Cry democracy!

• Author: Conniff, Ruth

A massive popular movement is spreading round the globe. The Occupy Wall Street slogan sums it up: We Are the 99%. First came the soul-stirring scenes of popular revolt in the Arab Spring, as people in Tunisia and then in Egypt shook off the chains of repressive dictatorship with huge nonviolent protests. Then demonstrations erupted across North Africa and the Middle East.

Soon after, in Madison, Wisconsin, tens of thousands of protesters--inspired, in part, by the example of Tahrir Square--rallied in a spontaneous and sustained uprising against Governor Scott Walker's bill to end the right of public employees to collectively bargain.

In Ohio, where Governor John Kasich pushed through a similar union-busting measure, huge protests gave way to a statewide referendum to undo the legislation on November 8. Despite a multimillion-dollar ad campaign by corporate-financed rightwing groups including Americans for Prosperity and FreedomWorks, the voters of Ohio rejected SB5, the anti-union law.

As democracy movements continued to remake the Middle East, and Midwesterners continued to resist the union-busting and corporate looting of their states, the Occupy Wall Street movement caught fire, spreading from New York City to Oakland and hundreds of cities and towns in between, as well as to Canada and other countries.

Across America and around the globe, people recognize what is at stake. Will we have plutocracy or democracy? Will we have a government and an economy run for the rich? Or will We, the People, run our own government and design an economy that serves all of us?

The old systems of kleptocratic rule are not holding.

Arab dictatorships have not been able to withstand the demands of their people. Neoliberalism in the United States has proven itself bankrupt.

Austerity in Britain and across the European Union has brought on a continent-wide recession, with massive unemployment and a decline in living standards.

When people face great suffering, and see it imposed upon them by their rulers, the bromide that "there is no alternative" no longer serves as a pacifier. So they rise up and seek out alternatives.

That's what has been so exciting over the past year.

People, around the world, are insisting on their right to control their own government, and their right to basic public services, and their right to a decent life.

In the United States and in Europe, the uprising is against the financialization of the economy, and governmental policies that...