I managed to get my hands on an interview with a participant of the NYU occupation, talking about why it has been seen by some as a “failed” attempt.
Some interesting points:
- They mention the UK occupations and how they wanted to show solidarity (their occupation was not mainly about Gaza, unlike others)
- Gave reasons of why it didn’t achieve its goals: because it was depoliticised, so was not taken seriously; because they weren’t inclusive enough (and failed to mention the political aspect of the occupation when engaging with outsiders); they didn’t know how to negotiate; they failed to explain how the process of consensus works in meetings, and so meetings ended up being quite undemocratic; and how their lack of strategy discussion really hurt their actions in the long run
Check it out! It’s in M4A format, sorry…
March 9, 2009 at 5:05 am
Hey-
In all fairness, Amanda was not part of most of the planning/execution, not an NYU student and is not a member or (at this point) ally of Take Back NYU!, which was the group doing the occupation. If you’d like to talk with folks who were more involved, send me an email, and I can put you in contact with some.
Solidarity,
-NYU Student