Beneath the Pavement, the Beach!

by Meghan Courtney and Brad Hirn

The pedagogical project is created in order to place… lives inside the classroom and to employ knowledge and transformation as weapons to change the world. From the perspective of the social location of the condemned on Earth, it becomes clear that knowledge alone, as intended by the school, does not transform life. Only the conversion of knowledge into action can transform life. This concretely defines the meaning of practice: the dialectic movement between the conversion of transformative action into knowledge and the conversion of knowledge into transformative action.

--Leonardo Boff in his introduction to Peter McLaren’s Life in Schools

The purpose of this article is to de-stigmatize and re-assert the word “revolution” into youth protest methodology. To illustrate the flexibility of “revolution” and why it is the appropriate word to use for youth protest, we have written a spectrum of revolutionary action comprised of four events in 20th century global history: the protests at the 2004 Republican National Convention (RNC) in New York City; the May 1968 near-revolution in France; the November 2004 “Orange Revolution” in Ukraine; and the Cuban Revolution in the 1950s. Each event corresponds to a different point on the spectrum, proving that, contrary to popular belief, the possibility does exist to re-signify the word and appropriate it for current American protest goals.

2004 Republican National Convention protests in New York City

Much has been written on the 2004 RNC protests in New York City. Hundreds of thousands of protestors, dozens of organizations and publications, and over 1,500 arrests over the course of a week—and still we are left to confront the issues targeted during that week without acknowledging their deepest causes: the U.S. federal government and American corporate capitalism, among others. While the marches were not revolutionary nor were they intended to be (despite the presence of individual anarchists and such groups as the Revolutionary Communist Party), the only responsible long-term reaction a self-proclaimed Leftist can have towards the protests is one of critical evaluation. If the most widespread goal among the participants was to protest the nomination of George W. Bush, then the RNC protestors succeeded in indulging themselves. (Can a ring of photographers surrounding panty-clad protestors be called anything else?) If a goal was to persuade the American public not to vote for Bush in the election, then the RNC protests failed for three reasons: [1] the popular stigma on protest activity sustained by the mainstream media and by the complacent middle class culture underlying America; [2] the post-Clinton rise of Christian evangelism and grassroots conservatism; and most importantly [3] the repetition of ineffectual protest methods, namely isolated short-term marches characterized by inarticulate energy rather than informative arguments, by the American Left, especially youth.

If there was anything extraordinary about the RNC protests, it was not that hundreds of thousands of people marched in the streets. It was that hundreds of thousands of people marched in the streets and then left as if a weeklong party had just ended. Did the protestors fully exploit those days of relatively unrestricted marching, or did adolescent indulgence and short-term thinking cripple any possibility for persuasion of the American public? While no one can say for sure whether or not the RNC protests could have provoked a concerted effort against the U.S. federal government or against the corporate media, the fact remains: the events of that week did not significantly persuade anyone outside the protests—the New Yorkers who did not participate and, more importantly, undecided American voters.

May 1968 near-revolution in France

A more potent example can be found in 1968 France. World War II hero Charles de Gaulle personified French traditionalism as president of his country during the late 1960s. To many students and workers, his lingering presence in the French government seemed to be in direct opposition to the liberal, youth-led movements sweeping the continent and the world. The dissatisfaction with de Gaulle’s presidency came to a head in 1968. In March, students occupied buildings at Nanterre University following a series of disagreements over the school’s conservative policies. In an effort to stop the demonstrations, university administrators closed Nanterre, followed by the Sorbonne on May 3. Student protests escalated and hundreds were arrested. Workers groups, with the hesitant support of their unions, prepared a general strike for May 10 to protest the students’ incarceration. Though the students were liberated, the strikes continued. At the end of May, nearly 10 million workers had abandoned their jobs to demonstrate their dissatisfaction with the government. Nevertheless, after de Gaulle called for an election to be held on June 23rd, the people re-elected him. Unbelievably, the discontent that had awakened the population in May had nearly dissolved by June. It seems that the prospect of eventual revolution was simply too inconvenient for the relatively affluent French population. Nevertheless, the May 1968 near-revolution stands as one of the most impressive mobilizations of citizens across class lines.

2004 Orange Revolution in Ukraine

Following widespread allegations of voting fraud during the November 21 runoff of the country’s fourth presidential election since the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union, Our Ukraine party leader and challenger Viktor Yushchenko urged supporters to protest the Central Electoral Commission’s decision to declare Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych winner. “A path to a compromise through people demonstrating their will is the only path that will help us find a way out of this conflict. Therefore, the committee of national salvation declares a nationwide political strike,” Yushchenko told supporters in Kiev’s Maidan Nezalezhnosti (Independence Square). Six days of nonstop peaceful demonstration, labeled an “Orange Revolution” in reference to the dominant color of Yushchenko’s campaign, included a student crowd’s occupation of part of the Ministry of Education building. Following Parliament’s declaration for a rerun because of invalid election results, the Supreme Court set December 26 for the new election, resulting in a victory for Yushchenko.

While the Orange Revolution is part of a recent linguistic trend of democratic “color revolutions” (the others being the Rose Revolution in Georgia, the Cedar Revolution in Lebanon, and the Purple Revolution in Iraq), Ukraine’s popular uprising should not be confused with President Bush’s occupation of Iraq, inaccurately termed a “revolution” by conservative weblogs and by Bush himself in a February 24 speech in Bratislava, Slovak Republic. The protests in Ukraine directly led to the rejection of the election’s official results, prompting first Parliament and then the Supreme Court to acknowledge rampant voting fraud and schedule a rerun. While electoral reforms followed Yushchenko’s election, the Orange Revolution did not install a new form of government or a new economic system. It was a limited revolution, which is not to imply that it was insignificant but only to distinguish it from complete revolutions such as Cuba’s.

1953-59 Cuban Revolution

Though several rebel groups rose in opposition to the corrupt, money-soaked, and U.S.-supported Batista regime in mid-century Cuba, the Leftist movement led by Fidel Castro, his brother Raul Castro, and Ernesto “Che” Guevara de la Serna ultimately took power. It was not until 1961 that Castro publicly announced his intention for Cuba to become a Communist nation, nearly three years after he took power and shortly before the United States’ failed Bay of Pigs invasion.

The Rebels’ beginning was tumultuous. In 1953, after a failed attack against the Moncada barracks and their subsequent imprisonment, the Castro brothers went into exile in Mexico where they met Guevara and began to rebuild their movement. In 1956, the revolutionaries left Mexico for Cuba and landed their ship, the Granma, on Cuban shores. The few men that survived the landing began to spread their revolutionary message among the peasants and outcasts in Sierra Maestra. By 1958, they had gathered enough of a following to begin a military advance against the capital. On January 1, 1959, with the support of almost 90% of the population, rebel tanks rolled into Havana and Batista fled. Though the government was originally a junta, Castro quickly took sole power and began enacting the reforms promised by the Rebels. Some Cuban conservatives left the country when he reduced rents by up to 50%, but U.S. interests were more upset by the Agrarian Reform Law of 1959. This legislation reduced the allowable size of a plantation to approximately 1000 acres—just 1/10 the size of some U.S. corporations’ landholdings. Some conservatives were also concerned that Afro-Cubans, women, and workers were to be given official legal equality and access to a free education. Though the revolution was successful in that a new form of government was established in 1961, the Cuban Revolution had its failings, including poor economic growth due to the U.S. embargo on trade against Cuba.

Each event represents a different point on the following spectrum of revolutionary action:

Not a revolution --> Defused revolution --> Limited revolution with same economic system --> Complete revolution with a new economic system

The four events, when placed on the spectrum, look like this:

RNC protests --> May 1968 near-revolution --> Orange Revolution --> Cuban Revolution

This is not a ranking of approval or commendation but rather an illustration of the elasticity of “revolution.”

On the word "revolution"

As the above spectrum illustrates, the word “revolution” does not signify one form or method of revolutionary action. Ukrainians achieved what we have called a limited revolution (the overthrow of an official governmental decision but the retention of the government itself) while Fidel Castro’s Rebel Army achieved a complete revolution in Cuba (the installation of a new government and a new economic system). These differences are crucial to asserting a multiplicity of definitions of the word “revolution.” Contrary to the popular perception of “revolution” as Marxist, the word can indicate various revolutionary methods and must not be restricted to any particular one.

Revolution has been criticized for its scope of total and absolute upheaval, but, given our flexible definition of the word, the Orange Revolution disputes that criticism through its display of limited but significant popular uprising. While Ukrainian discontent stemmed from invalid election results, do not a nation’s people have the capacity—indeed, the responsibility—to respond similarly when they disapprove of their leader on grounds of ideology and policy?

A common criticism of revolution and total societal upheaval is that such sweeping action does not allow for inherent human tendencies like power acquisition and abuse of authority, that one absolute ideology is too inflexible to “fit” around human reality. This argument does not allow for a re-signification, a re-definition, of the word “revolution” and a recognition of its own flexibility—for any word has multiple meanings and must be allowed to exist as such. Simply put, the word “revolution” does not necessarily indicate any ideology, for national revolution corresponds to an individual nation, and no one ideology covers every nation on earth.

Current youth protestors will undoubtedly debate the question of whether a revolution is the appropriate word to use and action to take; the current protest model does not even hint at revolution but prescribes a strict course of small organizational meetings followed by modest events such as last November’s post-election rally and large events such as the RNC marches — each of which could support the other but instead isolates itself in its allotted time and space. The result is short-term action that does not push against the most pervasive forces responsible for the conditions youth protestors claim to fight.

The word “revolution” encapsulates the local, national, and international changes which must occur if long-term change is to be achieved. It is not necessarily a bloody overthrow of the federal government, nor is it necessarily a complete overhaul of the economic system, but those options must be considered viable during preliminary discussions to ensure that the revolution does not falter during the most crucial transition from ongoing revolution to post-revolution. While local methods may differ, the end vision must be recognized by all participants. This is the revolutionary consciousness: the acknowledgement, appreciation, and engagement of each other’s dissatisfaction so that it may be translated into productive discontent.

We believe youth protest should recognize the relevance of the word “revolution” and the viability of revolutionary action, in whatever forms it may take. With that said, this article is a provocation of revolutionary dialogue. It is by no means the final judgment of revolution and its place in American youth protest methodology. It is, at its simplest, an urgent plea to start the informed discussion.