Tess Malone discovers the far-reaching international impact of the radical group taking on America's financial giants.

The smell of pepper-spray pervaded the air all over America last week as Occupy Wall Street left the confines of New York City’s Zuccotti Park and took charge across the nation.

From Boston to San Diego, OWS has travelled from coast to coast, proving the universality of the protests despite the individual grievances wielded on signs. This is because they are, in the words of the most famous slogan of the movement, the ninety-nine per cent who make up the real America, even though Wall Street leads everyone to believe that the one percent should account for all financial decision-making.

That one per cent is responsible for controlling more than our wallets, but also the government. Yet the OWS protesters have found power through using their voices to finally express what the one per cent leaves unsaid; that is, to expose how Wall Street refuses to accept responsibility for its role in the financial crisis and subsequent recession.

Little over a month ago this protest originated on one street. The movement started thanks to an email last summer from the Canadian Adbusters Media Foundation, known for its anti-consumerist magazine Adbusters, which requested: “On September 17, we want to see 20,000 people flood into lower Manhattan, set up tents, kitchens, peaceful barricades and occupy Wall Street for a few months. Once there, we shall incessantly repeat one simple demand in a plurality of voices.”

The group maligned Wall Street by calling it “the financial Gomorrah of America.” They demanded protest and solidarity, invoking Egypt’s overthrow of Mubarak. Proclaiming that Tahir’s protest was successful because they vocalised one simple demand, they said similarly OWS needed a basic goal: to demand that Barack Obama establish a presidential commission to end economic influence over government.

Obama is a paradoxical figure to the protesters: it was his lack of action against - and sometimes favouring of - Wall Street during the recession that inspired the protests, but he could also be the bringer of change.

OWS has, however, been criticised as a movement without evident goals. This could explain its burgeoning popularity across America and the world according to Yves Smith, a corporate finance consultant and financial blogger at the Naked Capitalist.

This lack of centralisation, whether in the form of having no direct leadership or of having no manifesto, is forging a new model of protest.

Protests have almost become institutionalised; therefore protesting this way would only be playing into the power structure OWS is trying to eradicate. After all, protesters harbouring demands are often labelled by the media and government as “difficult” and “irrational”.

The inability to directly define and therefore dismiss OWS means that the media has not stopped watching and has ironically increased the movement’s influence. As Smith writes, “OWS is an experiment in something more akin to direct democracy and it explicitly places the wishes and needs of the community first. If nothing else it is exercising muscles that have atrophied badly in American discourse.”

It’s the police and not the protesters who have been called disorderly by the media. Disrespecting the American flag was the main criticism of protests in the 1960s. Last Monday, however, it was the police not the protesters that tore down an American flag and pushed over an American military veteran in attempt to quell the Occupy Boston protest. This incident serves as a microcosm of how the power in America is the inverse of what it should be.

According to Nobel prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz in his essay from May for Vanity Fair "Of the 1%, by the 1%, for the 1%", 25 years ago 12 per cent of America controlled 33 per cent of the nation’s wealth, whereas today, one per cent of America controls 40 per cent. This is partially due to the fact that the one per cent has seen their incomes rise by 18 per cent during the recession, while the 99 per cent have seen theirs dip.

What this means for employment today is that one in six Americans searching for a full-time job cannot find one and 20 per cent of all youths are unemployed.

To put a face to these numbers, we must understand that the one per cent is more than just financiers, but most of America’s congress. This explains the mutual pat-on-the-back that was the bailout of the banks.

Politicians know that if they placate the one per cent while in office, they will be rewarded after they leave. This is why tax bills cannot get past Congress without enormous tax cuts implemented for the affluent.

Instead this money could be going towards infrastructure such as education, healthcare or parks, but because the wealthy can afford that, they ignore that everyone else cannot. Ultimately this hurts everyone, because in effect an unequal economy does not utilise its people in the most productive fashion. Monopolies (ignored during Republican administrations) and preferential tax laws only exacerbate the situation. The conclusion that, yes, it will get worse, seems inescapable.

The protesters are finally gaining more than just ideological success. In a joint NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll released last Wednesday, 37 per cent of the U.S. supports OWS, which is more than the 26 per cent that support the Tea Party.

Some of the world’s most venerated economists are stepping up in support, such as Nobel Prize winner Paul Krugman who went as far as to say “The real extremists here are America’s oligarchs, who want to suppress any criticism of the sources of their wealth.”

Ben & Jerry’s also became the first corporation to officially back OWS. Finally, Obama himself has seemed to support the movement: his senior advisor, David Plouffe stated “The president stands squarely with the middle class in terms of trying to protect consumers and make sure that what happened doesn’t happen again.”

The protesters have made their mark, however, through actions not words and their biggest victory yet was when NYC’s mayor, Michael Bloomberg, conceded that he couldn’t forcibly remove protesters from Zuccotti Park, effectively giving them the space to protest in for as long as they want.

The banks are more reluctant to respond. Most bankers agree with the demonising views of the protesters that certain media outlets have encouraged, portraying them as drugged out hipsters.

A bank executive said to the New York Times, “It’s not a middle-class uprising. It’s fringe groups. It’s people who have the time to do this.” In one of the few showings of support, the CEO of Citigroup, Vikram Pandit, said that protesters’ grievances were “completely understandable” and that he would be willing to meet with them.

OWS has taken over a month to finally reach the global sphere. Perhaps this is because of its American moniker, but the problems it addresses are not unique to America.

Both Britain and the US have undergone massive bailouts recently, the difference being that while the UK government bought out part of the banks through public ownership, the American government gave money directly to the banks, leading to more cause for concern. This may be why the protest started earlier in America, but ultimately it reflects a global sense that governmental concern for the welfare of the banks has superseded their concern for that of the public.

This was brought to fruition this past Saturday when the Global Change movement took place, with a day of protest in over 800 cities and 82 countries. The movement reflects the same concerns as OWS: they say “United in one voice, we will let politicians, and the financial elites they serve, know it is up to us, the people, to decide our future.”

The biggest event planned in the UK is to occupy the London Stock Exchange for as long as necessary, but there was also a protest in Edinburgh. Whether this will grow into another camp of 1,500 protesters as it did in New York is yet to be seen, but the international solidarity proves that movement is interconnected.

OWS and its counterparts may be just a brief outburst, or they may be the start of a global revolution, but one thing is for certain: the people will no longer wait for the government to save them. The 99 per cent are finally having their say.