I had the good fortune of attending civil disobedience training on September 16th in downtown Brooklyn set up by the organizers of Occupy Wall Street, where I was taught strategies for deescalating confrontation and dealing with police harassment and violence. Being someone who had never engaged in outright civil disobedience before, I have to admit that I was scared for my own safety and did not go to the rally the next day. But I managed to summon the courage to actually show up to the occupation on day 3 and sleep out in a park surrounded by police, the bright glowing lights of Wall Street skyscrapers, and the unending sound of buses and garbage trucks passing throughout the night. That illuminating first week culminated, with about 1,000 other occupiers, in acts of civil disobedience – marching in the streets up Broadway and through police kettles – that lead to about 100 arrests during the unpermitted march to Union Square Park; one of the many high profile events that would help to catapult Occupy Wall Street onto the world stage. After the climax of events on September 24th I decided to follow the advice of a sign hanging from a tree in Liberty Plaza which reads, "If you see something that needs to be done, then do it." I packed my car and drove to Canada to offer my assistance in setting up Occupy Nova Scotia.

I had never been to Nova Scotia before, but an acquaintance offered me the use of their home for a few months. A call to action had already gone out, and I arrived in time to make their second meeting taking place on the bleachers of the Commons, a downtown park in Halifax. Around ten people showed up for that meeting. They had been watching Wall Street and were ready to answer the call. Though meetings were planned last minute, with time and location going out over Facebook on the day of, attendance grew with each passing day. We met outside, in backpacker hostels and in cafes. On one rainy afternoon a few days later the group, not having finalized a meeting location, knocked on the door of a local church and requested a place for twenty rain soaked strangers to gather and talk. Not only were we welcomed inside, but we were fed as well. Within a week we managed to organize daily meetings with attendance reaching forty people a day squeezed into the back of an accommodating cafe cooperative, concluding with a large outreach event in the park on Saturday, October 8th with nearly one hundred participants, including members of the mainstream press who were trying to find out what was going on.

As it stands now, the group decided by consensus to occupy the city’s main plaza, Grand Parade Square, in front of city hall on October 15th, in coordination and solidarity with Occupy Wall Street and the many other occupations being planned for that day in the US and around the world. Whether or not it will succeed depends upon how much community support can be gathered in the coming week. If the past week is any indication, then they might be able to pull it off. When Occupy Wall Street was getting started there were only one or two dozen people gathering weekly at Thompkins Square Park in the East Village. But now that it has taken the global spotlight, the pace has picked up exponentially. Cities such as Boston and Portland have been able to draw crowds of hundreds to their first planning meetings in a matter of days.

Topics of discussion at meetings have been largely about the nuts and bolts of carrying out an occupation; covering everything from how to deal with the question of police permits, what groups might be willing to join in our efforts, whether or not we should have group spokespersons, where we can get tents and other supplies, who knows how to give workshops on civil disobedience, and everything in between. Anyone is welcome to add topics for discussion to the agenda, and there have not yet been any problems with one individual monopolizing or obstructing our meetings. On the contrary, they have been some of the most effective meetings I’ve ever participated in.

Here in Halifax, a broad coalition has been forming rapidly among local groups that have been struggling to have their voices heard on a host of important issues, including the Halifax Peace Coalition, the Halifax Media Coop, a local Food Not Bombs collective and others. Interest has also been expressed early on from labor unions as representatives from the Canadian Labor Congress and the Halifax-Dartmouth District Labor Council attended our meetings. Union representative Tony Tracy said he was sent by the unions because of their interest in what we were doing, and to help determine if they would organize their members to assist in the occupation. Apparently US labor has a reputation for being far to the right, and after the huge turnout of support from labor on October 5th in NYC, these Canadian unions are feeling a bit embarrassed and upstaged. Student groups have also been quick to take up the call. NSPIRG and SMAC members at Saint Mary`s University have expressed interest and are already talking about ways to support the occupation through direct action and have even begun outreach efforts on campus, putting up flyers and visiting classes to make public appeals for support.

As in most other major cities, the group has been quick to adopt the general assembly format using consensus based decision making, along with a set of facilitation hand signals and the "people`s mic."  This format seems to have been passed on through word of mouth as well as the translation of a document in Spanish which outlines the procedures of similar assemblies taking place in Spain. Occupy Nova Scotia has also organized itself, as in NY, into a series of working groups in order to coordinate all of the work that needs doing – food, outreach, media, supplies, comfort, legal, direct action, arts and culture, health and well-being, and facilitation. Working groups are free to define their own mandates, and report back on their progress at each general assembly. The general assembly is moderated by a rotating facilitation position, and it is announced that there is a policy of progressive facilitation, where women and racial minorities are given priority to speak.

Regarding the issue of racial diversity, although representation has been somewhat disappointingly low here, discussions have already taken place about how the group might become more welcoming by taking on more issues of interest to local racial minorities, while avoiding the trap of tokenism for the movement`s own legitimization that would alienate minority groups further. From poverty and lack of affordable housing, to unemployment and police discrimination, the concern for relevant issues is certainly present. One independent journalist Miles Howe who has been attending the ONS meetings recently broke a story on the continuing marginalization of the Pictou Landing First Nation people, and the ongoing pollution of their lands. But for that to translate into active participation by the First Nation people is something different entirely. And some participants have already expressed frustration over their inability to keep up with developments within the group without plentiful access to the internet.

Many who attend the meetings have been watching the developments on Wall Street closely and are relieved that people in the US are finally taking a stand. They are eager to learn from the successes of the Wall Street occupiers, and questions often arise about how they solve one problem or another in NY. While each occupation must ultimately be contextualized for local differences, I do believe that those who have experienced the Wall Street occupation first hand have valuable experience and knowledge to offer occupations just getting off the ground. By traveling to NYC for just a week, people can pick up connections and best practices that are not as easily transmitted through Tweeting, Facebook commenting and Youtube videos alone. There has also been a desire to open up the lines of communication between the occupations that are ready to begin elsewhere in Canada and the US.  People have spoken of staying up late each night to watch the Livestreams coming out of Boston, LA, Sacramento and other cities. The media team here sees the starting of their own Livestream as a front line of defense from police brutality. But the occupation is being planned on a shoestring budget, and with the costs involved, it is not clear whether that will materialize by next week.

There is a much more to be said about what is taking place here and in other cities, and the potential it has for revitalizing a strong people`s movement in the near future. Right now it`s an experiment in participatory democracy – creating a safe place where people can gather and have long overdue and difficult discussions about the many problems we face. As the movement grows it could expand into becoming an experiment in participatory economics, as occupiers look for ways to sustain their activities over the long term. But for that to happen will require a lot more hard work. For now the people have found their voice, and they have just begun to clear their throat.

James Green is a citizen journalist based in Brooklyn, New York. He can be reached at [email protected]. 

---