A collaborative effort between people of the 15M, OWS, Occupy, Indignados, and YoSoy 132 movements.

These notes are an attempt to summarise some of the common points between what are known as emerging movements, that is, the various social movements that have appeared in different parts of the world since 2011.

They have been compiled with the input from members of these movements. (15M, OWS, Occupy, Indignés, YoSoy 132)

It is presented in the form of theses collecting ideas and common values ​​observed in these processes, beyond the different social and political contexts in which they occur.

It is therefore somewhat incomplete, partial, non-representative. It will be of interest if it is useful and enhances the whole for discussion, sharing and collective thinking.

Thesis 1. Awakening of Consciousness. “We were asleep … we woke up!”. We become aware of our possibilities. “This is not a dream but an awakening.” “This is the revolution of consciousness” that is discovering/revealing to itself new possibilities.

Thesis 2. About Liberty. None of us has chosen the country, the place or the time in which we appeared as humans. We start from this non-freedom.
Thesis 2.1) The road towards freedom is called liberation. It is to free oneself step by step, it is movement, it is a process.
Thesis 2.2) “We are not afraid”. Liberation advances when we overcome fear and dread.
Thesis 2.3) We start from individual non-freedom and move towards “co-freedom“, freedom shared with others. True liberation is achieved with others and for others.
Thesis 2.4) The human process tends towards greater social freedom and also towards personal liberation.

Thesis 3. About Historicity.  We accumulate history.
Thesis 3.1) We benefit from the understanding and knowledge accumulated by men and women who have preceded us. We learn as we join in the social environment where we live and evolve.
Thesis 3.2) We use all kinds of objects, tools, constructions that were developed and have since improved over time.

Thesis 4. About Learning.
Thesis 4.1) We have learned what are the factors that help human progress:
– Increasing citizen participation in all social and political spaces.
– Improving citizens’ quality of life.
– Improving education, health, housing and food.
– Placing the economy at the service of the people and not the other way round where people serve the economy.
– Reducing spending on armaments and militarism.
– Enhancing dialogue and minimising institutional violence in its various forms.
– Ensuring social integration and consensual conflict resolution, whether between individuals, groups or peoples.

Prioritising the above points will open the social future.

Thesis 4.2) We have learned what the factors that impede human progress are:
– Hindering social participation of citizens in terms of rights, freedoms and denying them aspects of existence.
– Planning the economy in the direction of accumulation of resources in a few hands to the detriment of the majority.
– Relegating citizens to low conditions of life: slaves at one time, proletarians at another, or consumers today.
– Placing the value of the economy above human beings, causing exclusion, illness and even death for many people.
– Keeping armies with increasing destructive capacity. Researching and producing weapons of mass destruction.
– Policies where some countries oppress, invade or interfere in other countries.
– Exercising different forms of violence: physical, economic, racial, generational, religious, gender-bound, moral or psychological.

Thesis 5. About Equality. We are equal before the law, in our rights and opportunities. Not only as a theory or aspiration, but in practice!

Thesis 6. About Horizontality. We relate horizontally. We promote and explain horizontality, and developed it in all fields.
Thesis 6.1) Horizontality in relations of partnership, collaboration and sharing. No more representatives, bosses or leaderships. No one is in charge.
Thesis 6.2) We promote the creation of functions for collective issues, as needed. Rotating functions accountable to the whole.
Thesis 6.3) We are against competition, the exacerbated and excessive individualism that this system offers. We are expressing the sensibility of non-prominence, of anonymity, of the whole.

Thesis 7. About Diversity. We are all different, with different perspectives, ideologies, beliefs, etc.., and we enrich the whole with the variety of contributions.
Thesis 7.1) We will expand this diversity because we are growing, changing and developing further.

Thesis 8. About Inclusiveness. Facing what is different, “tolerance” is not enough. We try to go further, to include, approach and link.
Thesis 8.1) We practice “active listening”, meaning to understand the different, opening new avenues of understanding and communication.
Thesis 8.2) We also wish to include those who are violent, because we believe they will abandon violence when they understand the error in their behaviour.

Thesis 9. About Sociability. “Together we can” resolve conflicts. Although they are presented to us in an individualised way, they are social conflicts. Giving visibility and socialising the conflict we create conditions to solve the problems which we could never solve in isolation. We are moving towards “an assembly view of the conflict“.

Thesis 10. About Collective Intelligence. We put intelligence to network. The sum of individual intelligences does not yield the same result as working in relationship and networking, seeking a collective intelligence. This multiplies the responses and finds better solutions. Collective intelligence means a leap to a higher level of working together.

Thesis 11. About Peace. The human process progresses faster when it does not lose energy in violent confrontations. We practice partnerships that increase social progress.

Thesis 12. About Nonviolence. “We do not need violence, we are right.”
Thesis 12.1) We defend nonviolence as the bravest existential position possible.
Thesis 12.2) We coexist habitually with violence, it is close to us and our job is to deactivate it.

Thesis 13. About Voluntary Action. We work without economic calculations. We built with and for the whole. “We put drops of water in the great river of the human species.”

Thesis 14. About Coherence. We act according to our principles. We want our thought, emotion and action to converge. “When we say something, we committed to it and we do it.”

Thesis 15. About The Whole. I discover myself through us.
Thesis 15.1) We can build our liberation from the whole.
Thesis 15.2) It is in the whole where the best of each one of us is expressed.
Thesis 15.3) It is in the whole where we discover ourselves as humans and discover humanity in others.

Thesis 16. About Respect. We want people to express themselves freely and without being judged, as long as they do not abuse others.
Thesis 16.1) We respect others and respect ourselves. This increases our dignity.
Thesis 16.2) We respect others even if they have an ideology, belief or behaviour different from ours.
Thesis 16.3) We respect ourselves when we are coherent in our lives.

Thesis 17. About Spirituality. 
Thesis 17.1) We are witnessing the emergence of a form of atheist religiosity.
Thesis 17.2) There is a search for spirituality without gods and without temples.
Thesis 17.3) We are neither better nor worse for being atheists or believers.
Thesis 17.4) Religions have been ambivalent about aiding the human process. At times they have supported it, at other times they held it back and created enormous suffering.

Thesis 18. About Inspiration. We have had the experience of “connection” between us, being on the same wavelength, of “sharing the same things.” We were able to create an atmosphere that filled the streets and squares tinging everything with freedom, with possibilities, connecting with human beings in the struggle. Everything is full of humanity!
When that happens, everything looks possible, there are no limits. That energy is part of our inspiration…
Thesis 19. About Planetarisation. We know the importance of local actions, but we also know that they alone do not solve global problems. The world is in a process of planetarisation and certain solutions today have to have that scale. Some are:
Thesis 19.1) Ending hunger in the world is the priority.
Thesis 19.2) Redirecting arms and military spending towards social development so that they no longer slow down human progress.
Thesis 19.3) Deepening democracy, making it more participatory and advance justice, transparency and equality without social exclusions.
Thesis 19.4) Prioritising health, education and housing for everyone.
Thesis 19.5) These proposals are not unattainable utopias but real and achievable aspirations. There exist sufficient resources and technical conditions. The 99% of the world population share this aspiration. A harmony is emerging among people that will allow all this to happen … The emerging movements are a symptom … We are moving in the network towards global connection … “Our dreams do not fit in your ballot boxes”

Thesis 20. About rEvolution. In the XXI century we can and must reformulate social action and the kind of society we want.
Thesis 20.1) This rEvolution is nonviolent. “Next stop: rEvolution”
Thesis 20.2) Forms of social struggle based on violence reinforce the old violent and patriarchal system.
Thesis 20.3) One way to fight is the non-collaboration with illegitimate laws. Civil disobedience.
Thesis 20.4) The best way to fight is to build alternatives to what is not working as demonstration effects of the new.

Thesis 21. The awakening of a planetary generation.
Thesis 21.1) We are witnessing the dawn of a global generation that expresses itself in the emerging social movements.
Thesis 21.2) A generation that finds support and encouragement from previous generations. That is not in confrontation with them.
Thesis 21.3) The socialisation of management for worldwide technologies of instant communication and increasing social networks are creating the conditions for networking for a new stage of the human process.

Thesis 22. About The New Paradigm. The interaction of the above theses sets a new paradigm of civilization which is going to produce profound changes in the social, cultural and existential fields of human beings. “Sorry about the inconvenience, we are changing the world.”
Thesis 23. The New Paradigm is already installed. In reference to Thesis 2 about Liberty, these theses can be freely chosen to be discussed, rejected, socialised, studied, looked at in depth, applied, ignored, fought against, built in our own lives or denied, among many possibilities. Depending on what approach is taken, the future will be opened or on the contrary, closed. What for sure cannot be done is to remove them, forget them, let alone prevent them from developing. Because they are already installed in the minds of many citizens, also in yours. They’re here to stay and they are not going away. “We have already moved into your consciousness.” “If we are not allowed to dream, will not let them sleep.”
Thesis 24. The New Paradigm is already replicating. There are many manifestations of changes in the whole of society.
Thesis 24.1) We apply our energies to rescue everything truly useful to improve it, and above all to build the new. We do not even fight against the old, as it is falling apart on its own
Thesis 24.2) At some point we cannot define, this New Paradigm will enter a stage of viral replication…

Are you ready?

“We’re going slowly because we’re going far.”

Collaborative Working Group of members of 15M, OWS, Occupy, Indignés, YoSoy 132

*This document has started in several languages.  We hope that the list expands.  Anyone interested in collaborating can send a message.

*This version is not closed.  It will continue to be enriched with the contributions and comments that we receive.  We invite this to happen.

*We are thinking to update this to version 24.1 in October 2013.

*The website where suggestions can be left is:  http://thesisemergingmovements.wordpress.com/