Twenty reasons why it's kicking off everywhere 
Paul Mason, BBC News’ excellent Economics Editor: “We’ve had revolution in Tunisia, Egypt’s Mubarak is teetering; in Yemen, Jordan and Syria suddenly protests have appeared. In Ireland young techno-savvy professionals are agitating for a “Second Republic”; in France the youth from banlieues battled police on the streets to defend the retirement rights of 60-year olds; in Greece striking and rioting have become a national pastime. And in Britain we’ve had riots and student occupations that changed the political mood.
What’s going on? What’s the wider social dynamic?
My editors yesterday asked me put some bullet points down for a discussion on the programme that then didn’t happen but I am throwing them into the mix here, on the basis of various conversations with academics who study this and also the participants themselves.
At the heart of it all are young people, obviously; students; westernised; secularised. They use social media - as the mainstream media has now woken up to - but this obsession with reporting “they use twitter” is missing the point of what they use it for.
In so far as there are common threads to be found in these different situation, here’s 20 things I have spotted:…”CLICK THROUGH AND READ ON
(via newleft)
