Occupy Everywhere, also known as The ’99 Percent’ Movement, was an international, socio-political movement against social and economic inequality. In 2011, Adbusters magazine sent out an email to around 90,000 people sharing a Twitter hashtag #OccupyWallStreet. (Schneider 2011) The movement’s main concern was how large corporations, including the global financial system, control the world in a way that disproportionately benefited a minority. Thompson 2011 notes that the first protests took place in Wall Street, and began on 17 September 2011. By 9 October, the protests had taken place in over 951 cities across 82 countries, and received widespread media attention. Schneider 2011 mentions, “In three months, an idea and a hashtag became a worldwide movement.” In Australia, demonstrations as part of this movement took place in major cities such as Canberra, Perth, Sydney, Brisbane, Adelaide, Melbourne, and… even our very own Wollongong.
So how has global media served as a tool for social intervention here? Well, through the use of tools like Facebook and Twitter, individuals are able to build networks and take action. Change.org founder Ben Rattray argues that social media is used for “supporting, not supplanting, existing strategies”, and at the same time “spark something that wouldn’t exist”. (Kanalley 2011) Social media was also pivotal in other socio-political events in 2011, such as The Arab Spring. Individuals who gather on social network sites are creating social change and grabbing the attention of the mainstream media. Everything is now connected in this digital age, and social media is the paradigm shift that allows individuals and groups to have instant communication with like-minded peers across almost anywhere in the world.
You may be asking, what are the lasting effects of Occupy Everywhere and what exactly did it achieve? Many of the protestors had substantial levels of student debt (relatable?), and Dr. Theda Skocpol, a sociologist and political scientist at Harvard University who has analysed the movement, says “It’s [an] issue that Occupy spotlighted and as a result has continued to be a focus”. As a result, project Rolling Jubilee was started, which has abolished over $31 million in student debt so far in the United States. (Leonhardt 2016)
At the start of the Occupy Movement, there was a strong reliance on social media for the dispersal of information. There was a heavy production of Occupy-related content during peak activity of the movement, however, it was not sustained over the following year/s, and as a result social media’s importance to the movement has slowly decreased. It is important to note however, that social media was used as a tool for initially generating international interest in a socio-political movement against inequality. And without it, the movement would not have developed so rapidly, and probably would not have make such an impact on news media. That’s one positive effect of social media; it is hard to ignore. Sharma 2013 emphasises that social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn “have become a serious force in the globalized world, making it hard for any company to ignore their power.”
References:
Kanalley, C 2011, Occupy Wall Street: Social Media’s Role In Social Change, Huffington Post, accessed 07 September 2018, <https://www.huffingtonpost.com.au/entry/occupy-wall-street-social-media_n_999178>.
Leonhardt, M 2016, The Lasting Effects of Occupy Wall Street, Five Years Later, Time, accessed 07 September 2018, <http://time.com/money/4495707/occupy-wall-street-anniversary-effects/>.
Schneider, N 2011, From Occupy Wall Street to Occupy Everywhere, The Nation, accessed 07 September 2018, <https://www.thenation.com/article/occupy-wall-street-occupy-everywhere/>.
Sharma, M 2013, Social media’s power difficult to ignore, Iskon Times, accessed 07 September 2018, <http://www.iskcontimes.com/archive/social-medias-power-difficult-to-ignore%20>.
Thompson, D 2011, Occupy the World: The ’99 Percent’ Movement Goes Global, The Atlantic, accessed 07 September 2018, <https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2011/10/occupy-the-world-the-99-percent-movement-goes-global/246757/>.
The Digital Divine 