why occupy? creating collective identity and commitment in occupations
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Grooms 1
Owen Grooms
Jeff KeithCapstone
3/19/12
Student ID Number- 185999
Why Occupy?: The Creation of Collective Identity and Commitment in the BrazilianLandless Workers and Occupy Movements
Abstract
This paper explores the practice of physical occupation within two social movements, the
Landless Workers Movement (MST) of Brazil and the Occupy movement, in order to
understand how contemporary social movements use occupation as a strategy forpromoting group cohesion and activist commitment. Using interviews with members of
both movements and writings by movement participants, this essay analyzes, compares,and contrasts various participants views and several secondary sources regarding the roleof occupation in their respective movements. Their insights also speak to emergent trends
in the secondary literature on social movement theory. While the MST and Occupy
movements use occupation primarily to highlight social inequalities and to compel elites
to change, this essay argues that their occupations also create opportunities for tangibleengagement and community formation in ways that promote collective identity and a
shared sense of commitment. This work has implications for anyone seeking to
understand the many social movements that are using occupation to alter thecontemporary global power structure.
Introduction
Social movements have used occupation as a tool for social change in many
contexts, times, and places. In 1964 and 1969 the American Indian Movement occupied
the island of Alcatraz, and in 1973, the Ogala Sioux Nation famously occupied the town
of Wounded Knee, South Dakota.1
These occupations sparked greater involvement in the
American Indian Movement, making it a force to be reckoned with.2
Recently, the
occupation of Tahrir Square in Cairo was instrumental in bringing down the regime of
1Malcolm, Andrew. Occupation of Wounded Knee Is Ended."New York Times, May 9,1973.2Johnson, Troy. The Occupation of Alcatraz Island: Roots of American Indian
Activism. Wicazo Sa Review 10, no. 2 (October 1, 1994): 6379.
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Hosni Mubarak. TheIndignado movement in Spain put immense pressure on its Socialist
government and the entire political system, helping to bring about a political transition.
Several years ago, residents of Buenos Aires, Argentina occupied their suburb to protest
a serious lack of housing and land that is evident throughout the country and began
building a new community there.3
With these as only a few examples, I assert that social
movements use occupation primarily to bring attention to social justice issues and force
those with power to agree to demands,4
while other occupations also take over productive
capital or land and put it into the hands of the people.
One social movement that exemplifies both uses of occupations is the Landless
Workers Movement of Brazil (MST), which, since 1984, has worked with families to
occupy and redistribute unused or unproductive farmland owned by large landowners.5
More recently, the Occupy Wall Street Movement has exemplified the first method by
creating physical occupations across the United States and other industrializing countries
to draw attention to social inequalities and pressure those with power to change. Both the
MST and Occupy have remained resilient and have continued to grow, even though they
often face hardships and are provoked by elites. City governments across the United
States have shut occupations down, and at least one author has written that the MST is
using occupation less. Occupation, however, is central to what both movements have
been and are. How are these movements able to keep participants involved even though
the demands of physical occupations are great? Physical occupations provide both the
3
Kavanagh, Shane. Argentina: A Different Kind of Land Occupation
http://upsidedownworld.org/main/argentina-archives-32/1294-argentina-a-
different-kind-of-land-occupation4
See also Civil Rights Sit-ins5
Carter, Miguel. The Landless Rural Workers Movement (MST) and Democracy in
Brazil.Latin American Research Review. 194-5.
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Occupy Wall Street Movement and the Brazilian Landless Workers Movement with
opportunities for member participation and inclusivity, which combine to help create a
sense of collective identity so that individuals develop the commitment to drive the
movement forward.
In the field of social movement studies, there are some works on how the physical
occupation of space contributes to movement goals, with one notable article by Guy
Aitchison entitled, Reform, Rupture or Re-imagination: Understanding the Purpose of
an Occupation. Aitchison argues that occupations should serve as a space both to live
out the ideological ideals of the movements, and a space to focus on and live protest
collectively. While other works describe occupations, these are not informed by social
movement theory. For example, Troy Johnsons The Occupation of Alcatraz Island,
describes the history and success of the occupation in furthering the American Indian
movement, but it did not focus on the details of life in the encampment and its connection
to key terms such as commitment or collective identity.6
Additionally, while authors John
Krinsky and Ellen Reese do not discuss occupation, they do compare social movements
in three different cities and their ability to sustain themselves through collective identity
and increased commitment.7
Though there are works on occupation in general and social
movement pragmatism creating sustainable movements through collective identity and
commitment, there are no articles that discuss the two concepts together, which is what
this paper accomplishes. Additionally, because of the movements novelty, there are no
6
Johnson, Troy. The Occupation of Alcatraz Island: Roots of American Indian
Activism. Wicazo Sa Review 10, no. 2 (October 1, 1994): 6379.7
Krinsky, John, and Ellen Reese. Forging and Sustaining Labor-Community Coalitions:The Workfare Justice Movement in Three Cities. Sociological Forum 21, no. 4
(December 2006): 623658.
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secondary sources aside from a blog entry entitled Spatiality in Occupy Wall Street,
that discuss the effectiveness of occupation in obtaining movement goals within the
Occupy Movement. There is also little literature that analyzes and compares the actual
processes of occupation and its effects within different social movements.
Thus, this paper aims to contribute to several gaps in the scholarly understanding
regarding the importance of place in the creation of collective identity, movement
solidarity, commitment to occupations, and how social movements use occupation to
achieve movement goals. I am seeking to compare the processes and purposes of
occupation among the well-documented Landless Workers Movement of Brazil with the
novel Occupy movement. In order to understand the process of occupation as a whole
and within these two radically different movements, this essay examines how physical
occupations are integral to the continuation of both social movements and explores how
occupation performs a role in creating a committed base of activists that have a strong
sense of collective identity.
With the massive surge in occupation movements initiated with the Arab Spring
that has spread throughout the world, it is important to understand these movements in
context and in more detail. How does occupation empower people and movements? If we
understand this question, we will be more likely to understand why these movements
have become such powerful forces in contemporary world affairs, what their possible
future trajectory might be, and how their impact might affect us as individuals. As global
power structures change, it is important to understand social dynamics that are beginning
to shift previous balances of power. These social movements are becoming more
important to our lives as they gain power and seek to achieve social justice in a broader,
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societal and global context. In order to achieve social justice in this way, the MST and
Occupy both have utilized occupation, which creates a sense of solidarity and collective
identity among movement participants. More fully understanding how these movements
use occupation to fulfill their goals will help all of us understand these and other social
movements more fully.
Physical occupation is important to both the MST and the global Occupy
Movement in that it helps create a sense of collective identity and also a heightened level
of commitment. Clearly, this ideal is not achieved in all movements which employ the
tactic of physical occupation, but the physical presence and grouping together of people
is central to the formation of collective identity that is necessary for movements to
achieve social change and obtain high levels of commitment and member participation.
In understanding the source of increased commitment, readers must first understand why
and how people have come together under the banner of these social movements.
Background
In Brazil, land ownership is of upmost importance to everyone who attempts to
make a living in the countryside. The MST and other peasant organizations are especially
concerned with land, as Brazil has the second-highest concentration of land ownership in
the world. This has deep historical roots in slavery and the massivesesmaria land grants
given by the Portuguese crown to its subjects in an attempt to control and settle the
massive country during colonization.8
As the planter class developed through the
8Wright, Angus Lindsay, and Wendy Wolford. To Inherit the Earth: The Landless
Movement and the Struggle for a New Brazil. Food First Books, 2003.
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expansion of slavery, land ownership continued to be concentrated in the hands of the
few. In 1956 3% of the people owned 50% of the land in the most impoverished region of
Brazil, the Northeast.9
As a response to similar nationwide inequality, the MST arose in
the late 1970s in the more progressive southern region of Brazil where landless peasants
began to organize and occupy large farms in the hope of redistributing them. The
movement gained crucial support from church organizations such as the Pastoral Land
Commission of the Catholic Church (CPT), a manifestation of liberation theology,
wherein priests across Latin America organized people around social justice issues. The
MST staged its first occupations during the military dictatorship era and spread across the
country during the 1980s in order to pressure the government that began to include land
reform in its agenda during democratization.10
Even after decades of occupation and
government lip service to the issue, however, the inequality of land ownership today is
worse than it was in the 1950s: 1.6% of landowners now control 47% of farmland, and
the poorest third controls 1.6% of all arable land in Brazil.11
Why has the concentration of land ownership become more pronounced after
democratization? American University Professor Miguel Carter notes that the newly
democratic Brazilian government modernized the agricultural system and participated in
trade liberalization, which in turn gave rise to a powerful triple alliance of the national
landed elite, the state, and global agro-food corporations, which cemented the power of
9 Barnard, Clift. Imperialism, Underdevelopment and Education, inLiteracy andRevolution: The Pedagogy of Paulo Freire, ed. Robert Mackie (New York: Continuum,
1984), 19.
10Martins, Monica Dias. The MST Challenge to Neoliberalism.Latin AmericanPerspectives 27, no. 5 (2000): 3345.
11Carter, Miguel. The Landless Rural Workers Movement (MST) and Democracy in
Brazil. Latin American Research Review. 189.
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the elite and the oppression of the rural poor of Brazil.12
As Angus Wright and Wendy
Wolford note, the government spurred on investment by large syndicates, which in turn
bought up mammoth plots of land, produced surpluses that drastically reduced prices, and
in turn drove masses of small farmers off of their land.13
During democratization, the
landed elite maintained their power by becoming the largest voting bloc in the Brazilian
Congress, which continues to slow attempts at land reform today.14
Because the landed
elite wields so much power, the Brazilian government is reluctant to engage in any sort of
land reform, even that which it has promised. Written in the 1988 Brazilian Constitution
is a clause that necessitates the redistribution of land that is ill used or not used at all by
the owner, who is usually a latifundista, or large landowner.15
The MST occupies these
large farms in order to force the Brazilian Government to redistribute it to the poor. In
each occupation, the MST seeks out an eligible site for expropriation, recruits between
200 and 2,500 families, and educates and trains them for the effort, which attracts the
attention of INCRA, the Brazilian land reform agency.16
After a quarter century of activism, the MST has redistributed over 20 million acres
of agricultural land to over 350,000 families.17
With more than one million people
operating in 23 of 27 Brazilian states, and support from 20,000 activists ormilitantes, the
12
Ibid, 190.
13Wright, Angus Lindsay, and Wendy Wolford. To Inherit the Earth: The Landless
Movement and the Struggle for a New Brazil. Food First Books, 2003, xv.14
Carter, Miguel. The MST and Democracy, 191.15
See Brazilian Land Law.
http://www.planalto.gov.br/publi_04/COLECAO/REFAGR3.HTM#216
Hammond, John L. The MST and the Media: Competing Images of the BrazilianLandless Farmworkers Movement. Latin American Politics and Society 46, no.
4 (December 1, 2004): 69.17Wright, Angus Lindsay, and Wendy Wolford. To Inherit. xiii.
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MST is said to be the most important social movement in Latin America.18
It is able to
sustain itself and grow through the process of occupation wherein landless people create
a meager living in black tarps on the unused farmland they hope to use. With fairly
autonomous occupations springing up across the nation and eventually becoming
settlements, there is a complex and scattered network of collective groups and regional
variation and experimentation of tactics. The movement also uses thirteen large task
teams and some central governance in So Paulo that organizes the mass protests on the
capital and other nationwide initiatives the MST engages in, such as ending the usage of
pesticides in Brazil.
The Occupy movement rose more recently than the MST, and is rooted in other
more recent protest and occupation movements from across the globe. Kalle Lasn, who
writes for the Canadian-based magazineAdbusters, noted that the US needs its own
Tahrir, and first came up with the idea of an encampment in New York City, its start
date, and its name: Occupy Wall Street. Lasn and his partner White also created the first
website for the movement, which says that movement is inspired by popular uprisings in
Egypt and Tunisia.19
Unlike these Arab Spring Movements, which used occupation to
topple dictators, the Occupy movements targets are less clearly defined. The movement
claims that it is fighting against the richest 1% of people and the corrosive power of
major banks and multinational corporations over the democratic process.20
While the
18Carter, Miguel . The MST and Democracy, 187, 199.
19Schwartz, Mattathias. Pre-Occupied: The Origins and Future of Occupy Wall Street,The New Yorker, November, 28, 2011,http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2011/11/28/111128fa_fact_schwartz
20SeetheOccupy Wall Street Website. http://occupywallst.org/about/.
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Occupy movement cannot base its pressure around individuals as the protests of the Arab
Spring could, all of these movements are fighting gross inequalities through the process
of occupation. Marina Sitrin and Luis Moreno-Caballud, two activists with both the
SpanishIndignado and Occupy Movements, note that Egyptian and Greek protest
movements sparked both their Iberian and American counterparts, and that all four of
these movements occupy public space.
In addition to the process of occupation, the Occupy movement drew on a culture
of acceptance and openness that these predecessor movements also utilized. Therefore,
these occupations quickly turned to the construction of miniature models of the society
that the movement wanted to create, according to Sitrin and Moreno-Caballud.Themovement has been using general assemblies, consensus processing, and physical
occupations all over the United States and other post-industrial states to attract members,
draw attention to issues, force those with power to change, and provide access to truly
representative politics. The general assemblies provided this public forum where
everyone is free to voice their opinions or concerns.21
Additionally, like the MST,
Occupy has also recently worked to establish a working group organizational system,
which forms teams of specialized people that work on specific issues within and outside
of the occupations. According to Sitrin and Moreno-Caballud, the Occupy Movement is
beginning to gradually shift from acts of protest to creating the real change these
movements want realized in society as a whole. In effect, as the Spanish Indignado
movement has already done, the Occupy movement is going beyond the encampments
21LuisMorenoCaballudandMarinaSitrin,OccupyWallStreet,Beyond
Encampments,Yes!,November21,2011,http://www.yesmagazine.org/people
power/occupywallstreetbeyondencampments
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and interacting with other communities as occupations continue to be important as an
ever more inclusive, community-centered and collective place. This process brings the
ideals of the encampments to a broader world.While the Occupy movement is mainly concerned with reforming the financial
system and changing the role business plays in politics, it is also concerned with myriad
other systemic problems, and it aims to achieve social equality for everyone on a grand
scale.22
Similarly, while the MST is concerned about land reform issues, these are
connected with many aspects of social inequality and thus the MST has expanded its
mission to fighting for a more just Brazilian society in general. While the MST is
concerned that 1% of land is in the hands of 45% of the people, the Occupy movement is
concerned that 40% of the total wealth of the United States is held by the richest 1%.23
This is evident when it states its three main objectives on its website: to fight for land,
agrarian reform, and a more just and brotherly society.24
While several authors argue that occupations are important, but not necessarily
needed in both movements, both movements use occupation to drive the energy of their
movement, provide community, and help to form a collective identity. Both movements
use smaller groups to achieve issues committees in the MST and working groups
in Occupy. Additionally, both are intentionally democratic institutions. While the Occupy
movement uses consensus processing, the MST has a democratically elected executive
committee that makes big decisions. Both have general assemblies, though with the
MST, because of the massive scale, is a representative body of all settlements and
22
See: http://www.nycga.net/resources/declaration/23
Why We Occupy: The Declaration of Occupy D.C. YES! Magazine, December 7,
2011, http://www.yesmagazine.org/people-power/declaration-of-occupy-d.c.24
See: http://www.mstbrazil.org/content/objectives-mst
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encampments within the movement, while each encampment within Occupy answers
only to itself. Before delving into these processes, we must first understand that the initial
and often main purpose of many occupation movements is to attract attention to issues,
and that the MST and Occupy similarly use occupation as their main tool to bring the
inequalities they seek to address to the attention of politicians, the media, and the public.
Methodology
I based my research in social movement theory, notably in theBlackwell
Companion to Social Movements, and Collective Identity and Social Movements which
served as a theoretical basis for much of my research. I conducted nine interviews with
seven individuals by email, in person, and over the phone. I also used field experience in
Brazil to provide a more complete view of the MST. I used various secondary sources in
order to complete my view of both movements, especially in terms of the MST, while I
also used primary sources, mostly websites, to more clearly understand the two
movements and their usage of occupation as well.
Literature Review
I am basing my research in social movement theory that addresses commitment,
collective identity, and participation. While the literature on this topic abounds, this paper
is only beginning to fill a void in scholarship on the pragmatism of social movements in
relation to key needs such as commitment and collective identity. My paper will add to
Aitchisons unique work by addressing occupation within specific social movements.
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By analyzing a student movement in the UK, Aitchison defines three modes of
occupation, based on Erik Olin Wrights Envisioning in Real Utopias, which defines
three strategies for social change. The first form, which he labels symbiotic, involves
debate and dialogue with power holders and demands given to them. The second form,
the ruptural stage, is where the group realizes that dialogue is ineffective and
intentionally breaks off and becomes more radical. Aitchison demonstrates the
development of this stage by discussing how individuals within occupations reinforce one
anothers opinions, identities harden and opposition becomes more entrenched in the
individual.
25
The third, or interstitial phase, involves the deliberate creation of another
type of society, in this example, of radical democracy. In his conclusion, Aitchison finds
that the process of forming a democratic practice within the occupation, the process,
cannot be separated from what movements seek to achieve outside, the protest aspect.
He concludes that occupations are successful only when they include a wide range of
people, strategies, and processes.26
Saskia Sassen has also written several articles about what occupation does in
terms of territory and space. In Occupying is Not the Same as Demonstrating, she
writes that occupation remake[s], even if temporarily, territorys embedded and often
deeply undemocratic logics of power. For her, the city is a place where powerless can
change the narrative of history and claim a voice and citizenship because of the social
dynamics inherent in the urban street.27
In the Global Street, Sassen declares that
urban space makes [protestors] powerlessness complex, and in that complexity lies the
25
Ibid, 435.26
Ibid, 439.
27Sassen, Saskia and Haacke, Hans. Occupying is Not the Same as Demonstrating.
http://socialetymologies.com/?p=465
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possibility of making the political, making the civic. In these two articles, she declares
that the Occupy Movement, like protestors in Tahrir Square, has shown how important
claiming physical space is for the powerless, and that by forming an encampment and
keeping it peaceful, these movements have transformed the space they take into another
type of territory, that which can remake social and political processes to include the
powerless. Sassen says they are engaged in the work of citizenship, exposing deep flaws
and wrongs in their polity and society. She writes that the powerless can make history
without taking power. She is one of the few authors to discuss occupation providing
certain social movement building blocks such as empowerment, even if she does it
without directly referencing social movement theory.28
Two key secondary sources seek to directly address issues such as collective
identity, commitment and solidarity and give me the vocabulary and framework with
which to engage these issues. In Collective Identity and Social Movements, Polleta and
Jasper seek to understand why collective identity emerges, how it impacts personal
motivation, and how it affects movement choices. In the conclusion, the authors note that
there is a gap in understanding the importance of place in the creation of collective
identity. They claim that collective identity is an individuals cognitive, moral, and
emotional connection with a broader community, category, practice, or institution. They
note that it is a perception, and thus that it is not necessarily a concrete experience, but
can be imagined.29
28
Sassen, Saskia. The Global Street: Making the Political, Globalizations 8, no. 5(October 2011): 56571
29Francesca Polletta and James M. Jasper, Collective Identity and Social Movements,Annual Review of Sociology 27, no. 1 (2001): 283.
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In theBlackwell Companion to Social Movements, collective identity is seen as a
key ingredient of, and result of collective action by movements.30
Occupations are
critically important to this work of collective identity, as they fix a movement in space,
which is central to the construction and maintenance of social movement organization
actors collective and personal identities.31
If collective identities are more important for
occupation movements, what then, does this collective identity do for the two movements
in question? Typically, in social movements, collective identity increases both solidarity
for others in the movement and increased commitment to the movement. According to
Hunt and Benford, solidarity requires the identification of a collective entity and
participants identification with a body of affiliated actors. Similarly, social movements
must tie what they do to the basic nature of those from whom they seek commitment.
Thus, who individuals are and what they desire must be in general what the movement is
and seeks. As Hunt and Benford posit, commitment can only be seems as an individuals
identification with a collectivity that leads to instrumental, affective, and moral
attachments that lead to investments in movement lines of activity.32
Clearly, collective
identity is necessary in social movement development as Gamson states: any movement
that seeks to sustain commitment over a long period of time must make the construction
of collective identity one of its most central tasks.33
30
David A. Snow, Sarah Anne Soule, and Hanspeter Kriesi, The Blackwell Companion to
Social Movements (Wiley-Blackwell, 2004). 433.31
Ibid. 443.32
Ibid. 442.
33Gamson, William A. Commitment and Agency in Social Movements. SociologicalForum 6, no. 1 (March 1991): 27.
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In terms of the actual creation of collective identity, Hunt and Benford regard
participation, regarded as micromobilization, as important. Hunt and Benford do not,
however, focus on the concepts of inclusivity and community that this paper does. The
authors instead focus on the role of boundary framing in the creation of collective
identity. Boundary framing uses force by oppositional outsiders as a legitimizing force
for highlighting differences between the social movement actors and those they position
themselves against. This helps to construct a more defined and nuanced identity with
which participants understand in a more defined way who they are not, and see
themselves as having a collective self.
34
Overall, the literature notes that movements create collective identity through
participation and boundary framing to help create clear lines of identity. Social
movements also create collective identity and commitment through other concepts, as this
paper demonstrates. Before readers seek to understand the usage and production of
collective identity, we must first understand how occupations fulfill their first goal, which
is to bring attention to social justice issues.
Presence
As the Introduction to this paper argues, one main goal of occupation is to bring
attention to social justice issues and force those with power to ameliorate these issues. In
this context, Aitchison would deem Occupy to be a symbiotic occupation where
occupiers make demands of and have dialogue with the power structure. Demanding
change from those with power is the goal of many social movements, and those that
34
Ibid. 442-4.
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ascribe to this goal have several other means to achieve it, such as demonstration and
protest. As Sassen implies, however, demonstrations cannot fulfill the same role as
occupations, and cannot provide as much change, because they are ephemeral.35
Occupations, on the other hand, have long-lasting impacts on peoples minds, both within
and outside of the movement, which demonstrations might not be able to have. John
Spitzberg, a participant in Occupy Asheville, notes that the main purpose of the Occupy
Movement is to take a place, to effectively demonstrate to others the negative changes
in American society that they perceive.36
William Ott, a member of Occupy Birmingham,
compares this presence with the Civil Rights sit-ins that not only attracted attention, but
also created a slight disruption in the public sphere. Ott suggests that occupations allow
the movement to show its face and allow for a concrete and constant presence in larger
communities that is also personal. This constant presence not only informs and
potentially involves other individuals in the movement, but it also more effectively sends
a message to power holders.
In this vein, Allyn Hudson of Occupy Birmingham believes the most important part
of the Occupy Movement is that it is a constant presence in the face of those elites that
are causing inequality. He states that marches can soon be forgotten, but an occupation
stays in the mind and continues to strike fear in the hearts of those who oppose us.37
Yautom also agrees with this sentiment, saying the main object for the occupations is to
put pressure on powers that be to change.38
35
Sassen, Saskia and Haacke, Hans. Occupying is Not the Same as Demonstrating.
http://socialetymologies.com/?p=46536
Ibid.37
Allyn Hudson, interview by author, Birmingham, AL, January 12, 2012.
38Yotam Sawyer. Interview by author, Swannanoa, NC, March 17, 2012.
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The MST also performs occupations largely to attract attention and compel change.
For the MST, occupation is the direct action that forces the Brazilian land reform agency,
INCRA, to redistribute land. As Hammond notes, the occupying presence is crucial to
asserting the moral force of their demand to have a particular property expropriated.39
Without this moral force which demands attention, land reform would not occur.
According to Joo Pedro Stedile, and MST leader states, our goal is to do mass actions
to create pressure for concrete measures to resolve the problems.40
While Caldeira has
noted that the MSTs struggle for land is increasingly moving from the pasture to the
courtroom, she states, ultimately, the court battle can only be won if the battle outside
continues to take place.41
Hammond also notes that the cohesion of the occupation
during litigation is an essential task in ensuring success. In addition, the movements
land occupations have historically drawn media attention to the plight of the landless, and
the MST seeks to use this to motivate militants and to broadcast its accomplishments to
the public.42
Clearly, both of these movements use the action of physical occupation create a
strong presence and conjure a moral force to compel those with power to change
inequalities. What more, then, do occupations provide for these two movements? As the
Literature Review describes, the levels of commitment and collective identity in social
39Hammond, John L. The MST and the Media: Competing Images of the Brazilian
Landless Farmworkers Movement. Latin American Politics and Society, 46, no. 4(December 1, 2004): 69.40Ibid,72.
41Caldeira, Rute. Up-dating Its Strategies and Amplifying Its Frames: The Landless
Rural Workers Movement in Brazil and the Displacement of the Struggle for Land.
Perspectives on Global Development and Technology, 7, no. 2 (June 2008): 145.
42Hammond, MST and Media, 61, 72.
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movements are very important. These two movements maintain commitment and
collective identity and thus energy and power through occupation. How then do the
physical occupations create collective identities, as well as solidarity and commitment,
for these social movements? To answer this question, readers must understand how
physical occupations bring people into the movement and allow for direct participation
from many individuals.
Participation and Inclusivity
Clearly, as much as social movements need to influence those with power, they
also need people working to complete their desired goals. High levels of participation
bring energy to the movement as a whole, but it also works to empower individuals
within the movement. As Gamson notes, [s]ocial relationships that embody values of
participation and community in their concrete practices contribute to empowering
people.43
As participation drives empowerment at an individual level and sustained
momentum at the movement level, inclusivity becomes crucial to the success of both the
MST and Occupy movements as it drives higher levels of participation.
In occupations in general, high levels of engagement and participation are needed
at all times for it to be successful. Everyone involved plays an integral role in the
movement, and as Yotam Sawyer, an activist who had experiences in three physical
occupations, Occupy Wall Street in New York City, Occupy DC, and Occupy Asheville
notes, if someone does not participate [in the occupation], their absence is noticed.44
To
Allyn, the necessity of the involvement of everyone is a crucial aspect to the movement.
43
Gamson. Commitment and Agency, 1991. 28.
44Yotam Sawyer. Interview by author, Swannanoa, NC, March 17, 2012.
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He argues that, everyone has a role in the movement and is an integral part of greater
success. He argues that everyone has skin in the game within occupations, since they
have a needed, defined role and are achieving something important with others. If
everyone does not come together and work as a group, the occupation cannot be
successful, he says. Like Gamson, he notes that acting in a collective like this allows for a
rare chance to feel empowerment.45
The myriad constant needs of a physical occupation,
such as maintaining food distribution and medical attention, assure this, while decision-
making does as well. The occupations use consensus processing through General
Assemblies to allow for participation form everyone. Everyones concrete actions and
thoughts contribute to the wellbeing of everyone else and, thus, the continued success of
the movement. As individuals see themselves as an integral part of a whole, collective
identity is created, while they also increasingly see their work as crucial, commitment is
formed.
Within the MST, participation within occupations is just as crucial. Together,
MST occupiers cook, set up tents, organize and go to literacy classes, and protect the
encampment. Occupiers and militants quickly organize women and young adult
collectives.46
The encampments organize different teams to look at all relevant issues.
These teams, better referred to as nucleos de base or core foundations are created
during the occupation to provide the basis for the organizational structure of life after the
land is won. These tightly-knit groups of about twelve families help to provide not only
for effective avenues of participation, but also community togetherness and a sense of
45
Ibid.46
Branford, Sue and Jan Rocha. Cutting the Wire: The Landless Movement of Brazil in
We are Everywhere, edited by Notes from Nowhere, 132.
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collective identity at a smaller scale. Not only are all included in making the encampment
work in general, it is governed this way as well. Kane notes that the MST occupations
provide people with participatory democracy skills, as everyone is involved in the
governance structure.47
To the MST, land occupations are the lifeblood of the movement, because they
bring in landless people to become new and active members. Oziel describes the aspect
of base work in which older MST participants seek new movement members by
traveling to at risk urban communities and demonstrating the positive aspects of rural life.
These individuals bring others into the movement because they had success, they believe
others can and should as well, and because they are committed to the ideals of the
movement, he said.Occupations, he says, put into action peoples rights and show a new
way to see the world and politics. Thus, the people involve themselves more and want
to transmit this involvement to other people so that these others can also achieve the
realization of their rights.48
The MST recruits new members from large shantytowns that
are removed from rural life, as well as from areas close to the plantations they seek to
occupy.49
In general, those that become involved with the MST are some of the poorest
of Brazilian society, and thus, they know that their participation within the movement,
along with that of others, is the only thing that can ensure their livelihood. This
aggressive search for future occupiers ensures that future encampments will have enough
47Kane, Liam. Popular Education and the Landless Peoples Movement in Brazil(MST). Studies in the Education of Adults 32, no. 1 (April 2000):
48Oziel Fernando, email message to author, February 24, 2012.49Branford, Sue and Jan Rocha. Cutting the Wire: The Landless Movement of Brazilin We are Everywhere, edited by Notes from Nowhere, 122-133. New York: Verso, 2003.
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participants to be effective. Here, participation of long-time members drives the inclusion
of new members and provides for the sustained growth of the movement.
William of Occupy Birmingham says that people come to participate because the
physical occupation allows for concrete action with the support of others.50
Similarly,
Alicia of Occupy Eugene responded that people become involved because they know
they are not alone and that whether the space lives or dies, the people know it's possible
to create something else.51
Thus, occupations inspire people to create a different world
and provide a way to engage in a concrete way to achieve social change. As Saskia
Sassen states, occupations make novel territory, and thereby a bit of history. Rather
than just informing the populous, she argues that occupation remakes territorys
embedded and often deeply undemocratic logics of power, and redefine[s] the role of
citizens.52
Accordingly, John Spitzberg, who is involved in Occupy Asheville, states that
the physical occupation is an effective way for people to begin to, if symbolically, take
back land and wealth that was stolen from them by elites. The power behind creating
alternatives clearly drives people to participate in the Occupy Movement.
While this desire for concrete action in creating a new world may compel people
to participate, the Occupy Movement also actively seeks to bring in a large, diverse group
of people to work in the movement. For this, and other movements, inclusivity is an
important part of allowing for complete participation. Allyn Hudson notes that
progressive stack, a tool used in the General Assemblies to include groups that are
often silenced by society, actively gives preference to minorities and women in the
50
William Ott. Interview by author, Birmingham, AL, January 6, 2012.
51Alicia, email message to author, March 2, 2012.
52Sassen, Saskia and Haacke, Hans. Occupying is Not the Same as Demonstrating.
http://socialetymologies.com/?p=465
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bodys discussions.53
This helps to ensure that everyones voice is heard and decisions
are made by consensus in the General Assemblies. This leads to increased participation
and empowerment, as individuals feel they can actively become a part of democracy,
according to Allyn.54
Inclusivity is also an important aspect in the Occupy movement in regards to the
homeless populations that so many occupations have embraced. John Spitzberg notes that
the homeless population came in to the occupations as squatters, who were also frequent
users of drugs and alcohol, in need of shelter and care. However, because of their
exposure to practices like consensus processing through staying at the occupation, they
developed a sense of unity with the occupiers who had other places to stay. Spitzberg
noted that many of the homeless individuals who became involved with Occupy
Asheville were able to effectively engage in the movement and were able to give up some
of their addictive habits. Because they were welcomed into the movement through the
physical occupation, many of the homeless population became more aware of certain
issues, and several even became leaders in the Occupy community.
Spitzberg noted that it was with their acceptance into a caring environment and as
individuals that the homeless population was able to raise their self-esteem to a point
where they could become integral members of the movement. While there were
sporadically problems, he noted that one could rarely tell the difference between the
movement-oriented people, usually younger and often students, and the homeless after
this unity was established. Only after this intentional acceptance could the movement
represent more of society and have all individuals come together as one. This aspect of
53Allyn Hudson, email message to author, February 25, 201254Allyn Hudson, interview by author, Birmingham, AL, January 12, 2012.
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incorporating all people into the movement is especially important to Kayvon, an
Asheville-based activist who also participated in occupations in Zuccotti park and
Washington DC. He similarly believes that unity only comes through inclusivity. He
states, until we are all doing what we can to end the suffering around us, there won't be
the unity necessary to make an impact. Thus, when all are welcomed to participate,
occupations have been shown to promote a great deal of unity among all involved, and
thus, a collective identity can form. Collective identity can only by formed when those
within the movement treat everyone equally, and this can be effective only when
everyone that can be is intentionally brought into the movement.
Physical occupations offer several different ways for individuals to become
involved and help build the movement. Allyn Hudson, a member and lead organizer of
Occupy Birmingham, discussed how an individual was able to achieve real change by
interacting with the physical occupation. Because he saw the occupation and was
interested, the Imam of Birminghams Muslim community stopped by the occupation
outside of Regions Bank in the heart of the financial district. He discussed the
movements goals with the individuals present, and then informed the movement of a
couple, the Wards, that he knew who were in dire need of assistance. Bank of America
was foreclosing on their house, and the Wards felt this move was unjust, because they
had made all of their payments. The Occupy movement in Birmingham used this case to
begin the local manifestation of the nationwide Occupy our Homes campaign, which
sought to bring attention to unjust foreclosures by occupying the front lawns of those
attempting to keep their homes. Occupy Birmingham essentially uprooted itself for a
brief period from its financial district Occupation, leaving as little as one person at a time
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to watch over the occupation and continue to address the public, so that as much attention
could be placed squarely on the Occupation of the Ward familys front lawn. In addition,
Occupy Birmingham sought to organize the community around the Wards predicament
and made videos about the plight of the Ward family. This plan succeeded when the
Rachel Maddow Show featured the family and the protestors, which successfully
pressured Bank of America to cancel the foreclosure. As Allyn emphasized, the
Occupation of the Wards family only happened because of the physical presence of the
Occupation in the financial district, and the effectiveness of the physical occupation in
drawing support from many different areas, such as the community and media, to achieve
movement goals.55
In addition to the community-building centered around injustice that
Occupy Birmingham tried to create in the Ward family neighborhood, the Occupy
movement creates community in every physical occupation.
Community
The MST and Occupy Movement both build strong communities within their
occupations. As William Ott, a member of Occupy Birmingham, states, the Birmingham
occupation formed a community full of friends and action that was meaningful. He says
that this unity is a pushback against the balkanization and disconnectedness of our
society. For Ott, real community was not possible before this movement began, and
the occupation is a unique vehicle in bringing together passions and ideas for a different
world. Through the physical occupation, he says, we have found each other and
55Allyn Hudson, phone interview by author, March, 5, 2012.
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through this, solidarity. We are family, he states, community.56
Allyn also agrees that
the occupation provides those that engage with it a sense of community, and he states
that Occupy Birmingham is a community of equals that strive to recognize the diversity
of the people in our community.57
Alicia, of Occupy Eugene, notes that to rebuild
community is one of the principal purposes and goals of the movement.58
It is important
to explain the complexities of community within occupation and how it aids in achieving
a collective identity.
To Alicia, the Occupy encampments are simply showing us that we can dream,
we can say what we want, and we can have a voice of dissent, but until there is a
community guided effort and a stronger work ethic, an ideal community through
encampments cannot be achieved. The community of Occupy Eugene was still dynamic
and, as Alicia claimed, incredible. Like many occupations, it was made up of people
from different backgrounds and places who were all initially strangers to one another, yet
who instantly became neighbors and co-warriors. Alicia also highlighted the feeling of
interconnectedness of the encampment. As a community, one of its most important roles
was to provide as much immediate and long-range care to individuals as possible. Most
importantly, the community was able to rally around and engage in radical democracy.59
Clearly, many occupations have reached the interstitial phase that Aitchison writes
about in which activists create a new society and try to live it out. This can only succeed
56William Ott. Interview by author, Birmingham, AL, January 6, 2012.57Allyn Hudson, email message to author, February 25, 2012.58Alicia, email message to author, March 2, 2012.59Alicia, email message to author, March 2, 2012.
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in combination with strong protest and interaction with the rest of society as a vibrant
community.
Yotam Sawyer expressed this need for protest clearly as he emphasized the
importance of nurturing collective action within the community instead of care. He notes
that the focus on care distracted from collective action, which he regards as the goal of
the movement. A communal structure is also important to Yotam because it helps
individuals move on from their [individualistic] world and enables them to take action
and have clear roles within the movement. Clearly, this sense of community for Occupy
not only brought many out of isolation and provided a vibrant community in which they
could grow, but it also provided the framework for care, collective action and
effectiveness as a social movement. Similarly, the MST needs to develop strong
community for successful collective action in terms of occupation.
Within the Landless Workers Movement, community is initially built in the
acampamentos, or encampments that form as a group of Landless is brought together to
occupy a large farm targeted by the movement for redistribution. As discussed in the
section on participation, the struggle for land attracts most individuals into the movement,
according to Caldeira,60
When the movement occupies farms, the landless create
encampments of black tarps, tough living and precise collective organization that provide
formative experiences.61
Often, like in Occupy Movement encampments, people come
together with different backgrounds, both urban and rural, but must come together
instantly as a community as they face the trials of occupation. Hammond argues that as
60Oziel Fernando, email message to author, February 24, 2012.61Kane, Liam. Popular Education and the Landless Peoples Movement in Brazil
(MST). Studies in the Education of Adults 32, no. 1 (April 2000): 36.
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activists occupy farmland, their isolation forces them an effectively organized
community. As they work to secure a livelihood, political self-defense and education,
activists come together and support each other as a collective.62
Oziel states that the
settlements that emerge from occupation are rehearsals for the realization of an ideal
community, wherein individuals together determine community ideals and live
collectively.63
The ways in which participants of both movements come together to live
collectively and in community helps to create a strong collective identity amongst all.
The creation of community through struggle so drives the MST that this energy
sustains the movement long after the encampments become settlements after the land is
won. Caldeira argues that once individuals have occupied and are firmly part of the
movement, there is a second stage of construction and consolidation of a community of
struggle and resistance. This feeling of struggle and resistance so crucial to the initial
process of occupation is maintained by the movements process of continuing to protest
as a collective, which helps continue the revolutionary experience that has awakened the
individuals consciousness.64
Individuals must continue to struggle for rights to water and
education, as they did when over 18,000 marched on the capital, Brasilia, to demand the
government provide the infrastructure and teaching of high school education for MST
youth.65
62Hammond, John L. Law and Disorder: The Brazilian Landless Farmworkers
Movement.Bulletin of Latin American Research 18, no. 4 (October 1, 1999): 473.63Oziel Fernando, email message to author, February 24, 2012.64Caldeira, Rute. Up-dating Its Strategies and Amplifying Its Frames: The LandlessRural Workers Movement in Brazil and the Displacement of the Struggle for Land.
Perspectives on Global Development and Technology, 7, no. 2 (June 2008): 146.65Grooms, Owen. The Escola Do Campo Joo Sem Terra: A Look Inside the Process ofMaking Education Relevant in the Landless Workers Movement Settlement 25 De
Maio.ISP Collection (April 1, 2011), 17.
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Wendy Wolford asserts that the MST maintains participation of occupiers by
creating an imagined community through ideas and practices and distilled through
slogans and rituals. These processes help to tie members to the movement, even after they
have already won land and become firmly established as small landowners. Thus, they
still see themselves as part of the movement and involve themselves in new occupations,
which continually feed the movement. She writes that the MST creates this community
by presenting poverty as a result of class exploitation, and thus uses boundary framing
to solidify the landless as a collective and the rich as the oppositional class. This helps to
make it possible to identify whom to fight against and whom to fight with, increasing
solidarity and collective identity within the movement.66
In all, the main element of this imagined community is its oppositional class
character. In this narrative, they are landless because those dominant in society stole,
misused, and abused property that should belong to society as a whole. Thus, they must
actively work together to take back what was stolen from the now very clear opposite
class, the landowning elite. In this way, the MST uses Karl Marxs views of the capitalist
system exploiting the worker or soil, and produces a vision of an egalitarian community
where union is strength.67
Both the MST and Occupy movements build community
through intentional processes within their occupations and use action by external
oppositional forces such as police and armed gun thugs, to create demarcations of identity
through boundary framing. This helps greatly in creating a collective identity within both
social movements.
66Wolford, Wendy. Producing Community: The MST and Land Reform Settlements in
BrazilJournal of Agrarian Change, 3, no. 4. (October 2003) 518.67 Ibid, 513-517.
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Collective identity
High levels of participation, inclusivity, and feelings of community combine to
create collective identity, which in turn creates commitment. There are also additional
internal and external forces which help to create collective identities in both movements.
The MST forges collective identity through imagining a new ideal society in social,
political, and economic terms. To realize this identity, the movement must act, however,
and thus must change the economic, cultural, and social situations of those that actively
occupy the land. The MST provides access to basic rights, class-consciousness in
opposition to the dominant landowning elite, proposes a new ideal society, and then
changes the minds and lives of those that commit to the movement. Through these
processes, the MST produces enough unity and common ground for collective identity
formation.
Oziel declared that the MST is an instrument for the realization of the rights of
workers, empowerment, so that the people acquire rights on their own. People are
committed to the movement most of all, because they are committed to taking ownership
of their rights to a good livelihood as individuals, and they feel reciprocating commitment
form the movement. To achieve this, they also have to commit to each other. One MST
occupier stated: Its only together, through union, that well be able to get land, feed our
children, help our friends.68
This feeling of unity helps to cement a collective identity
within the individuals of the movement.
Similarly, Hammond argues that occupation drives individuals to be more fervent
and committed members of the MST He notes that occupations are an ideological
68Branford, Sue and Jan Rocha. Cutting the Wire: The Landless Movement of Brazilin We are Everywhere, edited by Notes from Nowhere, 125.
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hothouse which cultivates members commitment through the intense organization and
collective action necessary for this type of struggle to succeed. Hammond agrees that
joining an occupation in itself shown a high level of commitment because occupiers must
leave behind everything they have to see if their efforts will pay off.69
When I visited an
encampment of the MST, I was astonished by how much individuals said they desired to
occupy and how committed they were to the goals of the movement. One elderly
individual stated that he had worked as a sharecropper for a rich landlord his entire life
and could never escape his virtual slavery until the MST offered him an escape. He was
committed to occupying and enduring the tough conditions because doing so was better
than enduring the wage slavery he had been through his entire life.
Once individuals strongly commit in order to attain their rights, the movement
creates a communal atmosphere, a culture of struggle, and transforms the behavior and
values, and environment of the settlers. What is crucial is the inversion of values that
transforms everything from being individually to collectively owned and maintained.
Thus, people see themselves as a part of one collective very strongly, and thus more
active within, and committed to, the movement. Sue Branford and Jan Rocha note that
occupation is the cornerstone of the movement in which the landless lose their
innocence, become militant activists, and create a new identity for themselves. As MST
leader Joo Pedro Stedile asserts, the vehemence of the act of occupation puts you
firmly in one camp or another, because to occupy, you must have a position, in essence
a strong identity. The act of occupation is thus the fuse for a profound process of
69Hammond, John L. The MST and the Media: Competing Images of the BrazilianLandless Farmworkers Movement. Latin American Politics and Society 46, no. 4(December 1, 2004): 69
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personal and political transformation wherein individuals reject the values of the
establishment and take the step to impose their own agenda and become subjects of
their own history rather than objects.70
There is also a great sense of collective identity
created by outside, oppositional forces. Branford and Rocha describe in detail the
interactions of heavily armed gunmen and the MST occupiers, relating them to runaway
slaves.71
This greatly enforces the boundary framing that the MST itself uses to
differentiate the landless from the elite class.
One way in which the MST brings people together in the occupations and then
afterwards is through the mistica that displays the rich symbology of the movement in a
presentation of flags, songs, chants, theater, poetry, and stirring speeches. Carter states
that the misticas have helped to nourish an intense social energy, forceful convictions,
and [a] strong sense of identity. Furthermore, he notes that he often hears movement
participoants state things such as I love the MST or The movement is my family.72
I In my experience in an assentamento, or settlement, of the MST, the mistica was an
anniversary celebration of the first day of the occupation, which glorified that specific
struggle and the movement in general. It nurtured pride and a sense of identity within the
community. The mistica serves to bring the people together as one during occupation, so
that it is more successful, while in the settlements, the mistica often harkens back to and
glorifies the original occupation as the source of the progress the community has made.
70 Branford, Sue and Jan Rocha. Cutting the Wire: The Landless Movement of Brazil inWe are Everywhere, edited by Notes from Nowhere, 122-3.71
Ibid, 124.
72Carter, Miguel . The Landless Rural Workers Movement (MST) and Democracy in
Brazil.Latin American Research Review. 202.
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Also, the mistica helps to promote this imagined community ideal of unity within the
entire MST because it is put on by militantes, or movement activists, who travel to
different settlements and encampments in order to provide support, a sense of solidarity
within all sectors of the movement and unity in purpose.73
Mistica slogans affirm this
unity and also inclusivity: We are all comrades in the struggle for land, and Land
Reform, a struggle form everyone!74
Within the Occupy movement, collective identity is similarly created within the
physical occupations. According to Alicia, the physical occupations unite people who
have been oppressed their entire lives in various ways and thus the space heightens
individual understanding of injustice in the world. The unification of these minds around
similar injustices helps to create collective identity. Like the MST, the Occupy
Movements collective identity is created in part by boundary framing. Alicia notes the
importance of the oppositional collective identity that is used to differentiate activists
from antagonists. She finds that physical occupations create a central point where the
antagonists, which she describes as police and oppositional cultural forces, can harass
us en masse and thus unite us in our now obvious common oppression. She continues to
say that the suffering caused by this conflict built a sense of standing on common
ground and that the collective identity resulted more form the common antagonism
than from living together in community.75
Alicia very clearly shows how collective
identity and consciousness is formed by the external forces which make up part of the
power structure the Occupy Movement is trying to change.
73
Grooms, Owen. Field Journal, May 27th
, 2011, Madalena, Ceara, Brazil.
74Ibid.75Alicia, email message to author, March 2, 2012.
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Some note that unity was created within the movement as well. Kayvon notes that
being involved in occupations connected him to a large number of people that he
otherwise would not have met, and that it showed him how similar they were before the
occupation began. With the starting point of the occupation as common ground, he began
to look at people without the lens of social status or appearance, and thus was able to
congregate with people from very different backgrounds and form unity and at least some
semblance of a collective identity.76
When Yotam discussed the physical Occupation in DC, he focused on the collective
identity construction of marching through the streets every day and the feeling of
unification that resulted from the combination of this collective action and living
together. This created a high level of commitment, which was evident, since all in the
occupation slept in the open because tents were not allowed. At one point, it rained for
five days in a row, but the level of commitment was so high, that everyone stayed and
endured, even if they were sleeping in puddles. This level of commitment also increased
the size of the encampment. Because other Occupations were shut down, activists from
all over the country, the diehards as he called them, flooded DC, but this increase in
numbers did not compromise the feeling of collective identity felt among all who camped
there.
Though times were tough, he recalled that there was a great deal of lightheartedness
in Occupy DC, and that this was key to the group feeling that was so powerful for him
and all others there. Though this had to do a lot with a lack of external forces that helped
create a collective identity in occupy Eugene, such as harassment by the police, some
76Kayvon Kazemini. email message to author, March 27, 2012.
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internal forces also helped to create this feeling of involvement, commitment, and
identity. Through a series of de-escalation and peacekeeper trainings, everyone was
involved and became peacekeepers. This not only helped to create the common ground
needed for collective identity as occupiers and peacekeepers, but it also helped to
maintain low tensions and the lightheartedness that helped to keep the community strong.
Through daily peacekeeper meetings, these feelings were maintained as everyone had a
chance to participate and everyone was kept informed and up to date on important events.
This experience from Occupy DC illustrates the importance of participation, inclusivity,
and community in the creation of collective identity and commitment.
Conclusion
Both of these movements are inclusive and allow for people to actively participate
and engage in the work of occupation for social change. Occupation allows individuals to
become very involved and committed, integral parts of a community that is actively
seeking change as a collective. The powerful bond of collective action creates an identity
that helps to create more commitment and sustain the movements. These movements also
use deliberate processes to create collective identity, such as the mistica, and the
resistance of elites to their goals in terms of boundary framing in order to solidify
identity. These identities help to create and are created by, the commitment, solidarity,
and empowerment necessary to maintain the energy a dynamic, successful movement
requires. Clearly, social movements across the globe are using occupation as a tool for
social change in order to bring attention to their issues and provide a visible, tangible, and
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enduring force that compels change, while also from the framework of a community that
is strong through committed members and unified by a collective identity.
There is much discussion within the Occupy movement concerning the move
toward a more decentralized and neighborhood-activism approach, such as has occurred
in Spain with great success, as Moreno-Caballud and Sitrin note.77
Indeed, now that many
Occupy encampments have been removed, many have come to question the importance
of occupations within the movement, just as Cardeira raised the point that the MSTs
battles are important out in the field, but that they are becoming less frequent and less
important to the movement as a whole. As individuals analyze life the importance of the
physical occupations, however, they come to find that the aspect of place and community
in the movement was missing. Miki Kashtan notes that because the occupations helped to
remove individuals from isolation and alienation, the destruction of the encampments
turned a group of passionate activists and community builders into a collection of
individuals coming together for meetings that to many no longer seem relevant.78
Carter
would caution the loss of occupation within the MST, as he writes that the act of
occupation and the organizational structure and passion that arises from this is an
important democratizing force in Brazilian society as a whole.79
Clearly, as these social
movements continue to change, a great deal more research is needed to understand their
77Luis Moreno-Caballud and Marina Sitrin, Occupy Wall Street, BeyondEncampments, Yes, November 21, 2011, http://www.yesmagazine.org/people-
power/occupy-wall-street-beyond-encampments78Kashtan, Miki. Sustaining the Occupy Movement, Tikkun, Spring 2012, 26
79Miguel, MST and Democracy.
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new methods and ideas. Additional research is also needed to continue to understand the
role of occupation in these social movements and others.
The commitment necessary to become a physical participant of either of these
movements is intensified upon integration in the strong community one finds amidst
occupation. People are empowered by their ability to remake the power of space through
concrete, collective action. As individuals see themselves as a collective, their
commitment again increases, as does the energy they are willing or able to give towards
the movement. Both of these movements, and the individuals within them, more
effectively better their lives and their societies with occupation as a tool of their social
movements.
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