there are many types of activism
This page explains each type of activism and presents you with instructions on how to carry them out.
Boycott
A boycott is a type of activism where activists withdraw from commercial or social relations with a country, organization, or person as a punishment or protest. It is most commonly used against corporations at present, although many individuals in countries outside of the US now (February 2025) are boycotting all US goods.
Boycotts have a long historical presence. In the UK, in 1791, after Parliament refused to abolish slavery, thousands of pamphlets were produced urging a boycott of slave-produced sugar. Sales of sugar dropped almost 50%, whilst sales of Indian sugar, which did not involve slave labour, increased ten times. Shops began selling sugar “guaranteed to have been produced by free men.” The slave trade was finally abolished in 1807.
Boycotts are usually coordinated, as in the Alabama bus boycott, which began after Rosa Parks refused to move seats. The company lost up to 40,000 fares per day as Black people walked, car shared, and used Black-owned taxis to avoid the buses.
Sometimes they aren’t coordinated. No one seems to be organising a boycott of Tesla, yet sales dropped 60% in Germany and 63% in France in January 2025. Sales of electric cars rose 21% in the UK during this time, but Tesla sales dropped 8%. China, which has more than 1/3 of all Tesla sales worldwide, dropped 11.5%. There was no organising this boycott, but EV buyers are more likely to be progressive centrists or politically left wing, and Elon Musk is right wing, did a Nazi salute, and addressed far right parties in Germany.
You can read this if you want to know more about successful boycotts, and a post on organising boycotts is here. A boycott is one of the easiest ways to protest as an individual, but to have an effect they must be larger than a single person.
Petitions
A petition is a formal written request, typically one signed by many people, appealing to authority in respect of a particular cause. Petitions can be a type of activism, particularly when they show widespread agreement with an activist’s cause.
Petitions are old. Historians have suggested the first petitions were from slaves building the Egyptian pyramids and demanding better conditions. This is a fragment of an ancient Egyptian petition.
Some countries, like Holland and the UK, have a formal petition process. In these countries, when a petition to the government reaches a set amount of signatures, it must be discussed in parliament. However, that guarantee of discussion is not a guarantee of success. There’s an interesting PDF about the history of petitions in the UK.
Some people believe petitions are just a form of virtue signalling, however, there is evidence they actually work. It depends on what you see as the aim of petitioning. Very few petitions directly cause changes, though this does happen. A petition to give police dogs and horses more protection if attacked on duty led to the passing of Finn’s law in the UK. A less direct result came from a petition to stop the “tampon tax” – whilst the government didn’t directly change this, many companies lowered the prices of tampons and swallowed the costs of the tax themselves.
The worth of petitions isn’t just in their ability to change things, which they mostly don’t. They advance a cause by raising awareness and signaling public opinion, show the media that a story is worth considering, help organisations gain supporters, and are an accessible way for people to get involved with activism.
Petitions work best if:
- they are specific
- they are measurable
- they are achievable
- they are realistic
- they are targeted
- e.g. a petition to end sexism is vague, but a petition that targets a specific symptom of a sexist society, like the tampon tax, is more likely to work
- they are combined with other protest methods
Petitions are very easy to be involved with or to begin. You can set up an account on Change.org and start listing positions here.
Letter Writing
Letter writing is another type of activism, although these days it’s more often email writing. This is another one of those ancient methods of communication, with evidence of written letters dating back to at least ancient Greece. Proetus giving Bellerophon a folded clay tablet to deliver in the Illiad is one of the earliest examples of letters we have. Another is the complaint tablet to Ea-Nasir which dates from 1750 BCE.
Here are examples of letter writing that have improved lives or inspired changes, and which might inspire your own letters, and here is a post on how to write letters as an activist by Amnesty International and a second guide from PETA. If you’re in the UK, you can enter your postcode here to find out who your MP is. It will give you contact details, voting record, and declared conflicts of interest.
Social Media activism
Social media activism is a type of activism that has a bad reputation. It is seen by many as virtue signalling, with people sharing and doing nothing else to help. If all they do is share, they are still doing more than the people who do nothing except complaining about it.
Social media activism is fantastic at raising awareness and gives voice to many who were voiceless before. The Arab Spring was a pro-democracy protest that started in Tunisia in 2010 and used Facebook and Twitter to spread across the Middle East and raise awareness worldwide. When 17-year-old Darnella Frazier uploaded the video of the arrest and murder of George Floyd, it sparked mass outrage and led to protests against systemic racism worldwide. It gives marginalised communities the chance to be heard, and democratises access to information.
Those examples were people who used social media almost as a side effect. A more targeted campaign would be that of activist Tamara Burke who began the #MeToo movement. When Alyssa Milano picked it up, it went viral.
There are huge issues with social media activism, such as the Digital Divide. This refers to the many people who don’t have access to social media: many people in the world are still voiceless. Another issue is the glut of misinformation; often there are entire campaigns of misinformation, usually from the far right. There is also the issue of virtue signalling or slacktivism. Virtue signalling is prominent with companies such as Netflix, which shared tweets tagged #BLM without addressing racism within their own corporation. Slacktivism can be less of an issue – person A doing nothing more than sharing a cause doesn’t harm the cause, and Person B (who only learned because of Person A sharing) would not have gotten involved with the cause if they hadn’t known it existed. However, sometimes it can be harmful, such as when many accounts participated in Black Out Tuesday, and drowned out important messages about the movement.
Social media activism can be criticised in many ways, but it can also be amazingly useful. As with all the types of activism presented so far, what matters is how it is used, and that it is not the only method to be employed. It is by far the easiest form of activism, but it also attracts the most direct attacks.
Voting
Many people do not see voting as a form of activism, but it can be. We defined the steps of becoming an activist as:
- see that something is unjust
- believe it should be changed
- take action to affect change
The action you take to affect change can be voting. Some people vote for the same political party every time, regardless of what the party promises. Some people vote for the parties their parents voted for, as if there is a lineage to hold to. If you vote for the party that puts in its manifesto they will change the thing you believe unjust, that’s activism.
Of course, just because a party leader claims they will do something doesn’t mean they’ll actually do it, and that’s when all the other types of activism should be used. Voting is your right, if you live in a democracy, and one of the easiest ways to affect change.
Marches
A protest March is a type of activism where people walk, usually to a certain location, and often whilst making noise and/or waving signs. Some of these marches are an afternoon event, and some, like Gandhi’s salt march in 1930, last 23 days, cover 240 miles, and end up with more than 60,000 people incarcerated.
It can be difficult to find protests in your area, as the media often don’t mention them until after they happen; however, they can be found on social media. Often they occur on notable dates, such as Trans Awareness Day, or after tragic events, such as the murder of Brianna Ghey. Search for keywords relating to the event, for example after Brianna’s murder, there were vigils held in cities throughout the UK. If you make friends at marches, they may be able to tell you of other events.
Organising a march is difficult, and there is a lot you must be aware of. This changes depending on the laws of the country you are in – for example, in the UK, police must be notified of a march six days before it occurs.
Often a march will end in a rally.
Rallies
A protest rally is a gathering in a specific area to listen to speakers. They often come at the end of a protest march, and can include musicians with the speakers.
The speakers at a protest are often arranged before hand. They don’t tend to solicit speeches from the crowd. If you are ever at a protest and someone wants you to speak, you can say no. If you are going to speak at a protest, there’s a good Medium article on making the speech impactful here. Amongst other things, it advises a Connect, Contrast, Solution approach. You may find these speeches inspiring.
If you are going to organise a rally, get a team together, find out relevant laws in your area that affect rallies, try and seek help from others who have done it before, and read through this guide.
Sit-ins and die-ins
Sit-ins are a type of activism that involves demonstrators sitting in a place open to the public and refusing to leave. It is a nonviolent form of occupation and protest. Die-ins are similar, but with protesters pretending to be dead.
Sit-ins have had a lot of success – in 1955 in Baltimore a sit-in and other protests was responsible for the desegregation of Read’s Drug Store. Bernie Sanders organised a sit-in whilst he was a student in 1962. Sit-ins have been used worldwide, including in Pakistan, Hungary, South Africa, the United Kingdom, and India.
Die-ins are not as popular as sit-ins, but have been used when organisations and governments were believed to be responsible for deaths. They have been used to protest for animal rights, human rights, AIDS, gun control, and against racism, war, and traffic violence.
Sit-ins and die-ins are as easy to join as marches and allies, but difficult to organise, and require more than one participant to really be seen as a protest.
Strikes, Walkouts, and Picketing
These are all forms of labour activism. A strike is the downing of tools and refusal to work. A walkout is the abandonment of a workplace. A picketline surrounds an area where a strike is happening, and usually consists of the strikers. Walkouts can occur instantly and need not involve all workers, but strikes are arranged in advance, usually after a breakdown in negotiations.
In Japan, bus drivers went on strike but continued to operate their buses. They didn’t want passengers to be inconvenienced, but they wanted their employers to feel the strike, so they simply never charged any passenger whilst the strike lasted. It also had the affect of keeping the public on the driver’s side. Sometimes the striking workers can be the target of blame and anger instead of their employers who have given them reason to strike.
Whilst anyone can walkout at any time, it does require a few participants or an employer will assume you have quit. Strikes are organised through unions, and it is recommended you join one even if you aren’t currently wanting to strike.
Vigils
Vigils can be a type of activism, although the practice originated from a religious observance of night watches that still continues, so it’s more appropriate to say some, but not all, vigils are a type of activism.
Vigils are always held outside, at night, and are most common after someone has died. For example, vigils were held across the UK after the murder of Brianna Ghey. Although vigils are always a form of memorial, they do not need to be linked to a specific person. A gender-based violence vigil could be held in memory of all those who lost their lives due to gender-based violence.
Craftivism
Craftivism is a type of activism that is centred on practices of craft. The term was coined in 2003 by Betsy Greer, who has said “craftivism is a way of looking at life where voicing opinions through creativity makes your voice stronger, your compassion deeper, and your quest for justice more infinite.”
Although craftivism is a new term, craft has been associated with subversion throughout history. Long considered “women’s work” craft has a deep association with feminism. It’s DIY nature also gives it a natural anti-capitalism fit. It also tends to be more sustainable, giving it an environmental leaning.
Craftivism protest models can include knit-ins (sit-ins with knitting) and other crafts. It has come under fire for lacking in intersectionality and is often seen as embodying white, liberal feminism and having events attended only by white cisgender women.
Graffitivism
Graffitivism is a type of activism that we may have named here at Rebel Wrath. An online search returned zero results for graffitivism, and “graffiti activism” returned results for Street Art Activism. This is difficult to understand as it is such an obvious term and we can’t imagine no one has used it before, but there you go.
Graffitvism is a type of activism that uses graffiti to protest and raise awareness. Graffiti is a form of uncommissioned and unsanctioned writings or drawings made on a wall within public view. The use of graffiti as a form of protest dates back to the Roman Empire, giving yet another ancient form of activism. As long as there has been people, there have been protests.
Street art is considered democratic because it bypasses establishment gatekeepers such as the media to get a message in direct view of a wide audience. Graffitivism often tackles issues such as inequality, discrimination, environmental concerns, war, and corruption.
It’s not often seen as a criticism of capitalism. Banksy, one of the most well-known and influential graffitivist’s working today, has had pieces auctioned for as much as £18.6 million.
Graffitivism has low barriers to entry: all you really need is spray paint and a wall. Many graffitivists also use stencils as it makes placing the art much faster. Although some skill is assumed, in truth, you don’t need anything more than willingness, space, and spray paint.
Activist Art
Art has been used as a form of activism for centuries. Michelangelo’s David was a form of protest art, as was the graffitivism used in ancient Rome and Egypt. There was protest art in the French revolution. But art is more than just images – there have been protest songs, such as the 1795 “Rights of Women,” written by a lady and set to the tune of God Save the King.
It also includes literary work such as Animal Farm, Cory Doctorow’s Radicalised, and of course Attack of the 50 ft Trans Woman.
Art is one of the most difficult ways to protest. The barriers to entry, especially now with the ease of e-publishing, are low, but the skill to pull it off requires decades of work. If you have no experience or skill in art, it’s recommended you use any of the other methods of protesting.
Culture Jamming
Culture jamming is a type of activism that seeks to disrupt or subvert media culture and its mainstream cultural institutions, including advertising. It uses the rhetoric of mainstream culture to critique the institutions that make the culture, such as changing corporate logos and incorporates social hacking, billboard hacking, meme hacking, and subvertising.
Getting into culture jamming can be as free as using GIMP or another free photomanipulation software to alter a logo then release it online, or as expensive as hiring a billboard. It does take some amount of skill to make it look good.
Mutual Aid
Mutual Aid is the process of soliciting or giving donations to help people survive. This can be organised through sites such as Just Giving, or simply through Paypal, Ko-fi, or, in the US, Venmo. Although many don’t see Mutual Aid as a type of activism, it is difficult to campaign against something like poverty whilst simultaneously ignoring people facing homelessness, starvation, or death from poverty.
What comes next?
After the activism comes… more work. You can’t just campaign for change and then have change happen. We’re unlikely to tear down an established system – even revolution ends in a similar system with different management. The key to real change is reform, and to have reform you need a solid understanding of how the system works.
No generalisations. A lot of racists voted for Brexit, but not all Brexit voters are racists. A lot of fascists voted for Trump, but not all Trump voters are fascists. Common ground must be sought and lies dispelled.
Research has shown that protests have a discernible pattern. First, people get angry. Second, they protest. The third stage has two options: either the protest is crushed or reformers in power positions realise the people have a point, and seek to negotiate meaningful change.
By understanding the system you are protesting in, you can more easily identify potential allies. The slavery abolition campaigners, the suffragettes, and the US civil rights campaigners understood the system, and after their protests proved they had numbers on their side, after reformers in state realised they had a point, they negotiated their victories.