Campaigning Wiki

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Summary

A dilemma action is a tactical action designed so that every response by the target is costly to the target — the campaign wins whichever way the target responds.

Body

A dilemma action is a tactical action designed so that every response by the target is costly to the target — the campaign wins whichever way the target responds.

The dilemma framework comes from Sharp and is taught in CANVAS’s curriculum as the core design discipline for civil-resistance tactics [source: canvas]. A well-designed dilemma action forces the target into a triple bind: repress (and lose legitimacy), comply (and lose power), or do nothing (and lose momentum). Tactics4Change and ICNC’s 21st Century tactics catalogue updated variants — asymmetric digital actions, transient occupations, performative non-compliance [source: tactics4change], [source: civil-resistance-tactics-21c]. Beautiful Trouble presents many worked examples: a flash-mob buyout that embarrasses a chain whether the chain sues or ignores; a guerrilla projection that publicises a hidden fact whether the target confiscates the projector or not [source: beautiful-trouble]. A classic dilemma action presents the target with a request that is easy to grant but politically costly to grant publicly and politically costly to deny publicly.

Use it for

Designing an action with asymmetric costs in the campaigner’s favour; diagnosing why a planned action is too easy for the target to ignore.

Worked examples

  • case-studies/barbie-liberation
  • otpor-milosevic
  • case-studies/sindicato-inquilinas
  • case-studies/sunrise-green-new-deal

Open Questions

None yet.

Sources & verification

  • sources/canvas — grounding: secondary — RAW (1324 chars)
  • sources/tactics4change — grounding: secondary — RAW (1386 chars)
  • sources/civil-resistance-tactics-21c — grounding: secondary — RAW (2120 chars)
  • sources/beautiful-trouble — grounding: secondary — RAW (2589 chars)

Verified 2026-06-23 by llm-qc.

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