Is Occupy the West's Arab Spring?

By Kathleen Brooks, Research Director

Forex.com

In New York protestors have camped in Zuccotti Park, close to Wall Street, in a protest against corporate greed and bank bailouts. And a camp numbering about 300 people has been set up outside St Paul's Cathedral in central London, a few metres from the London Stock Exchange.

To date Occupy demonstrations have taken place in 900 cities across the world. While there is no central manifesto, the protests are all loosely aligned with those taking part primarily against economic inequality, corporate greed and the influence of banks, corporate money and lobbyists on government.

The trigger for the protests is harsher economic conditions in the West, where some countries are struggling with high unemployment levels as governments try to reign in public spending in Europe, the UK and the US. The uprisings in Egypt, Tunisia and Libya that were based on the prospect of a brighter, more equitable future are an inspiration for today's Occupy protests.

In fact, the Occupy movement sprung out of the Spanish "Indignants" movement, which was formed in the wake of the Arab Spring back in May. Both movements have many similarities, but is Occupy the West's Arab Spring?

Looking at the similarities first, both movements have an immediate undertone. People want change now and are willing to camp out either in Tahrir Square in Cairo or in parks across Manhattan and London until their message is heard.

Both protests are also based on mis-spent public funds. The Occupy protests are a manifestation of public anger that has been brewing since the banks were bailed out in 2008.The cost of bailing out the banks costs a whopping $850bn it has been estimated, and it doesn't stop there. In 2000 the World Bank said in a report that it costs an average of 12.8% of GDP to bailout troubled banking sectors across the world. This means that governments, and ultimately tax payers, have traditionally picked up the bill when banks fail.

Cause for commonalities

The anger is easy to see: the government came to the help of the banks the minute they were in trouble, but now the bill has come due public sector spending on services that people most need including healthcare and schooling is on the chopping block. Occupy is a demonstration about fairness and treating people with dignity and respect.

Likewise, the Arab Spring was ultimately about government greed and corruption that has been put before providing hospitals, schools, decent wages etc. for regular people. Thus the demonstrations in the West and the Middle East share a common theme: human nature's acute sensitivity to fairness. In the West it is unfair the bankers get bailed out but schools and hospitals don't, in the Middle East it's about corrupt governments.

The Arab Spring was primarily focused on governments' and political change, but Occupy also directs some of its anger at governments' and their closeness to banks and the structures of finance the protest is campaigning against.

Both protests have immediacy about them: change needs to happen, although the finished product, or a plan for the "change", is only half baked at best. The Arab Spring is further along this process. But in recent weeks we have seen the jubilation earlier in the year after the toppling of the Mubarak regime fade into frustrated pockets of violence as change has been slow under the interim military government.

The Occupy protests have had more of a carnival feeling so far. There is talk of a manifesto being compiled, however if the movement fails to put up an alternative to the current system then it may end up a rudderless ship, which fades into obscurity.

The Occupy movement can learn a lot from the Arab Spring, not least that change takes time and old regimes/ habits and relationships are hard to break.