The Occupy Movement, Capitalism, and Climate Change

Occupy Wall Street

Remember the Occupy protests?

Late last year, thousands took to the streets in cities across the world to protest against social and economic inequality. Their basic message was that big companies had too much influence on government, which undermines democracy, and the growing gap between rich and poor in society needed to be addressed.

The movement grew out of the general public resentment at the time that financial institutions had brought the world economy to it's knees but had suffered no repercussions as a result. Also, that seemingly nothing had been put in place to stop it happening again.

So how were these institutions allowed to screw things up in the first place? Well, in many countries (the U.S. and U.K. included), governments largely leave them to regulate themselves. Possibly because the financial sector adds billions to many countries' balance of payments. It may also have a lot to do with the very friendly relationship politicians have with corporate leaders in general.

Yup, money talks. So those companies had a free hand to do what they liked, coming up with riskier and riskier ideas in the pursuit of profit. The rest is history.


Of course, nobody objects to companies making a profit. Profits mean jobs, wages, and help the economy. It's what capitalism is all about, and capitalism is the only game in town.

But if the financial crisis has shown us anything, it's that the pursuit of profit at any cost just doesn't work. Yet, profit-at-any-cost is exactly how capitalism works lately. All because large corporations have too much influence on government.

So the Occupy Movement was right about that, even if the right-wing politicians and media tried to dismiss the protests as a bunch of anti-capitalists (Probably some of them were, but there's no doubt in my mind that the majority were just concerned citizens).

Whilst the world financial crisis is the most noticeable unwanted effect of letting large corporations do what they like, there are others. For example: Environmental pollution; the obesity epidemic; deforestation; third world labour exploitation; and, yes, climate change.

Capitalism has failed us and it needs fixing. That process needs to start with governments/politicians ending their cosy relationships with business, especially where it concerns funding election campaigns.

At the moment, business practically runs government, That's undemocratic. WE voted the politicians in, not some board of directors, so it US they should be listening to. If they do otherwise, then we should vote them out.