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SOCIAL STRIKES: GOALS AND TACTICS  
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Jeremy Brecher
November 17, 2025
Labor Network for Sustainability
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_ Nonviolent popular uprisings have brought down authoritarian
regimes in many countries around the world. Conditions for such action
do not yet exist in the United States, but the growing wrath of the
people make them increasingly plausible. _

,

 

Sometimes there is so much rage at a tyrannical government that
millions of people are willing to participate in general strikes and
popular nonviolent uprisings – what I have called “social
strikes” because they represent noncooperation and disruption by an
entire society. Previous commentaries in this series have explored how
social strikes have overcome tyranny in the Philippines, Serbia, South
Korea, other countries
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the history of mass strikes and general strikes in the US
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how today’s resistance to MAGA authoritarianism might help
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lay the groundwork for social strikes; and possible timelines and
organization for social strikes
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This commentary will discuss action when a social strike is looming or
underway.

Military strategists distinguish “wars of position” and “wars of
movement.” Social strikes are “wars of movement” par excellence.
Many of the habits of thought and action developed in quieter times
are counterproductive and need to be put in obeyance during what Mark
and Paul Engler have called “the whirlwind”
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revolt.

Defining goals

 

A Black Lives Matter die-in over rail tracks, protesting alleged
police brutality in Saint Paul, Minnesota, September 20, 2015. Photo
credit: Fibonacci Blue
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from Minnesota, Wikimedia Commons, CC by 2.0.

 

Social strikes generally grow out of burgeoning discontent about what
is, not pre-defined and agreed-to objectives about what should be in
the future — think of Black Lives Matter. While some participants
may have pre-formed goals (often not aligned or even conflicting with
each other), the goals of an emerging social strike movement usually
need to be established in the course of the struggle.

This requires a willingness by disparate constituencies to adapt to
the goals emerging for the movement as a whole. A prefigurative
example might be the way many currents came together around a common
set of demands in the Hands Off!, MayDay, and No Kings national days
of action. That requires a formal or informal process for discussing,
establishing, and modifying goals. Some kind of on-going participatory
forums – more or less open depending on the level of repression –
need to be part of this process.

In defining the goals of social strikes several criteria need to be
coordinated. Their demands need to represent broad objectives that
appeal to a broad public. They need to unify different sectors of the
population, such as private employees, government employees, women,
educated middle class, business owners, rural poor, urban poor, etc.
They also need to unify different movements, such as climate, racial
justice, labor, immigrant, etc. They need to embody broadly accepted
norms. These may be norms broadly held in the society, such as support
for democracy. They often are embodied in the existing constitution
but denied in practice by the regime. Again, the 2025 national days of
action provide good examples of such unifying demands, combining
protecting democracy with protection of immigrants, workers, women,
LGBTQ+ people, kids, the elderly, the disabled, and others.

It is often possible in a social strike to combine such broad goals
with specific demands by more specific groups that can be met by local
officials and immediate employers – release of prisoners, permitting
of demonstrations, shorter hours, wage increases, or whatever is
important to the participants. Broad goals that cannot be realized
immediately can be combined with more immediate goals that the regime
can grant without completely undermining its own authority. For
example, the authorities may refuse to grant full freedom of speech,
assembly, and press, but can nevertheless agree to let political
prisoners out of jail and restrain vigilante groups.

In many social strikes against tyrannies the unifying goal, often
reduced to a single demand, is removal of the top government officials
from office. In many situations such a demand may be the best or even
the only way to develop the unified power necessary to overcome an
authoritarian ruler.

However, as a study of popular uprisings over the 2010s
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leave a successful uprising with little consensus about how to go
forward from initial success. Or it can simply lead to a less terrible
but still unsatisfactory status quo ante. The drive for unity around
one or limited specific goals needs to be combined with vigorous
discussion of longer-range programs by constituent elements of the
social strike coalition. A good example of how to do this was provided
by the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions and other major unions
which declared a general strike against president Yoon Suk Yeol’s
attempted martial law coup, while also demonstrating for what they
called “Beyond Yoon” demands
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for just working conditions and public policies to ensure quality
public services for all Koreans.

Tactical considerations

 

Nonviolent Leaders and Campaigns. Photo credit: Public domain

Social strikes can use a plethora of tactics. For a compendium of such
tactics, I believe there is still no source more useful that Gene
Sharp’s magisterial three-volume opus _The Politics of Nonviolent
Action_.
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The second volume, _The Methods of Nonviolent Action_
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presents 198 different forms of action that have been used by
nonviolent movements. A few more have been invented since it was
published.

Social strikes can take a lot of different forms. They can be centered
in unionized industries or in urban districts or regions. They can
take the form of a single uprising or general strike or of
“rolling” actions in which different groups strike or otherwise
disrupt and then return to work or normal life. They can be
“quickie” actions lasting a day or even less, or open-ended ones
that last until victory, defeat, or explicit compromise.

Social strikes can involve quiet or disruptive street actions, or they
can simply involve people staying quietly at home. Street actions
allow social strikers and supporters to show their courage,
confidence, and resistance to repression; they also provide easy
targets for repression.

Social strikes
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often include strikes and general strikes, discussed at length in a
previous commentary. Social strikes have often involved occupation of
workplaces (the Polish general strike that gave birth to the
Solidarity union occurred when activists spread the word: Don’t burn
Party headquarters; occupy the factories.) Such occupations tend to
make repressive violence more difficult. However, they are frequently
perceived by those in power as a fundamental, even revolutionary
challenge to their authority, making them less willing to compromise.

Social strike tactics need to be selected on the basis of many
considerations. For example, what are people willing to do given the
present state of the movement? How will the wider public respond to
different tactics? What responses are different tactics likely to
provoke from the authorities? What kinds of outcomes (e.g. showdowns,
negotiations, changes in public opinion, splits and shifts in attitude
of the authorities) are different tactics likely to generate?

The ability to shift tactics can be a great asset. When a movement is
locked into a particular tactic, its opponents often try to break it
by raising the cost and pain of continuing. This can be thwarted if
the movement is able to shift tactics on its own initiative. One of
the reasons for the demise of Occupy Wall Street was its inability to
redirect its energies from continuing the occupation of Zuccotti Park,
even when it recognized that police eviction could no longer be
effectively prevented. When the authorities are willing to shoot down
large numbers of people in the street, staying at home or occupying
workplaces may be the best alternative to submission.

Social strikes often benefit from leadership by example. If one group
is ready to take an action and face the risks it entails, their
initiative may well encourage and inspire others to do the same. This
can be a way to escape the impasse where everybody is waiting to act
until they see whether others have the courage and commitment to act.
Such exemplary actions can precede and lay the groundwork for a social
strike. They can also introduce new themes and tactics into an
on-going struggle. The Tesla Takedowns and the blockading of downtown
Baltimore
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by trade unionists during the MayDay 2025 day of action illustrate the
potential of such exemplary actions.

Faced with the possibility or reality of a social strike, the
authorities normally turn to repression, ranging from harassment to
arrest to torture to assassination. Often the most effective way to
deal with repression is to render it counterproductive for the
authorities by means of a “political jujitsu” in which each act of
repression further undermines the support and legitimacy of those
responsible for it. This generally requires a disciplined nonviolence
in which the protestors present themselves as the upholders of peace,
order, and legitimate law while the authorities are painting a
portrait of themselves as out-of-control hooligans attempting to
maintain their own power through illegitimate violence. In such a
context, even members of the public who do not fully support the goals
of the movement can be mobilized around opposition to its illegitimate
repression. An example is the way labor and public opinion swung to
support Occupy Wall Street in response to a brutal police attack on
peaceful demonstrators crossing a bridge – resulting in an extended
suspension of police efforts to evict the Occupy encampment.

Social strikes are ventures into unknown territory. It is impossible
to know in advance just what potential participants will actually be
willing to do. Nor is it possible to know how those in authority, or
the broader public, will respond. Movements can attempt to “test the
waters” by means of lesser actions. If people won’t turn out for a
peaceful demonstration, maybe it’s not the right time to call on
them to strike. Conversely, if larger numbers come out than expected,
and they are all talking about what to do next, the time may be ripe
to escalate tactics. If the authorities brutalize demonstrators and
the public expresses outrage, or sections of the establishment
criticize the repression, the movement can get some sense of who it
might appeal to for support and who might restrain the authorities
from further repression.

_The final commentary in this series will discuss “Endgames for
Social Strikes.”_

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Gene Sharp, _The Politics of Nonviolent Action_ (Boston: Porter
Sargent, 1973). Sharp recognizes both well-organized, intentional
campaigns with well-defined leaderships like those of Gandhi, Martin
Luther King, Jr., and most trade union-led strikes, and also more
“spontaneous” nonviolent “people power” popular uprisings. He
is a strong advocate for the former. While movements with such defined
and empowered leadership indeed have advantages, the reality of social
strikes is often more like an eruption from below. Nonetheless a great
deal can be learned about strategy and tactics even for such
“whirlwinds” from Sharp’s work. For understanding the dynamics
of uprisings that emerge outside any kind of centralized control there
is no substitute for studying the actual history of a variety of such
movements.

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This is part three of the series on Strikes. For the first two parts
go to Labor Network for Sustainability:
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Gene Sharp, _The Politics of Nonviolent Action_ (Boston: Porter
Sargent, 1973). Sharp recognizes both well-organized, intentional
campaigns with well-defined leaderships like those of Gandhi, Martin
Luther King, Jr., and most trade union-led strikes, and also more
“spontaneous” nonviolent “people power” popular uprisings. He
is a strong advocate for the former. While movements with such defined
and empowered leadership indeed have advantages, the reality of social
strikes is often more like an eruption from below. Nonetheless a great
deal can be learned about strategy and tactics even for such
“whirlwinds” from Sharp’s work. For understanding the dynamics
of uprisings that emerge outside any kind of centralized control there
is no substitute for studying the actual history of a variety of such
movements.
 

* Strikes; Social Strikes; Black Lives Matter; Gene Sharp;
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