Societies of Occupy: Scenes from Occupied Pittsburgh

JUCS 1 (1) pp. 155–165 Intellect Limited 2014

KEITH SPENCER Carnegie Mellon University

Societies of Occupy: Scenes from occupied Pittsburgh

ABSTRACT Keywords The physical and digital fragmentation of the Occupy movement makes it notori- Pittsburgh ously difficult to define politically: in an attempt to analyse one local movement, Occupy movement the author performed convenience interviews with Occupy Pittsburgh participants, demographics noting demographic information and political opinion. Through repeated interviews socio-economics over several months, Occupy Pittsburgh became increasingly leftist and radical in protest movements rhetoric, even after dispersal of the physical camp. A similar trend seems to have consensus occurred nationwide. The author opines that the organizational model of consen- direct democracy sus may be the reason for the leftward shift in values and ideology, and ties this to observational research.

Most neighbourhood communities are linked by class and racial commonali- ties; Occupy’s societies, however, were not circumstantial. Rather, they were deliberate agglomerations of people with shared political and social views. More than a mere protest march, the physical sites of occupation were organ- ized, semi-autonomous communities, replete with their own social welfare systems, argots, customs, beliefs and division of labour. In an attempt to analyse and place the Occupy protests, I undertook a local project of interviews and participant-observer research around Occupy Pittsburgh, spanning October 2011 to May 2012. Occupy Pittsburgh existed as a physical encampment from October 2011 to February 2012, and has existed

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since then in an atomized state. My goal was to place and define the camp socially and ideologically, and understand its socio-political model. As well as being an active protester, I took the role of documentarian, conducting convenience interviews and taking notes on meetings and events happening around the camp. In this eight-month span, I conducted extensive interviews with 25 participants, attended three large community meetings and observed the physical camp on five occasions. In all interviews, I asked specific questions about subjects’ political views, educational and class background, employment, age and reasons for joining Occupy. Like most local Occupy camps, Occupy Pittsburgh had logistical and textual ties with the larger movement. Logistically, the model of physical camps was similar: a group of activists seized public space in an urban area, usually their local financial district, and lived, slept and protested there for as long as possible. Movements were textually linked by their adherence to the original set of demands laid out by the New York protesters in Declaration of the Occupation of New York City. Locally, protests varied wildly in their battle cries, contingent on local politics. At its peak, Occupy was estimated to consist of at least 951 physical camps (Alternet 2011). Yet since its inception, the movement had a promi- nent digital, non-physical dimension. In addition to originating online, the Occupy movement eventually spread to the immaterial – ‘Occupy Parents’ and ‘Occupy Ideology’ are but two examples of non-geographic occupations. The unusual social circumstances linking these semi-autonomous communities may constitute a new example of socio-political organization, and a coun- terpoint to the ‘imagined community’ of the nation state (Anderson 1991: 4–7). Indeed, two organizational facets of Occupy served to question many of the hegemonic tenets of the nation state: the physical existence of Occupy sites on so-called public (or private) land, and the notion of a transnational link between Occupys constituting their own ‘imagined community’. These attributes questioned both the sanctity (and even the idea) of private property, as well as the nation state’s hegemony over the concept of community. Viewing Occupy as a physically transgressive project leads naturally to another question: what political tendency does Occupy represent? Others’ accounts and my own interviews confirmed a politically diverse body poli- tic, though in Pittsburgh four viewpoints prevailed initially: capitalist libertarian, anarchist, socialist and liberal progressive. Yet after several months, the more right-wing elements were shed and the Pittsburgh branch coalesced into a definitively anti-capitalist movement – a phrase that recurs in print, which when describing the international Occupy movement generally uses the phrase ‘leftist’ or ‘anti-capitalist’ (Weinberg 2011). How and why did the movement become explicitly leftist? The answer may lie in the democratic model undergirding the movement: democratic consensus. The hyper-democratic participatory system of democratic consensus is inherently inclusive. Consensus epitomizes an ideology of inclusion, multiculturalism and valuation of diverse viewpoints.

1. DEMOGRAPHICS OF PITTSBURGH As a graduate student at Carnegie Mellon University I constituted one of numerous ‘eds and meds’ in the region, many of whom were transplants with a limited relationship to Pittsburgh. The regional colloquialism ‘eds and meds’ defines two major industries that helped revitalize the regional economy:

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educational institutions and research hospitals. Unlike its rust belt counter- parts – cities like Cleveland, Toledo or Detroit – Pittsburgh arguably had the most successful transition to a post-industrial economy, aided by the aforementioned industries as well as a strong service and creative economy (Florida 2002). The resurgent local economy made Pittsburgh a political symbol of rust-belt revival, exemplified by the decision to host the 2009 G20 gathering in the city. Pittsburgh sits at the western edge of the Appalachian mountains, and serves as an urban hub to the northern Appalachian working class. Its culture is a mix of African American, Appalachian and North-Eastern influence, the latter emanating from the professoriat and a historical connection to New York money. Like many rust-belt cities, Pittsburgh still has an industrial, gritty feel, and much heavy manufacturing has been converted to light manufacturing, or residential and commercial space. Despite its status as a creative-class destination, the city still bears a large urban precariat, who live in disharmony with the burgeoning professional class. The metropolitan region’s post-industrial resurgence spread wealth selectively: a 2000 study found that in the 1980s, when neo-liberal economic reforms led to manufacturing concerns vacating the region, income inequality grew faster in Pittsburgh than in any other stud- ied US metropolitan region (Madden 2000: 2–4). The latent effects of industrial outsourcing are still visible in Pittsburgh, which also suffers from racial segregation between African Americans and whites, as well as economic and educational disparities (Davis et al. 2007: i–22). Like most former manufacturing hubs, Pittsburgh has long been a hive of labour activity, and the state of Pennsylvania remains one of the more unionized states (Belser 2012). Many labour halls still exist in downtown Pittsburgh, whose skyscrapers also house a large number of financial and legal corporations. It is here, amidst the Manhattanized cityscape of downtown, that Occupy Pittsburgh took root on 15 October 2011. From this date until 7 February 2012, protesters occupied Mellon Green, a four-acre park in the middle of downtown, enclosed by the aforementioned financial skyscrapers. Mellon Green is also an oft-trafficked parcel, and thousands of commut- ers descend daily on the commuter subway station at the eastern corner of the park. In choosing an occupation site, protesters settled on Mellon Green for its proximity to these symbols of power, including its namesake Bank of New York (BNY) Mellon. As it is with the New York protesters’ Zucotti Park, Mellon Green is a privately owned public park. This minor legal point – the private ownership of public space – would eventually be the protest’s undoing; ultimately, their eviction came about not due to the City Council, which was largely supportive (Harris et al. 2011), but rather through the efforts of BNY Mellon, the legal owners.

2. PORTRAITS OF OCCUPY PITTSBURGH The Occupy Pittsburgh encampment featured many of the pleasures of a permanent community: a library, mostly consisting of political books; a kitchen serving donated food; a media and information tent, for visitors and press; and a general store stocked with donated clothes, blankets and other ameni- ties. These tents were situated in a row along the park’s main concrete path. Behind them, residential tents obscured the remainder of the park green. At the centre of the park sits a circular fountain, which was deactivated for winter

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and surrounded by a temporary chain link fence haphazardly decorated with political artwork and posters. On a given day, one could traverse the sidewalks lining the camp and observe all manner of person and conversation – political and practical, radical and liberal and everything in between. Meanwhile, locals continued using the sidewalks for commutation, and the occupation became a minor tourist destination. As the business suits and black bloc intermingled it was sometimes hard to tell who was occupying and who was not. This attests to the diverse socio-economic conditions of occupiers. Contrary to some journalistic depictions of occupiers as unemployed (Keneally 2011), my interviews revealed that Pittsburgh occupiers were mostly working or retired – though some were homeless despite their employment, and many workers were underemployed. One subject, Andrew, a homeless 19-year-old African American male, worked full-time at a fast food restaurant nearby. He had chanced upon the camp and decided to join quickly thereafter. ‘I was walking by one day and I see all these tents and stuff’, he said. ‘I’m currently homeless so I’m very sensitive to [the] community, and so I figured I would take upon myself to be a part of something positive […] and educate myself to learn more about what’s going on’. Andrew lived on the fringe of an underclass that sees the occupation as a means of survival. ‘I don’t have to buy food or clothes because there’s clothes here, and I can save money’, he told me. He explained that he ‘never paid attention to government’ or voted because of ‘chaos’ in his personal life. He said that while he could not place himself on the political spectrum, he liked the democracy of the camp. Of those to whom I spoke, only one other occupier seemed as financially stressed as Andrew. Leah, a 31-year-old Caucasian female, was employed as a ‘fifth grade Title I teacher’ in a public school. She said she made ‘about $1,000 a month’. ‘I run an after-school program, [I] have a master’s degree and I get no benefits. So that’s part of the reason that I’m here, because I pour everything into my students and I don’t make a living wage’. Leah said she was $70,000 in debt from school. Her experience in the workforce clearly affected her world-view: she called the Occupy movement ‘a movement for human rights’, and listed healthcare, free education and peace as her main prerogatives. ‘I don’t want to ever see another war in my lifetime, […] I want schools to be funded, I want education to be free, I want healthcare to be free’, she told me. Overall the occupiers came from diverse class backgrounds, though many of the activists belonged to one of two demographic groups: twenty-some- things at the beginning of their working lives, and older retired professionals and veterans. The story of Alexis, a 31-year-old African American female, was typical of the former group. Though she worked doing two service jobs aver- aging 30 hours a week, she had slept at the camp ‘15 of the last 20 nights’. Like Andrew, Alexis was not very politicized prior to joining. ‘Originally I didn’t want to get involved because I’m pretty apathetic’, she said, explain- ing that she was ‘ushered along’ by her friends to join. ‘I actually feel pretty empowered right now. I feel like something is possible’, she said. Alexis’s positive feelings about the social aspects of Occupy Pittsburgh extended to all occupiers interviewed. She said that she had met many people from different backgrounds through the movement. Alexis described herself as someone who ‘hangs out in dive bars’, and mentioned making a ‘new friend [who] hangs out in upper-scale bars’, and whom she ‘never would have met’

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if not for Occupy Pittsburgh. Likewise, Andrew lauded the encampment for providing ‘a pretty sturdy community’. ‘I feel like I’m part of a family’, he said. However, he was concerned with the ‘drama and gossip’ that permeated the community, likely referring to the conflict between himself and a middle- aged man named Blue who deliberately rammed into Andrew’s shoulder and accosted him during our interview. Chris Hedges, a journalist who has written extensively about the Occupy movement, describes the encampments as ‘beset with the usual problems of hastily formed open societies where no one is turned away’ (Hedges 2011). The occupiers in Pittsburgh generally agreed that this facet of the movement – the democratic notion that all are welcome and no one is turned away – was both a curse and a blessing. Julia, a 25-year-old Caucasian female and a union organizer, found the environment ‘generally open’ but sensed ‘a tension building in the camp’. ‘I think that’s natural with heated discussion and a close community’, she said. Julia was aware of the conflict between Blue and Andrew, and lamented it as ‘disappointing’. Though the inclusive nature of the encampment generates drama, all interviewees were positive about the hyper-democratic organization of the camp. Occupy Pittsburgh governs itself through consensus and describes itself as a leaderless movement, like all Occupy sites worldwide. Issues are resolved through ‘general assembly meetings’, as Andrew explained to me. The camp also elects its constituents to serve in various roles. Andrew was a ‘bottom-liner for morale group’, meaning he ensured ‘everyone was feeling good and smiling’. Likewise, the ‘statement committee’ was another appointed group that crafted public statements to be posted on the Occupy Pittsburgh website. Harvey, a 63-year-old Caucasian male, worked with this committee to craft policy. A retired sociology professor, Harvey called the movement ‘very productive’. ‘People […] seem very cooperative, living together, trying to get through the cold’, he said. ‘I think it has potential here to develop into a very wonderful community […] that moves off the occupation eventually and maybe closes down the city’. Harvey said he was not sleeping at the site for personal reasons, but said that he ‘always came to meetings of the statement committee’. With a doctoral degree, Harvey was best off financially of all the occupiers I interviewed. Unsurprisingly, he was also politicized prior to joining the occupation. He described himself as a socialist and said that as a professor, ‘Reading Marx’ was one of his ‘favourite classes’ to teach. Harvey lamented the presence of the ‘Ron Paul people’ among the camp, and said he wished for more socialist sentiment. Ron Paul, a Republican congressional representative with strong pro- market, anti-government libertarian views, is an icon among a certain young demographic. In the early days of Occupy Pittsburgh, his supporters’ presence was tangible, despite the community ban on signage promoting specific politicians or parties. Brian, a 23-year-old Caucasian male who worked at a nearby hotel doing ‘corporate audio’, was one avowed ‘Ron Paul person’ I encountered. He carried a poster that read ‘End the Fed’ and wore sneakers imprinted with the Ron Paul logo. ‘I am at Occupy Pittsburgh for the cause of liberty, which was what made America great’, he said. ‘The further we move towards a centrally planned government–economy–culture, we give up the very quality that made America great’. Brian described ‘liberty’ as ‘intoxicat- ing’, and said that ‘if people truly understand [liberty], then I think we can move towards that just and freer society’.

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While Harvey and Brian were explicit in their political views, most occupiers were loath to place themselves in any party or movement. Jefferson, a 57-year-old African American male who worked as a photographer, said that he did not subscribe to any political party. ‘I wouldn’t call myself a democrat, I wouldn’t call myself a socialist’, he said. ‘I’m just a guy who happens to live in a country that’s got serious problems [that] have caused a lot of our weak- nesses’. Likewise, Dmitri, a 64-year-old Caucasian male who subsisted on a veteran’s pension, described his political beliefs tersely as ‘not applicable’. Still, his reasons for joining Occupy were, he said, related to income inequality. ‘That 1% of the population controls 40% of the money just doesn’t sound right to me’, Dmitri said. Since its inception, the Occupy movement has faced accusations of being politically vague. Pundits on the left and right, including TV pundit Bill Maher, political science professor Michael Kazin and Forbes writer Tom Watson, all used the word ‘vague’ in their early assessments of the movement. This was in great contrast to my own experience with Pittsburgh occupiers – for while they universally eschewed candidate endorsements or party politics, their actual political views tended to be pointed and complex. No one to whom I spoke expressed approval of either major party, yet nearly all occupiers held political views that, from an outsider’s perspective, would certainly place them left of centre. Four people mentioned ‘socialism’ or ‘Marx’ in explicating their views; three invoked libertarianism, although two did so in reference to socialism. Yet no occupiers expressed political apathy, and most of them used populist language in describing their reasons for occupying. Leah described herself as ‘as liberal and progressive as possible – like FDR, New Deal, all that’. Jeremy, a 28-year-old Caucasian male who worked in a warehouse – a ‘union job’, he said – described his political views as ‘middle of the road’. Yet Jeremy said he was inspired to join Occupy because he saw the situation ‘getting worse and worse for the working man’. Like Brian, Jeremy also carried a sign that read ‘End the Fed’, a common refrain of ‘Ron Paul’ libertarians. Despite various views, the occupiers did not self-segregate by race, class or political persuasion; however, there were other issues that did result in conflict and division. Several subjects remarked on the division between those who camped and those who only came for the day. Yet many occupiers who worked full-time jobs expressed reluctance to camp because it would interfere with their career. ‘I’ve camped a few nights […] but I have to keep my photography business running’, said Jefferson, but added that he always comes down after work to ‘get what’s going on’. The division between campers and non-campers is related to another imbalance in the camp: that of gender. I noted in my observations that men clearly outnumbered women. Julia, the union organizer who had camped at Occupy Pittsburgh for several nights, was impelled to do so by a female friend who shared a tent with her husband. Julia said that she ‘would never camp alone’, adding that all the women who camped were ‘with someone’. On 9 December 2011 BNY Mellon announced it would be asking protesters to leave Mellon Green by 11 December, and on that day sher- iff deputies arrived to deliver eviction notices to the encampment (Vidonic 2011; Balingit 2011). Yet the camp had already transformed over the week- end, much of it had been dismantled, with only a small cadre of camping protesters remaining. Harvey told me they had ‘changed tactics’ and were planning a ‘week of action’, with daily protests against economic injustice.

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However, this marked the formal end of the semi-permanent community that had existed since 15 October. By 10 December, the day before the eviction notice – which was delayed in court due to legal action on the part of Occupy Pittsburgh – Mellon Green had come to resemble a construction zone, as occupiers raked and restored the trampled ground and took down most of the tents. Remarkably, Occupy Pittsburgh was able to fend off BNY’s lawyers for another two months, bringing the eviction to the appeals court. Ultimately, the occupiers lost their case, and the actual eviction date was set at 7 February 2012 at 11:59 p.m. When I returned on this evening for another round of interviews, I noticed a change in political sentiment. Listening to protesters’ discussions in the main tent, I observed that the political conversation was definitively radical; a group of black-bloc anarchists paraded through the park, waving the anarchist flag. I asked Eric, a 25-year-old Caucasian male who had joined the camp in December, how much political diversity there was in the protest’s current iteration. ‘It’s almost all very left-liberals or radicals, anarchists and socialists’, he said. I mentioned the ‘Ron Paul people’; Eric said that he had not seen any in a long time. Eric described his own views as ‘identified with currents of the radical left’, but eschewed labels, adding that he ‘didn’t like calling himself an anarchist’. Several hours before police were due to enforce the eviction notice, I asked Eric why he thought Occupy Pittsburgh had outlasted most of its peers – many major cities’ protests had been dismantled in coordinated police raids on 15 November 2011 (Walker 2011). ‘I think the city didn’t want to look bad after G20’, Eric said, referring to the riots during the last global economic summit. He mentioned that the Pittsburgh City Council had been quite supportive, unlike many other cities (Harris et al. 2011). After Occupy Pittsburgh lost its physical locus, occupiers continued to organize online, meeting in churches and community centres. Occupy Pittsburgh also began endorsing other groups and movements, a shift from the beginning when the movement purposely isolated itself. Eric noted that the unions let Occupy Pittsburgh meet and organize in their space for free. ‘There’s a very close relationship’, he said. ‘[Unions] do a lot for this movement in terms of providing space and resources’. The relationship between labour and Occupy Pittsburgh amounts to an implicit endorsement of these unions’ goals. On 21 April 2012, I observed a well-attended Occupy Pittsburgh meeting in a local Unitarian church. The meeting, subtitled ‘Where Do We Go From Here?’, consisted of an open round-table discussion over the future of the local movement. The demographics were very different from any previ- ous Occupy sample I had witnessed: almost all of the 35 people in attendance were middle-aged or older, except for three in their twenties. As occupiers went around in a circle and discussed goals and tactics, I noticed their convic- tions were unequivocally leftist/progressive; there were no ‘Ron Paul people’ nor anyone with right-wing views. Some of the topics mentioned in discussion included ‘fighting austerity’, ‘imperialism’, ‘privatization of war’, ‘frack- ing’, ‘fighting cynicism’, ‘independent political organization in communities and neighbourhoods’ and ‘neo-liberalism’. ‘It’s capitalism that has created these differences – race, class, gender. We have to think about new forms of identity’, said one attendee. Paul Le Blanc, another attendee, wrote a summary of the meeting in an article that appeared in Socialist Worker several days later as ‘Possible Futures

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for Occupy’ (Le Blanc 2012). Le Blanc painted Occupy in no uncertain terms as a movement whose ‘fundamental perspective’ was to

… replace the power of the wealthy and oppressive 1 percent with the power of the 99 percent. This power shift from the wealthy few to the great majority of people is a revolutionary goal, and it can only be achieved through the struggles of more and more of the 99 percent for social and economic justice.

3. TIDES OF OCCUPY Occupy Pittsburgh did not exist in a vacuum. Its aims changed via community influence and internal dynamics. Whereas in the initial stages Pittsburgh occupiers were multifarious in their views, the movement eventually became an unequivocally radical one. The proposition that Occupy Pittsburgh is leftist, even socialist, contrasts with the journalistic consensus in the early days of the movement, when many pundits painted its aims as ‘vague’. Likewise, over the course of the movement, Occupy Pittsburgh solidified along left-wing, anti-capitalist lines. In attempting to typify the overall views of Pittsburgh occupiers, it is worth dividing the movement into two stages, initial (fall 2011) and post-reformation (February 2012 and afterwards). In its initial phase, activists were defined by several traits: an aversion to placement in the standard liberal/conserva- tive dichotomy, buoyed by a strong sense of economic injustice. Multiple initial-phase subjects spoke of their politics being ‘not applicable’. It was not an avowed anti-capitalist demonstration; on the contrary, the capitalist-libertarians presented the opposite sentiment. As discussed, capitalist-libertarians were nowhere to be seen in the movement’s post-reformation era. This mirrors depictions of the international movement: journalistic sentiment in 2012 and beyond pegged the movement as left-wing and radical (Weinberg 2011). A group of researchers working concurrently to me made similar conclusions on multiple fronts. A 2013 report titled ‘Changing the Subject: A Bottom-Up Account of Occupy Wall Street in New York City’ and issued by the Joseph F. Murphy Institute for Worker Education and Labor Studies at the City University of New York (CUNY) also utilized convenience interviews during a rally in Manhattan’s Union Square on 1 May 2012. Interviewers asked participants similar questions as I did, querying about subjects’ class, wealth, work and political views. Among other conclusions, the researchers noted that many Occupy Wall Street (OWS) activists were ‘underemployed and/or had recently experienced layoffs’; that they ‘were carrying substantial debt, especially those under 30’; and that ‘most OWS activists and supporters were deeply skeptical of the mainstream political system as an effective vehicle for social change’ (Milkman et al. 2013: 2–4). Additionally, the CUNY researchers noted the structure of the movement as important: ‘OWS was committed to non-hierarchal “horizontalism”’, they write. ‘This organizational form, as well as the structure of the occupation itself, were self-consciously politically prefigurative’ (Milkman et al. 2013: 4). What explains the odd convergence of beliefs and ideas across disparate protests, linked only virtually and textually? I believe the most likely explana- tion is that the movement shared a Marxian structure – specifically that of democratic consensus and horizontalism, as mentioned. The concept of ‘horizontalism’ is of a democratic, leaderless system, essentially direct democracy

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(Milkman et al. 2013: 29–30). Direct democracy embodies very different ideals from western representative democracy, which rewards winning demographics and does not require overwhelming agreement on issues. In comparison to liberal democracy, the inclusive nature of direct democracy is one major ideo- logical difference. Though consensus is a common means of decision-making among smaller organizations and community groups, Occupy may be the first large-scale movement to use it exclusively. Fordham University communications professor Paul Levinson writes that the use of consensus within Occupy Wall Street represents ‘a resurgence of direct democracy not really known since ancient times’ (Wood and Goodale 2011). Others have noted the ‘drawbacks’ of consensus too – namely, that it can ‘take hours to agree on minor points’, and the ‘unity of the message can get diluted’ (International Business Times 2011). Despite these drawbacks, direct democracy is powerful because it encapsulates its own progressive ideology, which likely helped shift the movement’s focus. The assumption behind the use of consensus is that agreement is important, and all voices and beliefs have equal value and weight. Consensus is usually defined as being a general agreement of 90–95% of those present. There is a similarity between these numbers and the ‘99%’/‘1%’ trope adopted by Occupy to describe the imbalance of wealth. The idea of Occupy as a vast majority pitted against a ruling minority asserts itself in both rhetoric and organization. Hence, it seems that Occupy’s progressive political ideology arose partly out of the structural implications of consensus. It is unclear what happened to the politically neutral (or right-wing) faction that was common around Occupy Pittsburgh in 2011. Were they repelled by the increasingly radical politics and union involvement, or did they become radi- calized themselves? Unfortunately, I did not see any of the original subjects in subsequent interviews. However, the presence of older, experienced activists at Occupy Pittsburgh’s April 2012 meeting illustrates how veteran activists have taken leading roles in the local branch, perhaps compelled by Occupy’s new, overtly activist image. That Occupy would evolve into a more leftist or progressive movement may have been foreseeable from the start, when direct democracy was adopted as an internal political system. One legacy of Occupy Pittsburgh – as well as the movement at large – may be the ability of a movement’s organizational structure to determine its superstructure: while a system like direct democracy may seem void of inherent political ideology, it encapsulates and even reinforces certain progressive ideas about multiculturalism, unity and egalitarianism.

REFERENCES Alternet (2011), ‘Occupy Wall Street, Other Corporate Greed Protests Spread to 951 Cities Across the World’, Alternet, 15 October 2011, http://www. alternet.org/newsandviews/article/680789/occupy_wall_street,_other_ corporate_greed_protests_spread_to_951_cities_across_the_world. Accessed 8 May 2012. Anderson, B. (1991), Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism, London: Verso Books. Balingit, M. (2011), ‘Occupy Pittsburgh and BNY Mellon in court Dec. 22’, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, 14 December 2011. Belser, Ann (2012), ‘Pennsylvania slips to 14th in its union membership’, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, 17 February 2012.

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Davis, Larry E., Bangs, Ralph, Wallace, John, Crawley, Daria C., Constance- Huggins, Monique, Gilkey, So’Nia, Hannon, Haleigh, Newman, Michael and Thornton, Jennifer (2007), Pittsburgh’s Racial Demographics: Differences and Disparities, Rep. Center on Race and Social Problems, School of Social Work, University of Pittsburgh, http://www.crsp.pitt.edu/publications/ Demographics_Complete.pdf. Accessed 25 March 2013. Florida, Richard (2002), ‘The rise of the creative class’, Washington Monthly, 1 May, http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2001/0205.florida. html. Accessed 5 March 2013. Gangewere, Robert J. (2001), The Bridges of Pittsburgh and Allegheny County, Pittsburgh: Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh. Harris, Darlene, and Pittsburgh City Council (2011), ‘City Council Proclamation’, 14 November, City Clerk’s Office, City of Pittsburgh, http:// legistar.city.pittsburgh.pa.us/meetings/2011/11/6599_M_City_Council_11- 11–14_Regular_Meeting_Minutes.pdf. Accessed 5 March 2013. Hedges, Chris (2011), ‘Finding freedom in handcuffs: common dreams’, Home | Common Dreams, https://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/11/07-0. Accessed 10 December 2011. International Business Times (2011), ‘Occupy Wall Street Protests: A Fordham University Professor Analyzes the Movement’, International Business Times, 4 October, http://www.ibtimes.com/occupy-wall-street-protests-fordham- university-professor-analyzes-movement-321066. Accessed 24 July 2013. Kazin, Michael (2011), ‘Anarchism now: Occupy Wall Street revives an ideology’, The New Republic, 7 November, http://www.newrepublic.com/article/politics/97114/anarchy-occupy-wall-street-throwback. Accessed 8 May 2012. Kelly, Michael (1995), ‘The road to paranoia’, The New Yorker, 19 June, pp. 60–70, http://www.newyorker.com/archive/1995/06/19/1995_06_19_0 60_TNY_CARDS_000370096. Accessed 5 March 2013. Keneally, Meghan (2011), ‘Who are the 99%? Demographics of Occupy Wall Street protesters show they aren’t all unemployed liberals’, Daily Mail, 22 October, http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2052078/Occupy- Wall-Street-protesters-The-99-arent-unemployed-liberals.html. Accessed 5 March 2013. Le Blanc, Paul (2012), ‘Possible futures for Occupy’, Socialist Worker, 9 May, http://socialistworker.org/2012/04/26/possible-futures-for-occupy. Accessed 8 May 2012. Madden, Janice F. (2000), Changes in Income Inequality within U.S. Metropolitan Areas, Kalamazoo, MI: W.E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research. Milkman, Ruth, Luce, Stephanie and Lewis, Penny (2013), Changing the Subject: A Bottom-Up Account of Occupy Wall Street in New York City, 29 January, Joseph F. Murphy Institute for Worker Education and Labor Studies at the City University of New York, http://sps.cuny.edu/filestore/1/5/7/1_a05051 d2117901d/1571_92f562221b8041e.pdf. Accessed 13 March 2013. Nunberg, Geoff (2011), ‘“Occupy”: Geoff Nunberg’s 2011 Word Of The Year’, Washington DC: NPR (National Public Radio), http://www.npr. org/2011/12/07/143265669/occupy-geoff-nunbergs-2011-word-of-the- year. Accessed 10 December 2011. Occupy Pittsburgh (2011), ‘Statement on Representation | Occupy Pittsburgh’, Occupy Pittsburgh | Standing Together Against Corporate Greed, http:// www.occupypittsburgh.org/content/statement-representation. Accessed 10 December 2011.

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Occupy Wall Street: NYC General Assembly (2011), ‘Declaration of the Occupation of New York City’, 29 September, http://www.nycga.net/ resources/documents/declaration/. Accessed 18 April 2012. Vidonic, Bill (2011), ‘BNY Mellon can post lawsuit against Occupy Pittsburgh at Park’, Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, 13 December, http://triblive.com/x/ pittsburghtrib/news/breaking/s_771794.html. Accessed 14 December 2011. Walker, Jade (2011), ‘Zuccotti Park eviction: NYPD orders Occupy Wall Street protesters to temporarily evacuate park’, The Huffington Post, 15 November, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/11/15/zuccotti-park- evacuation_n_1094164.html. Accessed 8 May 2012. Watson, Tom (2012), ‘#Occupy Wall Street: New York’s hottest tourist destination?’, Forbes Magazine, 21 April, http://www.forbes.com/sites/ tomwatson/2012/04/21/occupy-wall-street-new-yorks-hottest-tourist- destination/. Accessed 2 May 2012. Weinberg, Bill (2011), ‘Occupy Wall Street: Yes, we are anti-capitalist!’, The Villager, 22 November, http://thevillager.com/2011/11/22/occupy-wall- street-yes-we-are-anti-capitalist/. Accessed 5 March 2013. Wood, D. and Goodale, G. (2011), ‘Does “Occupy Wall Street” have leaders? Does it need any?’, Christian Science Monitor, 10 October 2011, http:// www.csmonitor.com/USA/Politics/2011/1010/Does-Occupy-Wall-Street- have-leaders-Does-it-need-any. Accessed 12 May 2012.

SUGGESTED CITATION Spencer, K. (2014), ‘Societies of Occupy: Scenes from occupied Pittsburgh’, Journal of Urban Cultural Studies, 1: 1, pp. 155–165, doi: 10.1386/jucs.1.1.155_1

CONTRIBUTOR DETAILS Keith Spencer is a recent graduate of the Master of Arts in Literary and Cultural Studies at Carnegie Mellon University. His research centres on cultural studies/informed analysis of social movements, education policy and popular culture. His writing has been published in Dissent and Full Stop magazines. A portion of his study of Occupy was presented previously at the Modern Language Association 2013 conference in Boston. Contact: Department of Literary and Cultural Studies, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 15213, USA. E-mail: [email protected]

Keith Spencer has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the author of this work in the format that was submitted to Intellect Ltd.

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