The Misuse of the 3.5% Rule: Why Numbers Alone Won’t Win the Struggle
Over the past decade, the 3.5% Rule has become well-known in activist spaces. The phrase comes from political scientist Erica Chenoweth’s research on nonviolent resistance, conducted alongside Maria J. Stephan, and most famously presented in their 2011 book Why Civil Resistance Works: The Strategic Logic of Nonviolent Conflict. Analyzing 323 major campaigns from 1900 to 2006, they found something striking: no nonviolent movement that attracted at least 3.5% of the population to participate in its peak event had failed to achieve its goals.
Let’s be clear about what that means. The “peak event” refers to the single largest act of public collective action—often a protest or demonstration—within one year of a movement achieving its goal. And “achieving its goal” in this study meant something very specific: the overthrow of an oppressive regime or territorial liberation, not policy reform or raising awareness. These were maximalist campaigns, not localized or incremental efforts.
It’s also important to note that the 3.5% participation threshold was met only by nonviolent campaigns. Violent campaigns never achieved that level of engagement. The research did not find that 3.5% was a magic number that guaranteed success, but rather that in these historical cases, no movement that had reached that level had failed. It was descriptive, not prescriptive.
But that’s not how it is often being used today.
I’ve seen organizers frame their strategy around “hitting” 3.5%—as if the number itself is a shortcut to change. In one post, local protest organizers celebrated surpassing 3.5% of their city’s population, claiming they had reached the “sweet spot” for success. I don’t doubt their passion, but this is a fundamental misunderstanding of the research.
Before Chenoweth and Stephan’s research revealed this number, no one knew 3.5% was a threshold. The original participants in successful movements weren’t organizing to reach a specific percentage. They were motivated by conviction, by suffering, by deep relationships, by the hope of a better future. If we want to learn from their success, we can’t just try to replicate their numbers—we have to understand what compelled that kind of participation in the first place.
When we make the 3.5% Rule prescriptive, we reduce movement-building to a numbers game. We treat protest turnout as the key to everything. But Chenoweth and Stephan were clear: protests alone rarely bring change. They are just one tactic in a much larger nonviolent toolbox. Successful campaigns rely on a wide range of coordinated actions—strikes, boycotts, stay-aways, creative resistance. Protest is often the most visible part of a movement, but it is rarely the most impactful one.
Since the 3.5% finding became popularized, some studies have noted a decrease in the success rate of nonviolent campaigns. One possible reason is that activists are misapplying the research. We aim for numbers without building commitment. We plan protest events without long-term strategy. We misunderstand what made these movements work.
This is not a call to abandon the 3.5% figure entirely. It’s a reminder to read it properly. It’s a warning not to take descriptive data and turn it into a rule for success. We need to return our focus to the deeper work—building resilient communities, forming shared purpose, and nurturing the courage it takes for people to risk their jobs, their reputations, or even their lives for a cause.
Movements don’t win because they hit a number. They win because they move hearts, build power, and refuse to give up.
Further reading:
Erica Chenoweth and Maria J. Stephan, Why Civil Resistance Works: The Strategic Logic of Nonviolent Conflict (Columbia University Press, 2011)
Erica Chenoweth, “The Future of Nonviolent Resistance,” Journal of Democracy (Vol. 31, No. 3, July 2020)
Erica Chenoweth, Civil Resistance: What Everyone Needs to Know (Oxford University Press, 2021)