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Harvard Students Walk Out of EC 10 in Solidarity with ‘Occupy’

1946-1989, 2011-Present, Authority, Consciousness Raising, Date, Defining the Enemy, Disruptive Spaces, Evasion, Students, Subjectives of Refusal, Tactics of Disruption, The Workplace, Uncategorized, Urban Spaces

On November 3, 2011, 70 students at Harvard University, a well-respected Ivy League research institution, walked out of their Economics 10 course. The course, taught by Professor Gregory Mankiw, has the highest enrollment of any course at the University, with well over 700 participants. Mankiw is also an esteemed professor whom many others at various universities globally rely on for course material and textbooks. Students felt the course was symbolic of the economic ideology that led to the 2008 financial crisis and collapse, regarding Mankiw as supportive of conservatism. Students claimed the course too heavily asserted conservative economic claims as facts, referencing the course as “indoctrinating” and discouraging diverse viewpoints. According to those who walked out, part of the discontent with Economics 10 stems from what they say is the limited number of opportunities to express skepticism toward the material taught in the course.
Rachel Sandalow-Ash, a freshman at the time and co-organizer of the walkout, described graduates’ complicit nature, claiming their aid in many injustices in recent years. She describes that the desire of the organizers was to use their education for good and not personal gain. Students around Boston walked out at 12:30 p.m., protesting cuts to public education spending and skyrocketing student debts. She describes the issues had a greater impact on students at public universities, and the walkout was an effort to sympathize and present their solidarity with other students. While the walkout was certainly disruptive and emphasized their discontent with the bias embedded within Mankiw’s teachings, the convoluted argument encompassing Harvard course material as well as global economic crisis impacts on students made it very difficult to measure its success.

Who pays the price? Amazon’s AI Gamble

Uncategorized

30,000 Amazon corporate layoffs in 4 months

$200 billion planned in Amazon AI infrastructure spend in 2026

1,000+ Amazon workers who signed the petition against AI rollout

How beneficial is AI? How harmful is AI? Two questions, economists lack answers for due to the constant evolution of the economy, job markets, and society, but corporations implementing–and now forcing– AI usage must see some future benefit, right? A guardian publication in March 2026 revealed what many inside Amazon already knew: the company’s push to embed AI into every corner of its operations is not delivering the “productivity miracle” its executives promised. Dina, a software developer, was hired in 2024 to write code for Amazon’s software, program flaws, and fix bugs, but now her labor has shifted gears into tasking AI to do her work for her, and fixing its mistakes. The deskilling of labor has been prevalent throughout society, where corporations hire employees to do labor below their capacity, failing to maximize their employees’ time and labor. Many workers now, with the implementation of AI into their fields, have faced similar circumstances, and are now practically training AI to replace them, sparking concern among workers fearing replacement. Employees like Dina are not fulfilling the responsibilities initially assigned to them; they’re practically preparing to be replaced, training AI to do their jobs for them. While in the end, this could substantially decrease costs for corporations, allowing them to increase profit greatly, it sparks concern for the social consequences. Amazon has laid off 30,000 corporate workers in four months while its CEO pledges $200 billion in AI infrastructure spending in 2026 alone, being deliberately vague about the connection, describing that the layoffs are both AI-driven and not AI-driven. What is especially alarming about this disruption is not just the scale of job loss, but is rapidity and character. These jobs are not low-skill or easily replaceable but are roles of data analysts and software engineers–people who spent years acquiring complex technical expertise– now deskilling their labor to train AI to perform their functions, just to be laid off in the next round of cuts. The economic disruption this creates is profound. Whole career pipelines are severed when entry-level roles are disappearing, and demanding jobs are replaced by AI that can not replicate them.

Compounding this is the creeping surveillance architecture that Amazon has built around AI adoption. It is a creeping surveillance architecture that Amazon has built around AI adoption. Managers now have dashboards tracking which employees use AI tools and how often; promotion documents include questions about AI leverage; and the company’s daily check-in system — once used to gauge employee wellbeing — has been retooled to monitor AI usage frequency. Scholars of labor have a name for what Amazon is doing: importing the algorithmic management model pioneered in its warehouses and delivery networks into its white-collar workforce. The same performance metrics, the same minute-by-minute visibility into worker behavior, the same implicit threat of replacement if the numbers don’t satisfy. As Nick Srnicek, author of Platform Capitalism, put it, rushed AI deployment inevitably means expanded surveillance because “these tools increasingly require detailed knowledge of personal workflows and data.”

The disruption extends well beyond the workforce. The pledge to spend $200 billion on AI infrastructure represents a massive bet on data centers, facilities that are among the most energy-demanding and intrusive ever built. The amount of artificial intelligence needed requires enormous amounts of electricity and water, reliant on fossil fuel extraction, perpetuating the incoming effects of climate change as sustainable measures have yet to be implemented. The bitter irony is that the AI tools being deployed to boost productivity are doing practically the opposite and reducing it, meaning the environental cost is being paid for productivity that is not materializing. Burning the planet to generate code that can be made by a high educated intellectual human. To further this, when workers are replaced, and if in the long-run this turns to be profitable for corporations like Amazon, the massive drop in employment, leading to less circulation and increased accumulation amongst the already wealthy, will decrease spending, paralleling ideas that led to the 2008 recession. Ultimately, the increased reliance on technology, even given the abundance of capable workers, will have immensely disruptive social, economic and environmental impacts, that in turn cause large-scale global disaster.

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The Port Huron Statement (1962)

1946-1989, Authority, Consciousness Raising, Date, Defining the Enemy, Self Institution, Strike, Students, Subjectives of Refusal, Subjects Redefined, Tactics of Disruption, Uncategorized, Workers

The Port Huron Statement served as the first official statement of the Students for a Democratic Society and was an extension of a draft statement written by an SDS staffer, Tom Hayden. This document serves as an excellent call to action in a time of great societal upheaval. While the world was turning upside down due to a number of events, this group of students was attempting to outline the flaws of general society in their efforts to gain control over life’s unfortunate circumstances. Throughout the document, the author(s) discuss how the newfound world order in the 60’s was to address societal fears about the world’s affairs, which were to dominate. The goal of this society and statement was to prove to a younger generation that democratic systems were attainable. While this is a rather peaceful form of disruption in the way that it was calling for a return to an older, more democratic society, it is disruptive all the same in the way that it pushed back against the ever increasing societal understanding that violence and domination were the only ways to combat the fears and apprehensions of the age.

Our work is guided by the sense that we may be the last generation in the experiment with living.

The dominant institutions are complex enough to blunt the minds of their potential critics and entrenched enough to swiftly dissipate or entirely repel the energies of protest and reform, thus limiting human expectancies. Then, too, we are a materially improved society, and by our own improvements, we seem to have weakened the case for further change.

The Port Huron Statement (1962)Download

Revealing Division: The Philadelphia Shirtwaist Strike, the Jewish Community and Republican Machine Politics, 1909-1910

1840-1945, Authority, Date, Defining the Enemy, Disruptive Spaces, History, History/Theory, Strike, Subjectives of Refusal, Subjects Redefined, Tactics of Disruption, The Workplace, Uncategorized, Urban Spaces, Workers

“I personally will fight in this strike until after the last morsel of bread that I can buy will pass my lips. I will fight to a finish!” – Alice Sabowitz (15-year-old shirtwaist worker, 1909)

In December 1909, over 7,000 young Jewish immigrant women walked off their jobs in the shirtwaist factories in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The teenagers and young adults refused to come back to the sweatshops they worked in, which fined them for being late, charged them for their own supplies, harassed them by contractors, and paid as little as 50 cents a day.

The strike disrupted every aspect of Philadelphian life. The manufacturers formed a trade association to discredit the strikers, threatening them with blacklisting and eviction. Mayor Reyburn’s administration extended these consequences from the bosses, deploying local police as factory security, attempting to shut down the strikers’ headquarters. The Jewish elite of Philadelphia were conflicted between ethnic loyalty and class interest, but ultimately chose class, failing to support fellow members of their religious organizations. On February 6, 1910, the strike ended with a settlement negotiation. The workers didn’t necessarily win, but they held the line on union recognition, and 15-year-old Alice Sabowitz’s promise to fight to the last morsel of bread proved as true, not an exaggeration. The strikes built a genuinely powerful union, the ILGWU, thriving through the 1910’s and 20s. Wages and conditions improved for garment workers within the decade, but the individual women who brought the motion to fruition were fired, forced out of the industry, or black listed, personally paying the price. The strikes demonstrated the power of immigrant working-class women through sustained discipline against opposition from employers and government, ultimately feeding into the broader labor movement, suffrage organizing, and the political culture that shaped American cities for decades.

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People of Colour (1827)

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On March 23, 1827, an article was published in the Freedom’s Journal, which outlined from the guise of a “Christian Spectator,” the systemic abominations of the slave trade. Published 34 years before the Civil War began, this article outlines one of the many abolitionist perspectives of the period leading up to the war’s institutionalized abolition. While this article is written with a religious background, most of the piece is talking about very specific abominations of the slave trade, with a moral and religious theme residing very faintly in the background. The Freedom’s Journal serves as the first African American-owned and operated newspaper in the United States, and was a collection and public platform for any enslaved individual to speak directly for themselves and advocate directly for their individual and cultural rights. Although many papers and publications before and after the Civil War advocated for the rights ofc enslaved people, this paper was founded on the premise that enslaved people should plead their own cause, arguing that for too long others had advocated for their rights indirectly and spoken on their behalf. This article, with its religious context and publication in a rather unknown journal, still carries a lot of significance when trying to dissect broader themes of the early abolitionist movement(s).

Every American ought to feel that slavery is the opprobrium of the name of liberty.

The right of personal liberty, therefore, is not one which may be lawfully vindicated at all hazards.

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Retreat of the State in the English-Speaking Caribbean: Impacts on Women & Their Responses

1990-2010, 2011-Present, Consciousness Raising, Defining the Enemy, Disruptive Spaces, Institutions, Patriarchy, Subjectives of Refusal, Tactics of Disruption, The Home, The Workplace, Uncategorized, Urban Spaces, Women

“While macroeconomic policies and strategies are put forward as– and are assumed to be– gender-neutral, they often conceal a hidden gender bias with a resultant negative effect on women.”

Tang Nain, 1992

As described by Nain, Caribbean policy formation has placed women at a significant disadvantage compared to their male counterparts. UNICEF studies supported this and recognized that among impoverished communities, women and children were impacted much more disproportionately than men. The Development Alternatives with Women for a New Era called for an understanding of women’s reproductive capacity as well as their gender-specific responsibility of housework and childcare, factors not understood in typical mainstream market understandings. These women also argued that cutbacks in the healthcare sector disproportionately impact female populations due to reproductive care cutbacks. Furthermore, as women are a crucial function in the industry, they were harmed financially by these cutbacks as their hours and wages declined, and many were laid off. This was particularly prominent in Jamaica and Trinidad & Tobago, especially in times of crisis when attempting to settle national debt. In Jamaica and Guyana, rising taxes and fees created significant barriers to women securing education and employment, as education systems were underfunded, also curbing the supply of female teachers, as they made up the majority of educational professionals. In Guyana, the state’s failure to provide potable water placed responsibility on women, as they had to seek out safe water from springs due to their household responsibilities. These policy implications had incredibly uneven consequences on women, sparking unification movements and protests against their implementation. In 1991, at the West Indian Commission, the women’s movement produced a paper calling on the Caribbean governments to quantify women’s work. At the Women’s Economic Conference of 1992, the main issues of structural adjustment were addressed. These women lobbied and protests asserting that the state to prioritize health and education for the entirety of its people. They brought attention to the fact that repaying foreign debt was a more pressing cause than addressing the basic needs of Caribbean women. They argued that consultation with citizens must occur prior to addressing international debt. Joan French, presenter at the Regional Economic Conference, described that the state’s primary responsibility was to ensure the educational, health, recreation, social, and reproductive needs of the population are met wholly. They argued for recognition of the unpaid and overworked labor reserve within women’s households and public spheres, emphasizing focus on humanity, especially during times of crisis. Structural adjustment policies across the Caribbean, particularly in Jamaica, Guyana, and Trinidad and Tobago, disproportionately disrupted women’s lives by cutting healthcare, education, and public services while increasing taxes and debt repayment pressures, intensifying their unpaid domestic burdens and economic insecurity. This inequity sparked organized resistance, as women mobilized to demand recognition of their unpaid labor and to challenge governments’ prioritization of foreign debt over social welfare.

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David Walker’s “Appeal to the Colored Citizens of the World” (1829)

1700-1830s, Black, Defining the Enemy, Subjectives of Refusal, Uncategorized, White Supremacy

David Walker was born a free man in North Carolina on September 28, 1976. He later moved to Boston, where he began writing for the nation’s first African American newspaper. In 1829, while working with this newspaper, he published this Appeal to the Colored Citizens of the World. This appeal was a collection of essays that focused on appealing to the nation’s civic duty, what he believed was an inherent sense of Christianity, and finally, a sense of early black nationalism. While this pamphlet has a unique take on disruption for its use of Christian morals as a call to action, it was effective in its coupling with calls for radical abolitionism and critiques of the founding tenets and members of our nation, such as Thomas Jefferson and the Declaration of Independence.

The whites have always been an unjust, jealous, unmerciful, avaricious and blood-thirsty set of beings, always seeking after power and authority.

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Resistance After Galeano’s Murder in the Zapatista Movement

2011-Present, Authority, Defining the Enemy, Disruptive Spaces, History, History/Theory, Privatization, Subjectives of Refusal, Subjects Redefined, The Workplace, Uncategorized, Urban Spaces, Workers

Raheel Hayats essay looks at an important time for the Zapatista movement. This was after the murder of José Luis Solís López, also known as Galeano in 2014. He was a teacher, with the Zapatistas. State-backed paramilitary forces killed him in Chiapas. They did this as part of a campaign to stop the Zapatistas and other indigenous people from being independent, with the goal to make it easier for companies to take the resources from the area without any problems. The Zapatista movement is still fighting against this. The attack on the school and health clinic showed how the Mexican government uses violence and controls what people see in the media to hurt communities that are trying to be independent. They also get some peasant groups to work with them. The Zapatistas did not fight back with violence, instead they wanted justice to be done in their way. They did not want to use violence like the government. The essay describes how when Subcomandante Marcos appeared to die after Galeano was murdered it was not a sign that the movement was weak, it was proof that the movement was strong. Subcomandante Marcos was a person who helped tell people outside of the movement what was going on. He was also getting in the way of people seeing the real heart of the movement, which is made up of a lot of different indigenous people working together. The movement is really about these people, not just, about Subcomandante Marcos. By stepping aside and elevating indigenous leadership, the Zapatistas demonstrated that their power lies not in charismatic figures but in deeply rooted, bottom-up institutions of governance, education, and care, showing that they are stronger than ever as a collective challenge to capitalism, state violence, and neoliberal exploitation. This moment was deeply disruptive because it overturned the state’s expectation that repression, assassination, and the removal of a visible leader would fracture the movement, instead revealing a form of resistance that thrives precisely by refusing hierarchy, spectacle, and violent retaliation.

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On the Genealogy of Morals-First Essay

1840-1945, Authority, Consciousness Raising, Defining the Enemy, History, History/Theory, Tactics of Disruption, Theory, Uncategorized

“In this theory, the origin of the concept ‘Good’ was mistakenly identified, and thus sought in vain, for the judgment ‘Good’ did not originate among those to whom goodness was shown! Rather, it has been the ‘good men’ themselves, that is, the noble, the powerful, those of high degree, the high-minded, who have felt that they themselves were good, and that their actions were good…”

Frederich Nietzsche

The first essay of Nietzsche’s On the Genealogy of Morals destabilizes common assumptions of morality and “goodness” by exposing their social and historical construction rather than their assumed eternal truth. Today, we call compassion, empathy, and selflessness “good”, but where did these notions come from? Nietzsche describes the reality of these definitions of good as being rooted in the historical context of powerless or lower-class individuals revaluing the traits of their oppressors as “evil” (traits like pride, strength, or greed fall into this definition). Similarly, they elevated their conditions of weakness as “good.” Throughout the first essay, Nietzsche deeply analyzes the linguistic and historical roots of these definitions. This genealogical approach and tracing of historical uses of these terms disrupts the reader’s moral certainty through the assertion that our deeply rooted values and ethical convictions stem from reactive emotion rather than from any objective, factual, or concrete foundation. Ultimately, Nietzsche does not only critique morality, but exposes the unstable rooting of “good” and “evil”, revealing the traditional idea of “goodness” as disguised resentment rather than its more common positive interpretation and usage. Nietzsche urges readers to critically engage and understand the limitations of language in encompassing hierarchies and values, leaving the reader to question their own moral judgment and if the gravitational pull of power, history, and self-interest is escapable.

bell hooks’ “Ending Female Sexual Oppression” (1984)

1946-1989, Date, Defining the Enemy, Patriarchy, Subjectives of Refusal, Uncategorized, Women

This chapter rejects both traditional sexual repression and uncritical models of sexual “liberation.” This idea disrupts the assumption that sexuality should conform to male-centered standards of dominance, availability, and compulsory heterosexuality. This shift in ideology threatens social stability because it questions long-standing beliefs that women’s bodies exist for male access, that sexual activity is a social obligation, and that heterosexuality is the natural/superior norm. hooks shows that confronting sexual oppression also exposes divisions within feminism itself, particularly when rigid ideas about “politically correct” sexuality alienate large numbers of women. Ultimately, the movement’s power lies in its insistence on redefining sexuality as a site of choice, autonomy, and mutual respect, rather than coercion—an approach that challenges cultural, institutional, and interpersonal systems built on sexual control and inequality.

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Sidi M. Omar on the Preservation of Colonialism

2011-Present, Authority, Black, Colonized, Defining the Enemy, Disruptive Spaces, History/Theory, Imperialism, Indigenous, Latino, Subjectives of Refusal, The Workplace, Uncategorized, Urban Spaces, White Supremacy

Postcolonial theory challenges the proposition of colonialism as a closed chapter of history. It insists that political systems, economic dependencies, and even a structure of knowledge production persist in continuing colonial power structures. Sidi M. Omar’s work exposes how colonial domination carries on currently, a lot more than most people may think or know. Omar’s scholarship deals with Western Sahara, one of the world’s longest-standing unresolved colonial situations. While often framed as a territorial “dispute,” Omar disrupts this framing by naming what that is: an ongoing process of colonial occupation. From a postcolonial perspective, this re-naming is important. It reveals how colonial powers keep control, not just through force, but through language, law, and selective recognition on the world stage. Often, categories of Developed vs Undeveloped, First vs Third World, and Global North vs South are used to describe economic status groupings of nations based on GDP, another example of frequent renaming with the intent to be politically correct, but always falling short. The constant renaming of developmental statuses becomes redundant and meaningless as there are no terms that can fully encapsulate the lived reality of an entire place–much less a whole country. This goes for the use of GDP as well, as it can never be an all-encompassing measure of development, as it fails to account for many other factors that contribute to growth, development, productivity, the economy, and more.

A central contribution of Omar’s work is his critique of those international institutions that claim neutrality while reinforcing colonial hierarchies. Omar describes how legal frameworks that were to protect self-determination themselves become tools that delay it. Omar further disrupts dominant modes of knowledge, reminding us to be aware of whose voices get louder-and whose are muted-is never an accident. By placing the Sahrawi voices at the center, Omar resists an Eurocentric narrative of colonized peoples rendered passive or helpless. Instead, he foregrounds resistance, political agency, and historical continuity. In this way, it is not simply a postcolonial work of Sidi M. Omar; it’s actively disruptive. His perspective insists that thinkers revisit their own ideas on questions of sovereignty, legality, and justice in a world where colonialism has not ended, merely evolved. He challenges the common notion that “colonization is in the past’ while providing current examples of imperialist policies and ideologies that prevent development by promoting interdependence and maintaining power hierarchies that benefit wealthy nations and belittle the poor.

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The Global Consequences of American Consumption & Fast Fashion

2011-Present, Authority, Colonized, Date, Defining the Enemy, Disruptive Spaces, Imperialism, Subjectives of Refusal, The 'Natural World', The Workplace, Uncategorized, Urban Spaces, Workers

“Around the world, the equivalent of one dump truck filled with clothing is sent to a landfill or incinerator every second.”

Eric Liedtke

Clothing companies produce twice as much clothing today than they did in 2000, and the average American consumer now purchases four times as many clothing items as they did in that same time period. It’s estimated that Americans don’t wear about 50% of the clothing they own, and 65% of the clothing they purchase ends up getting disposed of within 12 months. Because of this, clothing is often exported to Global South Countries, disguised as assistance, sending clothing to countries in need when in reality it causes substantially more harm. The United States sends over 15 million articles of clothing to Ghana a week, ending up in massive secondhand markets like Kantamanto Market in Accra, creating a significant waste crisis as up to half the imported garments are unsellable, clogging landfills, polluting beaches, and overwhelming local waste systems with textile waste, much of it fast fashion that quickly becomes trash. This extreme quantity of unwanted clothing is a disruptive force that restructures everyday life in places like Accra, while the cause (fast fashion companies and exporting companies like the U.S.) creates an environmental catastrophe by forcing this immense burden upon lower-income nations on the other side of the world. Local textile producers and tailors are pushed out of business as secondhand fast fashion floods the market at prices they cannot compete with, eroding domestic industries, productivity, and livelihoods. At the same time, the sheer volume of unsellable garments turns consumption in the Global North into environmental destruction in the Global South, shifting the burden of waste management onto communities with the least infrastructure to absorb it. What appears as excess convenience for American consumers thus becomes economic displacement, ecological degradation, and public health risk elsewhere—revealing overconsumption as a global system of harm rather than an individual choice. The documentary “Buy Now!”, as well as various other environmental sources, exposes the harm of overconsumption, and its parallels to imperialist and colonizing methods specifically in America.

https://www.documentaryarea.com/video/Buy+Now!+The+Shopping+Conspiracy

Natalie Zemon Davis’ “Iroquois Women, European Women” (1973)

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Davis shows that Indigenous women resisted traditional European gender roles by maintaining forms of authority and autonomy that sharply contrasted with French patriarchal norms. European observers expected women to be submissive, economically dependent, and excluded from decision-making, yet Iroquois women controlled agriculture, household resources, and kinship through matrilineal and matrilocal systems. Senior women exercised influence within the longhouse, could initiate divorce, retained custody of children, and had decisive power over daily economic life—practices that undermined European assumptions about male dominance within the family. Even when exposed to Christianity, some Indigenous women adapted the new religion to expand their public voice, preaching, teaching, and leading prayer despite missionaries’ insistence on female obedience. Rather than passively accepting European gender ideals, Iroquois women reshaped colonial encounters to preserve their authority.

“If a man wanted a courteous excuse not to do something he could say without fear of embarrassment ‘that his wife did not wish it.’”

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Syntagma Square Assemblies

2011-Present, Authority, Blockade/Barricade, Defining the Enemy, Disruptive Spaces, Institutions, Occupation, Privatization, Strike, Subjectives of Refusal, Tactics of Disruption, The Workplace, Uncategorized, Urban Spaces, Workers

In May 2011, the movement of popular assemblies erupted as a disruption to society. Begun through a Facebook call to express indignation, this movement morphed quickly into a mass occupation. This assembly delegitimized the political class, forced general strikes, and disrupted the flow of everyday life in the heart of Athens. Parliamentary access, business, education, baking, and tourism were repeatedly interrupted, affecting the daily lives of people in Greece. The assemblies demanded direct democracy and exposed the divisions between peaceful protesters, anti-authoritarians,and nationalists, increasing tension within the movement, but also increasing difficulty for the state to involve itself. Tens or hundreds of thousands of people formed blockades and attempted to prevent Military Professionals from entering parliament. Protesters rioted, created barricades, improvised medical aid, and played music during tear gas exposure. This movement demonstrated how powerful the combination of unity, perseverance, and protest is, even when disordered and disorganized. This assembly created a political crisis that terrified elites and prompted the reconfiguration of social norms of who can speak and act in the public sphere. Syntagma’s occupations disrupted institutional routine, fractured political legitimacy, and dispersed power to the people through the promises brought through solidarity, popularity, and movement.

https://libcom.org/article/preliminary-notes-towards-account-movement-popular-assemblies-tptg: Syntagma Square Assemblies

Surrounding the Spanish Parliament: Occupy Congress & The M15 Movements

2011-Present, Authority, Blockade/Barricade, Defining the Enemy, Disruptive Spaces, Institutions, Occupation, Subjectives of Refusal, Tactics of Disruption, The Workplace, Uncategorized, Urban Spaces, Workers

The Occupy movements in Spain escalated quickly due to the deep economic crisis the country faced. protestors physically surrounded the national parliament, confronting the government about the widening gap between the general population of Spanish citizens and the elected officials in Congress. This occupation was incredibly disruptive as it halted the normal flow of political life and forced politicians to acknowledge and visibly see the public withdrawing their trust and faith. Over 1,400 police officers quickly became involved, and the scene escalated with dozens of arrests, rubber bullets, and baton charges, intensifying the situation drastically. Protestors in this occupation were charged with treason and crimes against the nation, even though they were surrounding rather than occupying the government offices. Protesters were organized by M15, which was incredibly efficient and effective at organizing creative protests and demonstrations within banks and parliament. In this video, Maria Carrion reports live from Madrid on the increased anger of Spaniards as they’re driven to hunger and poverty due to the bank repossessing their homes, while the tenants still have to pay the debt, while homeless. These protestors disrupted the political order of the nation and exposed the crisis and tension between the public and the austerity-driven state.

Darkness Before Dawn: Occupy Movements of Bahrain

1990-2010, Authority, Defining the Enemy, Disruptive Spaces, Occupation, Subjectives of Refusal, Tactics of Disruption, Uncategorized, Urban Spaces, Workers

“Every minute of the day, I think about what I need to be doing next to sustain the battle to gain freedom, not just for my husband but for myself and for others. None of us are free. We have been living off the whim of an autocrat who decided our fate with a stroke of the pen.”

– Dr. Ala’a Shehabi

The uprisings in Bahrain were demonstrations that challenged the internal power of the nation as well as its external relations. People gathered in masses at the Pearl Roundabout, with many series of anti-government protests led mainly by the Shia and some Sunni Bahraini opposition. The Pearl Roundabout was initially a symbol of modernization as well as the formation of the GCC, Gulf Cooperation Council; however became more commonly associated with the 2011 democracy protests and was demolished soon after as an attempt to quell the movement as well as its significance. Similar to global Occupy movements, thousands of people occupied this space, showcasing collective resistance and disrupting daily life. The movement threatened the GCC’s commitment to preserving Bahrain’s rule by ordering Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates to deploy troops over the border. In the end, this uprising not only disrupted the authoritarian rule of Bahrain but also the idea that the Arab Spring would not impact nations with substantial oil wealth in the Gulf.

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Flaming Fury: Tunisian Occupy Movements

1990-2010, Alternative Spaces, Authority, Date, Defining the Enemy, Disruptive Spaces, Subjectives of Refusal, The Workplace, Uncategorized, Urban Spaces, Workers

“Within days of Bouazizi setting himself on fire, Tunisians began filling the streets of their cities with largely peaceful protests… this display of mass nonviolent action to effect rapid change would have been stunning anywhere, but was especially remarkable in a region that had grown notorious for its seeming inability to change peacefully, if at all.”

Jeffrey D. Sachs

Mohammad Bouazizi, setting himself on fire in Tunisia during the series of Occupy movements, was immensely disruptive. This act emphasized the need for drastic change, as this man was willing to sacrifice his life and body to disrupt the cycle that many had become complacent with. This action symbolized how deeply disenfranchised people were under Tunisia’s authoritarian rule, and that the people would no longer stand for this. His igniting exposed the brutality of the economic and political system that had become incredibly exclusive, often leaving behind the lower classes. The youth were angry- they were consistently repressed under their government, and desperately wanted new rules, yet their internet connections and communication with others about their widespread dissatisfaction yielded few results. Following Bouazizi’s decision to set himself on fire, protests ignited around police abuse, corruption, and high unemployment rates across the nation. Ultimately, this resulted in President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali fleeing the country less than a month later, opening space for new political leaders and freedoms and the establishment of a more open civil society through a newly constructed constitution. This act also sparked the Arab Spring- uprisings in Syria, Bahrain, Libya, Egypt, and Yemen, demonstrating that this single act of disruption-when other methods are unheard, can transform political and economic landscapes, opening the conversation globally.

From Cairo to Wall Street :TunisiaDownload

Occupy Egypt: From Cairo to Wall Street

2011-Present, Authority, Defining the Enemy, Disruptive Spaces, Institutions, Occupation, Subjectives of Refusal, Tactics of Disruption, The Workplace, Uncategorized, Urban Spaces, Workers

“The balance tipped. Going down to protest became acceptable Before then, people like members of my family would have said, ‘No way, how could you protest? It is not something people like us do.’ Then it became normal to protest. It became something we could do.”

Jawad Nabulsi

Jawad Nabulsi tells his personal experience of the Occupy movements in Egypt, taking place in Tahrir Square. Nabulsi’s narrative is particularly impactful as he was from a fairly wealthy family, and he recounts times where he was privileged enough to not follow certain procedures, like taking his driver’s license test, because his family had connections everywhere. He frames himself as well as his brother as people who did not need to partake in the movement, but were capable of doing so to benefit others. The tactics of “occupation” challenged the normal flow of everyday life and infrastructure, through taking over public space like Tahrir Square, a major public square in the heart of downtown Cairo, Egypt. The occupation undermined the regimes claim to order and complacency, especially when large numbers of people camped in central Cairo. The tactics of occupation allowed a wide cross-section of society from students, workers, unemployed graduates, young women—to participate, not just in short demonstrations but in extended presence. This broadened social disruption. The disruption can also be seen through Nabilsis personal story as he took part in the occupations regardless of the fact that his family was very well off, showcasing a reframing of whos involved, demonstrating the strong desire for change, even from those benefitting from this system. The tactics of occupation in Cairo were highly disruptive: they rewrote the rules of protest, challenged the state’s control of space, mobilised and organized large groups of society, and created a model for global protest movements.

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Resistance Through No Sex: The 4B Movement in South Korea

2011-Present, Defining the Enemy, Patriarchy, Subjectives of Refusal, Uncategorized, Women

Women in South Korea have continuously been treated as inferior under a deeply ingrained patriarchal system. In 2016, after a young woman was murdered in a misogynistic hate crime, the country reacted with outrage over the poor handling of her case. Misogynistic crimes like this, combined with systemic gender inequality and intense societal pressures, helped spark a collective rejection of men and patriarchal norms. Although often described as a “sex strike,” that is not the sole purpose of the 4B movement. Women in South Korea also place greater emphasis on engaging with and supporting one another rather than conforming to traditional relationships with men.

”The 4B thing is a very Korean, feministic lifestyle, and it is irreversible. We cannot be taken back again!”

Life Without Men: The 4B Movement

2011-Present, Defining the Enemy, Patriarchy, Subjectives of Refusal, Uncategorized, Women

After a history of oppression, rigid gender roles, pervasive misogyny, and gendered violence, many South Korean women have collectively decided to reject traditional patriarchal structures. These women follow the principles of the “4Bs”: bihon (no marriage), bichulsan (no childbirth), biyeonae (no dating men), and bisekseu (no sex with men). Through these rejections, they are not only resisting gender discrimination but also destabilizing societal expectations—with no clear desire to return to traditional roles, even in the aftermath of mass protests. This social disruption has begun to expand westward, reaching beyond Korea’s borders.

SCUM MANIFESTO (1967)

1946-1989, Defining the Enemy, Disruptive Spaces, Patriarchy, Self Institution, Subjectives of Refusal, Tactics of Disruption, The Workplace, Uncategorized, Women

“SCUM is against the entire system, the very idea of law and government. SCUM is out to destroy the system, not attain certain rights within it.”

Valerie Solanas

Valerie Solanas, an American radical feminist, published The SCUM Manifesto in 1967, advocating for the dismantling of patriarchal structures established by men and the creation of a female-led society. Solanas critiques male dominance and systemic gender inequality, arguing that these societal flaws stem from male control. The manifesto calls upon “thrill-seeking females to overthrow the government, eliminate the money system, institute complete automation, and destroy the male sex,” framing men as the root of societal instability and inefficiency, justifying the radical restructuring of society in favor of women, by women.

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Accomplices Not Allies: Abolishing the Ally Industrial Complex – Indigenous Action Media (2014)

2011-Present, Date, Uncategorized

This zine offers a sharp critique of the political label “ally” and the network of activists who have created what it calls an “ally industrial complex,” driven by their own reputations as anti-oppression advocates. Grounded in the context of Indigenous resistance, it examines various problematic forms of allyship—including savior figures, opportunists, academics, and self-declared allies—who often center themselves rather than the communities they claim to support. Instead of promoting the concept of “ally,” the zine calls for the emergence of “accomplices”: individuals who attack colonial structures and ideals through solidarity rooted in trust, consent, and shared struggle.

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Action Planning: A Guide to Planning Effective Direct Action – Seeds for Change (n.d.)

Uncategorized

This source is a guide by Seeds for Change that discusses how to organize effective direct action. Tactics such as occupying a building, jamming a company’s phone line with calls, breaking machinery, disrupting an event, blocking vehicles, among other direct actions are described. The guide also emphasizes the importance of identifying targets, understanding different types of pressure, and various other planning and logistical steps.

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Setting Up a Workers’ Co-Op – Seeds for Change (n.d.)

Uncategorized

This document serves as a concise guide for individuals aiming to establish a workers’ cooperative, a democratically run business owned and operated by its employees. It outlines the essential stages involved, from forming an initial group and developing a business plan to navigating legal structures, securing finances, and officially launching the cooperative. Ultimately, setting up and running a workers’ co-op is presented as a form of direct action where people collectively take control of their work lives to create a more just and ecologically conscious way of working.

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Anarchic Agreements – Seeds for Change (n.d.)

Uncategorized

“Anarchic Agreements” is a guide for social and environmental justice groups seeking to establish internal rules and processes in an empowering way. It was co-written by Seeds for Change and researchers from the Anarchy Rules research project. The text explores crucial areas for “constitutionalising” a group, including defining its purpose, decision-making methods, task management, necessary policies, and strategies for maximizing empowerment. 

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What is Direct Action? – Seeds for Change (n.d.)

Uncategorized

This document, a guide from Seeds for Change, explores direct action as a means to achieve political goals, contrasting it with indirect methods. It showcases successful examples in Britain, demonstrating how diverse and disruptive tactics like blockades, occupations, and property damage are employed to exert pressure. It highlights key points for effective direct action, including sustained campaigns, clear aims, targeted pressure, identifying leverage, and the importance of organized communities and diverse roles. 

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An Interview with M.E. O’Brien (n.d.)

Disruptive Spaces, The Home, Uncategorized

This is an interview conducted with M.E. O’Brien, a leading voice of revolutionary queer politics, gender, and communist theory. The interview explores her concept of family abolition through a Marxist-feminist and queer lens, tracing its historical trajectory within capitalism and socialist movements. O’Brien discusses her influences, the arguments presented in her influential essay “To Abolish the Family,” and the potential of collectivizing care beyond traditional family structures. She examines the historical complexities of family politics in different contexts, including the Soviet Union, as well as the impact of immigration policies on marginalized communities in the U.S., among other key topics.

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The Written Resistance #4 – National Students for Justice in Palestine (2024)

2011-Present, Authority, Blockade/Barricade, Date, Defining the Enemy, Disruptive Spaces, Imperialism, Institutions, Occupation, Students, Subjectives of Refusal, Tactics of Disruption, Uncategorized

This is the fourth edition of the newsletter written by a compilation of individual authors and published by the National Students for Justice in Palestine. The edition features a range of articles documenting student activism across several universities, including Columbia, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Waterloo, Birzeit University, the American University of Beirut, and the University of Texas at Dallas. These articles explore student strategies, challenges with university administrations, and their connections to the military-industrial complex. The publication emphasizes the reclamation of political space and the forging of decolonized solidarity in a unified struggle against oppression.

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On the Principles of Non-Collaboration – Movimiento de Liberacion Nacional (n.d.)

Defining the Enemy, Imperialism, Uncategorized

The Movimiento de Liberacion Nacional (MLN) was founded in 1977 as a coalition of anti-imperialist Puerto Rican and Chicano-Mexicano activists in the United States. This document by the MLN outlines the group’s stance against U.S. imperialism and its support for Puerto Rican independence and the socialist reunification of Mexico. It details the MLN’s historical context, including resistance to U.S. expansion and colonization. The document emphasizes the principle of non-collaboration with the U.S. government, particularly in the face of grand jury investigations targeting independence movements. Furthermore, the text promotes solidarity with armed clandestine movements and calls for the dismantling of U.S. imperial power.

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Defy The Draft – 1967

1946-1989, Authority, Defining the Enemy, Strike, Students, Subjectives of Refusal, Tactics of Disruption, Uncategorized

Students join protesters in New York to show off their right to have freedom of speech by defying the Vietnam draft with the burning of draft cards

“One hundred American youths burned their draft cards in Central Park today in a protest against the war in Vietnam”
Sunday-Bulletin-1967.04.16-100-burn-draft-cardsDownload

Homestead Strike (1892)

1840-1945, Date, Defining the Enemy, Disruptive Spaces, Occupation, Privatization, Sabotage/Ecotage, Strike, Subjectives of Refusal, Tactics of Disruption, The Bourgeoisie, The Workplace, Uncategorized, Workers

The Homestead Strike of 1892, centered at Carnegie’s steel plant in Pennsylvania, marked a pivotal moment in American labor history. It erupted over wage cuts and benefit reductions, leading to a violent clash between striking workers and Pinkerton detectives hired by the company. After Carnegie and his staff pushed workers out of the plant to replace them with non – union workers, they pushed back and barricaded within it. There was violent conflict between them and the Pinkerton detectives. Despite the workers’ efforts, the strike was ultimately suppressed. Nonetheless, the strike remains a significant event in the struggle for workers’ rights and fair labor practices. It became a rallying point for other labor activists.

service-ndnp-nn-batch_nn_goethe_ver01-data-sn83030193-00206535386-1892070603-0384Download

Tecumseh Calls for Pan-Indian Resistance (1810)

1700-1830s, Date, Defining the Enemy, Disruptive Spaces, Indigenous, Self Institution, Subjectives of Refusal, Subjects Redefined, Tactics of Disruption, The 'Natural World', Uncategorized, White Supremacy

In this document, Tecumseh, a Shawnee chief and warrior, details a message of both resistance and spirituality. He writes to a community larger than just the Shawnee, calling on all the “red men” to unite and to reclaim the land that has been stolen from them by the “white people.”

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“The way, and the only way, to check and to stop this evil, is for all the red men to unite in claiming a common and equal right in the land, as it was at first, and should be yet; for it never was divided, but belongs to all for the use of each.”

Breaking the Illusion of Scarcity: A Squatter’s Primer (2003)

1990-2010, Date, Defining the Enemy, Disruptive Spaces, Occupation, Privatization, Tactics of Disruption, The Home, Uncategorized, We're Not Paying That

This piece is a detailed guide on how to squat an unoccupied property. Information on how to find a place, claim squatters’ rights, gain adverse possession, and fix utilities within the space are described and illustrated in the document. Additional squatting resources are provided at the end of the piece as well.

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 “If we are to avoid urban sprawl, we must see through the illusion of scarcity and utilize what already exists. So dig a pry bar under the boards covering the window, crack it open and squat it.”

A Civilian’s Guide to Direct Action – CrimethInc. (2017)

2011-Present, Date, Disruptive Spaces, Uncategorized

This piece is a step-by-step guide published by CrimethInc. on organizing direct action. Common objectives of direct action, how to navigate the initial planning stages, what to do during and after the action, as well as other information is described and illustrated in the document.

Crimethinc-Direct-Action-GuideDownload

President of the Lac du Flambeau Band of Lake Superior Chippewa Indians Letter to the Chairman of the Town of Lac du Flambeau – John Johnson Sr. (2023)

2011-Present, Date, Disruptive Spaces, Indigenous, Subjectives of Refusal, The 'Natural World', Uncategorized

This letter, written in December of 2023 by the President of the Lac du Flambeau Band of Lake Superior Chippewa Indians, John Johnson Sr., to the Chairman of the Town of Lac du Flambeau, Matt Gaulke, communicated that the tribe would be enacting a Road Access Permitting Ordinance applying to all roads that cross tribal land. This would allow legal access to the roads in exchange for a fee, and came after months of contentious dispute over road access on the reservation. In January of 2023, the northern Wisconsin tribe barricaded four reservation roadways they argued were being illegally used. In this letter, the tribe president demanded nearly $10 million to resolve past trespass violations, and required payment of these damages before issuance of any road permits under this new ordinance.

Lac-du-Flambeau-LetterDownload

The Construction of Lay Expertise (1995)

1946-1989, 1990-2010, Consciousness Raising, Date, Disruptive Spaces, History, History/Theory, Institutions, Occupation, Tactics of Disruption, The Workplace, Theory, Uncategorized

In the 1980s, the AIDs epidemic began to wreak havoc across the country, specifically amongst gay men. These affected communities felt that the government and other facets of society were not addressing the epidemic properly and so, they were dying in massive proportions. A group of committed activists formed an organization called ACTUP and used disruptive tactics to create more awareness about their issue. One of the most provocative techniques they used was to gather in large amounts and play dead with signs that suggested who was responsible for their death, like the CDC. This paper by Steven Epstein details other such tactics that disrupted people’s every-day movements and oftentimes, forced them to reckon with the AIDs epidemic and its victims. 

epstein-1995-the-construction-of-lay-expertise-aids-activism-and-the-forging-of-credibility-in-the-reform-of-clinicalDownload

Treesitter’s Journal Entry (2000)

1990-2010, Date, Defining the Enemy, Disruptive Spaces, Occupation, Patriarchy, Tactics of Disruption, The 'Natural World', Uncategorized

A journal entry written by an anonymous treesitter discusses issues of privilege and oppression, and how these issues relate to direct action campaigns to protect the forests.

“I see clearly that the forest will never be truly protected until this entire system of oppression is brought to a grinding halt.”

“Ultimately we will never save the forest until the bigger picture of oppression is addressed. As long as the rape and oppression of women continues so will the rape and oppression of the earth. It is one and the same.”

Treesitters-Journal-Entry-4Download

Introduction to Anarchy Comics by Jay Kinney (2012)

1990-2010, Consciousness Raising, Date, Tactics of Disruption, Uncategorized

Anarchy Comics is a series of underground comic books that were anarchist and satirical, criticising mainstream society. The first three issues were edited by Jay Kinney and the fourth by Paul Mavrides, and the contributers included anarchist artists of the times, such as Spain Rodriguez and Gilbert Shelton. The first issue of Anarchy Comics can be found here.

Anarchy-Comics-IntroductionDownload

Anarchy Comics: Issue 1 by Jay Kinney (1978)

1946-1989, Consciousness Raising, Date, Tactics of Disruption, Uncategorized

Anarchy Comics is a series of underground comic books that were anarchist and satirical, criticising mainstream society. The first three issues were edited by Jay Kinney and the fourth by Paul Mavrides, and the contributers included anarchist artists of the times, such as Spain Rodriguez and Gilbert Shelton. An introduction to Anarchy Comics, written by Jay Kinney, can be found here.

Anarchy_Comics_The_Complete_Collection_-_Anarchy_Comics_1Download

Temporary Autonomous Zone – Hakim Bey (1985)

1946-1989, Alternative Spaces, Authority, Date, Defining the Enemy, Disruptive Spaces, Evasion, History/Theory, Occupation, Patriarchy, Sabotage/Ecotage, Self Institution, Tactics of Disruption, Theory, Uncategorized, Urban Spaces

Classic anarchist text by Hakim Bey about creating temporary spaces that elude formal structures of control. From Pirate Utopias to Nomadic Bands, Poetic Terrorism to Ontological Anarchy, Hakim Bey draws on history and philosophy to think through spatial and mental liberation. 

"The TAZ springs from the historical development I call “the closure of the map.” 
The last bit of Earth unclaimed by any nation-state was eaten up in 1899. 
Ours is the first century without terra incognita, without a frontier."
Hakim-Bey-The-Temporary-Autonomous-ZoneDownload

Indiana University Students for a Democratic Society: Collection of Newsletters (1965)

1946-1989, Date, Disruptive Spaces, Institutions, Students, Subjectives of Refusal, Uncategorized

During the 1960s, Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) as a national organization had chapters at over 300 universities. The organization lasted unitl 1969, until it ultimately split due to disagreements within regarding revolutionary actions. Here is a collection of newsletters distributed by the Indiana University chapter of SDS in 1965.

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OVERVIEWDownload

The Kinetics of Our Discontent – Mehmet Dosemeci (2020)

History, History/Theory, Theory, Time Interrupted, Uncategorized

Mehmet Dosemeci questions why we have come to understand the history of social struggle through the category of movement and discusses the complicity of movements with the social order they are struggling against. Offers an alternate history of social struggle as the arrest or interruption of the existing order.

Why do we think of social struggles as movements? What is in motion and where is it going? Has struggle been thought and practiced otherwise? Not as movement but as disruption, arrest, stasis? If so, what are struggles trying to stop? Asking these questions pushes us to think about struggle kinetically: to analyze social struggle through the register of motion and its interruption.
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