Activism in a World of Autocracy — The People Power Academy at UVA

The job of an activist is not an easy one. They often lack support (except from other activists, of course), relying on their personal dedication to a cause to persevere amidst threats—and the reality of—persecution, detention, violence, and, in many cases, death. Now that authoritarian regimes across the world are sharing information, tactics, and resources with each other,many activists believe that the best path is to band together and share strategies with each other. 

The People Power Academy, held from Friday through Sunday at the Rotunda and Nau Hall, sought to bring activists from across the world together to achieve this exact goal. The event was organized by the Center for Applied Non-Violent Actions and Strategies (CANVAS), founded by Slobodan Djinovic and Srdja Popovic, two Serbian activists who helped bring about the downfall of autocratic president Sloboban Milosevic in 2000. UVA English Professor Steve Parks, a friend of Popovic and Djinovic, also helped coordinate the event and bring dissidents and activists from across the world onto grounds. Rania Aziz, an activist from Sudan, served as the host and opening speaker. 

The first day of the event featured a wide array of speakers, including:

• Leopoldo Lopez, a Venezuelan opposition leader. Lopez discussed his political career, ranging from serving as mayor of a neighborhood in Caracas from 2000 to 2008, to being barred from running for head of all of Caracas in 2008, to serving as one of the main leaders of the Venezuelan opposition, to facing house arrest and imprisonment before eventually fleeing the country. Lopez emphasized the role of women in activist movements, especially in light of the fact that female activists often face more scrutiny and discrimination than male activists.
• Felix Maradiaga, a Nicaraguan dissident and Nobel Peace Prize nominee who was heavily involved in organizing the People Power Academy. Maradiaga discussed his time working to return ex-Contra rebels to Nicaraguan society and his eventual fallout with the dictatorial Ortega regime, resulting in his imprisonment and expulsion to the United States. 
• Volya Vysotskaia, a Belarusian activist and refugee. Vysotskaia is a prominent critic of Belarusian dictator Alexander Lukashenko, beginning her activist career after the fraudulent 2020 elections in Belarus. Vysotskaia was one of a few people in her activist network who was able to flee the country before being imprisoned; she now works to free fellow activists and support them while in prison, including by collecting dozens of postcards at the convention to send back to prisoners in Belarus.
• A panel that included Peter Pomerantsev, a Ukrainian-British journalist; Yunier Suarez, a Cuban dissident; Sylvain Saluseke, a Congolese activist; and Rana Rahimpour, a journalist from Iran. The panel discussed issues such as press freedom and collaboration between global autocracies, and even engaged in a heated debate about whether or not sanctions were an effective deterrent to authoritarian countries.

Following these speeches, Felix Maradiaga gathered everyone together to make an announcement: he was publicly beginning an international campaign against arbitrary detention, with the ultimate goal of securing an international treaty preventing it. 

The second day featured an equally diverse set of speakers, including:

• Evan Mawarire, a Zimbabwean pastor and activist known for starting the protest movement #ThisFlag. #ThisFlag has its origins in a viral video posted by Mawarire in which he decried the economic and political decline that Zimbabwe has experienced after decades of rule by the autocratic Robert Mugabe. Perhaps the height of his career, however, was when he achieved a near-total shutdown of Zimbabwe on a set date through only a few posts on social media—an example, in his view, of the power of collective action.
• Andre Henry, a singer and prominent figure in the Black Lives Matter movement. Henry explained the origins of his activism—specifically the outrage he felt after the 2016 killing of Philando Castile, and his later work with the Black Lives Matter movement as it regained national prominence after the 2020 killing of George Floyd. 
• Yevgeniya Chirikova, an environmental activist from Russia. Chirikova has long been a critic of Vladimir Putin’s government, and organized a protest against the building of a highway through a forest in Moscow. In her talk, however, she placed a particular emphasis on the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and the struggles civilian and military populations alike have had to face throughout the ongoing war. 
• Another panel including journalist William Dobson and activists from Brazil, the Philippines, and Serbia. The conversation dealt with the function of the media in a world of rampant misinformation. For the Bolsonaro administration in Brazil, the Marcos administration in the Philippines, and the Vucic administration in Serbia alike, the panelists agreed that the best strategy to counter misinformation is to try to relate to the average person—something activists sometimes struggle at doing. 

The event concluded on Sunday, with a final set of speakers, including:

• Dominika Lasota, an activist from Poland. Lasota began her work as an environmental activist, but after the right-wing government of Poland banned abortion, she shifted focus to feminist activism. A key theme of Lasota’s speech was that activism is a long-term process: even large victories can seem fleeting. After Poland’s right-wing government fell, Lasota expressed her disappointment with the lack of change coming from the new government, but also her hope that collective action would eventually bring real reform. 
• Zoran Zaev, former Prime Minister of North Macedonia. Zaev was one of the only people in attendance with a successful career in both activism and politics, and emphasized the use of working within the political system to change it. Having been nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize for reconciling a dispute over the name of his nation with neighboring Greece, Zaev also promoted the value of acting in the world’s and people’s best interests, rather than for political success. 
• The final panel, moderated by Colorado College Professor John Gould, featured Egyptian economist Ahmed Samih Farag, Georgian legal expert Nini Gogiberidze, and Philippine academic Cecilia Lero. Lero gave a history of democracy in the Philippines, which has seen democratic backsliding, intense violence, and the return of the infamous Marcos family to power; Gogiberidze explained that while Georgia has seen significant improvement since independence, its gains have been fragile and must be protected; Farag presented a less optimistic view of Egypt, noting failures after the fall of Hosni Mubarak in 2011. Farag in particular presented a highly pragmatic view of activism and democracy: it is better approached slowly and realistically, for a “dream” that involves specific plans is much better than “hope,” which is vague and at times unrealistic. 

Besides the speeches, activists held workshops and study groups on topics such as cryptocurrency, avoiding burnout as an activist, organizing and successfully implementing the plans of a movement. The event also boasted a concert by Andre Henry, the Black Lives Matter activist who spoke on Saturday, and Ramy Essam, an known for his performance in Tahrir Square during the Egyptian Revolution of 2011. 

In a time of unprecedented danger for democracy, the role of the activist is more necessary than ever. As protestors at universities across the country are learning, however, it is undeniably challenging to keep a movement organized and further its goals effectively. Perhaps the best strategy any activist movement can pursue is unity—which can be difficult to achieve, but, as last week’s conference showed, is invaluable.