Institutionalized Protest

From Iran to Egypt, from Yemen to Libya, from Morocco to China and from Senegal to the United States citizens have spilled into the streets, surrounded government buildings  and choked public squares, holding signs and shouting — hoping that their combined presence and united voices will change their political futures. Recently newspapers and magazines have commented again and again on the solidarity shown throughout the world not merely between the citizens of these countries but between the countries themselves as the political climate of freedom, liberty and the rights of the people spread from the Tihamah of Yemen to the streets of Wisconsin.  But this picture of today’s political climate and of the protests themselves is entirely misleading. They are not the same. The amazing victories of the citizens of Yemen and Egypt are not the same as the bloody events in Libya and the Bachranne or the repression seen in Iran and China and they are certainly not analogous to the political debates over teachers unions which currently dominate the state of Wisconsin.

In Africa and the Middle East protests have erupted outside of the political framework. Their goal is to overturn the government and to create entirely new regimes. These protests differ in their effectiveness and peacefulness. The protests of China differ from those of the Bachranne because of the power of the Chinese government which vowed not to give protest even a momentary voice. Those in Libya differed from those in Egypt because of the insanity of a leader who controlled just enough power to strike back beyond reason, turning the protests into fights and blood baths. Those in the United States differ from all of these because they exist within rather than outside of the American political framework. Protest has always been part of the American system, protected by the government itself. Here people protest not against the government as a whole but against certain policies it employs. The goal is not a new government but a new policy. The protesters in Wisconsin, today, are merely in favor of a certain political ideology which has a space within the government.  The division is not the people against the government; it is political party against political party. And since in America the government and the people are one and the same, it is the opinions of one group of citizen against the opinions of another group. The African and Middle Eastern protests are rebellion in action; those is Wisconson are democracy in action.

Perhaps you may charge me with the fault of trumpeting American exceptionalism. I do not pretend that America is perfect, that its government does not err, or that our history is one of unspoiled justice or righteousness. I am aware that that we have not always lived up to our principles or even always attempted to do so. However this is an instance when we, as citizens of the United States, should realize the exceptional quality of our own nation and its government. We should be grateful that we need not rise up for liberty, equality and justice. Rather we have the liberty to protest with equal voices, knowing that if we choose to do so we will not be treated unjustly. We should be thankful that protests are a part of our government and our founding documents rather than antithetical to them. We should be thankful that our protests regard specific policies rather than the entire regime, and that we risk nothing more than the loss of time and the failure of a specific cause, not death or civil war.

Protests illuminate the true nature of the government under which they occur. The abilities of the ruling powers to govern well can be measured in the vastness of the protest, in the people’s determination and in their demands. The power of the government as well as their cruelty can be seen in their ability to end the protest and the means they employ to do so.  The people of Egypt and Yemen made clear that their governments were not merely inadequate but unlivable; their success showed their governments’ lack of power and inability or unwillingness to use coercive means.  The fact that in China protests were stopped before they had even begun shows the tight and unyielding control of the Chinese government over its citizens, while the bloody battles now raging outside of Tripoli  show the  lack of power, humanity and connection to reality exhibited by the Kaddafi regime.

Wisconsin, and indeed the general history of protest in America, tell us an entirely different story. In America we think of protest almost as a part of the status quo. We talk of them taking place during the civil rights movement and the Vietnam War, and see them on the side of the street, in public parks and even outside of the White House. To us protests mark not revolution but controversy. They surround big issues in our political history — equal protection, foreign policy and today, unions and the budget deficit.  They are not unimportant, nor do they show an inadequacy of the government. Rather they are part of the political system. After all democracy is nothing less than institutionalized protest. Therefore the protests in Wisconsin are not the same as those in Africa and the Middle East. We need not fight in the streets for freedom:  our government is based upon it.