We frame economic power as a contest between capital and labor, but the real star of the American economy is consumer spending, which accounts for 68% of GDP. The Great Recession saw a 3.4% drop in consumer spending — at the time, the most severe year-over-year decline since World War II. The U.S. economy registered a 9.8% drop in consumer spending during the second quarter of 2020, when Covid shut down the world as we knew it. In both instances the U.S. government responded aggressively, spending hundreds of billions, primarily on bailouts, to pull us out of the Great Recession, and trillions, primarily in direct aid, to get us through the pandemic. The lesson? When consumers stop spending, American leaders start listening. As Geo Hussar explained to his YouTube followers at the end of September, “this is not seizing the means of production, but seizing the means of consumption,” adding that if every American dropped their consumption, on average, by 2%, “that would be the most loud and potent form of protest.”
In this transcript Professor Chenoweth discusses the four elements necessary for a successful social movement. Below are excerpts from the transcript.
The third thing that successful movements do is they innovate new tactics. This is very important because movements that tend to over-rely on a single technique like protests, like demonstrating every Friday, something that becomes very routinized, end up succumbing much more quickly first of all to protester fatigue, but the second thing is they often subject their participants to a higher risk of repression or communal violence from opponents. So movements that are capable of having the capacity to shift to methods of dispersion, like stay-at-homes or strikes or forms of economic noncooperation, tend to be much more effective because they have the capability of maneuver when the state begins to ramp up violence against them.
Those are the four things—numbers, defections, tactical innovations, and discipline. What do we need for those things to happen? We need to organize. I think one of the key reasons why many movements have struggled around the world, including in the United States before now, is that there has been an overemphasis on mobilizing and less of an emphasis on organizing because to have the capacity to do these things skillfully means that there has to be a baseline level of trust, political education, collective identity, and also a sense that the struggle is longer than just the next event we have to plan to be in the streets, that the struggle is a long struggle, and even if there is one particular event that gets derailed, we are still in this, and it's a long-term kind of struggle. Movements that end up planning event to event or march to march or protest to protest are in much more danger of being thrown off-course and having these sort of demobilizational factors affect their long-term trajectories.
Protests in Perspective: Civil Disobedience & Activism Today, with Erica Chenoweth & Deva Woodly | Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs
Thank you. Folks, please keep documenting ICE invasion and violence. It will be important to show that peaceful communities are being invaded by ICE, not the other way around.
WHAT THE FUCK!!! Where is my Military. All you honorable women and men in our Military, speak to and tell your Commanders, tell them to mount up and go to the Capital and all the big cities especially the Blue Cities and protect us American's from Trump and his fascist, dicktator loving Evil Coo Coo's…..
To every American, don't waste your time protesting to the Government offices, mobilize at all the U.S. Military bases, offices and Armories, recruiting offices, etc, etc, etc!!! Carry the message!!
TELL OUR RGREAT MILITARY THIS; PLEASE PLEASE PROTECT OUR DEMOCRACY!! WHY DID ALL YOUR SISTERS AND BROTHERS IN ARMS DIE? TO ALLOW A CHICKEN SHIT EVIL COO COO NAMED TRUMP TO DISHONOR THEM AND YOU. A WANNA BE FUCKING DICTATOR AND YOU'RE NOT GOING TO LIFT A FINGER TO STOP THIS EVIL COO COO TRUMP, IF THAT'S THE CASE SHAME ON YOU…..
THIS PIECE OF EVIL COO COO SHIT CALLED TRUMP THREATENED TO FIRE OUR ADMIRALS AND GENERALS IF THEY DIDN'T SUCK HIS PUNY DICK.
MY ADMIRALS AND GENERALS, YOUR AMERICAN PEOPLE ARE BEHIND YOU 1000%, FORGET THE SUPREME COURT CONSERVATIVES, GO AND ARREST THEM, NO ONE CAN STOP YOU FROM SAVING THIS DEMOCRACY, ARE YOU GOING TO LISTEN TO AN EVIL FUCKING COO COO TRAITOR NAMED TRUMP, WHO DISHONORED YOU, YOUR MEN AND WOMEN, AND OUR CONSTITUTION?
FUCK NO, FUCK NO, AND A BIGGER FUCK NO.
IT'S SHOW TIME, EITHER SHOW UP AND FIGHT FOR OUR DEMOCRACY THAT YOU SWORE TO DEFEND AGAINST ENEMIES FOREIGN AND DOMESTIC, OR TURN YOUR BACK ON AMERICA AND GO HOME!!!
From No mercy/No malice
By Professor Scott Galloway
We frame economic power as a contest between capital and labor, but the real star of the American economy is consumer spending, which accounts for 68% of GDP. The Great Recession saw a 3.4% drop in consumer spending — at the time, the most severe year-over-year decline since World War II. The U.S. economy registered a 9.8% drop in consumer spending during the second quarter of 2020, when Covid shut down the world as we knew it. In both instances the U.S. government responded aggressively, spending hundreds of billions, primarily on bailouts, to pull us out of the Great Recession, and trillions, primarily in direct aid, to get us through the pandemic. The lesson? When consumers stop spending, American leaders start listening. As Geo Hussar explained to his YouTube followers at the end of September, “this is not seizing the means of production, but seizing the means of consumption,” adding that if every American dropped their consumption, on average, by 2%, “that would be the most loud and potent form of protest.”
Successful Social Movements
In this transcript Professor Chenoweth discusses the four elements necessary for a successful social movement. Below are excerpts from the transcript.
The third thing that successful movements do is they innovate new tactics. This is very important because movements that tend to over-rely on a single technique like protests, like demonstrating every Friday, something that becomes very routinized, end up succumbing much more quickly first of all to protester fatigue, but the second thing is they often subject their participants to a higher risk of repression or communal violence from opponents. So movements that are capable of having the capacity to shift to methods of dispersion, like stay-at-homes or strikes or forms of economic noncooperation, tend to be much more effective because they have the capability of maneuver when the state begins to ramp up violence against them.
Those are the four things—numbers, defections, tactical innovations, and discipline. What do we need for those things to happen? We need to organize. I think one of the key reasons why many movements have struggled around the world, including in the United States before now, is that there has been an overemphasis on mobilizing and less of an emphasis on organizing because to have the capacity to do these things skillfully means that there has to be a baseline level of trust, political education, collective identity, and also a sense that the struggle is longer than just the next event we have to plan to be in the streets, that the struggle is a long struggle, and even if there is one particular event that gets derailed, we are still in this, and it's a long-term kind of struggle. Movements that end up planning event to event or march to march or protest to protest are in much more danger of being thrown off-course and having these sort of demobilizational factors affect their long-term trajectories.
Protests in Perspective: Civil Disobedience & Activism Today, with Erica Chenoweth & Deva Woodly | Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs
It seems that martial law should be used against Trump's ICE goons.
Thank you. Folks, please keep documenting ICE invasion and violence. It will be important to show that peaceful communities are being invaded by ICE, not the other way around.
Miller. Nazi Miller. Hitler III. Hitler II is Nuttyyahoo....
WHAT THE FUCK!!! Where is my Military. All you honorable women and men in our Military, speak to and tell your Commanders, tell them to mount up and go to the Capital and all the big cities especially the Blue Cities and protect us American's from Trump and his fascist, dicktator loving Evil Coo Coo's…..
To every American, don't waste your time protesting to the Government offices, mobilize at all the U.S. Military bases, offices and Armories, recruiting offices, etc, etc, etc!!! Carry the message!!
TELL OUR RGREAT MILITARY THIS; PLEASE PLEASE PROTECT OUR DEMOCRACY!! WHY DID ALL YOUR SISTERS AND BROTHERS IN ARMS DIE? TO ALLOW A CHICKEN SHIT EVIL COO COO NAMED TRUMP TO DISHONOR THEM AND YOU. A WANNA BE FUCKING DICTATOR AND YOU'RE NOT GOING TO LIFT A FINGER TO STOP THIS EVIL COO COO TRUMP, IF THAT'S THE CASE SHAME ON YOU…..
THIS PIECE OF EVIL COO COO SHIT CALLED TRUMP THREATENED TO FIRE OUR ADMIRALS AND GENERALS IF THEY DIDN'T SUCK HIS PUNY DICK.
MY ADMIRALS AND GENERALS, YOUR AMERICAN PEOPLE ARE BEHIND YOU 1000%, FORGET THE SUPREME COURT CONSERVATIVES, GO AND ARREST THEM, NO ONE CAN STOP YOU FROM SAVING THIS DEMOCRACY, ARE YOU GOING TO LISTEN TO AN EVIL FUCKING COO COO TRAITOR NAMED TRUMP, WHO DISHONORED YOU, YOUR MEN AND WOMEN, AND OUR CONSTITUTION?
FUCK NO, FUCK NO, AND A BIGGER FUCK NO.
IT'S SHOW TIME, EITHER SHOW UP AND FIGHT FOR OUR DEMOCRACY THAT YOU SWORE TO DEFEND AGAINST ENEMIES FOREIGN AND DOMESTIC, OR TURN YOUR BACK ON AMERICA AND GO HOME!!!
ICE officers rappelling down from an ICE piloted Blackhawk helicopter?? Sounds like a Military crew, not ICE???
Putin is twiddling his thumbs
👀
without a true reveal, where will you go with your "go" bag?
Folks are shooting then subsequently eating Squirrel in my neck of the bayou!
Thank you Danielle!