by Liz Moore, Executive Director
We are fighting against a fascist takeover of the US government. Authoritarians around the world play from the same playbook: They will stoke fear and chaos to keep us off-balance. They will make threats to get people to obey in advance. They will weaponize fear, prejudice, and hatred of subgroups to keep us divided and apart.
It turns out authoritarians are fairly predictable. Our ability to apply lessons to organize with creativity is our best strategy to win.
We can look to recent history to predict the probability of stopping democratic backsliding: In research looking at 35 cases of democratic backsliding from 1991-2021, with no civil resistance movement, only 7.5% of cases stopped the authoritarian push. With a civil resistance movement, 51.7% of pro-democracy efforts succeeded.
There are no guarantees. And: we are each other’s best bet.
People power, also known as civil resistance, means waging struggle for political, economic, or social objectives without the use or threat of violence. It can include protest, sit-ins, strikes, boycotts, civil disobedience, and constructive interventions.
When would-be dictators seek to divide and rule — we must play as a team. They try to wear people down, going after group after group after group — we must care for one another to stay in the fight. They use threats of repression to maximize obeying in advance — we must plan in advance to make repression backfire and cultivate collective courage. They sow confusion, distraction, and overwhelm — we must cut through confusion to identify what regime actions or trigger events we want to be ready for. They seek to provoke opposition violence — we must not take the bait, remain strategic, and use collective nonviolent discipline.They combine trigger events with harsh repression — we must develop our capacity for rapid mobilization together.
History shows us key lessons: People power movements are successful when they include large, diverse participation from different sectors and groups in society and when they manage constructive tensions, center relationships and prioritize larger collective goals. Mobilizing with a NO is essential but we also need a Unifying “vision of tomorrow” grounded in shared values. Successful people power movements plan ahead to maintain nonviolent discipline and resilience to make repression backfire.
Successful people power movements expand their repertoire of nonviolent tactics: protest, non-cooperation, building alternatives, and culture. While protesting to make our NO visible is essential, we must also use non-cooperation strategies to undermine the authority of unjust policy by disrupting it, refusing to cooperate with it, or otherwise making it harder, or impossible, for the system to keep its unfair policy.
People power movements win through loyalty shifts: building relationships to recruit from within key pillars: business, labor, security forces, faith, education, media, and civil society. These pillars uphold or weaken authoritarian regimes — so moving people within them to refuse to cooperate by speaking out, taking action, and refusing to comply is key.
To build this movement, we must be willing to stretch ourselves to take risks and keep testing boundaries. We must invite more and more people in and recruit noncooperation partners from unlikely sectors. And we must use our most powerful human source: creativity.