There was a decade of popular uprisings from 2010 until the global pandemic in 2020. These uprisings shook the foundations of the global order. They denounced corporate domination, austerity cuts and demanded economic justice and civil rights. The Occupy Wall Street and the Black Lives Matter mass demonstrations following the execution of George Floyd in 2020 are cases.
There were also popular eruptions in Greece, Spain, Tunisia, Egypt, Bahrain, Yemen, Syria, Libya, Turkey, Brazil, Ukraine, Hong Kong, Chile and during South Korea’s Candlelight Revolution. Discredited politicians were driven from office in Greece, Spain, Ukraine, South Korea, Egypt, Chile and Tunisia. Reform, or at least the promise of it, dominated public discourse. It seemed to herald a new era.
Then the backlash. The aspirations of the popular movements were crushed. State control and social inequality expanded. There was no significant change. In most cases, things got worse. The far-right emerged triumphant.
What happened? How did a decade of mass protests that seemed to herald democratic openness, an end to state repression, a weakening of the domination of global corporations and financial institutions and an era of freedom sputter to an ignominious failure? What went wrong? How did the hated bankers and politicians maintain or regain control? What are the effective tools to rid ourselves of corporate domination?
Joining me to discuss the failure of these popular movements and the resurgence of the right-wing is Vincent Bevins, former foreign correspondent for Los Angeles Times and The Washington Post, and author of “If We Burn: The Mass Protest Decade and the Missing Revolution”
The Chris Hedges Report with Vincent Bevins on how our popular uprisings are crushed and the far right triumphs.