Got protests? A call to action for Occupy Wall Street, groups worldwide

On Oct. 15, the many streams of local protests that have been welling up worldwide over the past half-year hope to join in one mighty river of global action.

In more than 950 cities in 80 countries, according to 15October.net, movements akin to the Occupy Wall Street effort in the US will be taking their concerns public – whatever those concerns may be. In New York City, protesters plan to occupy Times Square and transfer their accounts from large national banks to smaller local banks perceived to be less tainted by the foreclosure crisis. In places as varied as Budapest, Tokyo, Helsinki, and Lansing, Mich., there will marches, rallies, concerts, and cultural events.

Just as the protests are all over the map, so are the causes. This, however, does not seem to trouble those who plan to take part.

It is a day meant to “assert the ‘think global, act local’ catchphrase,” notes Spanish activist and blogger Santiago Carrion, who posted his explanation of the movement on Friday. Each action, he writes, "will have its own theme or proposal, be it the privatization of Universities in Chile, the continuation of nuclear energy projects in Japan after the catastrophe at Fukushima, corporate greed in the US, widespread corruption and the destruction of the welfare state in Greece, Spain and the UK, or the worsening deforestation of the Amazon in Brazil.”

He does see a connection. These different issues are a reaction to the same process, he says, “which can be loosely defined as an appropriation of politics worldwide via deregulatory financial practices.”

15October emerged from the platform of Democracia real YA (True Democracy NOW!), which originated in Spain in May, according to the International Business Times. The movement is a reaction to the European debt crisis and the push for austerity measures that hit working people.

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