Protest and Socio-Political Experimentation

46 pagesThe creation and maintenance of a successful system of democracy is exceedingly complex and difficult. Any such system will have flaws and weaknesses, which can lead to democratic breakdown or backsliding as has been seen numerous times throughout history. Drawing on the work of Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt examining the causes of democratic decay, and particularly the role of the loss of faith in democratic institutions, this paper aims to provide information which could support efforts to preserve democracy through changes to its specific structures and institutions. The range of data available through the study of existing democratic systems around the world is limited and many experience similar difficulties to those present in the United States so, partially inspired by the work of David Graeber, this paper studies the efforts made in long-term and large-scale protests of May ‘68, Hong Kong’s Umbrella Movement, and Seattle’s Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone or Organized Protest. Each of these movements created new structures to make decisions, protect protesters in the areas they occupied, and meet their basic logistical needs, so they, and other protests like them, are of great value to study as natural experiments. Each protest experienced successes and failures in these areas and, with an understanding of why they faced the difficulties they did, future efforts could learn a great deal from the experiments that these protesters attempted. The aim of this paper is to offer useful insights itself, as well as to demonstrate a type of study with unutilized potential