Second Communique 23/02/09 - Occupation Postmortem

From Wednesday February 11th to Friday February 13th, 2009, Deptford Town Hall became the site of a new kind of student politics at Goldsmiths: a kind that favours collective action and direct democracy over pointless petitions and popularity contests. After a mere 29 hours of occupation of the Hall’s marble stairwells and neoclassical chamber halls, Goldsmiths’ Senior Management Team had caved in and granted four full scholarships a year for 10 years to students from areas of political strife and humanitarian crisis. This leaflet is an attempt to evaluate the occupation and its successes and failures.

For A&S, the occupation was a victory for the sort of direct action and democratic methods that characterise genuine social change, rather than for Palestinian nationalism or hand-wringing liberalism. We see the Palestinian ‘cause’ as reinforcing the existing authoritarian, capitalist structures in the Middle East, which as anarchists we also reject. For us, it is the act of occupying in itself that is revolutionary. This was borne out by the staggering change of perspective that all the occupiers underwent, with ideas and actions that had previously seemed ‘radical’ being (democratically) voted through by larger and larger majorities as time went on; and by Thursday evening, we were debating the different paths to social change and the makeup of a fair society.

Decisions were made by a meeting of all the occupiers, with anyone welcome to contribute and add to the agenda. A chair was elected every time in order to track the order of speakers (who have to raise their hands) and ensure that the meeting is faithful to its agenda. Where there was disagreement, decisions were made by majority votes. Unfortunately, the chair was not rotated sufficiently from one meeting to the next, and sometimes chairpeople (and some of the more vocal individuals) were tempted to speak out of turn, replying to points directly instead of waiting their turn like everyone else. This risked turning meetings from open discussions leading to democratic decisions into question and answer sessions with the ‘better-informed’ individuals on predetermined courses of action.

The pitfalls of ignoring democratic processes were clearly demonstrated in the last meeting of the occupiers, which ended in a vote to accept management’s terms (seen on the occupation blog here). The delegation, which communicated with management, emerged convinced of our victory, and their enthusiasm clouded the judgement of the general meeting to discuss the offer. We were explicit in our demands (which were two full scholarships for students from Al-Quds Open University), we allowed our excitement to cede them certain vagaries in the agreement (which actually only undertakes to give two scholarships to students from any Palestinian university). It may seem like a nominal difference, but we had voted down earlier offers over similar details, and the group was resolute that the scholarships should be for Al-Quds students. Other discrepancies were clear in the agreement’s imprecise language, which offers College loopholes with which to undermine the scholarship programme.

The ‘socials’ that were held each night also highlighted the different notions of ‘solidarity’ that existed within the occupation. Some were accused devaluing the cause and lessening the impact of the occupation by wanting to open up the space, while others believed that offering music, food and discussion were the best way to involve the wider student body. A&S took the position that solidarity is a material, definable act (like occupying a building) and not sitting around thinking how terrible it must be to live in Gaza. We believe the demands of this occupation were legitimate because they encouraged solidarity with people (the prospective Palestinian students) and not ideologies (Hamas, Palestinian nationalism).

To win what appears to be a concrete victory in just 29 hours is a clear vindication of direct action. Moreover, the general feeling at the conclusion of the occupation was that direct action had proved itself so effective that our demands were seen as too timid, and that our action had been too brief.

Through the smokescreen of student politics and bureaucratic wrangling, some of us caught a glimpse of an emancipatory form of participation: But why settle for a glimpse?

Your favourite student anarchist group,

Autonomy & Solidarity