Ryan Dexter
Ryan Dexter is a student of the Masters of Arts - Integrated Studies program at Athabasca University.
Looking at the history of social mobilisation in the early 19th century, three oppositional movements, anarchism, utopian socialism, and Marxism, were prominent and have continued importance for today’s community organisations and activism. Recent protests, such as Occupy Wall Street, were heavily influenced by these oppositional movements, especially anarchism. It was argued the contradictions inherent within the Occupy Movement stemmed from the historical contradictions between the three oppositional movements, which created a need for reconciliation and integration. How can the lessons from each oppositional movement be integrated into a modern social movement? Specifically, each movement details important elements of an integral approach to social change from below. Through an exposition of the main currents in anarchism, utopian socialism, and Marxism, as well as a critique of the Occupy Wall Street movement, important insights are reached concerning the future of bottom-up social change.
Keywords: Social Mobilisation, Marxism, Anarchism, Utopian Socialism, Occupy Wall Street, Social Movements.
The Occupy Movement, which featured the occupation of public spaces around the globe to protest economic inequality, captured the imagination of many politically conscious citizens all across the planet. It represented the re-emergence of politics on the world-stage, for when else, in recent memory, had a movement spread across the globe with so much passion and ferocity and connected so many? Although short lived, the Occupy Movement seemed to herald in the return of politics, as the movement united the 99% against the extremely rich and undoubtedly corrupt 1%, and took many risks to promote their vision. In particular, it was the millennial generation, the economically unstable recent university graduates who had been trained for jobs that no longer existed, that responded urgently and passionately to the grossly unequal situation in which they were struggling to make do. Quite simply, the Millennials, still idealistically looking to create a better world and shocked at the social, political, and economic circumstances their generation was existentially thrown into, had little to lose in joining protest and occupation movements. In the years following the climax of the movement, scholars are still assessing the strengths and weaknesses of the movement, helping to provide insight and direction for future political work.
Along this line of inquiry, this paper sets out to trace the structure and logic of the Occupy Movement back to its historical and ideological influences from the early 19th century. It was at this time when utopian socialism, a movement based on moral argument and the formation of ideal communities; anarchism, a radical political ideology espousing a form of society without rulers; and Marxism, a revolutionary ideology focusing on the working class as a transformational power, were dominant political ideologies. The successes and failures of the Occupy Movement, fuelled by the historical debate between the three oppositional movements, are assessed and described. I argue that the successes and failures of the Occupy Movement can be understood in terms of the naturally arising conflicts between the three oppositional movements informing it. The social mobilisation tradition, based on the perspective of the oppressed and down trodden, is closely analysed in this paper. However, I also argue that anarchism, utopian socialism, and Marxism, though they must necessarily be reinvented in every generation, are the weapons of the people for the purpose of the world-historical battle against the forces of industry and capitalism. These oppositional movements, emerging simultaneously with industrialisation and the rise of capitalism, are world-historical counter weights to the juggernaut beast of industry running amok and causing the deterioration of humanness itself. Finally, an integrated approach to social mobilisation, encompassing utopianism, anarchism, and Marxism, is put forward, suggesting future directions for the politics of social movements.
Friedman (1987) noted, as he traced the history of the social mobilisation tradition, that social mobilisation “encompasses the three great oppositional movement of utopianism, social anarchism, and historical materialism [Marxism]” (p. 225) and emerged in France and England in the early 19th century. Further, social mobilisation was a response to social reform, a top-down planning tradition, and, from the bottom up, “responded to the social upheaval, human pain, and brutalisation that accompanied the industrial revolution” (Friedman, 1987, p. 225). Even more pointedly, Friedman (1987) contended that the planning tradition of social mobilisation took the perspective of the oppressed and marginalised, especially those oppressed by the newly emerging industrialism in the 19th century, and “its purpose was the political practice of human liberation” (p. 225); if there were to be liberation, more attention would need to be placed on the oppressed and marginalised all over the globe. Nicely summing up the Zeitgeist of the early 19th century, Kumar (1990) wrote it is only with the invention of “ideas of progress, reason, and revolution, was it conceived that a completely new order of freedom and happiness might be achievable by conscious human action” (p. 6). Therefore, industrialism and the socio-political movements that opposed industrialism were both part of the spirit of the times of the early 19th century, as both were only possible with the invention of “progress, reason, and revolution” (Kumar, 1990, p. 6), and represented conflicting forces operating in the same space and time.
Although utopianism, historical materialism, and anarchism share common roots and are deeply connected in the social and political milieu of the early 19th century, more emphasis has been put on the differences between them than on their commonalities (Friedman, 1987). This tendency of stressing the differences continues today and is evidence for the complex and intertwined beginnings of the three oppositional movements (Friedman, 1987). Altogether, this tendency is not strictly a prejudice born out of the turbulent 19th century. Instead, stressing the differences emphasises the unique contributions of each movement that emerged from the same fertile socio-political ground, emphasising different aspects of the infinitely possible future glimpsed by the revolutionary utopian spirit of the era. With the advent of the great historical shift industrialism represented in the 19th century, the possibilities for social and political change were greatly bolstered as society was in transition, and the future was not immediately foreseeable.
Honeywell (2007) identified utopian socialism as a social and political movement that greatly embodied an idealistic and optimistic approach to social change, while Taylor (1982) noted a commitment to community values such as co-operation and harmony. The utopian socialists conceived of social change as necessarily consisting of an economic component and a collective ability to transform, modify, and adapt the natural and social milieu for, and by, the inhabitants of the community. The utopian socialists conceived of a “well organised society, namely, a true association” (Frobert, 2011, p. 744) in which there would be no poverty, only abundance, while happiness would flourish (Frobert, 2011). In these descriptions, the idealistic and optimistic approach of the utopians was clearly evident. However, as Taylor (1982) noted, utopian socialism did not call for or anticipate a final, unalterable goal for society to reach. In fact, the ideal society, seen through the eyes of the utopian socialists, was the “basis from which an almost limitless development of human capacities and social progress will flow” (p. 51). From the notion of limitless development, the ideal society, far from an end goal, was more like the beginning, providing the basis for unlimited human development.
The utopian socialists saw property laws and customs as a holdover from the feudal past and in opposition to the evolutionary, progressive movement of social change that they proposed (Frobert, 2011); these property laws and customs were also the consequence of the unregulated nature of industrialism (Frobert, 2011). In this regard, the utopian socialists’ vision of the future “rests on a particular understanding of the potential for social change located in the present” (Honeywell, 2007, p. 241). Thus, the insights of the utopian socialists were not fantasy, as some critiques contend, but were actually situated in the present political moment. To overcome the obstacle of the contemporary constitution of property, the utopian socialists conceived of a “social form of property” (Frobert, 2011, p. 745), meaning property would be the “consequence of a collective choice” (Frobert, 2011, p. 745), which would be directed to ensure the fair distribution of property based on an individual’s capacity to produce (Frobert, 2011). Further, all persons would be invested in participating in the collective decision making (Frobert, 2011), since all would, in some way, be producers. However, the utopian socialists left open the possibility of guarantees and insurance for those potentially unable to participate as producers (Frobert, 2011).
For the utopian socialists, the regulation of property led to an inefficient use of available resources (Frobert, 2011) and, thus, necessitated reform through the integration of new societies into the economy. In this way, reforms targeted the financial and economic aspects of society (Frobert, 2011), involving a variety of institutions, such as the state, banks, and cooperatives, through multiple levels of intervention (Frobert, 2011). Furthering this line of inquiry, the utopian socialists brought to popular attention the interrelationship between the political and economic dimensions of society and progressive social and political ideas, including democracy (Frobert, 2011). Overall, the utopian socialists concluded optimistically that the new societies, or experimental communities, were “the agency that would gradually transform the conditions of social life throughout the whole world” (Kumar, 1990, p. 11). For the Owenites, a specific group of utopian socialist lead by Robert Owen, “education in community” (Kumar, 1990, p. 17), which stressed the development of the whole person, was central to utopian communities. Not only was education administered in the community, but community living itself was a form of education (Kumar, 1990). Deeply experimental and experiential, the Owenite communities, through their practice of novel property, family, education, work, leisure, and marriage arrangements, were geared towards building a new culture and society (Kumar, 1990).
As the utopian socialists were the early progressives of the 19th century, they wrote “too early into the 19th century to fully understand the complex situation of the working class” (Paden, 2002), and thus, “failed to reflect the interests of any class, but instead adopted ideas from a variety of classes” (Paden, 2002, p. 68). Smith (2009) suggested that the utopian socialists conceived of their social and political approach before class antagonism became politicised, which meant they did not conceive of the working class as a revolutionary force (Smith, 2009). Coming to the 19th century political scene later than the utopian socialists, Marx and Engels saw the antagonistic and exploitative relations between the bourgeoisie and the working class and were able to formulate an ideology based explicitly on the role of the proletariat class as a revolutionary agent.
Marx and Engels were well aware of the small idealistic communities constructed by the utopian socialists to demonstrate how a new society could be formed in the present. However, Marx and Engels “noted the description and construction of these demonstration communities often diverted the utopian socialists from more direct — and possibly more productive — political activities” (Paden, 2002, p. 69). In this regard, some Marxists believed that debating the merits of ideal societies was a waste of political time and energy (Paden, 2002). More specifically, Marx believed that the conditions of capitalism were so abominable that they, in themselves, called for revolution. In this way, idealistic speculation was not needed and, in fact, wasted valuable political resources and was a political trap (Paden, 2002). The notion that idealist speculation was counter-productive was based on the observation that the utopian socialists’ attempts to transform society through their utopian communities had all essentially failed (Paden, 2002). From the failure of the utopian socialists stemmed Marx and Engels’ belief that the future communist society could not be achieved through reform and other gradual forms of change, especially not through attempts that champion moral arguments and small utopian projects (Paden, 2002). Marx and Engels believed such strategies were ill-suited to the bourgeoisie, who believed the current order to be well put together. In addition, the bourgeoisie would not surrender their position due to a moral argument because bourgeois morality confirmed their social position.
As fanciful idealising and moral arguments were believed to be politically unfruitful, the Marxist camp contended “an ideal society could only be attained through violent revolution guided by materialistic social theory” (Paden, 2002, p. 72). The Marxists believed this would happen in two stages. First, several changes would be made by the proletariat who would form a dictatorship, which would facilitate the socialisation of industry, education, and taxation (Paden, 2002). Second, the state then would wither away, and a classless, communist society would emerge where the “contradictions characteristic of earlier modes of production… are overcome” (Friedman, 1987, p. 251). The abominable conditions that capitalism created would themselves, calling for revolution, lead to the overthrow of the conditions that created them, bringing in a new communist society where individuals truly had the ability to realise themselves in their species being.
Marx also criticised the utopian socialists concerning their conception of human nature. Both Marx and Engels, as well as the utopian socialists, agreed that the ideals of the future society must be located in principles of morality based on a true conception of human nature (Paden, 2002). To Marx and Engels, the utopian socialists, who based their understanding of human nature on “a fixed set of natural human needs” (Paden, 2002, p. 80), misunderstood human nature (Paden, 2002). Marx and Engels “stressed the capacity of human beings to develop new abilities, new relationships, and new forms of life, all of which contributed to the development of new — but still natural and human — needs” (Paden, 2002, p. 80). The utopian socialists argued that the existing society did not meet the needs of human beings, while Marx and Engels argued that the current society prevented human development and flourishing (Paden, 2002). Based on these two notions of human nature, two different views of the ideal society emerged: the utopian socialists focused on static communities meeting the fixed needs of human beings, while Marx and Engels described a society where human beings had the freedom to self-actualise, grow, and change in a dynamic way. In this regard, Marx and Engels were much more revolutionary, as they stood for the “self-transforming and self-realizing process of emancipation” (Paden, 2002, p. 81).
Although Marx and Engels had several criticisms of utopianism, they also continued to acknowledge the great debt they owed the utopian socialists (Paden, 2002). However, Marx attempted to distance the term “utopian” from “socialism” in order for the movement to gain more credibility and appear more realistic (Lovell, 2004). In spite of this clever rhetoric, Marx remained a utopian, as he theorised the end of alienation, politics, and class struggle (Lovell, 2004). Additionally, Marx also believed in harmonious social relations, as “once humans were free, their individual, and unequal, needs would not cause conflict with others, because they could all be satisfied” (Lovell, 2004, p. 635).
Anarchism, the third oppositional movement included in the social mobilisation tradition, is also deeply utopian and interrelated with both Marxism and utopian socialism. According to Gordon (2007), anarchism involves several conceptual clusters, such as: domination, pre-figurative politics, and the open-ended conception of politics. Domination refers to anarchism’s rejection of hierarchy. Leadership is denounced as it presents a situation where one individual has power over another: “the problem is not just bad leaders, but leadership itself, which creates a ‘power-over’ dynamic that inevitably reproduces coercive relationships and diminishes the autonomy of followers” (Western, 2014, p. 677). Pre-figurative politics refers to the congruence between the means and ends (Gordon, 2007); the means must express the goal state and the path should be seen as the goal. Pre-figurative politics also refers to direct action, which is action without mediation, or taking the responsibility for social action into one’s own hands (Gordon, 2007). The open-ended conception of politics refers to the anarchist’s refusal to theorise the post-revolutionary moment, a key difference from the utopian socialists and Marxists. Revolution is, instead, conceived as an ongoing, interminable process (Gordon, 2007).
Kropotkin (2002), one of the founders of anarchism in the 19th century, used scientific methods from the natural sciences to study human institutions and wrote anarchism “does not recognize any method other than the natural-scientific” (p. 191-192). Whereas Marx and Engels introduced the new science of historical materialism, Kropotkin grounded his research in the available scientific methodologies of his time. Even when grounded in natural-scientific methodology, anarchism remained utopian, for Kropotkin (2002) explicitly stated the goal of anarchism as follows: “realizing the greatest sum of happiness for every unit of human society” (p. 192), where each unit was an individual within society. In this sense, anarchism, like utopian socialism and Marxism, was inherently connected with the revolutionary, utopian spirit of the 19th century.
However, a major difference between anarchism and Marxism was their respective positions on revolution. Marx thought state power must be taken by the working class, forming a dictatorship of the proletariat. This dictatorship would be an intermediate step, called socialism, on the road to true communism (Paden, 2002), a society where the contradictions of earlier societies were overcome and human flourishing was free to occur (Friedman, 1987). Anarchists, alternatively, believed that having no government would be of greatest benefit for the realisation of individual happiness (Kropotkin, 2002, p. 46) and aimed to pursue the political path wherein the “ultimate aim of society is the reduction of the functions of government to nil” (Kropotkin, 2002, p. 46). Instead of the intermediate step of the proletariat seizing state power and gaining power from the bottom-up so as to be able to change society from the top-down, which was the Marxist approach, Kropotkin and the anarchists suggested the immediate abolition of the state. For anarchists, the problem was that the dictatorship of the proletariat, which Marx and Engels thought would only be a brief transitory stage on the way to true communism, seemed to continue without a clear end in sight (Disalvo, 2015).
As anarchists rejected domination, including hierarchy, anarchist social movements were leaderless. Instead, movements organised through democratic participation and deliberation (Western, 2014) and formed a new type of leadership called autonomist leadership (Western, 2014). Western (2009) also suggested that, unfortunately, anarchist movements resorted to a utopian fantasy of leaderlessness by rejecting all forms of leadership (Western, 2014), which had immediate practical consequences. For instance, anarchist movements have been unable to move past the point of protest because of anarchist members’ attachment to the ideology of leaderlessness and non-hierarchy, which makes it very difficult to coordinate information, make decisions, and delegate tasks (Western, 2014). However, the notion of leaderlessness is an ideological myth, “for leadership always occurs but is not always transparent” (Western, 2014, p. 679). The famous leaders of anarchism, including Kropotkin, discussed democratic leadership that was context dependant and temporary. There was no fixed hierarchy, though leaders would emerge in certain time-bound situations because of their relative expertise or knowledge: “any formalisation of a leadership position is temporary, open to recall and dissolvable at any time” (Western, 2014, p. 678). In this sense, anarchism has leaders, but no followers (Western, 2014). Kropotkin’s important discussion on mutualism also informs the classic anarchist conception of leadership as the temporary cooperation of leaders and participants in the co-creation of leadership, while the positions are afterwards exchangeable (Western, 2014).
Following the recession of 2008-2009, citizens were outraged because the government bailed out the banks (Dean, 2014). The favourable treatment of the banks by the government was perceived in stark contrast to the governmental neglect citizens were feeling amidst deteriorating economic conditions of many American citizens (Pickerill & Krinsky, 2012). For many, Occupy Wall Street was the tipping point, where resistance to the forces of capitalism, which were responsible for creating gross inequalities, emerged (Pickerill & Krinsky, 2012). Pickerill and Krinsky (2012) summed up the Zeitgeist surrounding the beginning of the Occupy Wall Street Movement: “a moment of clarity of the absurdity of the current economic and political system” (p. 279). Suddenly the dam burst, and enough was enough for many outraged people who had little to leave behind when joining this mass protest.
The condition of having nothing, or very little, to lose was especially true for Millennials who, after graduating with enormous student debt and prepared for jobs that were no longer available, were frustrated with the political and economic circumstances that were largely attributable to the corrupt decision making of the financial elite (Calhoun, 2013). In this way, Millennials were enthusiastic to join activist circles and engage in radical politics, though largely without any past experience with activism (Calhoun, 2013; Rowe & Carroll, 2014). In fact, Welty (2014) stated: “OWS [Occupy Wall Street] might best be thought of as the millennial generation’s first public response to the particular social, political, and economic climate around them” (p. 39). A steep learning curve, the millennial activists did not have the experience of failure and engaged in an ambitious activist campaign to occupy Wall Street that even the initiators did not believe would catch on (Rowe & Carroll, 2014).
Occupy Wall Street, Calhoun (2013) wrote, “was a loose-knit coalition among activists with a variety of different primary concerns: labour conditions in Walmart, fracking and energy policies, financial regulation and indeed inequality itself” (p. 26-27). With so many diverse political interests involved, Occupy Wall Street was an international social mobilisation force (Calhoun, 2013, p. 27), and the movement’s goals, methods, and strategies implicated both domestic and international audiences and targets (Calhoun, 2013, p. 27). Another key aspect of the movement was the occupation of public spaces, which signified the protesters’ aims of representation, to be considered in decisions, and to be able to be public with their demands for greater equality by taking up public space (Calhoun, 2013, p. 29). As protesters occupied public spaces, police responded. The police response ultimately increased the media coverage the protest received, broadcasting it over the country and many parts of the world, helping to create a vibrant, flourishing social mobilisation movement (Calhoun, 2013). In fact, the police force’s efforts to control and regulate the behaviour of the protesters turned to violence, which helped fuel new waves of protest in light of the perceived unjust use of police force (Calhoun, 2013).
Calhoun (2013) suggested that the Occupation Movement created a close community of members and participants bound together through the shared presence of being in public spaces and protesting, which helped to insulate the movement from outer forces, but also caused the movement to stagnate and remain simply a moment (Calhoun, 2013). Another factor that lessened the impact of the Occupy Wall Street movement was the notion of occupation, which, conceptually, does not have a definite end point (Calhoun, 2013), as protesters can continue the occupation indefinitely. However, work in the occupation camps needed to be continually done to ensure cleanliness and sanitation levels were safe and hygienic (Calhoun, 2013). Interestingly, the lack of leadership in the Occupy Wall Street movement created difficulties when trying to determine an end point to the occupation (Calhoun, 2013).
What was the effect of the Occupy Movement? What is next? Langman (2013) suggested that a lot happened and confirmed that, after Zuccotti park, 1400 occupations occurred nationally and internationally with thousands of newspaper columns, television reports, and magazine articles focusing on the occupations and inequality (Langman, 2013). Further, Langman (2013) stated there was a mindset shift that occurred for many Americans during the occupations, for the majority of Americans came to see inequality as a serious problem for which they would be willing to pay greater taxes to remedy. In terms of what was next, Calhoun (2013) suggested any attempt to reignite the Occupy Wall Street movement was contrary to the spirit of social mobilisation, for this movement was the result of a spontaneous uprising, collective action, and community spirit that perfectly expressed the contemporary Zeitgeist. Calhoun (2013) concluded that the next step must build upon the Occupy Wall Street movement in a brilliant, innovative, and equally spontaneous way — a way that cannot be predicted far in advance.
Many of the activists in the Occupy Wall Street movement were self-identified anarchists and upheld many of the ideological stances of past anarchists in their organising strategies. 19th century anarchism, therefore, can be seen as a direct historical influence on the Occupy Wall Street movement. Anarchism, rejecting hierarchy, formed horizontal networks without leaders in the Occupy Wall Street movement, which had its strengths and its weaknesses. For one, horizontalism was effective “as working groups performed kitchen, medical, sanitation, etc. chores; carried out the movement tasks of media, press, outreach, legal, finance, information technology, political education, and organizing direct action” (Disalvo, 2015, p. 270). However, horizontalism meant members were spending much time attending countless meetings during the day, which became elitist and undemocratic as members did not connect with others outside their demographic (Disalvo, 2015). It became impossible for the anarchists to organise themselves because their networks were decentralised. There were no leaders to organise the movement, and therefore, little of substance happened. Further, the anarchists refused to organise because that would be aligning themselves with state power, as founding an organisation would mean adopting the form of an organisation, which would be akin to government structures. The refusal to formally organize was the major downfall of the Occupy Wall Street moment, as mobilisation was never properly organised, and therefore, lacked the ability to move from occupation to beyond successful protest.
The utopian socialists believed that they could change society by creating utopian societies within the existing society. From this perspective, much of what the Occupiers were doing was creating a utopian community in public spaces to demonstrate their opposition to the existing world order, with all its inequality and domination. Disalvo (2015) wrote “rather than build a mass movement, [protesters] appeared to just want the kind of community they believed in, one with fewer limits on their participation and power” (p. 270), and, in this sense, it appeared as though the protest really was building a new kind of community in which the protesters would like to live. Furthering this line of argument, Jaffe (2013) wrote occupiers “were taking over a park and creating a space where all of us could imagine something different” (p. 199), thereby testifying to the impulse underlying the Occupy Wall Street movement to break through the shell of the economic-political-social order by re-imagining and reconfiguring existing spaces within the old world order.
Cooperation, harmony, and meeting the needs of human beings within a community were essential beliefs for utopian socialists. For instance, the protesters collectively took care of sanitation, medical issues, and food preparation (Disalvo, 2015). In this regard, the eviction of the occupiers by the NYPD in full riot gear was traumatic and heartbreaking for those involved in the community (Welty, 2014). In this instance, the protesters truly “felt their community had been destroyed” (Welty, 2014, p. 43); the people occupying and the public space being occupied were the community they had created to manifest their values and sense of equality. This deep felt sense of community was born from the forms of aid within the community that did not depend on charity or large institutions, but focused on the principle of people helping people (Welty, 2014). Much of the efforts of protesters were geared towards charitable causes, such as non-profit organizations that helped survivors of Hurricane Sandy. In this sense, the community of protesters worked collaboratively to ensure that the basic needs of those affected by the hurricane were also met (Disalvo, 2015).
While originally seen as a nuisance and as free loaders, homeless people were eventually welcomed and later integrated into the Occupy Wall Street movement community of El Paso (Smith, Castaneda, and Heyman, 2012). The protesters considered the homeless as part of the 99%, and thought that they should be unified as members of the 99% were exploited by the political and economic system (Smith, Castaneda and Heyman, 2012). In this way, the communities engendered by the Occupy Wall Street protesters were idealistic in the sense that they included everyone who helped out and was part of the cause of ending corporate corruption.
However, as Disalvo (2015) discussed, “Utopian experiments survive only while the rulers tolerate them. Whether or not you deal with them, they will deal with you” (282), meaning the utopian project of building ideal communities within the shell of the existing society turned out to be naïve, as protesters were quickly displaced and occupations were taken down quickly (Disalvo, 2015). Although the Occupy Wall Street movement attempted to show that another world is possible in the middle of the economic order, namely Wall Street, Marx’s criticism was prescient in that building another society would not create lasting change in the existing society. Even if the occupiers succeeded in reconfiguring another world within the existing world, their ability to influence others who were not a part of this community suffered. In this way, the limits of the utopian socialist paradigm were encountered.
Although mostly inspired by anarchist currents, the Occupy Wall Street movement also had Marxism as a direct influence, as the foundation of the movement lay in the deep inequalities between opposing classes. From this perspective, it is interesting that the protesters were mainly 20 and 30 year olds who came from middle class backgrounds, but turned radical when job opportunities started becoming scarce (Disalvo, 2015). In this sense, we see that the class warfare exacerbated radical politics in this time, which was similar to Marx’s notion of class consciousness and the working class being the vehicle for revolution. With the refusal of the protesters to organise and create their own system of governance, due to their anarchists’ tendencies, Marx’s notion of seizing state power was not adhered to. Further, the anarchist elements of the Occupy Wall Street movement called for non-violent protests, which were not in accordance with Marx’s idea of the dictatorship of the proletariat, the violent overthrow of the government. Following a Marxist line of thinking, more effort needed to be devoted to taking over, or simply influencing institutions, through more aggressive measures. Perhaps more direct involvement with political institutions, which the anarchist aspects of the Occupy Wall Street movement were not in favour of because of the hierarchical implications, could have better formally organized the movement and helped the Occupy Wall Street movement have a deeper structural impact.
Importantly, Amirault (2014) discussed how Marxism, although less influential in social movement struggles since the fall of the Berlin Wall, was still crucial because “as long as capitalism remains the primary mode of social production class remains the fundamental relationship that reproduces and changes it” (p. 144). In this regard, Amirault (2014) called for a return to Marxist inspired social movements, especially in the case of Occupy Wall Street, which was a response to corporate corruption among the super-rich. Class was central to the Occupy Wall Street movement, and Eagleton (2011) defined class as “a question of where you stand in a particular mode of production” (p. 161). Further, many of the protesters were Millennials who could not find work, homeless people, or others who could no longer accept their absurd economic and political predicament, having little to lose by joining Occupy Wall Street. In this sense, although not a part of the social movement Zeitgeist as it once was, Marxism was still a rich body of political economic study that would surely inspire and could still benefit protesters and protests such as Occupy Wall Street.
Although divided by their particular differences, the revolutionary, utopian spirit of the 19th century unites anarchism, utopian socialism, and Marxism. More specifically, the unifying element is a combination of dissatisfaction with current social, political, and economic conditions and a recognition of the importance of the development of human capacities and the fulfilment of human needs. Pertinently, the same currents informing the oppositional movements, such as reason, progress, and revolution, also influence industry and capitalism, the very force that the oppositional movements oppose. While anarchism, utopian socialism, and Marxism all oppose industry running amok, each of the oppositional movements stresses different aspects of these core principles and each provides an enduring contribution to social movement networks and community organisations. In this sense, this paper aims to acknowledge the importance of radical political ideologies in times of extreme inequality and oppression. Indeed, we see that in the 19th century during the horrible exploitation of workers during the emergence of the capitalist mode of production and in the years after corporate greed caused a great recession in much of the world, anarchism, utopian socialists, and Marxism, remain relevant inspirations and sometimes direct influences on recent struggles for justice. The continued relevance of the oppositional social movements is, I argue, because the beast that anarchism, utopian socialism, and Marxism were formed to oppose, has not gone away, and will likely not for some time.
In fact, capitalism, through commodity culture, systems of currency, which have become increasingly abstract, and predatory marketing forces violently shaping not only choices, but even desire and identity, has become more complex. In this sense, every renewed look at Marxism, anarchism, and utopian socialism must be a development of those political ideologies that initially emerged to combat an exploitative industry and the misery it engendered. However, capitalism has now superseded its original form many times over, and is now calling for us to revisit the writings of anarchism, utopian socialism, and Marxism. The need to revisit the oppositional movements is especially relevant whenever the misery engendered by capitalism becomes too much to bear for too many people, such as after the great recession of 2008-2009. In this way, the social mobilisation tradition provides those living under the dictates of capitalism with a lineage of thought that can be turned to under adverse economic, social, and political circumstances. Specifically, anarchism, utopian socialism, and Marxism, emerging alongside the forces of industry and capitalism, are crucial tools, weapons, and teachings with which to do battle against the forces of dehumanisation at the hands of industry running amok. The crucial usefulness of the oppositional movements’ tools should not be forgotten because of complacency during more fortuitous times, for even in prosperous years, the desire to unite with our ideals must be at the forefront of economic, social, and political consciousness.
For an updated, more developed and integrated perspective, social movement networks and community organisations would do well to incorporate, while modernising and building upon, original strategies of the three social mobilisation schools of thought. Specifically, social movements would do well to continue with the utopian socialist tenet of constructing ideal societies within the existing society, but they must also incorporate anarchism’s emphasis on temporary, contextual, and exchangeable leaders. In this way, real, successful models of future societies could be enacted, giving others some proof of the feasibility of the movement’s economic, social, and political vision, while temporary, contextual, and exchangeable leadership enables a community to flourish as the organisation functions. By balancing anarchism’s reluctance to get involved with government and Marxism’s eagerness to seize power, social movements could strategically involve themselves with government and institutions, while also having the freedom to act and engage in politics independently of government. Further, by negotiating Marxism’s decisive endpoint of the revolution with anarchism’s insistence on an ongoing process of political and social development, social movements could articulate goals, or stages of their movement, while also leaving the process open ended and experimental. Importantly, however, is the notion of pre-figurative politics, where the means must be congruent with the ends. Pre-figurative politics applies in terms of utopian socialism’s creation of an ideal society, which must reflect the values of the society envisioned for the future, and political organising tactics including temporary and contextual leadership both in terms of internal and external functions.