#Occupytheestablishment The Commodification of a “New Sensibility” for Public Space and Public Life

Abstract

The idea to occupy and re-imagine public space as political protest against an exclusionary and nontransparent democratic system was sparked in 2011 by the editors of Adbusters magazine and exploded into popular consciousness largely through the power of social media. The earliest moments of this collective praxis first disrupted Lower Manhattan, then, as quickly as wind sweeps across land, ignited city centers across America, and ultimately across the globe. For a brief period, the Occupy Wall Street (OWS/Occupy) movement represented the genuine promise of “hope and change” that many Americans had clung to following the 2008 global financial crisis. But like many social media phenomena, the movement’s physical visibility and accompanying popularity faded as rapidly as it had appeared. Fueled by a powerful statistic, that “1% of the Population owns 40% of the Wealth,”¹ Occupy ignited deep-seated frustrations and began a profoundly needed conversation about income disparity with the provocative slogan, “We are the 99 percent.”