Why Occupy Wall Street Will (Not) Fail

According to MarketWatch's Brett Arends, the Occupy Wall Street protests are doomed to fail. On the contrary, for a handful of reasons I think the underlying momentum behind the Occupy Wall Street protests suggests that the movement has no other direction than some measure of success. The power behind Occupy Wall Street is in its show of force despite not having a specific agenda or leader. And to say the least, the spirit of the Occupy Wall Street movement is not going anywhere.

In sum, Arends' reasons why Occupy Wall Street is doomed are as follows: (1) the protesters are in the wrong place, (2) the protesters do not have an agenda, (3) the weather's turning cold, (4) money talks and will drown out the voices of the protesters, and (5) American society will forget about Occupy Wall Street eventually. Arends appears to see Occupy Wall Street as being a temporary, directionless phenomenon futilely going up against an overwhelming, bureaucratic machine that is the establishment.

According to Arends, owing to America's short attention span "[Occupy Wall Street] will go as stale as last month's bread". Arends: "In six months' time, or maybe just six weeks, everyone will have forgotten about [Occupy Wall Street]."

Where Arends' arguments are somewhat valid, we have to put the Occupy Wall Street protests into the proper context. To use a football analogy, Arends appears to view the Occupy Wall Street movement as being the sum of the entire game where in reality the initial Occupy Wall Street protests may only be the opening kickoff. Even in football where the team returning the opening kickoff automatically scores a touchdown, the opposing team (though initially losing at the start of the game) can still come back to win. As in football, momentum is key for Occupy Wall Street, and in light of the movement spreading globally, it appears that Occupy Wall Street continues to gain momentum.

As for Arends' initial contention that the Occupy Wall Street protesters are in the wrong place, the movement has spread across the nation to many cities including Washington, D.C., Fairbanks, Alaska, and Cheyenne, Wyo. The precise location of the movement's numerous protests becomes immaterial in light of the intense fervor generated by societal unrest and festering anger. As Occupy Wall Street has now gone global, it can hardly be said that the movement is in the wrong place.

As my Benzinga colleague John Thorpe eloquently wrote, "The beauty of this movement is there is no leadership structure. There is no individual whose charisma and singular will carries the movement forward... There is no one leader or group of leaders to arrest and end this occupation. There is no Martin Luther King, Jr. to shoot. There is no Malcolm X to shoot. There is no JFK or RFK to shoot. There is no easy way out for the government, like there was in the 1960's."

Further, as I have written previously, with the Occupy Wall Street movement, the cat is out of the bag. Were the protesters to suddenly disappear, the operative question would not be, "Why did the Occupy Wall Street movement dissipate", but rather, "What exactly is the Occupy Wall Street movement planning next?" Even if the protesters disbanded and returned to their homes and hamlets tomorrow, the show of force demonstrated by Occupy Wall Street to the establishment would remain evident. Even if the protests ended abruptly tomorrow, Occupy Wall Street will have accomplished what it set out to do: to make a stand against the establishment to show that many young Americans are fed up with the hopeless status quo and exploitation in today's economy.

Furthermore, the problems and issues that gave rise to Occupy Wall Street will not go away with colder weather. Though the coming of winter could signal a temporary calm for the protests, the changing of seasons will not signal the end of the problems and issues. And even then, seasons change; dark and dreary winters turn into hope-filled springs giving way to periods of new growth -- Occupy Wall Street protesters are already planning for further efforts next year with a "National General Assembly" to be held in Philadelphia in July 2012. Any way you cut it, the movement does not appear to be going away.

The fact of the matter is that Occupy Wall Street is here, the movement appears to remain strong & viable going forward, and the movement does not appear to be going anywhere. Where the movement has not articulated any specific demands or policy recommendations, the overt strength of the movement rests in its continued youth and vitality.

While problems arising from issues like unemployment, higher education costs, student loans, and economic disparity do not appear to be on their way out, it is reasonably foreseeable that voices of dissent will persist. Where those voices of dissent now take the form of Occupy Wall Street, perhaps in the future those same voices of dissent will evolve into other forms.

As Arends argues, while segments of American society may be watching "till something interesting happens on the Kardashians", the serious socio-economic problems facing society remain and require resolution. Where the energy behind Occupy Wall Street appears to be generated by issues like unemployment, excessive student loans, and economic disparity, that energy in American society must go somewhere; even if the Occupy Wall Street protests fail, that energy must be expended somehow.

As such, in light of continued youth unemployment, hunger can be a powerful motivator. Even worse, non-productivity can lead to counterproductivity. If our contemporary socio-problems including but not limited to unemployment, a declining standard of living, rising food prices, and exorbitant higher education costs fester, protests in one form or another will probably continue -- perhaps to the point of evolving into riots and mass societal unrest.   

If the Woodstock Festival was a mere weekend and we remember it even today, then I think the Occupy Wall Street protests will most definitely be remembered years from now. I think it is a wild stretch to suggest that "[i]n six months' time, or maybe just six weeks, everyone will have forgotten about [Occupy Wall Street]". Occupy Wall Street does not appear to be the entire span of the game, but rather merely the kickoff.

Where the Occupy Wall Street movement may be susceptible to being hijacked by various political factions, the underlying energy of the movement reflects a clear, solid spirit of discontent that will remain in American society as long as the severity of the problems remains. Yes, the Occupy Wall Street movement may have some issues, and yes, the winter may not be the best time of year to camp out and protest in the streets, but there is reason to believe that the spirit of Occupy Wall Street goes beyond the streets of Manhattan. In terms of an agenda, it is not as much about what Occupy Wall Street is saying as it is about what Occupy Wall Street portends for the future. In short, Occupy Wall Street portends that the winds of American society are changing.

If only in an analogous way, Arends is correct in writing that the weather is changing. Indeed, and as the weather is changing one cannot help but feel that we are about to enter a new season in America's history.