How to rally Women's March spirit into action
On Jan. 21, a day after U.S. President Donald Trump's inauguration, women and men from all over the world — including tens of thousands of Canadians — joined in the Women's March to support women's rights.
The massive show of solidarity has left organizers and participants grappling with the question: How do you move from a day of marching to a movement than can force real political change?
Becky Bond, a former senior advisor to the Bernie Sanders presidential campaign, and co-author of Rules for Revolutionaries, says now it's up to activists and the volunteers involved in the march to "organize people into a fighting force that can take on Trump."
"That starts when people actually meet together in person. And what we're seeing across the country, and it's happening in Canada too, is we're seeing people form local groups like Indivisible to come together in their community and organize themselves to fight for change."
Bond points to a few efforts underway such as Knock Every Door in the U.S. that canvasses door-to-door, as well as Justice Democrats where regular people are called to run for Congress to make them more responsive.
"The most important thing is people can't wait for the national organizations, for national party, to tell them what to do. It's going to take two years of hard work to dislodge Trump from the presidency, and Republicans from Congress."
Micah White, co-creator of Occupy Wall Street and author of The End of Protest, tells Walker that every protest is testing a theory of social change.
But says not to expect elected representatives to listen just because millions of non-violent protesters "manifest some sort of higher form of democracy."
"The number one thing for people to realize is that protest alone doesn't give the people power," says White.
"There is no constitutional requirement that Trump has to listen to protest."
White tells Walker there's only two ways to gain political power right now: to win elections or win wars.
"We have to figure out how do we take social movements and use them to win elections," says White.
"That's really what activists needs to be thinking about ... getting beyond that just protesting in the streets is enough."
Listen to the full conversation at the top of this web post — including looking at marches on Washington through a historical lens.
This segment was produced by The Current's Willow Smith and Ashley Mak.