????乍一看，露宿于華爾街街頭的示威者似乎并不是一股催生改革的可靠力量。但茶黨（Tea Party）的集會(huì)最初也沒有顯露出有朝一日會(huì)改變游戲規(guī)則的潛質(zhì)。

????這兩個(gè)群體都崛起于政治和金融領(lǐng)袖未能解決美國搖搖欲墜的金融局勢(shì)之際。他們都對(duì)未來憂心忡忡，但方式有所不同。

????茶黨鼓吹財(cái)政改革，但最終的結(jié)局或許只是激化了政治僵局而已。誕生僅一個(gè)月的占領(lǐng)華爾街運(yùn)動(dòng)則旨在揭露并彰顯嚴(yán)重的不平等問題，但目前還未能提出一套方案來顛覆美國日益分化的體系。

????占領(lǐng)華爾街抗議活動(dòng)‘是針對(duì)美國領(lǐng)導(dǎo)層的一次明確而清晰的倒戈行為，”加州大學(xué)圣巴巴拉分校工作、勞工與民主研究中心（the Center for the Study of Work, Labor and Democracy at the University of California, Santa Barbara）主任尼爾森?利希頓斯坦稱。

????“抗議者正在尋找某種方式，來掌握自身的未來，”他說。“就某些方面而言，這個(gè)時(shí)期比上世紀(jì)30年代還要糟糕，當(dāng)時(shí)的美國還具備生產(chǎn)能力和大規(guī)模生產(chǎn)率。但如今的體系并沒有一個(gè)結(jié)構(gòu)穩(wěn)健的基礎(chǔ)?！?/p>

????現(xiàn)在判斷華爾街抗議活動(dòng)會(huì)有什么結(jié)果還為時(shí)尚早，但此前有過全國性改革脫胎自這類無綱領(lǐng)運(yùn)動(dòng)的先例，北伊利諾伊大學(xué)（Northern Illinois University）研究勞工和社會(huì)運(yùn)動(dòng)的歷史學(xué)教授羅斯瑪麗?弗雷爾說。

????她說，肇始于19世紀(jì)90年代末期的平民主義運(yùn)動(dòng)針對(duì)強(qiáng)大的銀行、鐵路托拉斯和其他金融精英，但這項(xiàng)運(yùn)動(dòng)耗費(fèi)數(shù)十載才有所作為?！爸敝辽鲜兰o(jì)30年代中期，華爾街才受到約束。”

????“運(yùn)動(dòng)啟動(dòng)之際通常并無目標(biāo)和要求，”弗雷爾說,“這些運(yùn)動(dòng)往往以各種抱怨開始。關(guān)鍵在于人們持續(xù)聚集在一起?！?/p>

????當(dāng)初，志同道合的共和黨人孕育（甚至啟動(dòng)了）的茶黨運(yùn)動(dòng)，如今的占領(lǐng)華爾街運(yùn)動(dòng)同樣有可能在沒有明確領(lǐng)導(dǎo)的情況下找到立足點(diǎn)。

????工會(huì)已經(jīng)聲援支持“99%人群”，甚至給祖可蒂公園露營地的抗議者送來了咖啡和甜甜圈，但勞聯(lián)產(chǎn)聯(lián) （AFL-CIO）董事達(dá)蒙?席爾瓦說，工會(huì)組織非常小心，唯恐轉(zhuǎn)移人們關(guān)注的焦點(diǎn)，稀釋抗議者的訊息。

????抗議活動(dòng)利用了公眾普遍存在的情緒，即對(duì)金融行業(yè)的救援行動(dòng)嚴(yán)重?fù)p害了其他人群的利益，讓美國嚴(yán)峻的就業(yè)形勢(shì)成為全國關(guān)注的焦點(diǎn)。這次抗議也揭露了政界的失?。浩駷橹?，他們未能采取任何措施來應(yīng)對(duì)就業(yè)領(lǐng)域全方位動(dòng)蕩的局面。

????加州大學(xué)河濱分校（University of California, Riverside）教授邁克?戴維斯說：“美國很長時(shí)間沒有針對(duì)就業(yè)問題進(jìn)行過嚴(yán)肅的討論了?！钡@位專門從事經(jīng)濟(jì)史和社會(huì)運(yùn)動(dòng)研究的學(xué)者表示，就業(yè)問題并無輕而易舉的解決之道，因?yàn)椤皼]有什么政策能把我們近些年來喪失的550萬個(gè)制造業(yè)崗位還給我們?！?/p>

????曾在1998年擔(dān)任麥克阿瑟基金會(huì)（MacArthur Foundation）研究員的戴維斯說：“很重要的一點(diǎn)是，抗議者是否有能力將其思想擴(kuò)散到全美的社會(huì)生活中去，這樣抗議活動(dòng)才不會(huì)被視為一場(chǎng)僅僅局限于精英校園和城市中心的運(yùn)動(dòng)?！?/p>

????他補(bǔ)充說，如果不能取得實(shí)質(zhì)性的改變，抗議活動(dòng)也可能會(huì)逐漸退潮，比如2006年洛杉磯爆發(fā)的以支持移民權(quán)利為主旨的大規(guī)模示威活動(dòng)?，F(xiàn)在距離那次示威活動(dòng)已經(jīng)過了幾年的時(shí)間，“還沒有取得進(jìn)展，幾乎未能催生出任何權(quán)利?！?/p>

????勞工歷史學(xué)家和其他學(xué)者把占領(lǐng)華爾街跟過去的一系列運(yùn)動(dòng)【比如，1932年為退伍軍人爭取現(xiàn)金福利的酬恤金游行（the 1932 Bonus March）和民權(quán)運(yùn)動(dòng)（the Civil Rights Movement）】以及當(dāng)代的抗議事件【比如，反對(duì)剝奪工會(huì)集體協(xié)商權(quán)的威斯康星州抗議活動(dòng)和埃及解放廣場(chǎng)（Tahrir Square）爭取自由的示威活動(dòng)】相提并論。這些示威活動(dòng)都獲得了不同程度的成功。

????At first glance, protesters camping on Wall Street's doorstep might not seem to be a sure recipe for reform. But Tea Party rallies initially didn't seem to be a game changer either.

????Both groups, worried about the future but in different ways, emerged as political and financial leaders failed to tackle the country's battered financial situation.

????The Tea Party plumped fiscal reform, but may have wound up simply solidifying political gridlock. The Occupy Wall Street protest -- only a month old -- is giving voice, and visibility, to serious inequalities, but has yet to arrive at a formula to upend the country's increasingly stratified system.

????The Occupy Wall Street protest "represents an explicit and clear defection from our leadership," says Nelson Lichtenstein, director of the Center for the Study of Work, Labor and Democracy at the University of California, Santa Barbara.

????"They are looking for some way to grasp their futures," he says. "In some ways, this period is worse than the 1930s when the country had production capabilities and enjoyed mass productivity. But now the system is not on a structurally sound basis."

????It's too early to tell what will come of the Wall Street protests, but prior national reforms have sprung from such unscripted movements, says Rosemary Feurer, a history professor at Northern Illinois University, who studies labor and social movements.

????The populism that began in the late 1890s, and aimed at powerful banks, railroad trusts and other financial elites, took decades to make a difference, she says. "It wasn't until the mid-1930s that limits were put on Wall Street."

????"Movements don't start with goals and demands," Feurer says. "They always start with grievances. The key is people gathered in a sustained way."

????Like the Tea Party, which was nurtured -- perhaps even launched -- by like-minded Republicans, the Occupy Wall Street movement could find its footing without overt leadership.

????Labor unions have expressed their solidarity with the 99 percenters -- even bringing coffee and doughnuts to their Zuccotti Park encampment -- but are wary of taking any focus away and diluting the protesters' message, according to Damon Silver, a director at AFL-CIO.

????By harnessing widely shared sentiments that the financial sector's rescue seriously damaged the rest of the population, the protest has cast a national spotlight on the grim American jobs picture. It also shined a light on the failure, thus far, of politicians to take any steps to deal with the across-the-board upheaval in employment.

????"It's been so long since this country has had a serious conversation about jobs," says Mike Davis, a University of California, Riverside professor who studies economic history and social movements. But, he says, there are no facile answers because "there is no policy that can bring back the 5.5 million manufacturing jobs that we lost in recent years.

????"Much will depend on the ability of the protesters to extend their ideas into the fabric of the country's life so it's not seen as being confined to elite campuses and cities," says Davis, who was a MacArthur Foundation fellow in 1998.

????Protest movements also can peter out without achieving meaningful change, he adds, pointing to the massive 2006 pro-immigration rights demonstration in Los Angeles. Now, just a few years later, he says, "there has been no progress and there are hardly any rights left."

????Labor historians and others compare Occupy Wall Street to a raft of past movements -- back to the 1932 Bonus March for veterans cash benefits or the Civil Rights Movement as well as current phenomena like the Wisconsin rebellion against bargaining rights-stripping and Egypt's Tahrir Square freedom demonstrators, which have had varied degrees of success.