3.5% Is Not Enough, Bless Your Heart.
- Danika Joy Fornear
- Apr 29
- 3 min read
Updated: Apr 30
And before you get mad — the condescension is only in the title, not the message.
This isn’t about talking down to you. It’s about grabbing your attention, because the truth is too important to sugarcoat.
This isn’t about talking down to you.
It’s about grabbing your attention, because the truth is too important to sugarcoat: We don’t need another feel-good myth. We need to get real about what it’s going to take to beat authoritarianism — and it’s going to take a hell of a lot more than 3.5% showing up to march.
Where the 3.5% Myth Comes From
The 3.5% figure comes from political scientist Erica Chenoweth’s famous research on nonviolent uprisings.
They found that movements involving at least 3.5% of a population in sustained, disruptive action have historically never failed to achieve major political change.
But here’s the key:
It wasn’t one-day protests.
It wasn’t “show up and go home.”
It was long-term disruption: mass strikes, boycotts, general noncooperation, community defense — sometimes lasting years.
3.5% was a threshold, not a magic number.
And Chenoweth herself has been working to correct the way their research is now being misused by desperate activists and hopeful pundits alike.
“The 3.5% rule is often mischaracterized,” Chenoweth wrote recently.
“It’s not about the size of a one-off protest. It’s about sustained, organized, disruptive collective action — and success is never guaranteed.”
(Source: Harvard Kennedy School, 2023)
Protesting Is Good. It’s Not Enough.
Look — protests matter.
They show power. They lift morale. They signal that we’re not going quietly.
But mass marches alone won’t bring down a system that’s been rigged, militarized, and corrupted over decades.
Right now, American authoritarianism is:
Protected by billionaires and corporate media
Backed by armed militias and paramilitary policing
Embedded in state and federal courts
Normalized by 24/7 propaganda
A flash-mob protest is not going to scare that system. Sustained resistance might.
How Many Will It Really Take?
If we’re serious — and we have to be — then history shows we’re going to need more than 3.5% showing up once.
We’ll need:
At least 5–10% of the U.S. population — roughly 17 to 34 million people — actively participating in disruptive, ongoing resistance.
Mass strikes, mass boycotts, economic shutdowns, targeted noncooperation, mutual aid, and community defense — not just once, but again and again.
That’s what moved history in the past.
That’s what toppled unjust regimes — not just marching, but refusing to comply, breaking the systems of oppression, and building new ones.
3.5% Sparks It. 10% Finishes It
3.5% can sound the alarm.
3.5% can flood the streets.
But winning takes more: organization, disruption, endurance.
We don’t say this to scare you.
We say this because you deserve the truth.
We are not powerless — but we have to act like it’s the fight of our lives.
Because it is.
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Together, we can do more than survive authoritarianism — we can defeat it.
Sources:
Chenoweth, Erica. Civil Resistance: What Everyone Needs to Know. Oxford University Press, 2021.
Harvard Kennedy School, Ash Center for Democratic Governance and Innovation. Understanding the 3.5% Rule: What It Means — and Doesn’t Mean. 2023. https://ash.harvard.edu
Chenoweth, Erica, and Stephan, Maria J. Why Civil Resistance Works: The Strategic Logic of Nonviolent Conflict. Columbia University Press, 2011.
CNN. What the 3.5% Rule Actually Means for Protest Movements. 2020.
NPR. What Makes a Protest Movement Successful? 2020.
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