Occupy Wall Street organizer traces movement’s legacy to Mamdani era

Marom traces ‘direct through line’ from Occupy protests to socialist electoral wins

Yotam Marom, a key organizer of the Occupy Wall Street movement that erupted in 2011, said in an interview published Tuesday that the protests’ lasting impact is visible in the current wave of democratic socialist electoral victories in New York, including the mayoralty of Zohran Mamdani and a recent sweep of House primaries by Mamdani-backed candidates.

In an interview with The Guardian’s Natasha Lennard to mark the publication of his new book, For Louder Days: Reaching Beyond a Politics of Powerlessness, Marom argued that the movement’s core contribution was not its brief, police-raided encampments but a fundamental shift in the public’s understanding of economic class.

“Occupy brought thousands of people into the movement, trained hundreds of leaders, and led to the foundation of a bunch of different organizations,” Marom told The Guardian. “It changed the public’s common sense around class in this country; it introduced the narrative of the 99% versus the 1%.”

Marom said there is “a pretty direct through line from Occupy Wall Street to here,” adding, “it’s pretty hard to see how you get something like Bernie [Sanders]‘s run in 2016 without that, and now this opening of mass socialist politics, with the elections of the Squad and Zohran [Mamdani] and a slate of DSA candidates in New York.”

His assessment arrives as MSI previously reported that Mamdani-backed candidates swept New York Democratic primaries in June.

Marom founded the Wildfire Project, a training organization for grassroots groups, and has worked with groups including the Sunrise Movement, the Dream Defenders, and the Uncommitted movement. In his book, he describes a pattern he calls the “politics of powerlessness” — a set of behaviors in which movements, fearing a more powerful opponent, turn inward and focus on internal purity rather than building the institutional capacity needed to win.

“It’s a set of ideas and behaviors that turn us inward, away from our opponent (the forces of capitalism and state violence) and the public, toward — and often against — one another,” Marom said. He argued that the current electoral insurgency, especially in New York, represents a break from that pattern, with organizations “essentially saying, ‘No, we want power. We want to govern. We know it’s risky and complicated, but it’s the only way.’”

Marom also cautioned against overstating the left’s current successes. “In New York, where I live, we might be feeling on top of the world — Knicks in five! Zohran and the recent DSA sweep!” he said. “But, of course, we’re only at the beginning of this trajectory.” He noted that the far right controls the federal government and that the movement faces “a very long road ahead.”