WHY WE DO NOT MAKE DEMANDS

From Occupy to Ferguson: Whenever a new grassroots movement emerges, experts criticize the lack of clear demands. Why don't protesters combine their goals into a unified program? Why are there no representatives who can negotiate with those in power to advance concrete ideas about institutional paths? Why can't these movements express themselves in familiar language and with appropriate decorum?

This is often the insidious rhetoric of those who want movements to be limited to civilized appeals. When we pursue a plan that they would rather not accept, they declare it irrational or incoherent. Compare last year's People's Climate March, which united 400,000 people behind a simple message and involved so little protest that police didn't even have to arrest a single person, with the Baltimore Riots beginning in April 2015. Many praised the Climate March while deriding the Baltimore riots as irrational, ruthless and ineffective; However, the Climate March had little concrete impact, while the riots in Baltimore forced prosecutors to indict an unprecedented number of police officers. You can rely on this: If 400,000 people reacted to climate change the way a few thousand reacted to the murder of Freddie Gray, politicians would set their priorities differently.

Even those who demand demands with the best of intentions tend to misunderstand lack of demands as a failure rather than a strategic decision. Today's movements without demands are not an expression of political immaturity - they are pragmatic answers to the impasse of the entire political system.

If it were so easy for those in power to comply with the demands of protesters, one might think we would see more of it. In reality, from Obama to Syriza, not even the greatest idealists were able to keep their election promises. The fact that Freddie Gray's murderers were charged in the wake of the Baltimore Riots suggests that the only way to move forward is to finally break with appellative politics.

The problem is not the lack of demands from today's movements; the problem is the politics of demands themselves. If we want structural change, we should not take part in the game played by the powerful through parliamentary channels. We should stop making demands and start setting goals.

Even if you only plan to make demands, you'll put yourself in a weaker negotiating position if you say from the start what the minimum is to satisfy you. No skilled negotiator starts with concessions. It's wiser to appear irreconcilable: So you want to come to an agreement? Make a suggestion. Meanwhile, we're here, blocking the federal highway and burning something down.

There is no better leverage in negotiations than the ability to achieve the things we long for directly past official institutions - the true meaning of direct action. Whenever we succeed, those in power scramble to offer us everything that we had previously asked for in vain. For example, abortion in the USA was only legalized (through the court decision in Roe vs. Wade) after groups like the Jane Collective had made it possible for tens of thousands of women to have affordable abortions through self-organized collectives.

Of course, those who are in a position to directly implement the changes they long for do not need to make demands of anyone - and the sooner they realize this, the better. Remember Bosnia: government buildings were burned down there in February 2014 and meetings were then called to make demands on the government. A year later, the people got nothing for their efforts except criminal charges and the government was once again as stable and corrupt as ever.

The general view is that a movement needs demands to hold itself together: without demands it would be diffuse, fleeting, ineffective.

People who have different demands or none at all can still build collective power together. If we understand movements as spaces of exchange, coordination, and action, it is easy to imagine how a single movement can promote a variety of intentions. The more horizontal it is structured, the more it should be able to pursue a variety of goals.

In fact, in principle all movements are tainted by internal conflicts over how they are structured and how they prioritize their goals. The demand for demands usually arises as a power struggle by those most involved in the dominant institutions to delegitimize those who would rather empower themselves than simply make requests of those in power. This distorts real political differences as mere disorganization and real opposition to the ruling structures as political naivety.

Forcing a diverse movement to reduce its intentions to a few specific demands inevitably consolidates power in the hands of a minority. Who decides which demands are important? Most of the time, these are the same groups of people who have disproportionate power elsewhere in society: rich, predominantly white professionals, skilled in dealing with institutions and mass media. In the name of efficiency, the marginalized are being pushed back to the margins in their own movements.

However, hardly any movement has ever been more effective. A movement with room for diversity can grow; a movement based on uniformity withers. A movement that integrates a diversity of ideas is flexible, unpredictable; it is difficult to deceive them, difficult to wrest autonomy from their actors in exchange for a few concessions. A movement that focuses on uniformity through reduction. is forced to constantly marginalize parts by subordinating their needs and concerns.

A movement that encompasses a variety of perspectives and critiques can develop broader and more varied strategies than a campaign reduced to one aspect. Forcing everyone to agree to a set of demands is strategically unwise: even if it works, it doesn't work.

In this ever-changing world, demands can be outdated before the campaign really gets going. In response to the murder of Michael Brown, reformists called for police to be equipped with body cameras - but before that campaign was fully underway, a grand jury announced that Eric Garner, Michael Brown's murderer, would not be indicted, even though the murder was filmed.

»OK, a lot of things upset you - who doesn't? But tell us, what solution do you propose?”

The demand for specific details is understandable. It's no use just blowing off steam; what matters is changing the world. But significant change requires far more than the minor adjustments that those in power would easily allow. If we act as if there are simple solutions to the problems we are confronted with, in order to make ourselves no less “pragmatic” than the experts on what exists, we are paving the way for our failure, regardless of whether our demands are met or not. This breeds disappointment and inaction long before we have developed the collective capacity to address the root of the problem.

Especially for those of us who believe that the fundamental problem of our society is the unequal distribution of power and influence - rather than the need for this or that political correction - it is a mistake to promise easy remedies in a vain attempt to legitimize ourselves. It is not our job to present finished solutions for the masses to applaud on the sidelines; Let's leave that to the demagogues. Rather, our challenge is to create spaces in which solutions can be discussed and directly implemented on a permanent and collective basis. Instead of proposing fake solutions, we should spread new practices. We don't need blueprints, just a starting point.

Movements based on specific demands collapse once those demands are overtaken by reality, while the problems they sought to address remain. Even from a reformist perspective, it makes more sense to build movements around the issues they address rather than specific solutions.

On the other hand, it is doubtful that the dominant institutions could grant most of what we want, even if those in power had hearts of gold. No corporate initiative will stop climate change; no government agency will stop surveillance of the population; no police force will end the privilege of white people. Only nongovernmental organization (NGO) organizers cling to the illusion that these things are possible—probably because their jobs depend on it.

A strong enough movement could deal blows to industrial environmental destruction, government surveillance, and institutionalized white supremacy, but only if it does not limit itself to mere supplication. Demand-based politics limits all scope for change to reforms that lie within the logic of the existing order, marginalizes us and forever pushes real change into an unattainable distance.

It makes no sense to ask those in power for things that they cannot grant even if they wanted to. Likewise, we should not give them the excuse that they need to gain even more power than they already have in order to meet our demands.

Our only demand: don't mess with us!

It is an old tradition for non-profit organizations and left-wing coalitions to present demands that they know will never be approved: stop tax tricks, money for people instead of banks, phase out coal now, financial markets must be geared to the interests of the poorest, stop rainforest deforestation. In exchange for brief audiences with bureaucrats who have to answer questions from more sophisticated actors, they soften their demands and get their more recalcitrant colleagues to behave. This is what they call pragmatism.

Such an approach may not achieve its intended purpose, but it does accomplish one thing: it consolidates a narrative in which existing institutions are the only conceivable agents of change. This, in turn, paves the way for more inconclusive campaigns, additional electoral spectacles in which new candidates for office deceive young idealists, additional years of paralysis in which the average person can only imagine exercising power through the mediation of a party or organization. Rewind the tape and play it again.

Proper self-determination is not something that those in power can grant us. We must develop it by building on our own strengths and placing ourselves at the center of the narrative as story actors.

At the beginning of a movement, when participants do not yet have a sense of their collective potential, they may not yet realize how profound the changes they want really are. If demands are formulated at this stage, it can inhibit the movement and limit the ambition and imagination of those involved. Prioritizing limiting or diluting goals early on also increases the likelihood of this happening again and again.

Imagine if the Occupy movement in the USA had initially made concrete demands - would it still have served as an open space in which so many people could meet, develop their analysis and radicalize? Or would it have ended up as a single protest camp, concerned only with criticizing individual corporations, austerity measures and perhaps the Federal Reserve? For the goals of a movement, it is better to develop with the movement itself, proportional to its strength.

In practice, uniting a movement behind specific demands usually means appointing spokespeople to negotiate on behalf of the movement. Even if they are selected “democratically” based on their dedication and experience, they cannot prevent this role from developing interests that differ from those of the other protagonists.

To maintain their credibility as negotiators, speakers must be able to pacify or isolate those who do not support their agreements. This gives ambitious leaders an incentive to show that they can dominate the movement in the hope of landing at the negotiating table. Especially the brave souls whose uncompromising actions gave the movement its influence are now meeting career activists who joined them afterwards and tell them what they have to do - or even deny that they belong to the movement. This drama unfolded in Ferguson in August 2014, when sections of the population who had built the movement through confrontation with the police were vilified by politicians and public figures as outsiders who were exploiting the movement to engage in criminal activity. The exact opposite was the case: outsiders tried to hijack the movement sparked by honorable illegal activities in order to re-legitimize the old institutions of authority.

In the long run, this kind of pacification can only lead to the demise of a movement. This explains the ambiguous relationship that most leaders have with the movements they represent: in order to be useful to those in power, they must be able to restrain their followers, but their service would not be necessary at all if the movement posed no threat. Hence the strange mixture of militant rhetoric and practical obstruction that often characterizes such people: their dogs should bark but not bite...

Reforms exist to stabilize and preserve the status quo, to break the momentum of a social movement and to ensure that pervasive change does not occur. Granting small concessions can serve to divide a strong movement and cause less committed participants to leave or knowingly turn a blind eye to the repression of the indomitable. Such small victories are only granted because those in power see them as the best way to avoid major changes.

In times of turmoil, when everything is up for grabs, one way to defuse a burgeoning revolt is to accept the demands before the revolt has time to escalate. Sometimes this appears to be a real victory - as in Slovenia in 2013, when two months of protests toppled the government. That ended the riots before they could address the systemic problems that went far deeper than who was in power that gave rise to them. Another government came to power while the protesters were still dazed by their success - and everything went back to business as usual.

During the buildup to the 2011 revolution in Egypt, Mubarak repeatedly offered what protesters had demanded days before; But as the situation on the streets worsened, those involved became more and more unforgiving. If Mubarak had offered more earlier, he might still be in power today. Certainly, the revolution in Egypt ultimately failed not because it asked for too much, but because the changes were not profound enough: by deposing the dictator while leaving the army and the “deep state” infrastructure untouched, the revolutionaries left the gates open for new despots to consolidate the power. For a successful revolution, they would have had to have destroyed the structure of the state itself while everyone was still on the streets and there was still room for maneuver. “The people demand the fall of the regime” provided a simple platform around which many could rally, but did not prepare them to take on the regimes that followed.

It only worked in Egypt because they didn't just demand

In 2013 in Brazil, the MPL (Movimento Passe Livre) helped expand massive protests against increases in bus and train fares; This is one of the few current examples of a movement that has had its demands met. Millions took to the streets and the 20 cent increase was withdrawn. Activists from Brazil wrote and spoke about the importance of concrete and achievable demands in order to gradually grow through success. Next, they hoped to force the government to make public transportation free.

Why was your campaign against the fare increase successful? At the time, Brazil was one of the few nations experiencing an economic boom; it profited from the Great Depression by withdrawing funds from the unstable North American market. Elsewhere - in Greece, Spain and even the USA - governments, like the anti-austerity protesters, had their backs to the wall. The rulers could not meet the demands even if they had wanted to. It was not for lack of concrete demands that no other movement was able to achieve such concessions.

Barely a year and a half later, when the streets had emptied and the police had re-established their power, the government announced another wave of fare increases - this time more drastic. The MPL had to start from scratch. This shows that capitalism cannot be overcome one reform at a time.

Protests against fare increases in Brazil: concrete demands, but a Sisyphean struggle.

Even if you only want to make a few small adjustments within the status quo, setting structural change as a goal is a smarter strategy. We often have to aim for much higher goals in order to achieve small, concrete concerns. Those who refuse to compromise confront those in power with the annoying alternative of dealing with the reformists. Someone will always be willing to take on the role of negotiator - but the more people refuse, the better the negotiator's position will become. The classic example of this is the relationship between Martin Luther King, Jr. and Malcolm X: without the threat created by Malcolm King to negotiate.

For those of us who want truly radical change, there is no gain in watering down our desires for the public. The Overton Window – the range of possibilities that appear politically feasible – is determined not by those at the supposed center of the political spectrum, but by the outsiders. The broader the field of positions, the more scope for action opens up. Others may not immediately join you if you take a fringe position, but when others see you consistently defend that position, they are more likely to be encouraged to act more ambitiously themselves.

In purely pragmatic terms, those who embrace a variety of tactics, even when it comes to achieving smaller victories, are stronger than those who seek to limit themselves and others and exclude those who refuse to be limited. However, from a long-term strategy perspective, the most important thing is not whether we achieve a particular immediate outcome, but how each battle positions us for the next round. If we forever put aside the questions we really want to ask, the right moment will never come. We don't just have to win concessions; we need to develop skills.

Perhaps the most compelling argument for making concrete demands is this: If we don't do it, others will take them up - and hijack the momentum of our raising to advance their own agendas. What if people rally around a liberal-reformist platform or, as in many parts of Europe today, around right-wing nationalist content because we fail to make demands?

This clearly illustrates the danger of failing to convey our visions of change to the people we share the street with. It is a mistake to expand our tactics without talking about our goals, as if every confrontation inevitably moves toward liberation. In Ukraine, where the same tensions and momentum that produced the Arab Spring and Occupy in the United States provoked a nationalist revolution and civil war, we now see how even fascists can use our organizational and tactical models for their own purposes.

But that is hardly an argument for making demands on those in power. On the other hand, if we always hide our radical desires behind a reformist facade for fear of losing a broad audience, those who want real change will run into the arms of those who are the only ones visibly challenging the status quo: nationalists and fascists.

We need to clearly articulate what we want and how we want to achieve it. Not to impose our methods on everyone, as authoritarians do, but to provide an opportunity and an example for all those who seek a way forward. Not to offer a demand, but because this is the opposite of a demand: we want self-determination, something that no one can give us.

Graffiti in London (2012), which takes up a saying from May 1968 in Paris

The way we analyze, organize and fight – it should speak for itself. It should serve as an invitation to join us in a different way of doing politics, based on direct action rather than supplication. The people in Ferguson and Baltimore who responded to the murders of Michael Brown and Freddie Gray by attacking the police have brought more pressure to bear on the issue of police violence than decades of pleas for greater civil society oversight of the police. By taking space and redistributing resources, we circumvent the pointless, cumbersome machinery of representation. If we're going to make a demand to those in power, it's a simple one: Don't mess with us.

Instead of demanding, we should set goals. The difference is that we set goals on our own terms, at our own pace, as opportunities present themselves. They do not have to be in the interests of the prevailing order and their realization does not depend on the goodwill of the authorities. The essence of reformism is that even if you win something, you have no control over it. We should develop the power to operate on our own terms, regardless of the institutions we take on. This is a long-term project, and an urgent one.

By pursuing and achieving our goals, we develop the potential to set ourselves higher goals. This is in stark contrast to how reformist movements collapse when their demands are realized or presented as unrealistic. Our movements will be stronger if they can accommodate a variety of goals, as long as they are not openly contradictory. When we understand our respective goals, we can see where it makes sense to work together and where it doesn't - a clarity that wouldn't come if we settled for the lowest common denominator.

From this perspective, not making demands is not necessarily a sign of political immaturity. On the contrary, it can be a wise refusal to fall into the same traps that robbed previous generations of agency. Let us experience our own strength outside the cages and queues of representative politics - beyond the politics of demands.

Perhaps the moral of the story (and the hope of the world) lies in what one demands, not from others, but from oneself.

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