The most effective protest movements have strategies for spreading their messages that are multifaceted and target different groups of people in different ways. This is important as it involves numerous interest groups in a movement, all of which bring with them different resources, influences and ideas. This diversity increases the likelihood of a movement sustaining momentum in the long term.
Setting short-term and long-term aims
Depending on the cause, it may be important for movements to set clear short-term and long-term aims or goals. This involves creating a vision that extends beyond the immediate issues that gave rise to a movement and looks for practical ways to transform society. By setting short-term and long-term aims, movements are prompted to think about and take action to ensure the sustainability of their cause. The creation of these aims should be done collaboratively and representatively to ensure that members believe in them, and they should be clearly framed.[1] Clearly stated aims help movements to measure the successes and failures of actions and campaigns. Many movements are successful in the short term but dissipate once short-term aims have been met, despite the potential they may have had to make lasting change. Similarly, the failure to meet short-term goals does not necessarily minimise the impact a movement can have in the long term. For instance, during the Chilean student protests, the short-term goal was to increase state support to students through scholarships and subsidised lunches and transport. However, the movement was less successful in achieving its long-term aim, which was to reform a political system still based on a constitution written during the Pinochet dictatorship. However, because of the short-term successes, many members of student movements were able to garner enough public support to start their own political parties and run for elected office. Those parties went on to hold around 20 per cent of the seats in parliament and thus may in future be able to achieve the long-term aims of the movement and ensure sustained change.[2]
Diverse campaigns
There are a number of ways that movements can spread their messages and achieve their aims. However, no single way is always effective as different contexts require different strategies. It is important to consider all of the actors that are involved in bringing about change and design campaigns to target each of them. In Mexico, the growing disappeared movement, which arose in response to the tens of thousands of people who have been disappeared, uses an array of campaign strategies. The movement organises mass marches in multiple locations, particularly on special days such as Mother’s Day, and also carries out widespread advocacy and awareness campaigns in an attempt to gather information about the missing people. The movement partnered with the media to spread awareness about the situation on a local and global scale, and also physically carries out search parties and digs to find mass graves. Each of these strategies targets a different segment of society in the hope that cumulatively they will lead to an improvement in the situation and the uncovering of the truth.[3]
While carrying out protests, it is also necessary to develop a strategy to target reformers within government. Particularly in very repressive environments, these reformers provide an opening for citizens to express their grievances to sympathetic people with access to the levers of power
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