Connecting Our Individual Actions With Systemic Change
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The impacts of climate change are becoming stark in parts of the U.S. and Europe, as summer heat waves claim the lives of thousands of people and threaten the well-being of many more communities.
Policy experts, scientists, educators and ecological advocates have made enormous strides in helping the broader public recognize the need to shift the ways in which we produce and consume energy, food, infrastructure, and other aspects of society. How can we expand this recognition into meaningful, expansive social and economic transformations?
Writing for YES! in 2021, climate scientist Peter Kalmus described collective action as the product of individuals leading the way, showing what’s possible, and shifting our understanding of what ought to be accepted as normal:
I believe there’s a deep connection between individual and collective action, that collective action is comprised of our individual actions — both informed by and informing culture. And it’s certainly possible to reduce our own emissions while at the same time doing everything we can to demand systems-level change….
If we find it difficult or irrelevant to use less fossil fuel ourselves, how effective can we be in pushing for broader systems-level change? If we want cultural shift, we need individuals to lead the way. We need many individuals showing what’s possible, shifting the normal, telling a new story with their actions. Those of us situated to do this with relative ease have a moral responsibility to do so. Sooner or later, our social norms will reflect this.
–Peter Kalmus
Read the full article: A Clear Choice: My Fossil Fuels — or 5.6 Million People Fleeing a Hurricane
From the Archives: What the Freedom 250 Celebrations Ignored on July 4
Freedom 250, the Trump-endorsed celebrations of the U.S.’s 250th birthday, often cited the Declaration of Independence, but only sections of it that are both familiar to much of the public – and unthreatening to the authoritarian president. We all know the familiar sentences: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”
In 2019, Zenobia Jeffries Warfield, the former executive editor at YES!, drew attention to the deliberately overlooked section of the Declaration of Independence, which upholds the right to overthrow tyrannical governments.
“Baked into this nation’s founding is a remedy for exactly the kind of dangerous politicking currently oozing from the Oval Office,” wrote Warfield.
Read the full article: The Declaration of Independence Told Us What to Do About Tyrants Like Trump
From the Archives: We’re Still Feeling the Impacts of the Encampments
It’s been two years since students launched Palestine solidarity encampments on their campuses across the country. The impacts of these courageous efforts continue to be felt in our movements, as organizers carry the encampments’ practices of collective care and solidarity into anti-ICE, anti-Trump, and other political spaces.
The legacy of the encampments in New York City can also be seen in recent electoral victories for pro-Palestinian candidates. Darializa Avila Chevalier, who recently won a Democratic primary for a House seat as member and endorsee of the Democratic Socialists of America in New York City, was interviewed by Arun Gupta for YES! in May 2024, while taking part in the Columbia University encampment.
Read the full article: Students for Gaza Are Undeterred
New Work by YES! Contributors
- Sarah van Gelder, founding editor of YES!, finds a sense of national pride in the multitudinous ways Americans are resisting the Trump regime.
- Sonali Kolhatkar, the host of Rising Up With Sonali, looks at how some state governments are finding ways to fight back against the rising influence of money in politics.
- Marianne Dhenin reports on grassroots canvassers who are urging voters to defend abortion rights in their states this November.
New Solutions Journalism From Independent Media
✊ Taking on the Rich Is Possible. Our Illinois Coalition Won a Tax on Tech Giants. – Truthout
?? Houston Birth Workers Respond to the Black Maternal Health Crisis – Scalawag
? Miami Artists Use Spotlight on FIFA World Cup to Challenge Immigration Enforcement – Prism
✋? These Black Georgians Refuse to Be Silenced – Hammer & Hope
? The Data Center Backlash That’s Uniting America – Waging Nonviolence
✌️ How We Survive and Turn the Tide: Lessons from Florida – Convergence
Rising Up With Sonali
Rising Up With Sonali, formerly the broadcast arm of YES! Media, is lifting up solutions journalism through hard-hitting interviews.
Sonali has a new book out this year that collects powerful interviews from her show with activists who battled ICE raids and with academics who put the attacks on immigrants into a broader historical and cultural framework. Breaking ICE: Community Defense Against State Terror and MAGA Fascism (Seven Stories Press, August 2026) is available for pre-order now through an independent bookstore. You can also directly subscribe to support Sonali’s solutions-based broadcast effort.
Doing Our Part for Collective Transformation
Over the last few years, anti-authoritarian and anti-genocide movements have shown that systematic transformation requires masses of people to find their roles in the struggle, but not everyone knows where to start. By taking meaningful personal steps while also demanding systems-level change, each one of us shows what’s possible and helps fuel bigger fights. From the person who offers water at the anti-Trump march, to the medic who provides care at anti-ICE protest, we shift our norms toward collective care and transformation — and discover “a remedy for exactly the kind of dangerous politicking currently oozing from the Oval Office.”
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Truthout
hosts a monthly newsletter with relevant content from the YES! digital archives and new solutions journalism from a variety of publications. These curated resources can help us imagine – and build – movements for transformation.
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