# 50501 National Proposal: Implement Pillar Strategies (Legally, Ethically, Strategically)
by Acorn Baden
We propose that 50501 National Coordinators support a phased shift in strategy: moving from mass mobilization alone toward a two-part pillar strategy informed by the research of Dr. Erica Chenoweth. This approach has the potential to dramatically increase our effectiveness while remaining grounded in nonviolence, legality, and strategic discipline.
****Strategic Proposal****
We recommend state and local organizers continue the mass mobilization strategy while simultaneously building capacity to implement:
- First, a Naive Pillar Strategy (basic)
- Then, an Informed Pillar Strategy (research-based and focused)
This dual-track approach allows us to continue broad public engagement while developing the intelligence and networks necessary for more strategic interventions.
****Naive Pillar Strategy (Phase 1)****
1. Create a master list of Pillars of Support (POS) that uphold the current regime.
2. Map those pillars geographically and institutionally.
3. Encourage activists to focus on the pillar closest to them (not just physically, but also relationally).
4. If that pillar begins to defect (meaning individuals or groups withdraw support from the regimeO then activists move to the next accessible pillar.
****Informed Pillar Strategy (Phase 2)****
1. Gather strategic intelligence about the pillars on the master list.
2. Analyze which specific individuals or groups are most likely to shift loyalty under our influence.
3. Ask activists to focus their efforts on the most persuadable pillar first.
4. When loyalty shifts occur, reassess and repeat, targeting the next pillar with the greatest potential for defection.
“Defection is shorthand for getting more people who support the opponent to stop supporting the opponent.” ~Dr. Erica Chenoweth
****Legal and Ethical Commitments****
This project must be designed and implemented in a way that is legally sound, ethically principled, and rooted in nonviolent discipline. That means:
- We focus only on public officials and public figures not private citizens.
- We avoid doxxing, meaning we do not publish personal or residential addresses, phone numbers, or private contact details.
- We avoid defamation by ensuring our claims are fact-based, verifiable, and avoid false or misleading statements.
- We do not encourage harassment, threats, or intimidation of any kind. Our goal is nonviolent persuasion, not coercion.
- We respect privacy laws, especially for individuals who are not in the public eye.
- We avoid false light and misleading framing, particularly with those who may not have publicly stated affiliations.
- We create systems to protect contributors from retaliation, including options for anonymity or secure vetting.
- We can include a Code of Conduct to guide ethical use of any tools or data we develop.
****Why Pillar Strategies Matter****
Dr. Chenoweth and collaborators developed a model to identify strategies that outperform the historical record of resistance movements. They found that:
- Mass mobilization alone has <50% probability of success and only outperforms historical outcomes at participation rates over 1% of the population which is over 3.3 million people in the U.S.
- Naive Pillar Strategy already outperforms mass mobilization even with just 0.1% participation (~335,000 people).
- Informed Pillar Strategy has the highest probability of success (88%) and is effective even with small participation, so long as activists are targeting persuadable pillars.
Rather than trying to shake the whole system at once, we aim to strategically loosen the bricks within the pillars—the individuals and institutions who uphold Trump’s authoritarian agenda.
****Broaden the Target: Beyond Security Forces****
Security forces have been largely “coup-proofed.” So we must broaden our understanding of what counts as a pillar.
# Categories of POS
These are some of the categories for Pillars of Support (POS):
1. Corporations
2. Business and economic elites
3. Media
4. Educational elites
5. Civilian bureaucrats and servants
6. Party officials and staff
7. Security personnel/forces
8. Cultural influencers
9. Foundations and philanthropists
10. Civil society organizations
11. Religious leaders
12. Organized labor
13. Other elite and local authoritarians
****Six Degrees of Pillar-ation****
To succeed with the informed strategy, we need to build capacity for Six Degrees of Pillar-ation. This means recognizing that:
- Most activists are just a few connections away from someone inside a pillar of support.
- By mapping these networks, we can find and reach the most persuadable bricks; those whose mortar (loyalty) is already weak.
- We focus on relational organizing, quiet conversations, and strategic influence not just shouting outside someone’s office.
This is how we create cascades of defections; where one shift leads to another, and pillars begin to weaken together.
****Final Notes****
This strategy is not about punishing individuals. It’s about persuading institutions to withdraw their support from authoritarianism and helping individuals inside those institutions do the same. With clarity, care, and strategy, we can be bold without crossing legal or ethical lines.
This is how we bring the Trump Bridge down not by force, but by pulling out the bricks that hold it up.
**"Defection is shorthand for getting more people who support the opponent to stop supporting the opponent". ~**[**Erica Chenoweth**](https://nonviolent-action-lab-podcast.simplecast.com/episodes/meet-the-nonviolent-action-lab)
# Background Information
Researcher Dr. Erica Chenoweth (they/them) and others tried to figure out what strategies might outperform the historical record in a research paper called [a dynamic model of nonviolent resistance strategy](https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9328538/). What Dr. Chenoweth and others were trying to do is build a strategy that outperforms that historical record. Dr. Chenoweth gave [a talk in November](https://youtu.be/XwyUT-PHLPI?si=AwQAJFQs_yeHCECf) where they discuss the study in updated terms.
They plotted the historical record on a graph in black which is kind of a linear line (see below). In this chart the horizontal axis is peak participation in the movement and the vertical axis is the probability of success. The black line is historically how the probability of success for movements has gone at different percentages of the population.
They then plotted the probability of success of the mass mobilization strategy on the same graph in blue. The mass mobilization aims to get as many people as they can into the streets as quickly as they can and hope for the best That's mostly what we see with 50501 and other movements around the world.
They then plotted the probability of success for the naive pillar strategy on the graph in red. The pillar in this strategy stands for a pillar of support which is an institution, group, or system that plays a crucial role in maintaining and upholding a larger structure, such as a political regime or social order (in our case the current White House Administration).
In this naive pillar strategy instead of activists just going everywhere and hoping for the best, activists try to mobilize near their closest pillar of support, like an economic elite or security force that is closest to them and they make a lot of noise and hope that that pillar defects.
They then plotted the probability of success for the informed pillar strategy on the graph in green. The informed pillar strategy is where activists gather some intelligence about which of the pillars is already the most likely to defect. The activists know something about a pillar's personal preferences and so they go to that one first. The activists try to get those low hanging fruit early. The activists hope those loyalty shifts create a cascade of defections.
A cascade of defections occurs when individuals or institutions supporting a system begin to break away, leading to a ripple effect of further withdrawals. This weakening of support creates pressure on others to follow, ultimately destabilizing the system.
# Why this is important
These researchers found that the third strategy (informed pillar strategy) outperforms the others in generating defections, even when the size of the mobilization is small. When activists have information about pillars’ levels of loyalty to the regime, they can target persuasion on the pillars most likely to defect. Importantly, for small or medium-sized movements, the strategy of focusing on pillars—especially the least loyal pillars—is more likely to yield success than relying on rapid mobilization and numerical advantage alone.
The mass mobilization strategy had less than a 50% average probability of success and only outperformed the historical record at about 1% of the population involved. In the United States of America 1% of the population is more than 3,350,731 Americans. The mass mobilization strategy performs similar to the pillar strategies only if 10% of the population is involved. The problem is something like 95% of the observations never get that percentage of the population to take these actions. They just can't get that many people that fast and so it's very risky.
With the naive pillar strategy, it already outperforms the historical record and the mass mobilization strategy even at the smallest numbers of participation, 0.1% which would be more than 335,073 Americans. The naive pillar strategy had an average of 68% probability of success.
In the informed pillar strategy, that's where activists go to where a pillar they think might be likely to defect is going to be and the activists get the pillar to defect and that initiates the cascade of defections. The informed pillar strategy is succeeding at incredibly high historical levels even with very small numbers (0.1% of the population). The informed pillar strategy has an average of 88% probability of success.
# Research Recommendations
The informed pillar strategy suggests that movements need a lot more capacity to get information about who is connected to whom [something I call "Six Degrees of Pillar-ation"] and who might be disloyal early in a campaign. That requires all kinds of capacities.
It also requires activists to broaden their understanding of which pillars matter: moving away from security forces which have been largely coup proofed and moving towards economic and business elites, civil servants and the other types of pillars (see below) who are available to movements when security forces aren't.
Activists should also think about going beyond coercion. That means going behind the model of just shouting loudly outside of people's houses. Dr. Chenoweth recommends organizers think about quiet and covert methods of eliciting those loyalty shifts: persuasion, fraternization, pressure, etc. There are lots of different mechanisms for this available.
# Six Degrees of Pillar-ation
When we get to the informed-pillar strategy phase we can use this strategy to create a cascade of defections**:** **Six Degrees of Pillar-ation**. This concept suggests that any activist is only six degrees away from a pillar of support —whether through personal, professional, or social connections. By mapping out these connections, activists can discover direct and indirect links to key individuals or institutions that uphold the current White House Administration, allowing them to exert pressure where it matters most.
The idea is to mobilize activists to think strategically about how their personal networks intersect with the pillars of support, such as media, corporations, or military institutions. Activists can then use these connections to engage in conversations, organize actions, or initiate campaigns that challenge those pillars and encourage defections. By working through these six degrees, activists are not just focusing on distant institutions but focusing on people and systems that are within their sphere of influence, making the effort more personal, accessible, and effective.
Six Degrees of Pillar-ation taps into the power of relational organizing, leveraging social and professional networks to increase participation. This strategy also emphasizes that individual connections can drive large-scale changes by focusing on loyalty shifts within the pillars. By identifying and engaging key figures within these networks, activists can create internal pressures that weaken the Administration‘s foundations, ultimately building toward a broader movement of defection and dissent.
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