The Winter of Our Discontent Session 2 Ultimate Goals The New School
The New York Institute for the Humanities at NYU, together with the New School will be co-hosting a public symposium on the Occupy movement and the current state of the Left in the United States. Billed under the banner of “The Winter of our Discontent,” it will hold lengthy sessions touching on the wider interlocking themes of long-term goals, short-term tactics and the possible means of social change. Among the participants are Verso authors Marina Sitrin and Rebecca Solnit, both of whom contributed to Occupy! Scenes from an Occupied America, Verso and n+1’s in-depth coverage and analysis of the Occupy movements. They will be appearing on Saturday alongside a number of other activists, political organizers and academics who have been deeply engaged in the Occupy movements and other projects helping promote democratic and social change. Included among the speakers are Todd Gitlin, James Miller and Jonathan Schell, as well as David Graeber and Lawrence Weschler.
THE WINTER OF OUR DISCONTENT
Stepping Back, Taking Stock, and Gazing Forward in the Wake of Occupy Wall Street
SATURDAY FEBRUARY 11, 2012, 1pm – 6pm
Tishman Auditorium at The New School
66 West 12th Street, NYC
The abolition of the state in favor of something more directly participatory — or rather the strengthening of a state in which elected representatives insure universal health care, equal educational opportunity, environmental norms, and so forth? The abolition of capitalism — or else the elaboration of new forms of mixed economy (regulation of markets and financial institutions in order to promote social justice and reverse the polarization of wealth; forging new attitudes towards growth, productivity and consumption in the context of climate change; etc.)?
Initial Statement: DAVID GRAEBER
Respondents: TODD GITLIN, TERESA GHILARDUCCI, MARINA SITRIN
Participants include:
– James Miller, professor of Politics and chair of Liberal Studies at The New School for Social Research, SDS veteran, author of Democracy is in the Streets: From Port Huron to the Siege of Chicago, and a co-convener (with Lawrence Weschler) of this symposium.
– Stephen Lerner, Washington, D.C.-based labor and community organizer, till recently with the Service Employees International Union where he led its Justice for Janitors campaign.
– Yotam Marom, a political organizer, educator, and writer based in New York, a veteran of Occupy Wall Street’s Zuccotti Park occupation, and member of the Organization for a Free Society.
– Jonathan Schell, formerly with the New Yorker, more recently with The Nation Institute, Toms Dispatch and Yale University, author of The Fate of the Earth and The Unconquerable World: Power, Nonviolence and the Will of the People.
– Rebecca Solnit, longtime San Francisco-based anti-globalization activist and author of Hope in the Dark: Untold Histories, Wild Possibilities, and A Paradise Built in Hell: The Extraordinary Communities that Arise in Disaster.
– Lawrence Weschler, director of The New York Institute for the Humanities at NYU, author of The Passion of Poland, Vermeer in Bosnia, and Uncanny Valley: Adventures in the Narrative, and a co-convener (with James Miller) of this symposium.
This symposium is co-sponsored by The New School and NYU’s New York Institute for the Humanities.