Occupying Wall Street: An Inevitable Consequence of Uncontrolled Deregulation - by Azeem Ibrahim

According to Guardian writer David Graeber, the young people protesting in the financial districts of cities all over the United States are there "to reclaim the future." Young, educated and unemployed (or underemployed), the protesters are reacting to "the results of colossal social failure." Their banners say they are against corporate greed, unfair taxation, loss of trust in the government and the economy, but like similar movements across the Middle East and Europe, Occupy Wall Street represents a widespread revolt against the failure of global economic justice.

Unchecked capitalism has failed to provide a viable, sustainable system that includes the younger generation. Above all, its leaders have shown a dangerous failure of imagination by allowing international finance to destroy the social contract between the governing and the governed.

Britain and the United States have suffered for the last thirty years from the effects of uncontrolled deregulation, with a brutal loss of jobs and the elites turning away from core civic values in the pursuit of profit. Corporate greed has exacerbated social and financial inequality and corporate money has distorted politics, particularly in the U.S., where corporations are now deemed to be "people" with freedom of speech, that is, freedom to buy congressional seats. European politics, too, have lurched from one financial scandal to the next, and there too the fabric of social democracy is showing signs of wear.

For more: Azeem Ibrahim: Occupying Wall Street: An Inevitable Consequence of Uncontrolled Deregulation