The protesters I spoke to at La Defense (who came from all over Europe) have no time for any elected politicians, and consider them, along with the 'mainstream media' (especially anyone with a TV camera) as part of a many-headed hydra that has conspired to allow bankers to take home their six-figure bonuses while unemployment soars.
But hasn't this also been the week electoral democracy made something of a comeback? George Papandreou's quickly shot-down referendum plan was a timely reminder that the European project, sold to people as a great liberal plan that would make us all cosmopolitan citizens of the world, has in fact disenfranchised all of us - nobody has asked the Greek people if they want to see salaries cut, or the Spanish if they want to see public sector redundancies, or the French if they want taxes to rise. Right wing French politician told La Croix newspaper this week he thought the latest bailout plan should be submitted to a referendum all across Europe; that might not be a bad idea. 'Austerity' is not inevitable - it's an ideologically driven project in privatising public services and creating unemployment in order to protect the profits of banks, who will not accept that if you lend to someone who goes bankrupt, you can't have that money back. There are alternatives - Argentina in 2002 pulled out of its peg to the dollar and sparked an export boom.
The democratic deficit created by the EU has run parallel with a deficit of political representation in most Western countries, with no-one prepared to voice the view that we might not be living in the best possible economic system. As this good NY Times piece points out, there no longer seem to be any economists, in university departments, think tanks or governments, that aren't wedded to the neoliberal model, but that doesn't mean there are no alternatives. What's interesting now is that there seems to be a space opening up in electoral politics to talk about the alternative - in Britain we've seen Ed Milliband talk about the need to 'rid the country of irresponsible, predatory capitalism' and admit the relentless pursuit of materialism they see all around them might just provoke rioters to smash up JJB Sports. Here in France anti-globalisation candidate Arnaud Montebourg made a surprise breakthrough in the socialist primary - and polls show around 60% of French voters believe the economic system is broken. François Hollande, who won that primary and now takes on Nicolas Sarkozy for the presidency, needs to listen to those polls, because those are formerly socialist voters who despair of democracy's ability to create fairness. If he doesn't find a language to speak to them, they may well turn to far right Marine le Pen, who's very cleverly found a way to make nationalist discourse seem to provide answers to high unemployment and a feeling of powerlessness.
Naomi Wolf argues in this piece for today's Observer that, instead of rejecting the ballot box, Occupiers should try and make it speak for them, and I think she's right. In the crudest terms, anger at unemployment, austerity and bankers' bonuses is running so high there's an electoral advantage for any centre-left politician to step away from economic orthodoxy and embrace policies Occupiers might want to vote for. That might be a lot to hope for from such very unlikely radicals as François Hollande and Ed Milliband, but this could be a turning point in history - and if we all came up with concrete ideas to help them seize it, that would be a lot more effective that camping outside banks.
