The foundation of a transformative movement that serves all of Earth’s inhabitants and Earth herself is a broad vision, what we want the world and our lives to look like once our movement is in full swing. According to Erica Chenowith, possibly the leading scholar of nonviolent resistance movements, it takes the active participation of just 3.4% of the population of a polity, like a country, to create meaningful, substantial change, like a change of governance. Countless movement leaders and activists believe such a movement must center the leadership of Black Indigenous People of Color (BIPOC). I would add that such leadership must be diverse across not only race and ethnicity, but also gender and sexuality, class, age, physical and mental ability, culture, and wisdom traditions. The leadership structure must be shallow where self-governing affinity groups and spokes councils make decisions at the lowest possible practical level by consensus. Chenowith, and many other scholars as well as movement leaders, have shown how much more successful nonviolent strategies and tactics are for creating durable change than are violent methods. In addition, our movements must be ever emerging, responsive to new developments as opposed to recklessly reactive to new instances of oppression. We must be self-determined, staying centered on our values and goals. We must be nimble, ready to change our priorities and plans at any time. We must be ready to escalate our campaigns whenever there are opportunities to increase the pressure for change. Such nimbleness will require continual education and training. This will include ongoing power analysis of the existing pillars of power and of our own capacities for effective consequential action, as well as learning and practicing how to govern. History shows that effective movements consist of a popular front involving broad masses of people sharing a common goal but also with narrower priorities and modes of action, along with a vanguard of activists committed to transformation, nonviolence, and principles of care, discipline, and sustainability of the movement. A central aim of the movement is to decouple from mainstream institutions through boycotts, general strikes, fostering a repair/DIY culture, and mutual aid. To replace the mainstream and take power, we wed resistance with alternative wellbeing structures and processes.
Recipe for Regeneration
