AEI’s Jamila Raqib Address at Amnesty International Conference in Boston
October 4, 2025
Speech Delivered by Jamila Raqib
Thank you for bringing us together for this important conversation at a time of such great urgency, when so much feels like it’s on the line.
It’s a strange thing to be here, at Amnesty International, talking about authoritarianism in the United States. Not because this country was ever a perfect democracy but because Americans are waking up to the fact that this latest assault on democracy, what we’ve been witnessing in recent months, is more aggressive and more dangerous.
The title of this panel is Know Your Rights, Defend Your Rights, which implies, rightly so, that in facing this crisis, knowing our rights isn’t going to be enough. And defending them is going to require more than a legal strategy or an electoral one - showing up to vote every four years or two years.
Because we know that democracy is more than just our legal or electoral systems. It’s not just our courts or the constitution, or Congress. It’s all of these things. But it’s also us. All of us here and out there. Because when our formal systems are weakened or attacked, then we, the people, become the most powerful line of defense.
Much of my work over the past twenty years has been with groups in countries, usually far away, who were fighting dictatorships, occupations or carrying out struggles for human rights and climate justice, or to advance the rights of women and Indigenous groups.
Now, our work is finding an audience here at home from people who recognize that what we’re witnessing in our country follows an authoritarian playbook we’ve seen before - throughout history and around the world. And that we have a playbook too.
I want to spend the time I have to share some observations and insights from that anti-authoritarian playbook, one that has been distilled from centuries of what people have done to resist and defeat attacks on their communities and political systems, all without using violence.
The first point I’d like to make is that acting quickly matters.
Our study of coups and other authoritarian power grabs shows us that these violations are successful not because people support them but because people fail to act or take too long to act because they’re afraid or confused.
The authoritarians know this, that’s why they carry out their violations in ways that foster this sense of fear and confusion. It’s part of the reason that coups are carried out at night, so people wake up to a new reality they feel powerless to resist.
We saw this a few weeks ago when the administration tried to deport 76 children who came to the United States as unaccompanied minors from Guatemala. They did this at 3 in the morning on a holiday weekend, waking the children up and putting them on three planes, one of which took off, but which was forced to turn around after a judge temporarily blocked the deportation. It’s shocking and cruel, but again, it’s part of the strategy. Which means our strategy must be to resist passivity and confusion by having capacities and networks in place to act quickly.
The good news is that we are developing these networks, these rapid response capabilities. People are getting activated in every corner of our country. They recognize that what they do, or don’t do, in this moment, matters. They want to act. They feel a sense of urgency - we all do.
And this brings me to my second point. And that’s that acting quickly matters, but how we act also matters.
A lot of our global movements, when they’re faced with a crisis, often default to marches and rallies. Which are important - they communicate that people reject these policies. But it’s a real mistake to think that if enough of us go in the streets and stay there long enough, our success is inevitable. You may be familiar with the work of our colleague, Erica Chenoweth, whose work says that struggles that are able to mobilize 3.5% of the population are very likely to succeed. But some people have taken the 3.5 number to mean that all we need to do is get 12 million people in the streets and we can defeat authoritarianism.
But we’ve seen huge mobilizations globally that do little to change policies and systems. Numbers are important, but just as important is the quality of the participation.
Our movements need to be disciplined and well-trained. That means understanding the risks involved - how to withstand repression, the need for nonviolent discipline - to make sure people aren’t provoked into violence or other unwise behavior.
All this takes advance planning and preparation and training.
Effective action also means that we have to move beyond symbolic actions that show we reject these policies to methods that withdraw our cooperation and build alternative power. My colleague and mentor Gene Sharp developed a list of 198 Methods of Nonviolent Action.
The list includes the methods we associate and even equate with nonviolent action, like marches and rallies, but they also include social, political, and economic noncooperation, things like strikes and boycotts, refusal to assist government agents, and disguised disobedience in cases where the risk of open refusal is too high.
It also includes a category of methods known as nonviolent intervention, actions like alternative communications systems, and economic systems, mutual aid, guerilla theatre, and reverse strikes, which is one of my favorites - where instead of stopping work like in a regular strike, people do work that they’re not expected to do, or even paid to do, in order to bring attention to the government’s failure to address a need in the community. And sometimes they send a bill for the work.
The methods of noncooperation and intervention is where we should be focussing because this is where our movements can build power, not just to conduct resistance effectively or to disrupt, but also to transition to a more just system.
So how do we select actions and then sequence them as part of a larger strategy? This brings me to my third point:
We must understand our contexts.
Action that’s effective stems from an understanding of our local contexts. That means that before we jump into action, especially action that’s risky, we pause to understand our landscape and our opponents. It means asking questions like:
Who are the groups - what we would call the “pillars of support” - whose cooperation, obedience, and assistance is needed to carry out the harmful policies, and how vulnerable are each of them to persuasion? How vulnerable are they to social or economic pressure?
It means developing campaigns around the issues that are most important to our communities.
We’re talking today about defending democracy but for a lot of our communities, this isn’t a very compelling narrative. Our existing system has let too many people down. Democracy is also a bit too abstract as a concept.
Creating more compelling campaigns, campaigns that people will want to join, to give their time, their energy, their resources to, means that we need to translate the national level harm we’re seeing being systematically carried out and connect it to the lives of everyday Americans - their social values, their economic livelihoods, the health and wellness of their families and communities.
Because if we think of Gandhi’s Salt March or the Montgomery Bus Boycott, the issues that were selected were not the most important or the most severe issues that the society faced. They were ones that were concrete, representative of the wider injustice, they affected a lot of people and maybe most importantly, they targeted the weakest points of the opponent’s policies.
Which means they were achievable, and when they were achieved, they set the movement up for a success that shook people out of their perceived powerlessness, and built their confidence to make bigger demands.
So these are just a few insights I wanted to share in the context of this discussion, the need to act quickly and with urgency, to take action that draws from the large repertoire of diverse actions available to us, and to make sure our action stems from a good understanding of our landscape.
And I’ll just conclude by saying that ultimately, the need to build power is central to everything we do. And again, this is power not just in numbers but in capacity, alternative institutions, skills. Today people are organizing in decentralized groups: through their churches and places of worship, gardening and reading clubs, unions, and schools and professional groups and neighborhood associations. And they’re looking to carve out roles for themselves. These groups are pockets of power and they could be transformed into organizing hubs, if they were supported by a decentralized training infrastructure of resources that could help them design and carry out action, even if centralized leadership doesn't emerge or is disrupted.
And actually what’s needed, beyond dealing with this immediate crisis is something longer term: a civil resistance muscle - education and literacy about nonviolent action and movement work that is embedded in our public education and educational institutions. So that we can defend our rights, our communities, and our political systems not just in this moment, but in years to come. Because an engaged and informed citizenry is our best and most resilient forms of democratic defense.
In closing I’ll just say that it’s a moment of crisis but also a moment of opportunity. Movement building isn’t easy. I’m paraphrasing Dr. King when he said that there’s no neat row of buttons we can push to get the outcomes we want. There’s a rigor to this process that we simply can’t skip if we’re to have a chance of being successful against powerful and sophisticated opponents. But ultimately, what happens next is up to us, what we do or what we refuse to do, and that should offer grounds for real hope for all of us.
I’ve been really struck by what my fellow panelists have shared - not just about what people are facing but the courage and creativity and effectiveness they’re showing. It should remind us all that we’re not powerless in facing this crisis, and we’re not starting from zero. There’s a lot of insight and information we can draw from not just to get inspired but to figure out what we ourselves can do.
And we need to document and celebrate these incremental successes because they build hope and hope in these circumstances isn’t just a nice idea, it’s a strategic necessity. I look forward to continuing the conversation.
-Jamila Raqib
Perspective Daily Interviews AEI’s Jamila Raqib on Nonviolent Resistance
Published on September 15, 2025
”Finally an end to war and dictatorship? This method works better”
Interview by Julia Tappeiner
Nonviolent resistance isn't wishful thinking, but a struggle with sophisticated tactics. That's what makes it so effective. It has already been used to push back Russia.
The article in brief
In 1989, almost 2 million people in the Baltics formed a 600-kilometer-long human chain – a silent, singing protest against Soviet rule and the beginning of independence.
According to a study, nonviolent movements are almost twice as successful as armed ones – but their success rate has halved in the last 15 years.
Successful nonviolent resistance requires more than protest: with strategy, diverse tactics, and broad social participation, it can even counter military force.
Read the full interview here.
Gaslit Nation Interviews AEI Director Jamila Raqib
Published on July 22, 2025
”Fire in Our Peace: The Power of Nonviolent Resistance”
Interview by Andrea Chalupa
They want us to believe that silence is strength. That if we keep our heads down, the storm will pass. But we are the storm. And our storm doesn’t need fists. It needs strategy, courage, and the fire of militant nonviolence.
In the latest episode of Gaslit Nation, Jamila Raqib, the executive director of the Albert Einstein Institution, delivers a masterclass in radical defiance without a single weapon raised. Raqib doesn’t just talk resistance. She teaches the art of war, the nonviolent kind, built on discipline, planning, and unshakeable conviction.
She carries forward the torch of Gene Sharp, the quiet revolutionary whose writings, like From Dictatorship to Democracy, which the Gaslit Nation Book Club read in March, have armed movements from Serbia to Syria. His ideas are dangerous, not because they incite chaos, but because they illuminate how to take power back without bloodshed. And dictators fear that more than any rifle.
This is militant nonviolence. It’s strategic. It’s disruptive. And when practiced with precision, it brings regimes to their knees.
Blueprint for the Battle Ahead Raqib outlines a crucial truth: power is not monolithic. It comes from the obedience of people, workers, civil servants, police, students. Withdraw that obedience, and even the strongest tyrant collapses.
Take Serbia. Take Bangladesh. The world keeps giving us proof that nonviolent action isn’t weak; it’s lethal to authoritarianism when wielded with discipline. These movements succeeded not because they were polite, but because they were strategic. Organized. Defiant.
This is how repression backfires. Every crackdown becomes fuel. Every jail cell, every bullet, every propaganda campaign becomes a rallying cry, if activists know how to use it.
Weapons of the Peaceful Warrior Raqib reminds us that art is a weapon. Culture is armor. Community is infrastructure. And technology is a battlefield. Whether it empowers or undermines you depends on how well you understand it. Movements rise and fall on logistics, not just slogans.
Fear will always be there. That’s normal. But as Raqib insists, fear doesn’t mean stop. It means go smart. Fear is a compass, if it scares the regime, you're probably doing something right.
Nonviolence is Not Passive. It's Precision. This conversation isn’t about kumbaya. It’s about battle-readiness. It’s about studying the terrain of power, exploiting the cracks, and toppling giants with the slow, grinding force of disciplined resistance.
Nonviolence doesn’t mean surrender. It means refusing to give your enemy the war they want. It means winning on your terms. And in a time of rising fascism, digital surveillance, and global despair, we must turn to the tools that have worked, again and again.
So study Gene Sharp. Listen to Raqib. Organize like your life depends on it, because it does.
This is not the time for feel-good hashtags. This is the time for public education, mass mobilization, and strategic action. Nonviolent resistance is not soft. It’s the hardest fight there is.
But it’s the one that wins.
Listen to the full interview here.
Japanese Newspaper Shukan Kinyobi Interviews AEI’s Jamila Raqib
Published on August 22, 2025
“Misunderstood as Idealism — Lives Protected Precisely Because of Nonviolence”
Interview by Kazuhiro Soda
Q (Soda, interviewer): You were born in Afghanistan and moved to the United States with your family. Can you tell us about that?
Jamila Raqib:
Yes. I was born in 1979, just as the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan. Because of the war, my family fled and emigrated to the United States. Later, when I was older, I met Gene Sharp and began working with him at the Albert Einstein Institution. At first, I myself was skeptical of his ideas.
Q: Why were you skeptical?
Raqib:
Because my own experience of war had been so violent and cruel. When I first read Sharp’s writings, they seemed like “beautiful ideals,” far removed from reality. But as I worked alongside him, I realized that they were actually about how power works in real life. He showed that the power of rulers depends entirely on the obedience and cooperation of ordinary people. If people withdraw that cooperation, rulers cannot govern.
Q: Some say that nonviolence is unrealistic in the face of brutal dictators.
Raqib:
It is precisely under dictatorships that nonviolence is strongest. Violence is the arena in which dictators excel; they have overwhelming superiority there. Nonviolence shifts the struggle onto terrain where ordinary people have the advantage. That is what Sharp clarified over decades of research. Nonviolent action is not weakness. It is a strategic method of defense that can protect more lives than armed struggle ever could.
Q: You’ve been involved in training activists around the world. What lessons stand out?
Raqib:
One lesson is that nonviolent struggle requires planning, discipline, and unity. Many movements collapse not because nonviolence “failed,” but because they did not prepare for what comes after victory. For example, during the Arab Spring, there were inspiring uprisings. But in many cases, people had not developed strategies for building institutions once the dictator fell. Without that, authoritarianism simply returned.
Q: In your view, what is the role of ordinary citizens in nonviolent defense?
Raqib:
Nonviolent defense is not something only for activists. It has to involve entire societies — workers, students, professionals, families. It’s about withdrawing cooperation from oppression in every sphere. Strikes, boycotts, civil disobedience — these are not marginal actions; they are ways to make dictatorships unworkable.
Q: Finally, why do you believe in nonviolence?
Raqib:
Because it aligns with something deep in human beings. Yes, humans are capable of violence. But we are also capable of cooperation, protection, and solidarity. Nonviolent action taps into those instincts. It allows people to defend their dignity and their communities without becoming destroyers themselves. That is why I believe it can protect lives more effectively than violence.
Panel Discussion: How to Resist Authoritarianism Without Burning Out
June 17, 2025
How to Resist Authoritarianism Without Burning Out
As repression deepens across the globe, people are resisting—not with megaphones or viral headlines, but with strategic action, unlikely alliances and the quiet power of staying put.
That was the heart of a live conversation we hosted on 2 June 2025. Moderated by Juanita Esguerra Rezk, PhD, Head of Research at Right Livelihood, the discussion featured:
Jamila Raqib, Executive Director of the Albert Einstein Institution and legacy holder of 2012 Right Livelihood Laureate Gene Sharp, the world’s foremost thinker on strategic nonviolent action
Kerstin Bergeå, Chair of Svenska Freds, Sweden’s largest and the world’s oldest peace organisation
In under 40 minutes, they unpacked what it takes to build resistance movements that last, and win.
Watch the panel discussion here.
A plan, not just a protest
“We’re not just resisting the current system,” said Raqib. “We need a positive vision that meets people’s needs, one that builds recruitment and reminds people they’re not alone.”
She spoke about the need for movements to shift from reacting to planning:
“Our opponents are strategic. They have a playbook. It’s to throw us off balance, to keep us constantly reacting with every new violation.”
Raqib shared lessons from Bangladesh and Serbia, where student-led nonviolent uprisings, grounded in clear demands and broad support, are forcing political change and preparing for long-term transformation.
From the streets to the stage: building cultural power
Bergeå stressed that movements can’t win alone, and they definitely can’t win quietly.
“Including actors, artists and comedians gives us visibility in new spaces,” she said. “It shows we are part of the culture, not separate from it.”
She described how Svenska Freds worked with Fridays for Future and actor Gustav Skarsgård to challenge Sweden’s arms trade, even filibustering a weapons manufacturer’s general meeting by asking critical questions for 30 minutes straight.
“Culture is where people live,” she added. “It helps us show there’s an alternative.”
Gender isn’t a bonus. It’s a backbone.
The role of gender was front and centre. Both speakers underlined that inclusive leadership isn’t just ethical. It’s strategic.
“We tend to think that women’s inclusion is a nice thing we do,” said Raqib. “But actually, it’s strategically important. Movements are more disciplined with the participation of women.”
She pointed out that authoritarian regimes actively target women with sexual violence to break movements apart, because they know how powerful women’s leadership is.
Bergeå added, “It’s the means that matter, not just the result. If the process is inclusive, the peace will be more sustainable. And we have data to prove that.”
Fear is real. But it’s not the end.
When it comes to fear, Raqib was clear: “Fear is a tool of the authoritarians. Even the threat of punishment makes people comply before it’s even used.”
Her advice? “Pick methods that reduce risk. Boycotts, stay-at-home actions—these are powerful, and they don’t invite the same repression.”
Bergeå added that community is key: “Some of us take more risk than others. But no one should have to feel alone, even if they’re in jail. Support groups are a powerful tool.”
What now?
For those feeling overwhelmed but ready to act, the speakers offered grounded advice.
“Don’t lose hope,” said Bergeå. “Choose a target. Strategise. Take yourself seriously.”
Raqib echoed the call to action: “You’re not alone. You have a powerful tool. Our job is to be imaginative, systematic and strategic.”
Because true resistance means more than showing up. It means being ready to act.
Right Livelihood Features AEI’s Jamila Raqib on How Women Resist Conflict, Patriarchy and Exclusion
Published on June 19, 2025
Sima Samar and Jamila Raqib on How Women Resist Conflict, Patriarchy and Exclusion
What does it mean to fight for justice and human rights in times of conflict, repression and political transition, while being excluded from decision-making because you are a woman? In this exchange, 2012 Right Livelihood Laureate Dr Sima Samar and Jamila Raqib, Executive Director of the Albert Einstein Institution and legacy holder of 2012 Laureate Dr Gene Sharp, explore how gender adds a profound and often dangerous layer to the struggle for rights.
Samar, former Afghan Minister of Women’s Affairs, has defended girls’ education under regimes intent on silencing them. Raqib supports grassroots organisers around the world in applying nonviolent strategies—including the 198 methods of nonviolent action—to confront repression and expand civic space.
This conversation took place at the UN Commission on the Status of Women in New York in March 2025.
Jamila:
There’s been a lot of attention on women’s inclusion in peace processes, how that leads to more sustainable, more democratic outcomes. But increasingly, we’re focusing not just on presence, but on leadership. And that has very direct links to a movement’s effectiveness.
We need as many people as possible to take ownership of the movement space. This cannot be a small group fighting on behalf of everyone. We need the participation of older people, children, individuals from all walks of life. And there’s also a strong connection between women’s leadership and a movement’s ability to remain nonviolent. Women are able to do something that really creates a dilemma for authoritarian systems and violators of human rights.
Sima:
I believe discrimination and inequality are the root causes of conflict. For me, it starts at home—when a man believes he is superior to the women in his family. That same mindset flows into schools, streets, society and, ultimately, escalates into national and international conflict.
The link between gender and conflict is inseparable. We cannot have sustainable peace without the participation of women. Nobody can speak on behalf of a woman, because men don’t experience what we experience. The impact of conflict on women is completely different.
Afghanistan is a clear example. We reformed laws. We achieved some freedoms, like access to education, to justice. We had female prosecutors, judges, police officers. And then suddenly, all of it was gone. Public life is now fully controlled by men, using culture and religion as tools of exclusion.
Jamila:
Yes, I completely agree. It’s heartbreaking. There were moments in our history when people were genuinely hopeful—hopeful for their children and for the future. And yet, every few years, we seem to go backwards. There’s no indication that things are getting better.
For many women now, the strategy is just to survive. But when survival becomes your only strategy, there’s no room left for meaningful participation—in your community, your country or even your own family. What is often framed as crisis management, I see as something deeper — a design. The system is set up in such a way that we’re always responding to crises. We don’t have the time, space or energy to think about what alternatives might look like, let alone organise around them.
Sima:
Exactly. And let’s remember UN Resolution 1325. It’s been more than 20 years. There are now multiple Security Council resolutions about women’s participation in conflict resolution. But in practice, decisions are still made by men—often behind closed doors, sometimes even just over the phone.
And even when women are included, we have to look critically at how. Look at Colombia, women were included in the peace process, but now that progress is slipping.
In Afghanistan, the government peace delegation had 21 members. Only four were women. How much space were they really given to speak? What impact could they have?
I always say: we must make space for ourselves. But we also need the capacity and opportunity to make that space count. Our participation should not be symbolic. As I said once on a local TV programme, we’re not there to make the table colourful. Yes, we wore green and yellow and red scarves. But that’s not the point. The point is: Are we heard? Are we trusted? Are we shaping decisions?
We cannot fix this world if more than half of the population is not included in the decisions that affect all of us.
Jamila:
Exactly. That kind of symbolism is dangerous. We’re thinking a lot about transitions—how movements negotiate after nonviolent resistance. But many of these transitions fail to deliver democratic outcomes.
One reason is the exclusion of the very people who fought for change. Even when they are in the room, their role is symbolic. That doesn’t lead to sustainable or inclusive societies. If you leave people out of the process, they won’t feel represented in the outcome.
Women are not waiting to be included. They are already leading and organising in powerful ways, often behind the scenes. We often take women’s contributions and attribute their success to charismatic men, and this is a mistake.
Sima:
And it’s not just women who are excluded. Victims of conflict, people with disabilities, ethnic minorities. Many are left out. Yet women and children are the majority of those impacted.
In Afghanistan, many were disabled because of war. These people should be part of the process. If not, the result is just an exclusive power grab. That’s not democracy. It’s not about protection. It’s about control.
Jamila:
Yes. And unless power is genuinely redistributed, nothing truly changes. The structures stay the same.
What we’re seeing globally is not random—it’s a backlash. Leaders invent enemies so they can present themselves as protectors. Look at Turkey. The arrest of the mayor of Istanbul—there’s talk of a coup, but it’s clearly about removing a political rival. It’s the same playbook everywhere. Keep people afraid. Use the media. Declare yourself the saviour. We saw it in Afghanistan too.
Sima:
Yes. And often it’s done in the name of protecting women. In reality, it’s about power.
I think we need to be cautious with language too. There’s a tendency now to replace the word “victim” with “survivor.” But that doesn’t change the reality of what women endure.
Personally, I still see myself as a victim of war and conflict—even though I survived. Calling all women “survivors” risks softening the seriousness of what has happened. It can even mask the need for justice and accountability. Patriarchy is on the rise and gaining more power everywhere.
Jamila:
That’s a powerful point. I think there’s often a disconnect between principles and practice. Between how we talk about these issues and what we actually do.
We speak of gender equality, women’s empowerment, protection. But at the same time, countries fund wars, build weapons, and invest in militarisation.
And we know this—war is not good for women.
Sima:
It’s not good for anyone.
Jamila:
Exactly. And yet, so many wars are justified in the name of protecting women. It just doesn’t make sense.
Sima:
(nods)
Right Livelihood Features AEI’s Jamila Raqib on Education, Power and Gender Apartheid
Published on June 19, 2025
Who Gets to Dream? Sima Samar and Jamila Raqib on Education, Power and Gender Apartheid
What does it mean to treat education as a form of resistance, especially when access to learning is denied as a means of control?
In this exchange, 2012 Right Livelihood Laureate Dr Sima Samar and Jamila Raqib, Executive Director of the Albert Einstein Institution and legacy holder of 2012 Laureate Dr Gene Sharp, sat down for a candid, peer-to-peer conversation on how education is both weaponised and reclaimed in contexts of conflict and repression. Speaking directly to one another, they reflect on the rise of what Samar calls “education apartheid” and share urgent, decentralised strategies for keeping knowledge alive—from underground schools to civic education via mobile phones.
Samar, former Afghan Minister of Women’s Affairs, has defended girls’ education under regimes intent on silencing them. Raqib supports grassroots organisers around the world in applying nonviolent strategies—including the 198 methods of nonviolent action—to confront repression and expand civic space.
This conversation took place in March 2025 during the UN Commission on the Status of Women in New York.
Jamila:
We always talk about education as having transformative potential, but we need to ask, transformative for whom? And toward what end? I’ve found that even in the most repressive environments, people are seeking knowledge, not just formal education, but the kind that empowers them to act, organise and resist. That’s the kind of education I’m interested in.
At the Albert Einstein Institution, we work with people fighting for freedom, justice and dignity. They’re often already incredibly brave and creative. But they don’t always have access to information that can make their efforts more effective. That’s why I believe education is not just a right, it’s a tool. And when that tool is denied, it’s because it has real power.
Education empowers people to be citizens of a society, to make contributions… to hold their governments accountable. Education is political. And for women, it’s also survival.
Sima:
Yes, I fully agree. But we have to be very clear, what education are we talking about? Because education can also be misused. In Afghanistan, I saw it up close. The Taliban established more than 21,000 madrasas, many with financial support from abroad. Families, desperate and without access to health care or income, would send their sons to these institutions. And those children were trained, not in the values of human rights or critical thinking, but in hatred and violence.
So we need education that teaches equality. That teaches girls and boys they are equal. That includes human rights and the capacity to think for oneself. If education becomes just another instrument of ideology, it loses its liberating power. Denying girls education is gender apartheid.
Jamila:
Exactly. I think we sometimes forget that education itself is political: what is taught, who gets to teach, who gets access. When we talk about educating girls in conflict zones, we’re not just fighting for school buildings. We’re fighting against structures that see empowered women and girls as a threat.
That’s why I also look at decentralised solutions. What happens when the state fails or actively blocks access to education? We can’t wait. Communities already know how to adapt when the government doesn’t provide food or security. We need to apply that same urgency and creativity to education.
In many parts of the world, education is withheld from girls not by accident, but by design. It is used as a tool to control, exclude or indoctrinate. For us, education is not just about schools. It’s about power: Who gets to imagine a future and who does not.
Sima:
And that’s what I call real resistance. In Afghanistan, girls are still studying, even underground. There are online schools, home-based education, secret classrooms. And they’re taking enormous risks to do it. But let’s be honest, the Taliban’s ban on girls’ education isn’t about logistics or security. It’s about control. It’s a crime against humanity, and it should be treated as such.
And yet, the world’s response has been very weak. There’s plenty of sympathy, but very little action. I always say, if a girl can’t go to school in Kabul, it’s not just her problem. It’s a global problem.
Jamila:
Yes. And I often think, what kind of political will would it take to really change that? Because we’ve seen that when powerful actors want to intervene, they find a way. So the question is not whether we can support girls’ education. It’s whether we choose to.
And in the meantime, we need to educate in every possible way: civic education, nonviolence, resistance. Not just in universities, but in communities. Even in short videos or WhatsApp messages. That’s what we do, because people are looking for tools. They want to know: What can I do? What do I still have control over?
Sima:
I remember someone told me a story. A preschool teacher asked, “How many immigrants are in your class?” And a little boy said, “We’re all children.” That’s the kind of education we need, starting from the earliest age. Teaching dignity, not division. Respect, not fear.
But it’s not only in schools. The media also educates. And often, it reinforces inequality, showing women as objects, not people. So we need to think about the whole ecosystem of education, formal and informal, and ask: Is this helping us build a more just and peaceful society?
Jamila:
Absolutely. And we need to resist the idea that education is neutral. It never has been. It either reinforces the system as it is, or helps people imagine something better.
Sima:
And imagining something better. That’s the beginning of real change.
New York Times Columnist Nicholas Kristof Features Gene Sharp’s Work
Published on May 21, 2025
“Three Well-Tested Ways to Undermine an Autocrat.”
By Nicholas Kristof
The question I get most often is: What can we do to take our country back?
So let me try to answer, drawing on lessons from other countries that have faced authoritarian challenges.
The funny thing is that there’s a playbook for overturning autocrats. It was written here in America, by a rumpled political scientist I knew named Gene Sharp. While little known in the United States before his death in 2018, he was celebrated abroad, and his tool kit was used by activists in Eastern Europe, in the Middle East and across Asia. His books, emphasizing nonviolent protests that become contagious, have been translated into at least 34 languages.
“I would rather have this book than the nuclear bomb,” a former Lithuanian defense minister once said of Sharp’s writing.
A soft-spoken scholar working from his Boston apartment, Sharp recommended 198 actions that were often performative, ranging from hunger strikes to sex boycotts to mock funerals.
“Dictators are never as strong as they tell you they are,” he once said, “and people are never as weak as they think they are.”
The Democrats’ message last year revolved in part around earnest appeals to democratic values, but one of the lessons from anti-authoritarian movements around the world is that such abstract arguments aren’t terribly effective. Rather, three other approaches, drawing on Sharp’s work, seem to work better.
The first is mockery and humor — preferably salacious.
Wang Dan, a leader of China’s 1989 Tiananmen Square democracy demonstrations, told me that in China, puns often “resonate more than solemn political slogans.”
Sign up for the Opinion Today newsletter Get expert analysis of the news and a guide to the big ideas shaping the world every weekday morning. Get it sent to your inbox.
The Chinese internet for a time delighted in grass-mud horses — which may puzzle future zoologists exploring Chinese archives, for there is no such animal. It’s all a bawdy joke: In Chinese, “grass-mud horse” sounds very much like a curse, one so vulgar it would make your screen blush. But on its face it is an innocent homonym about an animal and thus is used to mock China’s censors.
Shops in China peddled dolls of grass-mud horses (resembling alpacas), and a faux nature documentary described their habits. One Chinese song recounted the epic conflict between grass-mud horses and river crabs — because “river crab” is a play on the Chinese term for “censorship.” It optimistically declared the horses triumphant.
“They defeated the river crabs in order to protect their grassland,” it declared. “River crabs forever disappeared.”
Humor puts autocrats in a difficult position. They look ridiculous if they crack down on jokes but look weak if they ignore them. What’s a dictator to do?
Take President Xi Jinping of China, who is sometimes mocked for resembling Winnie-the-Pooh. So China bans Pooh bear images and movies — giving people more reason to laugh at him.
Neither Winnie-the-Pooh nor a cavalry of grass-mud horses will topple Xi, but wit did help overthrow the Serbian despot Slobodan Milosevic in 2000. A dissident group called Otpor was so modest in size that protests by it wouldn’t have been noticed. But Otpor, relying heavily on Sharp’s work, engaged in street theater that got people buzzing: In Belgrade it put Milosevic’s image on a barrel and encouraged passers-by to whack it with a bat.
“Seeing a group of devil-may-care young people ridiculing Milosevic made onlookers smile,” Tina Rosenberg writes in her book “Join the Club,” “and encouraged them to think about the regime, and their own role, in a different light.”
Rosenberg quoted one Otpor leader as saying, “It was a great party all the time.” This made the protests trendy and cool, the ridicule grew contagious, and eventually the opposition became a mass movement that forced Milosevic to resign.
A second approach that has often succeeded is emphasizing not democracy as such but rather highlighting the leaders’ corruption, hypocrisy and economic mismanagement.
Critics usually have plenty of ammunition when pointing to hypocrisy, for authoritarians tend to preen as moral guardians while the lack of accountability often leads to, er, lapses. One example: The police chief in Tehran, who was in charge of enforcing the Islamic dress code for women, was reportedly found naked in a brothel with six equally naked prostitutes.
Corruption is also usually an easy target, because as autocrats become increasingly powerful, they and their family members often decide to enrich themselves: Wherever there is authoritarianism, there is corruption.
Chinese officials understand the sensitivity of the issue: They have told me that they’re fine with journalists like me criticizing the Communist Party for repression or bad policies, but can we please just lay off reporting on the finances of party leaders (like the former prime minister whose family was so hard working that it rose from poverty and amassed at least $2.7 billion)?
One of the people who seemed to scare President Vladimir Putin the most was Aleksei Navalny, a master of mockery who posted videos of extravagances such as Putin’s apparent $1 billion pleasure palace — and who, when imprisoned in the gulag, announced that he had tried to unionize the guards.
The third approach that has often succeeded is focusing on the power of one — an individual tragedy rather than a sea of oppression. Protesters against apartheid used to employ the slogan, “Free South African political prisoners,” but that never got much traction. Then they switched to “Free Nelson Mandela,” and we know the rest.
Likewise, the Arab Spring began in 2010 with a single wrenching story: A 26-year-old Tunisian street vendor set himself on fire to protest corruption — and millions of other Arabs demonstrated against their rulers.
In Iran, six months of protests started in 2022 when a young woman, Mahsa Amini, died after being arrested by police for wearing her hijab improperly. “With her killing, people lost their patience and poured into the streets,” Nasrin Sotoudeh, an Iranian lawyer known for her defense of human rights, told me.
Sotoudeh noted that even a single creative protest by an ordinary person can ignite a broader movement. She cited the woman who in 2017 stood on a Tehran street, removed her head scarf and waved it at the end of a stick; the incident went viral and began the “girls of revolution street” movement to end the compulsory hijab. And while the hijab law remains in place, women now sometimes get away with ignoring it.
We often think of politicians as the natural leaders of such movements. But it’s striking how often the stars have been from other worlds. A shipyard electrician in Poland named Lech Walesa. A Czech playwright named Vaclav Havel. Female lawyers in Iran. A female engineering student in Sudan. A widow and housewife in the Philippines named Corazon Aquino.
There’s no simple formula for challenging authoritarianism. But these approaches have enjoyed a measure of success abroad and may be ones we Americans could learn from.
In my next column, I’ll look at how such a strategy might unfold in the United States.
Climate Justice Fellowship Enters its Third Year
In the Mau Forest in Kenya, armed forest rangers use axes and hammers to tear apart the homes of the indigenous Ogiek people, part of a government scheme to use the forest for carbon credits. When faced with evidence of these forced evictions–more than 700 last year–the Kenyan government has argued that these abuses are happening outside the country’s borders.
During one of last year’s Climate Justice Fellowship practice/problem sessions, designed for the group to discern effective approaches to pressing problems, one Kenyan fellow thought to ask villagers to place Kenyan flags on their homes, thwarting the government’s disinformation efforts. The tactic was successful in halting–or at least pausing–additional evictions.
The Climate Justice Fellowship
The Climate Justice Fellowship is a partnership between Right Livelihood and the Albert Einstein Institution that supports grassroots climate efforts across the globe by building knowledge and enhancing collaboration among climate justice activists.
Begun in 2022, the Climate Justice Fellowship is now in its third year. Each cohort spends 15 months together, learning the principles and tactics of strategic nonviolent action.
Last year’s fellowship focused on African climate efforts, with recruitment supported by the Africa Climate Justice Collective and GRAIN. The kick-off meeting in Abuja, Nigeria was generously hosted by Nnimmo Bassey of Health of Mother Earth Foundation.
Impact
The impact of the fellowship is powerful and ongoing.
One of the movements represented successfully halted the development of the San Pedro Coal Fired Power Plant in Cote d’Ivoire.
Another is seeking reparations for communities impacted by the construction of the Singrobo Hydroelectric Power Station and the Atinkou Thermal Power station, in Côte D’Ivoire and Mozambique.
Meanwhile, fellows from the 2022 European cohort continue to report benefits from the concepts they learned during the fellowship. These fellows have credited AEI’s work with helping them address internal conflict within their movements, recover from burnout, and improve their strategies.
This year’s fellowship is focusing on Asia. With the realization that fellows who participated together with members of their own group showed greater growth, the fellowship is focusing on the following movements this year: Mother Nature Cambodia, Sahabat Alam Malaysia, Greater Kaziranga Land, Seikatsu Club Consumers' Co-operative Union, and Human Rights Defence Committee.