Why building inspiring alternatives is necessary to counter authoritarianism

This article Why building inspiring alternatives is necessary to counter authoritarianism was originally published by Waging Nonviolence.

We are heading down a perilous road. Vulnerable communities face growing threats. The climate crisis is outpacing scientists’ worst predictions. Authoritarianism is no longer a distant possibility — it is rising, with democracy backsliding across the globe. With Trump’s return, public services like education, labor protections, humane immigration policies, health care and diversity programs are being dismantled.

Meanwhile, trust in democracy is eroding — especially among young people. As political scientist Steven Levitsky points out, part of the problem is motivational: The political right is fighting for a clear, albeit dangerous, vision. The left, by contrast, is often fighting against that vision, with fewer compelling alternatives on offer.

So what can we do? We build. We shift away from reform — away from tweaking broken systems — and instead direct our energy toward creating entirely new ones. And the beauty of this method is: we don’t have to start from scratch. We can draw from history.

One of the most effective nonviolent movements in modern times was Gandhi’s campaign for Indian independence. His success wasn’t built on protest or disruption alone. Gandhi believed civil disobedience was just one part of the work. It’s also critical to build what he called constructive programs — alternatives to the unjust systems he sought to replace.

These were the foundations of a new society, built within the shell of the old. Because resistance isn’t only about saying no. It’s about creating a future worth saying yes to.

Empowered communities: Building power from the ground up

As organizer and strategist Marshall Ganz notes, power means having others more dependent on you than you are on them. Translated, this means the people have become almost entirely dependent on the services and structures owned or operated by states and mega-corporations, who far too often, exploit people for their own gain. 

To become genuinely empowered, people can work in community to meet their essential needs — food, housing, healthcare, education, energy, technology and economic stability. And this is not theory. It’s already happening. Across the globe, people are building systems from the ground up that meet human needs while resisting corporate and state overreach.

Such a model provides a way for resisters against Trump to build real and meaningful power that does not depend on our increasingly broken federal government to pass certain legislation or persuade Trump supporters to alter their agenda. 

Here are seven ways that communities — rural and urban, small and large — can begin developing their own constructive programs that can radically shift the balance of power.

Food security: Growing resilience, one seed at a time

Corporate agribusiness dominates food supply chains, prioritizing profit over people. These monopolized supply chains not only distance us from the sources of our food — they make us vulnerable to disruption, price manipulation and environmental collapse. To grow their power and resilience, communities are reclaiming food through local co-ops, urban farms and direct partnerships with farmers.

Examples that have taken root worldwide are many and varied. Teikei, for example, is a community-supported agriculture model that fosters direct collaboration between Japan’s urban consumers and rural organic farmers. La Via Campesina connects small-scale farmers across Latin America, Africa and South Asia in a movement for food sovereignty. In France, AMAP networks coordinate weekly produce deliveries from local farms to urban households. And the Michigan Urban Farming Initiative reclaims abandoned lots to grow fresh food and revive community pride.

Each of these models started with a small group of people, determined to reclaim power over their food security. You can do this too. Starting a garden, even a small one in a windowsill or back patio can make a big difference. Preserving what you grow allows you to benefit from your garden year-round. Starting or participating in a community garden is another way to gain food autonomy, as is supporting local farms. 

These actions may seem small, but they are not insignificant. Every plot of land reclaimed from corporate control is a seed of resistance. Every homegrown meal is an act of political agency.

By feeding ourselves and our communities — intentionally, ethically and locally — we remove power from those who misuse it, and begin building something lasting in its place.

Housing: Reclaiming shelter as a human right

In cities across the globe, real estate speculation and corporate landlords have turned shelter into a commodity — driving rents sky-high and pushing working people into precarious living conditions or homelessness.

But communities are not powerless. When people organize to collectively own and manage their homes, they create one of the most powerful tools of nonviolent resistance: housing cooperatives. By removing the profit motive, these cooperatives offer safety, affordability and self-governance — none of which corporate landlords or overstretched governments can reliably provide.

The modern cooperative movement traces its roots to the Rochdale Society of Equitable Pioneers, a group of 19th-century industrial workers who pooled resources to escape exploitative landlords. Their model lives on in the U.K., where housing co-ops still provide nonprofit, resident-governed homes insulated from market volatility.

In Sweden, nearly 25 percent of all housing is cooperative — a structure that has sparked national debate around housing as a public good, not a commodity. And in Oakland, California, the East Bay Permanent Real Estate Cooperative is charting a bold new path. This Black- and Indigenous-led initiative removes land from speculative markets entirely, demonstrating how marginalized groups can reclaim agency — on their own terms.

You too can reclaim power over housing. Start a community housing fund by pooling resources into a shared savings account or credit union fund. Agree on contribution rules — equal payments, or sliding scale. Even a small emergency fund can offer powerful support in times of crisis: rent hikes, job loss, medical emergencies, or repairs.

You may also explore cooperative models by co-purchasing a duplex, small apartment building, or piece of land, such as a community land trust. Residents pay affordable rent back into the fund, enabling future purchases. Over time, this model can scale — transforming not only your housing, but your neighborhood’s entire relationship to land and shelter.

Taking even a small step toward shared ownership is a radical act in a world where housing is treated as a financial asset. It’s a refusal to accept displacement as inevitable. In the struggle against authoritarianism, extractive capitalism and inequality, reclaiming our homes is not just necessary — it’s revolutionary.

Health care: Healing without permission

Across the globe — even in wealthy nations — health care is increasingly monopolized by profit-driven corporations or crippled by underfunded public systems. Millions are left without basic care, forced to choose between crushing debt or untreated illness.

But another path is possible. For example, in the 1960s, the Black Panther Party opened People’s Free Medical Centers in cities across the U.S. — providing checkups, vaccinations and education in neighborhoods abandoned by the formal health care system. And in rural China, the Barefoot Doctors program trained tens of thousands of local villagers to deliver basic medical care, hygiene education and nutritional guidance.

Communities can reclaim health care by forming local health circles with traditional as well as alternative healers and wellness professionals. Workshops on preventative care, first aid, trauma healing and herbal medicine can address a wide variety of health conditions, such as hypertension, diabetes, digestive troubles and anxiety. 

And creating a cooperative health fund can make an important difference in people’s lives in getting the medicine and care they need. Like the housing fund model, communities can pool small monthly contributions into a health care emergency fund. This fund could help cover a member’s unexpected medical costs, pay for visits to a local practitioner, or subsidize herbs and supplements for those in need.

When health care is rooted in people rather than profit, healing becomes a partnership of traditional practitioners and community caring. It isn’t about rejecting modern medicine. It’s about reclaiming control — so that no institution has a monopoly on our well-being.

Education: Learning to resist, learning to build

Education is on the frontlines in the fight for democracy. As authoritarianism rises and public institutions are privatized, education becomes a battleground. Currently, we are witnessing the dismantling of the Department of Education, funding cuts to universities — particularly those who refuse to gut their DEI policies — book bans, laws against teaching critical race theory, and requirements to display the Ten Commandments. When an elite few control what counts as knowledge, when critical thinking is replaced by obedience, we’re not just approaching fascism — we’re already living it.

That’s why the struggle for education is not just about schools. It’s about survival.

In 1942, under Nazi occupation, Norway’s fascist Minister of Education ordered teachers to indoctrinate students with Nazi ideology. Thousands refused. The regime shut down schools and sent nearly 1,000 educators to prisons and camps. Still, the teachers didn’t yield. They taught in homes and forests, preserving knowledge underground. Four months later, the fascist government backed down.

More recently, in the 1990s, after the Serbian regime banned Albanian-language education, over 100,000 Albanian children walked out of the public system. Families built resistance schools in basements and abandoned buildings. There, they taught history, language and culture — preserving identity and planting seeds of future freedom.

Local people can empower their own communities by supporting their public schools to be just that — public, rather than the instrument of special interest groups. And to fill in gaps, people can form banned-book clubs, cultural history panels and climate science workshops. Libraries, community centers and private homes can offer specialized courses on black history, queer studies, storytelling and a variety of skills training in various trades. 

When communities reclaim education, they don’t just fight back — they lay the intellectual foundation of a new society. One rooted in critical thinking, creative resistance and collective care.

Energy: Power from the people

Corporate-run power grids leave entire regions vulnerable to blackouts, price spikes and environmental destruction. When energy is monopolized, it becomes a tool of profit — not survival.

But communities don’t just need access to power. They need control over how it’s produced, who benefits from it, and how it impacts the Earth. Energy autonomy is more than sustainability. It’s resistance. It’s resilience. It’s liberation.

In Germany, the Bürgerenergie (Citizen Energy) movement empowers communities to own and operate wind farms, solar arrays and microgrids — cutting out utility companies, slashing emissions, and returning profits to the people. And in Puerto Rico, the community-owned Cooperative Hidroeléctrica de las Montaña provided electricity even during Hurricane Fiona, which knocked out the power grid for most of the island.

You don’t need a wind turbine to get started. Energy sovereignty begins with small, intentional steps. Organizing work parties to make local homes more energy efficient by weatherproofing windows or installing insulation can make a big difference in energy usage. Combining resources to invest in solar panels, pellet stoves, or the use of flowing water to generate electricity, can provide critical resilience during outages or extreme weather.   

Self-sufficiency doesn’t mean isolation. Communities can connect with neighbors to apply for grants, crowdsource funding or build shared microgrids. Cooperation scales — especially in crises.

When communities own their energy, they own their future. They are no longer dependent on corporations who serve shareholders, or governments who delay transition for political convenience.

Technology: Reclaiming the digital commons

Big Tech corporations monitor, monetize and manipulate digital spaces — treating our attention and data as commodities, shaping public discourse through opaque algorithms. The result? A digital world that is increasingly extractive, surveilled and inaccessible to those without wealth or expertise.

But just like food, land or energy — technology can be reclaimed.

In Catalonia, Spain, a handful of volunteers launched guifi.net, a grassroots internet network to solve rural connectivity gaps. It has since grown into one of the world’s largest community-owned digital systems, with over 40,000 routers or access points, and more than 13,000 users. It’s decentralized, open-source and collectively maintained — free from corporate control.

The Freifunk initiative in Germany helps communities build decentralized Wi-Fi networks using simple hardware and open-source software. And in Oakland, California, People’s Open Network and Sudo Room run a wireless mesh system designed to provide secure, free internet to underserved neighborhoods — proving that digital equity is a community project, not a corporate product.

You don’t need to be a coder or tech genius to get started. Most community tech projects began with a small group of curious, determined people — learning as they go along.

Members of your community could research open-source tutorials and online forums that walk beginners through setting up mesh networks. Fundraising for a few Wi-Fi routers and installing open-source firmware like OpenWRT or LibreMesh can be the beginning of a secure, community-run network. 

Bringing together people with an interest in IT, digital security or open-source software means you don’t need experts — you need people willing to learn, share and build together.

Community-owned technology isn’t utopian. It’s necessary. And it’s already happening.

Safety and security: From control to care

“Safety” is often used to justify surveillance, incarceration and militarized policing. But real safety doesn’t come from control — it comes from care, trust and collective responsibility.

Across the world, communities are rejecting the false binary of “police or chaos.” In their place, they’re building community-based safety networks, crisis response teams, and restorative justice circles that prioritize healing over punishment, and solidarity over fear.

In New South Wales, Australia, over 150 neighborhoods formed independent watch programs — funded and run entirely by residents, not police. These groups focus on communication, support and de-escalation, creating safety through connection instead of force.

And in Eugene, Oregon, the CAHOOTS program (Crisis Assistance Helping Out On The Streets) has transformed how the city handles emergencies. Staffed by medics and mental health professionals, CAHOOTS responds to nonviolent crises — mental health, substance use, homelessness — without police. In 2019 alone, they responded to 20 percent of all 911 calls, and needed police backup less than one percent of the time.

Creating community-based safety doesn’t require permission. It requires a shift in mindset — from protection-through-force to protection-through-care.

One way to begin is to form a small group focused on checking in with vulnerable neighbors, sharing emergency contacts and planning for common crises — heatwaves, blackouts, domestic violence or neighborhood conflict. Mapping resources is helpful so everyone knows who in their community has medical training, mental health experience or de-escalation skills.

Communities can also host workshops on active listening, conflict resolution and harm reduction. These practices are teachable, repeatable and transformative. And they can emerge into mobile crisis teams, neighborhood peace groups or mutual aid collectives. Even a group that meets monthly can evolve into something life-changing.

Ensuring a just transition: From extraction to empowerment

Constructive programs often begin where mainstream institutions fail, as they clearly are in so many ways right now. When people are left without access to housing, food, health care, education, safety or a political voice, it becomes necessary to build new systems that serve the people — by the people. Constructive programs respond directly to these unmet needs by fostering grassroots participation, long-term resilience and local control. Unlike top-down aid programs or short-lived charity efforts, these initiatives focus on empowerment, not dependency.

Across the globe, community-led solutions have succeeded in tackling poverty, expanding access to essential services and restoring dignity to marginalized populations.

Authoritarianism thrives when people are isolated and dependent — when food, energy, housing and safety are controlled by a handful of elites. But when communities feed each other, house each other, teach each other and protect each other — they are less dependent on dominant systems, which allows them to mount a more effective resistance. Such communities, then, don’t just survive. They become ungovernable by any unjust governing body, regardless of who is in power. 

The answer isn’t just electing better leaders. It’s building a world where no one has the power to deny another human being their basic rights. That starts small — with a garden, a shared fund, a healing circle, a co-op, a mesh network or a neighborhood safety team.

Not every system can be fixed. But every broken system is an opportunity to build something better. Because once you build it yourself —  you never have to ask permission again.

This article Why building inspiring alternatives is necessary to counter authoritarianism was originally published by Waging Nonviolence.

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Source: https://wagingnonviolence.org/2025/05/building-alternatives-key-counter-authoritarianism/