Protecting Democracy

Updated March 2020

RESISTANCE

After one year of a Trump campaign and three years of a Trump presidency, we know a lot more that we did when this website was first introduced in the winter of 2017.

To summarize, for three years — democracy, the rule of law, common decency, norms of behavior, common sense, integrity and honesty are assaulted daily by this president. At this point, Trump has managed to surround himself with fawning enablers and the entire Republican Party — elected representatives, senators and Republicans themselves —  have abandoned conservative principles and behave collectively like cowardly cult members.

An astonishing turn of events. It is still unbelievable that this has happened to our country . . . but it has.


Curator note: Nicholas Kristof, the author of this article and regular NYT columnist, occupies a soft spot in our hearts because he is an Oregonian from Yamhill, a small rural farming community. His article about the “resistance” provides outstanding guidance to people, information, strategies and networks that are creating a real and sustained effort to protect our democracy. I have taken the liberty of bolding, italicizing, inserting bullets and links to the resources he cites. There has never been a greater time to stand up and speak out for American democracy.
his blog is dedicated to one of the recommendations from Gene Sharp —  “meticulous research, networking and preparation” —so that when the time comes, as we prepare for the 2020 elections, we will be ready.

How to Stand Up to Trump and Win

People observing “A Day Without Immigrants” in Brooklyn in February.
Todd Heisler/The New York Times

BOSTON — After President Trump’s election, a wave of furious opposition erupted. It was an emotional mix of denial and anger, the first two stages of grief, and it wasn’t very effective.

Yet increasingly that has matured into thoughtful efforts to channel the passion into a movement organized toward results. One example: the wave of phone calls to congressional offices that torpedoed the Republican “health care plan.”

Yes, Trump opponents lost the election and we have to recognize that elections have consequences. But if “resistance” has a lefty ring to it,

it can also be framed as a patriotic campaign to protect America from someone who we think would damage it.

So what are the lessons from resistance movements around the world that have actually succeeded? I’ve been quizzing the experts, starting with Gene Sharp, a scholar here in Boston.

GENE SHARP

  • Sharp’s works — now in at least 45 languages and available free online — helped the Baltic countries win freedom from Russia, later guided students in bringing democracy to Serbia, and deeply influenced the strategy of Arab Spring protesters. Sharp is THE expert on challenging authoritarians, and orders for his writings have surged since Trump’s election.
  • Today Sharp is 89 and in fading health. But his longtime collaborator, Jamila Raqib, has been holding workshops for anti-Trump activists, and there have even been similar sessions for civil servants in Washington exploring how they should serve under a leader they distrust.
  • The main message Sharp and Raqib offered is that effectiveness

does not come only from pouring out into the street in symbolic protests. It requires meticulous research, networking and preparation.

  • “Think!” Sharp said. “Think before you do anything. You need a lot of knowledge first.” His work emphasizes grass-roots organizing, searching out weak spots in an administration — and patience before turning to 198 nonviolent methods he has put into a list, from strikes to consumer boycotts to mock awards.
  • Raqib recommended pragmatic efforts seeking a particular outcome, not just a vague yearning for the end of Trump. When pushed, she said that calls for a general strike in February were insufficiently organized, and that the Women’s March on Washington, which had its first protest the day after Inauguration Day, will ideally become anchored in a larger strategy for change. But she thinks the Day Without Immigrants” protest was well crafted, and the same for the bodega strike by Yemeni immigrants.

SAM DALEY-HARRIS

Sam Daley-Harris, another maestro of effective protest, agrees on a focus on results, not just symbolic protest. He has overseen groups like Results and the Citizens Climate Lobby that have had outsize influence on policy, so I asked him what citizens upset at Trump should do.

  • “The overarching answer is to work with your member of Congress,” Daley-Harris told me. He suggested focusing on a particular issue that you can become deeply knowledgeable about. Then work with others to push for a meeting with a member of Congress, a state lawmaker or even a legislative staff member.
  • He recommended speaking courteously — anyone too hostile is dismissed and loses influence — and being very specific about which bill you want the person to support or oppose.

. . .

THREE INSIGHTS AND RECOMMENDATIONS

  1. First, advocates are often university-educated elites who can come across as patronizing. So skip the lofty rhetoric and emphasize issues of pocketbooks and corruption. Centrist voters may not care whether Trump is riding roughshod over institutions, but they’ll care if he rips them off or costs them jobs.
  2. Second, movements must always choose between purity and breadth — and usually they overdo the purity. It’s often possible to achieve more with a broader coalition, cooperating with people one partially disagrees with. I think it was a mistake, for example, for the Women’s March to disdain “pro-life” feminists.
  3. Third, nothing deflates an authoritarian more than ridicule. When Serbian youths challenged the dictator Slobodan Milosevic, they put his picture on a barrel and rolled it down the street, allowing passers-by to whack it with a bat.

In recruiting for the Trump resistance, Stephen Colbert may be more successful than a handful of angry Democratic senators. Trump can survive denunciations, but I’m less sure that in the long run he can withstand mockery.

I invite you to sign up for my free, twice-weekly email newsletter. Please also join me on Facebook and Google+, watch my YouTube videos and follow me on Twitter (@NickKristof).

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