Frustration feeds waves of protests

It has been a spring seething with protests around the globe. From Chile to Ecuador and Bolivia, Hong Kong to Lebanon, Egypt and Iraq, Spain and Brexit in Britain, people have been taking to the streets to voice their anger and be counted.

Economic concerns, inequality and technology are factors across countries. But reasons for the protests range from price hikes, climate change, political separatist or pro-democracy movements, elections, sectarian divides, and corruption.

On the surface, the protests and demonstrators can appear commendably brave in the face of risk and highly motivated — bringing together a massive flexing of mass muscle.

Underneath it represents a desperation that suggests visually impressive signs of public opposition are essentially their only option.

We are in an era where systemic change is seen as increasingly difficult to achieve and at the same time there’s less patience for slow, incremental reform and co-operation. Working from within politics is considered less viable than yelling from the outside and causing economic disruption. People are more fractured than ever in the group identities they relate to.

There’s a recognition that elites have monopolised staggering amounts of wealth and power and in new ways through technology.

The past few years have also reminded us how outsized personalities can have an outsized impact on people’s lives as strongman politics have come to the fore. Just at the weekend, for instance, the US Treasury said the country’s Budget deficit had hit US$984 billion for the financial year, meaning it has more than doubled since 2015, increasing in each of the three Trump years, partly through tax cuts that largely benefited the wealthy.

The new wave of protests has risen despite the bitter results of unrest in the Arab Spring several years ago.

The New York Times reports on a Harvard study which shows that 20 years ago mass protests demanding systemic change were able to achieve it 70 per cent of the time. But that rate has fallen to 30 per cent.

In Hong Kong, where a five-month struggle has focused on democratic rights, economic inequality in a city of high property prices has been an important factor. A single car park at an office tower sold for US$969,000 last week.

The protests in the autonomous Chinese territory have been the most fascinating look at new-age demonstrations. Last week the extradition bill that sparked them was withdrawn.

The protests have been organised and countered on social media; featured millions of people overall but have been driven by a small core of students and professionals; and encouraged opponents to come up with innovative ways of blunting the authorities’ technological advantages.

This ongoing cat-and-mouse struggle and stalemate where nothing really gets resolved in a satisfying, concluding way is the protest of the present.