Listen to the audio version >>What can we do if MAGA authoritarianism so undermines democratic governance that it cannot be successfully challenged by conventional means? In many other countries, tyrannies have been overthrown by nonviolent mass popular uprisings. This commentary scours US history for examples of “social strikes” – mass strikes, general strikes, and other large-scale nonviolent actions – that shed light on the possibilities and difficulties of using such forms of action to challenge Trump’s burgeoning autocracy.

 

 

Tyrannical regimes from Serbia to the Philippines to Brazil and many other places have been brought down by nonviolent revolts that made society ungovernable. More recent examples include the “popular impeachment” of the governor of Puerto Rico in 2019 after the leaking of scurrilous chat group discussions by top government leaders and the massive uprisings that removed the president of Korea as he instigated a coup last December.

Could such “social strikes” — large-scale nonviolent direct action variously called “general strikes,” “political strikes,” nonviolent uprisings, or “people power” — play a significant role in countering Trump’s developing autocracy?

From the outset of the Trump regime calls for mass disruptive action started coming from unlikely places, like Anthony Romero, executive director of the ACLU, an organization normally associated with legal action through the courts. When Romero was asked in an interview what would happen if the Trump administration systematically defied court orders, he replied, “Then we’ve got to take to the streets in a different way. We’ve got to shut down this country.” Similarly, senior Democratic representative Jim McGovern said, “We can’t just sit back and let our democracy just fall apart. What we need to think about are things like maybe a national strike across this country.” Sara Nelson, head of the Association of Flight Attendants, said that American workers — no matter what they do or what sector they are in — now have very few options but to “join together to organize for a general strike.” (Nelson led the organizing for a national general strike that successfully deterred Trump’s attempt to shut down the government in his first term.) On the mass calls of anti-MAGA groups the question of general strikes and nonviolent popular uprisings is constantly raised.

Calling for general strikes is a staple of the radical toolkit. (I’ve made questionable efforts to call two or three myself over the past half-century.) But why has the idea of such mass actions suddenly appeared on the lips of such a wide range of people? There are three principal reasons:

• First, the wide range of people being harmed by the MAGA juggernaut gives credibility to actions based on wide public participation.
• Second, the demolition of key institutions of democracy, constitutionalism, and the rule of law is threatening to leave few alternatives to popular uprising.
• Third, the failure of the leadership of the Democratic Party to effectively oppose the emerging MAGA tyranny has led to despair about resistance within the institutions of representative government.

These undeniable realities are forcing people to think in unaccustomed ways. Are there precedents in US history from which they can learn?

Social Strikes, Mass Strikes, and General Strikes

 

 

The U.S. has seen at least half-a-dozen phases of intense class conflict like those the German revolutionary Rosa Luxemburg called “periods of mass strike.” These often involved popular action that went far beyond, though usually including, the withdrawal of labor power that conventionally defines a strike. Mass strikes have included general strikes, mass picketing, occupation of workplaces and government buildings, nonviolent direct action, shutdowns of commerce, blocking of traffic, and other disruption of everyday activities. Mass strikes have often been met with severe repression and at times involved violent conflict with company guards, police, state militias, and the US Army.

The U.S. has also seen a handful of actions that fit the classical definition of a “general strike” as a coordinated work stoppage by trade unions in many different sectors.

The closest the US has come to a national general strike was in 1886, when a strike for the eight-hour day became a general strike in Chicago and some other locations. Since then, there have been a handful of general strikes in individual cities, for example Seattle in 1919, San Francisco in 1934, and Oakland, California and Stamford, Connecticut in 1946. They have all been sympathetic strikes to support particular groups of workers in struggles with their employers.

Such union-called general strikes, however, have been a rarity in U.S. labor history. American unions are bound by laws specifically designed to prevent them from taking part in strikes about issues outside their own workplace, such as sympathy strikes and political strikes. In most cases their contracts include “no-strike” language that bans them from striking during the contract. Unions that violate these prohibitions are subject to crushing fines and loss of bargaining rights. Their leaders can be — and have been — packed off to jail.

Historically, American unions have often opposed their members’ participation in strikes that union officials have not authorized because such leaders wished to exercise a monopoly of authority over their members’ collective action. In labor movement jargon, such unauthorized actions were often condemned as “dual unionism.” US unions have often disciplined and sometimes supported the firing and blacklisting of workers who struck without official authorization. As a result, unions have often deterred their members from participating in mass strike actions even when the rank and file wanted to strike.

Strikes for specifically political purposes like affecting legislation or deposing political leaders are common in other countries. In March 2025 alone there were general strikes in Belgium, Argentina, Serbia, and Korea — all directed against government austerity policies or, in the case of Korea, unconstitutional seizure of government power. But such political strikes have been a rarity in the U.S.

A unique US political strike was conducted by West Virginia coal miners in 1969 demanding that the state legislature pass a law to provide compensation for victims of black lung disease. The strike was opposed by the United Mine Workers union; its president, Tony Boyle, pledged “The U.M.W.A. will not abridge the rights of mine operators in running the mines. We follow the judgment of the coal operators, right or wrong.” Miners encouraged research by sympathetic doctors, then established the Black Lung Association, which some miners came to refer to as “our union away from the union.” The strike began when a West Virginia miner, fed up with the lack of progress on health and safety conditions, spilled his water out on the ground — the traditional appeal to other miners to join a strike. Within five days the wildcat strike spread to 42,000 of West Virginia’s 44,000 coal miners. They continued to strike for twenty-three days until the state legislature finally passed a bill to compensate victims of black lung disease.

General “Strikes”

 

 

In recent decades the use of the terms “strike” and “general strike” has often been broadened beyond workers’ withdrawal of labor power to other forms of direct action, such as student strikes and general popular uprisings. There has been some criticism that this broader usage misses the unique power that results from workers’ ability to halt production through the withdrawal of their labor power. But the term “general strike” continues to be widely used for actions that may include striking unions but are based on a wider set of actors, tactics, and objectives. I use the term “social strikes” to include this wider set.

An example was the “general strike” initiated by the Occupy Wall Street movement. In December 2011, Occupy Los Angeles proposed a general strike on May 1 “for migrant rights, jobs for all, a moratorium on foreclosures and peace — and to recognize housing, education and health care as human rights.” Occupy Wall Street in New York echoed with a call for “a day without the 99 percent, general strike and … no work, no school, no housework, no shopping.” On May Day, thousands engaged in such protests in dozens of cities including New York, Chicago, San Francisco, Oakland and Seattle. Several resulted in street battles and tear gassing by police. While there were many forms of protest, there were few if any walkouts from work.

“Imagine the Power of Working People…”

 

 

Perhaps the most powerful use of a general strike in US history came during Trump’s first term – a general strike that was threatened but achieved its main objectives before it needed to be carried out. In December 2018, President Trump refused to sign any appropriations bill that did not fund his proposed Mexican border wall. The government shut down, putting more than a million employees out of work. TSA officers and air traffic controllers began calling in sick, and the entire airline industry teetered on the edge of collapse. Sara Nelson, president of the Association of Flight Attendants gave a speech saying, “Go back with the fierce urgency of now to talk with your locals and international unions about all workers joining together — to end this shutdown with a general strike.” She recorded a video message urging her union’s members to get to the offices of their congressional representatives until the shutdown was resolved. After 35 days of the shutdown, flight delays were cascading. Trump unexpectedly reversed course and agreed to a congressional resolution to fund the government — but only for three weeks.

Airline flight attendants then announced a new website called generalstrike2019.org with the headline “Imagine the Power of Working People Standing Together to Demand That Our Government Work for Us.” It called on “all Americans” to “join us in protest at our nation’s airports to show what workers can achieve together.” At the last minute, instead of shutting down the government, Trump declared a state of emergency to build his wall. (Both the Democratic House and the Republican Senate soon voted to revoke the emergency.)

Sara Nelson summed up the lesson of the workers’ action: “Our country doesn’t run without the federal workers who make it run.”

Unlike some countries, the US does not have a tradition of using mass strikes, general strikes, political strikes, and other forms of social strikes as a means to resist and overcome government tyranny. But these examples give some hints about how such movements can arise and be effective. The great periods of mass strike in American history show a process of working-class self-mobilization that could provide a seedbed for social strikes against tyranny. The various citywide general strikes show the potential for union-led general strikes where enough workers belong to unions and unions are willing to play such a role. The effective threat of general strikes to end and avert government shutdowns in 2019 shows their potential power and reveals that their possibility is more than a pipedream.

The next commentary in this series will explore how social strikes might be used to resist and overcome MAGA tyranny.