For the Long Haul

A guide to sustaining long-term activism from a social-movement veteran.

To win in significant ways, we will have to build and sustain movements—grassroots movements propelled by urgency, that move at a pace that we can maintain collectively, for years to come. This is the long haul. Changing the world will require large numbers of ordinary people moving into action, bringing more and more people along with them and constellating powerful new collectivities.

For the Long Haul addresses the question of how to sustain long-term involvement in transformative social movements. Chris Dixon takes up this question with a particular focus on our time of compounding crises and widely felt urgency. This urgency, the book argues, is warranted; creating a just and habitable future requires dramatic social transformation.

Written in a compact and accessible manner, For the Long Haul takes up the question of activist longevity through five chapter-length propositions. Each chapter names a key obstacle to movement durability and then elaborates practical tools for contending with the obstacle and nourishing long-haul organizing. Focusing on the US and Canada, the book is based on interviews with and writings by seasoned organizers, experiences of past and present-day political organizations, and a broad range of movement histories. Deceptively simple prompts, such as cultivating a long view, caring for each other, making plans, and sticking around, lead readers to rich examinations of movement history and culture that center Black, Indigenous, queer, and feminist voices.