A tactic that goes on too long loses its participants' commitment, however effective it was at the start.
Rule seven of Rules for Radicals, paraphrased. Attention and enthusiasm decay, Alinsky argued, so every tactic has a useful life after which it becomes a ritual; he advised changing tactics before the decline rather than after it.
In practice
- A weekly vigil that drew crowds in its first month is down to three regulars by the sixth, and its target has stopped noticing.
- A household chore rota that worked in January is ignored by March.
- Possible explanations
- One explanation is habituation: novelty fades for participants and targets alike. Another is the issue-attention cycle, in which public interest rises and falls whether or not the problem is solved.
- In its favour
- Consistent with Downs's issue-attention cycle and with research on burnout among volunteers and activists.
- Against it
- Some of the most consequential campaigns succeeded by enduring: the Montgomery bus boycott lasted 381 days. Changing tactics too often can signal weakness.
- Standing
- Compare Downs's issue-attention cycle and Alinsky's enjoyment rule.
- Subject
- Organizations & Bureaucracy
- Essay
- Rules for running organisations, and for pressing them