Politicians and rallies won’t save us: We need direct action, disruptions to systems of power and community care – Part I

Editor’s note: This is Part I of a three part series on movement work, strategies and tactics for the current political climate in the US.  

In some ways it has been refreshing to see so many people publicly demonstrate their anger and resistance to the various Executive Orders that the Trump Administration has imposed on us since January 20th.

Protests and rallies can energize us, can help us to not feel isolated, and can even assist in developing community.

However, it is always important to engage in critical thinking about all the protests and rallies that have taken place since January 20th. In February, I posted a piece entitled, On why we need to think strategically and not always be reactionary: Moving forward in the resistance, on movement building and Collective Liberation in this moment. In that article I made 8 points that might be beneficial regarding our need to be strategic in the current political climate we find ourselves in.

On March 8th, there was a large rally held in downtown Grand Rapids, a rally that lifted up International Women’s Day. I also wrote a reflection of that rally, which you can find here. One thing I pointed out was:

I get that people who attended to rally/march on Saturday are upset about what the Trump Administration has done since January 20th. People not only have a right to be pissed off, they ought to be pissed off. However, this shit show is a constant for Black people, Indigenous people, immigrants, the working class, queer & trans people, those with disabilities and anti-war activists who are confronting US imperialism. 

Those who organized last Saturday’s Hands Off rally heard some of this critique, especially from BIPOC organizers who are embedded in community and doing the ongoing work address systemic oppression. The rally on Saturday had a majority of BIPOC speakers and those who are deeply involved in the struggles that their communities are engaged in. Many of those same speakers invited the rally participants to join in the work they are engaged in, the kind of work that actually creates change and confronts systems of power and oppression. 

Why politicians won’t save us

The political system in the US is and has always been controlled by those with tremendous political and economic power. The political system is no bankrupt, simply because it is designed the way that those with economic power have always wanted it to go. To the degree that there has been any political gains, it is because of the various social movements have had over the past 250 years. 

Slavery was abolished because of the Abolitionist Movement, labor right were won by workers fighting for workplace democracy, African Americans fought for more equality through the Civil Rights Movement, and LGBTQ justice has been won by various movements led by those who gay, lesbian, bi-sexual, trans and queer. None of these gains, and many more, were ever gifts from those in power, including politicians. Indeed, whatever gains have been won are because of the organized efforts by those directly involved in the struggle and those most affected.

We need to begin to come to terms with the fact that regardless of which political party is in power, most people will still be experiencing oppression. Just look at what happened during the Biden Administration:

• There were more deportations in the last four years than there were during the first Trump Administration.
• The Biden Administration approved more fossil fuel extractions on US soil than the first Trump Administration did.
• The wealth gap has expanded during the Biden Administration, especially amongst the Billionaire Class.
• The Biden Administration increased US military funding every year for the past 4 years.
• The Biden Administration increased funding for policing, even in the era of Black Lives Matter.
• The Biden Administration was completely and utterly complicit in the war crimes and genocidal policies of Israel, refusing to end weapons sales to Israel, being complicit in allowing Israel to block humanitarian aid to Gaza and always voting against most of the rest of the world when the United Nations condemned what Israel was doing. 
• The Biden Administration was not only silent, but enabled the repression targeted at the US campus Pro-Palestine movement. 
• Rent increases went up during the Biden Administration, which did very little to address the current US housing crisis. 

Now, people are quick to say that what the current Trump Administration is doing in much worse that what happened under the Biden years, and I would not dispute that. However, that is a pretty low bar. The fact is that all partisan politics in the US has shift right, especially over the past several decades. This is why Michigan Senator Slotkin was praising Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush during her response to Trump’s State of the Union speech. This is a clear indication that the Democrats embrace a more rightward political trajectory. Even greater evidence is in how the Democratic Party has responded to the Trump Administration since January 20th. The Democrats response has been weak, cowardly and primarily performative.

Now, I’m not suggesting that people shouldn’t vote, but part of the problem with liberal, especially white liberals, is that they complain when Republicans have a majority, and then do little more than defend the Democrats they voted for, even when those Democrats support militarism, genocide, the prison industrial complex, increased policing, corporate welfare, fossil fuel extraction, a for-profit health care system, the privatization of public services, an unhealthy, exploitative and polluting food system, etc, etc. 

Why rallies won’t save us

Rallies won’t save us, because they are not only one tactic that organized people can use, they don’t fundamentally disrupt systems of power and oppression. What we need to be thinking about are goals, strategies and tactics.

If our goal is merely to get rid of Trump and Musk, then we will not address systems of power and oppression. Instead, our goals should reflect values and principles, like the dismantling of the Prison Industrial Complex, an economic system based on cooperation, direct democracy or collective liberation. If we just want to get rid of Trump and return to life under a Democrat in the White House, then we have to come to terms with the fact that we don’t really want to change things and that the masses of people will still be subjected to poverty, institutional racism, deportation, police violence, homophobia & transphobia, a shitty health care system, Climate Change and unaffordable housing for most people.

One could argue that the goal of the Civil Rights Movement was to oppose racial discrimination and win greater equality. So what strategies did the Civil Right Movement utilize? One could argue that they used a legal strategy, an economic strategy, and a strategy of polarization. Polarization is a strategy to force systems of power and the general population to have to come to terms with inequities and injustices in the system of racial discrimination.

The tactics that the Civil Rights Movement utilized were vast, such as boycotts, strikes, lunch counter sit-ins, freedom rides, marches and civil disobedience, all for the purpose of exposing the inherently unjust systems in society, as well as to create more equality. 

Of course the Civil Rights Movement was not static, since it also evolved. (See the book, A More Beautiful and Terrible History: The Uses and Misuses of Civil Rights History) The Voting Rights Act and the Civil Rights Act in the mid-1960s did not get the results they hoped for, so the movement began to demand more economic justice and the right to defend their communities. When Dr. King moved north in 1965/66, his way of seeing the US radically changed, which is why he not only condemned racial discrimination, but militarism and capitalism, in what he referred to as the evil triplets. 

This evolution of the Civil Rights Movement also involved resisting the US military draft, condemning the US war in Vietnam, supporting labor strikes, the right for Black people to defend themselves, which is what groups like SNCC, the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense, the Deacons for Defense would embrace. This is also why Dr. King began to organize the Poor People’s Campaign, which brought together Black, Latino, Asian, Indigenous and white people to promote an economic bill of rights. 

The social movements of the 1960s and 70s didn’t focus on who sat in the White House, since both Johnson and Nixon were committed to pretty much the same thing of maintaining US global military supremacy, Capitalism and the system of white supremacy, which is exactly what Dr. King was referring to the “evil triplets.”

The Civil Rights Movement, or as many would call the Black Freedom Struggle, evolved, it learned from its mistakes, it took significant risks and it confronted systems of power and oppression. 

In Part II, I want to discuss ways that movement work can utilize Direct Action and disrupting systems of power and oppression, and why it is important if we want to achieve our goals.