What chance a general strike in Manhattan?

More an observer than an active participant, I have been stopping by
the Occupy Wall Street encampment now for a couple of weeks. At first, I
viewed the movement as more of a local curiosity, but after attending a
galvanising protest last Friday I began to develop a very different
impression.

Called in response to police brutality and pepper spraying of
protesters a scant few days before, the demonstration was a raucous and
energetic affair which stood out against the normally staid and bland
activist scene here.

Building on this momentum, Occupy Wall Street carried out yet another
protest on Wednesday which, remarkably, included many rank and file
labour unions. Though the protesters failed to challenge the police on
many occasions, the march reportedly drew some 20,000 people, an
astonishing and unheard of figure for an anti-corporate demonstration of
this type. In light of these remarkable developments, many will now
wonder: What's next?

Judging from Occupy Wall Street's call to "shut it down", many
protesters already have a fixed idea. To me, "shut it down" conjures up
the notion of a general strike, which, if carried out properly in Lower
Manhattan, could prove to be very devastating to business as usual in
New York and inflict heavy economic losses.

"A general strike would be the perfect escalation for the Occupy Wall
Street movement, offering the opportunity to engage workers, students,
professionals and retired folks throughout the city (not just lower
Manhattan)," notes Mike Locker, the president of Locker Associates, a business and consulting firm working on behalf of many unions.

Locker, who I interviewed in a previous Al Jazeera column
dealing with the role of organised labour in future protests, adds that
demonstrators "could organise local assemblies to discuss organisation,
demands and ongoing activities to build our power (more occupations),"
during a general strike. "In the afternoon we could have a super march
toward Wall Street from all over the city," he says.

It's an intriguing idea to be sure, but how to tactically,
politically, and psychologically appeal to New Yorkers in such an
unprecedented effort? I don't pretend to have all the answers, yet as
someone who grew up in Lower Manhattan and who has been an off-again,
on-again activist over the years, I can hazard some thoughts.

An overlay of the local area

If they were to formally call for a general strike, the protesters would
enjoy a number of logistical advantages. Unlike Midtown, which has
longer blocks and broader streets, Lower Manhattan is built on a smaller
scale and has some windy lanes and warrens. As a result, the police
will find it more difficult to control and direct political protest.

In this sense, the Occupy Wall Street movement differs somewhat from
anti-war demonstrations aimed at President Bush in April, 2003. Though
some of those protests took place around Washington Square Park in
Greenwich Village, other demonstrations occurred in Midtown where the
police were able to set up metal gates and effectively corral activists.

At the time, I recall how some protesters debated whether to conduct
direct action down in the Wall Street area, but for whatever reason, the
idea never materialised. That is a pity, since New York activists tend
to underestimate the actual power they can exert within the New York
City milieu.

During the build up to the war in Iraq, organisers carried out huge
demonstrations, but in the end the actions failed to derail Bush's
plans. Looked at in hindsight, activists might have been able to cause
more disruption with fewer numbers if they had instead concentrated
their efforts in the downtown financial area.

Occupy Wall Street differs from the Iraq protests in other
significant ways, perhaps most crucially in that the movement has an
actual base of operations in Liberty Plaza. In the winter of 2003,
activists used to congregate around United Nations Plaza, but the area
never took off as a permanent encampment. Perhaps that is not too
surprising given the actual geography: Located on the East River, the
United Nations is physically and psychologically removed from the busy
lives of many New Yorkers. Liberty Plaza, by contrast, is located right
in the middle of one of the busiest thoroughfares in all Manhattan.

From a logistical standpoint, the Wall Street area displays all kinds
of advantages. Because Manhattan is narrowest at this point,
demonstrators can maximise their numbers for optimal effect. In
addition, nearly all New York subway lines run through the area,
including the 1, 2 and 3 lines, 4, 5, and 6 lines, A, C, and E lines, J,
M, and Z lines, as well as the N, R lines. Moreover, the Staten Island
ferry disembarks a scant few blocks from the Occupy Wall Street
encampment and the entrance to the all important Brooklyn Bridge is
located just a stone's throw away.

The Holland Tunnel, which connects commuters to and from New Jersey,
also lies nearby and commercial streets like Broadway run just adjacent
to the Occupy Wall Street headquarters. In the event that Mayor
Bloomberg adopts a draconian policy toward protesters, local activists
won't have to travel far to make their grievances known, as City Hall is
only a mere ten minute walk from the permanent encampment.

Building social and political coalitions in the area

From a multi-class and multi-racial perspective, the area holds out some
intriguing possibilities. Though Wall Street itself is a white collar
area, many working class folk also frequent downtown or have jobs in the
vicinity.

In particular, Chambers and Church streets are heavily black and
Latino by day and presumably many of these workers are feeling the
economic pinch. Borough of Manhattan Community College, which is
directly situated on Chambers Street, makes sense as a key outreach and
organising target.

Realistically, if the protesters want to maximise their impact they
would be wise to keep to the Wall Street area and stay out of Tribeca
and Soho, neighbourhoods which are overrun by tourists. Both districts
serve as the party grounds for stockbrokers and the affluent but do not
offer any tempting or tangible political targets. Nevertheless, if
Occupy Wall Street continues to grow, then setting up information points
in other key and strategic areas of Lower Manhattan might make sense,
say in Washington Square, Union Square and Tompkins Square Park.

Whether they recognise it or not, the protesters have another
political advantage in that organised labour has a distinct presence in
their area. Indeed, the headquarters of 32 BJ of the Service Employees
International Union or SEIU is located nearby, and getting the union's
support could prove crucial in the days ahead. The union, which
represents doormen, security guards and maintenance workers, plays a
significant role in the Wall Street area. "Practically all buildings in
the vicinity of the demonstrations," notes Locker, "are 32BJ buildings."

Right across the street from Liberty Plaza is Ground Zero, and every
day construction workers make their way to the site. If the
demonstrators haven't thought of it already, they should consider
setting up a dialogue with the workers, who operate in an area of vital
economic importance for the city. What would be the response from such
workers to a general strike? That is anyone's guess, but history does
not suggest that construction workers would be so amenable to radical
entreaties.

Indeed, as this interesting article from Dissent
magazine points out, nationalistic New York construction workers took
great relish in physically attacking anti-war students on Wall Street in
May, 1970. The disturbances, which came to be known as the "hard hat
riot", underscored the profound cultural gap separating the counter
culture from the working proletariat of that era.

Judging from what I have seen thus far, it is students and young
people, and not organised labour, which are more willing to engage in
militant tactics. It is they who seem to be driving the protests, and
labour is participating, albeit in a rather non-committal and lacklustre
way.

To be sure, during Wednesday's protests certain labour contingents
were visible. But when the police tried to cage protesters behind steel
rails on Chambers Street, it was young people, and not labour, which
ignored the entreaties of the authorities and briefly toppled
barricades.

Whether other New Yorkers, let alone labour, are willing to engage in
more direct and confrontational political tactics such as a general
strike remains to be seen. Judging from my own observations over the
years, I have my doubts. Fundamentally, the protesters may find that the
biggest obstacle to obtaining a greater following is the city's
unstated psychological code.

Ask many Americans what they think about New Yorkers, and they may
reply that we are unfriendly. I would say it's not so much that,
however, as a go-it-alone type attitude and a tendency to mind one's own
business, which in turn makes collective action more of an uphill
climb.

Assuming, then, that Occupy Wall Street did put out a call for a
general strike - and it remains to be seen what the protesters would
specifically hope to achieve through such action - how would the public
react? The problem is that we are essentially in uncharted waters here.
As a general rule, labour has shied away from using the radical weapon
of a general strike, and the most historic instance in which such
tactics were employed - in Seattle in 1919 - had ambiguous results.

The lessons of Seattle

In that case, 65,000 local labourers walked off the job for four days in
solidarity with shipyard workers who had opposed wage cuts. During the
strike, labour demonstrated that it could effectively govern within
local communities by serving food, supplying hospitals and keeping order
in the streets.

Unfortunately, the walkout collapsed amid pressure from the mayor,
federal troops and an unsupportive American Federation of Labor. Not
only did the shipyard workers fail to achieve wage increases, but
union-busting and red-baiting were quick to follow. In the long term,
however, the strike inspired generations of workers who strived to build
a more socially progressive order.

Needless to say, of course, 1919 was a vastly different era from
today and labour was much more radical and willing to engage in
provocative tactics. Nevertheless, Locker is upbeat. A general strike in
New York, he says, "could spark a nationwide strike and bring the
movement to a whole new level".