2023 showed us the importance of communities taking their power back across the world, showing that another world is possible. In 2024, global communities of resistance, from Niger to Mexico, Pakistan to Palestine, took collective decisions to repair their communities, create the conditions for their rights to be respected and take back power. Here in the UK, we celebrated key dates of repair and resistance, and continued action learning towards a world where many worlds fit.

2023: sham democracy exposed

However, looking back on 2023, we also saw the forces of repression gain strength, through electoral and symbolic violences across the world. In the UK, the sham far-right government has continued to fail all peoples everywhere, dehumanising migrants, using economic violence against its people, criminalising resistance, allying with fossil fuel giants and genocidal regimes.

The sham of this UK “democracy” is easy for all to see.

2023 has shown us that political systems in the UK are out of the peoples’ control. Since October, tens of thousands have regularly marched for the people of Palestine, demanding the UK government call for a ceasefire and stop supporting the onslaught of the Israel Defence Forces. Yet the establishment remains corrupt, and unmoved by some of the biggest marches in recent history. Communities have also been calling for an end to fossil fuels for years, and yet 100 new oil and gas licences were announced this summer.

Politics in the UK is not working for the people: it is working for Empire, for the wealthy, and for those who wish to crush the people.

2023 has exacerbated the process of people becoming disconnected from themselves as political actors. People do not feel their communities can make collective decisions about their lives that will actually lead to change. This is a major state of disrepair. And as peoples of conscience working to secure Planet Repairs across geographies and cultures, we see this disrepair as a call to action.

2024: decolonising politics

Looking into 2024, across the PRALER network we will put the educational revolution to the service of decolonising politics. For too long “democracy” has been a word used to destroy communities, ways of life and cultures: but we know that in learning about collective, ancestral forms of governance is needed now more than ever. In 2024, important elections will happen: in the UK, in Ghana, Mexico, India, South Africa and many more, putting to the test our ability to connect the dots of the bad government, and compelling us to enact good governance, from the bottom up.

Decolonising Politics Following the example of communities of resistance across the globe, and aligning with their fights, we will take back decision-making power for ourselves. In 2024, to repair communities here in the heart of empire, we aim to build glocal assemblies for collective, powerful decision making. Together, learning from communities across the world, we aim to make, and act on, collective decisions. These decisions will meet our needs, and support the needs of communities abroad, so we remain accountable to our global community.

140th anniversary of the Berlin conference

2024 will also see the 140th anniversary of the 1884 Berlin Conference, a flashpoint of the Maangamizi crimes against humanity, where imperial powers ripped communities apart and drew lines across Afrika to claim land that was not theirs, and profit from the suffering of millions. On the anniversary of this Maangamizi, we step up our fight for Afrikan reparations, defined by the communities fighting to repair themselves on their own terms. In autumn 2024, a reparations conference will be held in Berlin, returning to the symbolic city to work to repair the harm of centuries of colonialism.

Get involved

From making art 🎨, to having flyers and stickers at your community center 📚, amplifying content with your networks 📣 and even translating 💬- we’re looking for you! Step up to Decolonise Politics: bit.ly/DecolonisePolitics

Our plans for 2024 are ambitious, but they are possible. However, to embody this educational revolution, we need your support. Supporting the PRALER Fund will help us to build up our communities for true education, for legal support, land restitution, stop the harm of colonial violence, help build real connections for communities to lead education through their own liberation. Donate here: https://chuffed.org/project/praler