Consider the umbrella: Student movements and the repertoires of subversion and sublimation

Ours is a time that seems defined more than anything by the aftermath of the 2008 Financial Crisis: jobless recoveries, secular stagnation, youth unemployment, and levels of inequality not seen in almost a century. The Crisis did not unleash forces of progressive ‘creative destruction’ and a realignment. Instead, the ‘neoliberal’ system has been bailed out, fortified, and retrenched. Structural adjustment has migrated from the global South to North, with even nominally democratic states becoming crude facilitators of plunder. This has led to an acute gloomy forecast for youth of many countries today. Using my experiences in Hong Kong’s Umbrella Movement, I analyze both the structural conditions giving rise to the revolt and the repertoires students are employing, with particular attention paid to the subversion of state power through détournement. This age of subversion places educationist, educators, and education systems in contentious roles. I conclude with a reflection of the trend of ‘sublimation’, wherein teachers and education systems are being handed the impossible responsibility of reform to fix what are essentially political problems.