Occupy has responded to these ejections by changing its focus from public spaces toward private property: foreclosed homes. Recently, CNN.com published an op-ed by Sonia K Katyal and Eduardo M. Penalver. Read it here. They recently co-authored a book called Property Outlaws: How Squatters, Pirates and Protesters Improve the Law of Ownership. In their article on CNN.com they argue that Occupy’s change in tactics – from occupying parks and streets to occupying foreclosed homes – might very well work to their advantage.
One reason that this might be a successful endeavor is because it could remedy the movement’s most cited shortcoming: a lack of political agenda. Moreover, it can help connect current members of the movement to working-class Americans. If the Occupy movement is going to be successful (it’s already changed the framework of political discussion) then it will need to have closer ties to unions and working class Americans. Aligning their causes with foreclosed homes can help the Occupy movement to do just that.
Possessing physical spaces has had success throughout American history. Katyal and Penalyer argue that “a straight line runs from the 1930s sit-down strikes in Flint, Michigan, to the 1960 lunch-counter sit-ins to the occupation of Alcatraz by Native American activists in 1969 to Occupy Wall Street”. They argue that the sit-down strikes arguably laid the groundwork for the enforcement of federal labor laws; the lunch counter sit-ins led to the enactment of Title II of the Civil Rights Act of 1964; and the Alcatraz occupation paved the way for a milestone reversal in Federal Indian policy, leading President Nixon to support tribal self-determination. For the sake of my country and world, I hope that the Occupy movement has these sorts of success. We’re in desperate need of them.
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The Takeaway: In the end, occupying foreclosed homes might strengthen the Occupy movement by presenting a tangible political demand and forging closer ties to working-class Americans.
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