These days, it is easy to be cynical about democracy. Even though there are more democratic societies now (119 and counting) than ever before, skeptics can point to low turnouts in national elections, the degree to which money corrupts the process, and the difficulties of mass participation in complex systems as just a few reasons the system is flawed. The Occupy movement in 2011 proved that there is an emphatic dissatisfaction with the current state of affairs, particularly with the economy, but, ultimately, it failed to produce any coherent vision for social change. So what should progressives be working toward? What should the economic vision be for the 21st century? After Occupy boldly argues that democracy should not just be a feature of political institutions, but of economic institutions as well. In fact, despite the importance of the economy in democratic societies, there is very little about it that is democratic. Questioning whether the lack of democracy in the economy might be unjust, Tom Malleson scrutinizes workplaces, the market, and financial and investment institutions to consider the pros and cons of democratizing each. He considers examples of successful efforts toward economic democracy enacted across the globe, from worker cooperatives in Spain to credit unions and participatory budgeting measures in Brazil and questions the feasibility of expanding each. The book offers the first comprehensive and radical vision for democracy in the economy, but it is far from utopian. Ultimately, After Occupy offers possibility, demonstrating in a remarkably tangible way that when political democracy evolves to include economic democracy, our societies will have a chance of meaningful equality for all.

Occupy Wall Street, as centered in New York City, received much publicity. Little attention, however, has been granted to the hundreds of Occupy groups in marginal locations whose creative politics were certainly not limited by the influential example of Occupy in Zuccotti Park. This volume rectifies this oversight, with thirteen essays critically addressing the politics of occupation in places such as Indiana, Oregon, Texas, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Montana, and California. It initiates an interdisciplinary and critical discussion concerned with the importance of the ‘local’ to contemporary politics; the evolution of Occupy Wall Street tactics as they changed to fit differing, non-spectacular contexts; and what worked or did not work politically in various contexts. All of the above is designed to inform and improve that as-of-yet-unnamed movement which will come after Occupy. Boasting scholars from sociology, English, anthropology, peace studies, and history, the volume is divided into three major sections: Occupying the Local: Promise and Predicament; Occupying Space and Borders: South, East, and West; and Occupying the Media: Local, Regional, and National Dilemmas.

Hegel after Occupy is a Western Marxist analysis of different attempts to understand the present historical situation and the way theories of postmodernity, globalization, and contemporaneity implicitly or explicitly conceptualize the relationship between the historical present and political action. They all persuasively describe a breakdown of former historical categories but paradoxically end up understanding this breakdown as the end of politics tout court. Analysis and "position" thus merge, and the analytic diagnosis of a disavowal of the future (and the past) ends up as a disavowal of politics. The Contemporary Condition series edited by Geoff Cox and Jacob Lund, Volume 09 Copublished with Aarhus University and ARoS Art Museum

Occupy Pynchon examines power and resistance in the writer’s post–Gravity’s Rainbow novels. As Sean Carswell shows, Pynchon’s representations of global power after the neoliberal revolution of the 1980s shed the paranoia and metaphysical bent of his first three novels and share a great deal in common with the work of Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri’s critical trilogy, Empire, Multitude, and Commonwealth. In both cases, the authors describe global power as a horizontal network of multinational corporations, national governments, and supranational institutions. Pynchon, as do Hardt and Negri, theorizes resistance as a horizontal network of individuals who work together, without sacrificing their singularities, to resist the political and economic exploitation of empire. Carswell enriches this examination of Pynchon’s politics—as made evident in Vineland (1990), Mason & Dixon (1997), Against the Day (2006), Inherent Vice (2009), and Bleeding Edge (2013)—by reading the novels alongside the global resistance movements of the early 2010s. Beginning with the Arab Spring and progressing into the Occupy Movement, political activists engaged in a global uprising. The ensuing struggle mirrored Pynchon’s concepts of power and resistance, and Occupy activists in particular constructed their movement around the same philosophical tradition from which Pynchon, as well as Hardt and Negri, emerges. This exploration of Pynchon shines a new light on Pynchon studies, recasting his post-1970s fiction as central to his vision of resisting global neoliberal capitalism.

In light of the predatory practices employed by massive corporations—some of which are even bigger than nations—and their wealthy owners, a movement arose from among the people known as the 99 percent, those who are not among the wealthiest 1 percent of the population. The world watched as members of the Occupy movement poured into the streets, demanding that those responsible for the economic crises faced by the world be held accountable for their negligence and misconduct. Now, however, the crowds have gone; their voices are muted, but their demands endure. In light of the current situation, what’s next for the world? The answer is action. In this compact manifesto, Frank Sykes summarizes the ideas that were voiced by the thousands who converged on Wall Street and in large cities across the globe, drawing a map of the future of this global phenomenon. Ordinary people demand not only our fair share of the wealth generated by our work and ingenuity, but also a say in its distribution. Even though the Occupiers have gone home, the problems they protested still exist, and the need to act is more urgent now than ever!

The Civil War did not end with Confederate capitulation in 1865. A second phase commenced which lasted until 1871—not Reconstruction but genuine belligerency whose mission was to crush slavery and create civil and political rights for freed people. But as Gregory Downs shows, military occupation posed its own dilemmas, including near-anarchy.

Post-conflict reconstruction is one of the most pressing political issues today. This book uses economics to analyze critically the incentives and constraints faced by various actors involved in reconstruction efforts. Through this analysis, the book will aid in understanding why some reconstructions are more successful than others.