It’s not yet clear whether the US has entered an authoritarian period or a right-wing period (or both), because the political struggle is still underway and by no means resolved.

But it is pretty clear that we have entered a period of instability or unrest, which is quite common in global perspective but especially dangerous in a superpower. As I wrote on this blog in 2023, “We will know that we are in that situation if the daily news often includes reports of violent clashes, dubious arrests and prosecutions, threats, firings or resignations connected to politics, and occasional assassinations and politically-motivated mass murders.”

All those boxes are checked in 2025.

I also wrote: “I believe we need broad-based nonviolent social movements to get us through any unrest and ideally to bring us to a better place. Such movements will generate protest actions, some of which will involve reported violence–if only as a result of hostile responses by other groups or police. Thus we should be striving for a high ratio of nonviolence to violence.”

I wrote that it was “time to plan, educate, organize, and train” for nonviolent mobilization in the context of unrest and state violence. I tried to do some of that work– for example, at the 2024 Frontiers of Democracy conference. I do not think I succeeded or was part of larger efforts that were successful. I wish we had prepared better.

It’s not too late. As many people as possible must participate in broad-based, visible, nonviolent political resistance. Please feel welcome to join me at a Crossroads and Connections Webinar on Thursday September 18, 2025 from 6:30 – 8:00 PM Eastern to discuss tactics and strategies. I am happy to do other events like that if I can be helpful.

The graphs show incidence of political violence in the USA recently, per The ACLED Explorer. See also: nonviolence in a time of political unrest; a checklist for democracy activists;  the current state of resistance, and what to do about it; tools people need to preserve and strengthen democracy; learning from the Great Salt March: on civil disobedience and breaking through to mass opinion; countering selective harassment in the Trump Administration; building power for resisting authoritarianism etc.