HMN 2025: How ‘Lived {experience}’ is valued in activism, however is it doing extra hurt than good?

The thought of “lived {experience}”—information gained via direct, private {experience}—is now central in activism, academia and politics. Popularized by feminist thinkers like Simone de Beauvoir and ideas like standpoint theory, it is sensible that individuals see the world in another way primarily based on what they have been via. And actions like #MeToo confirmed how sharing private tales, significantly for oppressed, marginalized or victimized teams, can drive actual change.

Lived {experience} lends authority to these lengthy excluded from public debate, providing perception traditional expertise may miss. But it additionally raises questions on who will get to talk. Those with out direct {experience} of a problem can discover their place in activism questioned.

High-profile instances like Rachel Dolezal and Andrea Smith, activists who falsely claimed black and Native American ancestry, respectively, spotlight how highly effective the declare to lived {experience} has change into—a lot in order that some really feel compelled to lie about it with a view to be heard.

My research, primarily based on in-depth interviews with 20 activists from a spread of actions and backgrounds throughout Europe, India and the US, exhibits what challenges come up when lived {experience} is handled as the last word credential in activism. The interviewees revealed how emphasis on private testimony can shift activism away from political motion, towards guilt, polarization and disengagement.

This issues, as a result of it impacts who feels capable of take part in actions pushing for social change.

One trans activist confused the significance of lived {experience} in main the combat for transgender rights, warning that with out trans voices on the heart, the motion dangers overlooking key views which can be typically absent from analysis and politics.

For others, the emphasis on lived {experience} creates inside dilemmas. Activists with out lived {experience} can really feel not sure of their place. One white anti-racist activist primarily based within the UK put it this fashion: “I might undoubtedly be silent in a variety of issues, and I would not be happy with it. But I would not have the best to talk up.”

Another white feminine activist working in worldwide growth described a rising discomfort along with her position: “I essentially query whether or not I’ve legitimacy in management. Can I legitimately present up? Or do I simply want to depart the event sector completely?”

In some activist areas, talking with out related lived {experience} is seen as a transgression. Identity turns into a type of ethical litmus check for who will get to talk and lead.

Activists described an awesome sense of guilt about their very own social benefits. One mirrored on how acknowledging these benefits, by recognizing the privileges they maintain (and their subsequent lack of marginalized lived {experience}) is usually a barrier to activism: “I believe it is very important interact in self-awareness, however generally it strikes into self-criticism. You can stall in the event you’re all the time feeling responsible.”

One interviewee noticed a “collective inertia” amongst allies, activists and lecturers who, not sure of their place, selected silence over motion.

Another described how guilt about having a privileged lived {experience} shifts the main focus away from collective political motion and towards perfecting the self—a type of confessional self-work that dangers changing into inward-focused, quite than resulting in significant social change.

These feedback mirror considerations raised in social justice research about how guilt, humility and lived {experience} can shape or stall activism. My findings recommend that whereas lived {experience} stays important, the way in which it is used issues—when it isolates quite than unites, or fuels self-focus over motion, we have to use it extra rigorously, in ways in which construct connection and drive change.

Identity, {experience} and variety of opinion

Some activists strongly defended the concept these with the least privilege ought to have probably the most say. As one LGBTQ+ activist put it: “The one who has the least privilege in society will get to determine what’s true. If you are straight and cis, and also you’re a man, middle-aged, and white, examine your privileges.”

While this angle facilities voices lengthy pushed to the margins, it might additionally wrongly assume everybody with a specific lived {experience} will have the same views on a problem.

Many writers and philosophers, equivalent to Frantz Fanon, have challenged the concept identification alone dictates political outlooks. As British author Kenan Malik lately argued: “Black and Asian communities are as politically numerous as white communities.”

Latino and black voters’ help for Donald Trump within the US has challenged many individuals’s assumptions about how identification dictates political allegiance.

This pressure has prompted some activist organizations to rethink their strategy. The UK charity Migrant Rights Network shifted their messaging from “lived experience-led” activism to “lived experience and values-led” activism in 2023.

They argued that figures like Rishi Sunak and Suella Braverman display that lived {experience} alone doesn’t assure shared values. Both come from immigrant backgrounds and have skilled racism, but their help for restrictive immigration insurance policies has led critics to query whether or not their private histories depend as legitimate lived {experience}.

At the guts of that is an uncomfortable query: ought to lived {experience} solely be acknowledged when it aligns with sure political values?

A approach ahead

My research suggests that if we solely worth lived {experience} when it confirms our personal views, we danger turning it right into a selective software quite than a real dedication to listening.

If we are saying lived {experience} issues, now we have to be keen to have interaction with it throughout the spectrum—even when it challenges us. That does not imply now we have to agree, nevertheless it does imply staying open to dialogue.

None of this implies lived {experience} ought to be dismissed—it supplies important perception into how injustice is felt, understood and navigated by these most affected. However, when it turns into the only real measure of credibility, it might create divisions inside activist areas and silence individuals who wish to contribute.

A extra productive strategy could be to view lived {experience} not as the ultimate phrase or the tip of a dialog, however as a place to begin—one which invitations listening, dialogue and in the end, collective motion.

As one activist in my study mirrored: “If you are taking the time to speak and hear, you are not disqualified simply since you did not develop up in that context. The secret’s humility.”

This article is republished from The Conversation beneath a Creative Commons license. Read the unique article.