workers unable or unwilling to strike, the plan is to assemble at Frank Ogawa Plaza at 5 pm and march to the Oakland Port, the fifth busiest in the country. Union contracts prevent longshoremen from striking, but a large picket line could prevent them from clocking in to their 7 pm shift, effectively shutting down all activity at the port. “This will show that not only are we the 99 percent but that they are not making any money without us,” explained Raymond “Boots” Riley, an organizer with Occupy Oakland and member of political hip-hop band The Coup.
“Strong people don’t need strong leaders.” That statement fits into the ideology of the Occupy movement, but it comes from Ella Baker, a legendary Civil Rights organizer. As an advisor to the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee, or SNCC, Baker played a key role in encouraging the organization’s non-hierarchical orientation. Made up of young whites and blacks, SNCC would led a direct action movement of countertop sit-ins and then organize Freedom Summer, a voter registration project in Mississippi. Some older Civil Rights organizations disapproved such tactics. “We’re sitting this one out,” was NAACP’s message about Freedom Summer, fearing a backlash.
There are many differences between the Occupy movement and SNCC, especially when it comes to SNCC’s emphasis on developing leaders among the dispossessed through the tireless work of grassroots organizing. But the Occupy movement, like SNCC, is dreaming big and making “impossible” demands, and seems to be lighting a spark under organized labor much as SNCC breathed new life into the civil rights movement. When you’re dying a slow death, after all, not taking risks can be the riskiest course of action. As one union member told the Occupy Oakland’s strike subcommittee, “Thousands of union members are looking for inspiration. And whether you like it or not, you occupiers are now the leaders we are looking to.”
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19 Comments so far
Show All"Thousands of union members are looking for inspiration" because labor unions keep sending boatloads of money to the Democratic Party only to witness that Party pander to corporations and chastise union and non-union workers when they attempted to hold Democrats to account.
Obama's initial reaction to OWS was to enact three more NAFTAs. If that isn't grounds for cutting off funding for Democrats, what is ?
The Financial Aristocracy is the only political party we have. They run all candidates.
If that isn't grounds for cutting off funding for the Democrats, what is?
Must...must...must give... must believe in demo..crat. They good..other bad. Send money...give money. They be.. they be the good....the good evil. Me be good citizen. Vote..vote for democrat. Be victory.
"Of course, it’s easy to argue that calling for a general strike is foolish overreach. 'It’s not possible to organize a general strike in one week,' said a member of the California Federation of Teachers during opening comments at the first strike-planning meeting. His was a reasonable statement."
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I hope that this event goes forward tomorrow in Oakland. Even if it feels rushed or half-baked, if it begins with a strong enough showing (I started to write "a big enough bang", but thought better of it) it may generate enough momentum to become better "organized" on the fly.
I get the impression that when push comes to shove, too many well-meaning leaders instinctively kick into devil's-advocate mode, which can amount to casting about for "reasonable" arguments to check audacity, and consequently pull back from committing to bold action.
Excessive prudence, like any other virtue, carries a price. Here, as in Wisconsin, it threatens to drive a surging movement back into the jaws of co-optation and the fallback position of seeking less risky methods that supposedly achieve desired incremental change, but are actually treadmills of diminishing returns.
IMO, overweening prudence and caution are luxuries that bottom-up push-back can't afford.
"Audacity" certainly came at a price didn't it?
The "bottom" and the "back" can't afford to breathe right now. If they choose prudence and caution it's their call to make.
great article... however, i do wish the media and all people in general would stop assigning what is happening as a "Left" thing. "By calling for a general strike, Occupy Oakland has gone into the deep end of the left’s swimming pool, navigating imaginative and uncharted waters." i know this instance is not an out and out co-opting but there are many times where it is. if you are among the ones thinking this way then you are missing the whole point of the 99% if you think it is a Left against Right thing and are only helping the 1% by dividing us, pitting us against each other. it only helps the 1% if we are pointing fingers and blaming each other because then we are not joined together to face the real enemy, stop the political posturing and the co-opting. the 1% who are neither left or right but a whole separate entity who use our differences against us when the whole point of our Constitution is to allow ALL of us to have our own opinions & not let one group be held higher than another in the eyes of the law or to have more rights. more than 1/3 of the people in this country consider themselves Republican and more are right leaning Independents. we are victims of the 1% also. i am a social Progressive, fiscal Conservative Independent Libertarian. i have lost my job, house, car and retirement savings in the last 3 years and hate that there are so many that would exclude me from the 99% because of my political beliefs or that people think i am part of the cause of all this rather than a victim of what the Corporatist owned NeoConn puppets have done. i am tired of people who do not realize that the Republican Party is no longer under the control of or working for the people they were elected by any more than most of the Dem politicians do. an example of this is when Congress was voting to extend the Patriot Act 12 NY Congresspersons voted for it. 6 of the 12 were Democrats. so stop thinking that politicians on the left bear no responsibility in this mess because it just isn't true. both political parties are using our anger to further their own political agendas and to keep their jobs by turning us on each other when we are all in the same hole together.
Historically, the word "left" in politics means the interests of the 99% - of the have nots, of the working class - not a belief system.
The rulers have turned the word, and all politics, into a matter of belief systems because that distracts people away from accurately seeing the objective reality about the conditions under which they live, makes the people easier to divide and conquer, and disguises the true nature of the ruling class agenda.
Catayl: I think if you read CD's comments with any regularity you would find that the majority (85% plus?) hold that there is really only one party with two heads which represent different branding of the same old product: the Transnational Corporate Business Party.
Example: the majority of the country got sick of the southerner "Billy Boy Beer (really Georgie Boy) brand of tough talking, simple thinking, anti science, quick draw, love it or leave it, your with us or against us, gut emotional, smirking cowboy.
Decided to go the "opposite" direction with the: multi cultural, multi ethnic, GQ looking, refined and sophisticated, champagne sipping, your best college professor type who pontificated about justice, the dispossessed, mother nature, and seemed to represent the fulfillment of the american dream.
But what we get is the same old gut rot in a sparkling new bottle with the same old trip to the emergency room for the vast majority of voters.
What we have is Bush ll (the wanker) one and two and now three with the bummer on top of Bush 1 with clitoris clinton being two and three.
Another way to look at it is the Bad Cop, Good Cop dichotomy. The good cop lets the tough looking bad cop hang around the periphery, maybe walking through the room with a rubber hose. We see him go in another room and here the screams. The good cop gives you a coke and cigarette maybe lets you watch a little oprah or dancing with the stars. Then he tells you he's the only one who can save your ass from "crazy crusher cop" if you just play ball with him.
We all know the truth: their on the same team that's trying to send you up the river till the next ice age. Naturally the good cop depends on whether your republican or democrat. A republican good cop with convince you that the demo bad cop will make you a weak pussy, maybe even give you an injection of castrating socialism. He won't let you watch nascar and won't let you have your plastic gun while your doing your time in a super max.... The dim good cop with tell you that the bad cop is crude and might use offensive language in your presence, maybe make you listen to Russ Limpcock 24/7, and will take your essential oils away and won't let you have a vegetarian diet.
Oh, as for the libertarian stuff, just try and think back to when you where a kid and played monopoly. Did that seem to have a nice economic outcome for you? Or did one
dude end up with everything and the rest out on the street. Well at least the game could start over with monopoly with a fresh "deck."
Hey players, it's time to reshuffle the cards!
As "half-baked" as this fledgling general strike might be, at least the Occupy Oakland bunch is taking action. Perhaps the notion of general strikes will spread across the nation with the same fury that the Occupy Wall Street movement has.
I'm for anybody and any idea that sticks a thumb in the eye of the greedy-rich.
It's all half-baked until it's been in the oven a bit. The first general strike is apt to be the toughest. And then, you know, someone might get the bright idea that this can happen in multiple cities at once.
Thumbs up!
As far as "left" and "right" terms, I think those terms should be changed to "forwards" and "backwards". The Forwards movement is the people on the streets everywhere demanding a whole new way of running out countries for the better for everyone. The Backwards 'movement' (formally knows as the 'right') is the people who want things not only to stay the way they are but to keep getting worse for most of the country and putting us further into the past from which we struggled to move away from.
The fifth of November would be a good time to visit the seventeen other agencies that sent their corporate thugs to brutalize American citizens.
I wish you all well. It's the correct response to institutional corruption.
I am wishing success for this action, and that it will not be the last of its kind. I pray that the port will be crippled or substantially slowed down.
Good Luck Oakland! Shut em' Down!
Focusing on an anarchist view of what is happening, it seems proper the leaderless-ness of this movement, even though some have called it half baked. Unions joining in, well, what are they to do? Not take a stand is taking a stand on the wrong side of this movement, uncomfortable as that might be, it puts certain union heads in a position they really don't want to be in, because they identify themselves as above the fray. So maybe this will bring certain people back into the fold or what they are suppose to be about? I haven't seen many political people showing up at the "baricades" as yet, so, be it Democrat or Republican, they know they have been talking out of their ass for years and are feeling the heat. Something of a peoples party would scare the bejesses out of them if the movement started to create a platform and a means to enforce that platform with the new politicians they create. 3rd wheel compromising, wouldn't it be great!
the world's 99% are watching and supporting the 'occupy' movement. all americans need to wake up and do the same. demand jobs. demand jobs that start out paying a living wage. demand all corporate welfare be stopped, now. so quick were our politicians to cut and bind welfare for citizens but welfare for corporations and elite continues to rise. the pentagon and the military-industrial complex is the biggest ponzi scheme, corporate welfare, fraud/theft this side of mars. it makes the wealthy wealthier. it gives power to sociopaths. demand jobs that create and not ones that destroy or even contribute to destruction. demand a return to and recognition of sovereignty. the greeks have every right to and should default if only to protect the greek citizens and their culture. so too, for italy, portugal, spain, ireland and all others bound and gagged by the eu, the imf, the world bank et al. sovereign nations and cultures need to savour what they are and what they have, not giving more power to the powerful. just remember what has happened to all indigenous peoples throughout the world throughout history, whether through religious pomposity and propaganda, swords, guns, bombs, the eu/euro scheme to homogenize such divergent peoples and cultures and economies ... or as of late 'economic weapons of mass destruction' ... the outcome is not good. stand up and support the general strike in oakland. stand up and start a general strike in support of humanity.