towards a common platform for action
Standing together to fight inequality
Fight Inequality Alliance is a growing global movement organising and mobilising to counter the excessive concentration of power and wealth in the hands of a small elite. We are building a just, equal and sustainable world.
This vision was developed collectively to set out a common analysis and approach for our global work. It is a guide and a resource, not a compulsion — the work of alliance members is rightly rooted in their own geographical and sectoral contexts, and this vision will keep adapting as the alliance grows.
how we got here
For centuries too many people have lived and died in poverty on the margins of society, robbed of dignity and opportunity because they are born girls, born into poverty, or suffer discrimination because of their caste, race, sexual identity, indigenous group or religion. Today these age-old disparities have been further entrenched by an acute concentration of wealth and power into the hands of a small elite.
This is no accident.
Collusion between political and economic elites has undermined democracy and created economic systems built on a blind faith in markets and money — pushed so far that over the last 30 years they have caused an inequality explosion. That ideology drove a race to the bottom on wages while the number of billionaires kept rising. It handed unprecedented lobby power to multinationals while eroding the state and necessary regulation. It built an elaborate network of secretive tax havens, drove the privatisation of vital public services, and denied communities control over the natural resources they need to live a decent life.
Inequality has deep roots. Gender inequality persists universally, and is further entrenched by the concentration of power and wealth. Women experience it in cities and rural areas, in schooling, in high- and low-paid work, in marriage and family, and in exposure to unconstrained violence — with impacts that are deeply felt and too widely accepted as normal.
Systems of oppression have taken different shapes throughout history. But people have built broad alliances before and won: against slavery, against colonialism, against apartheid, and for LGBTQI rights, women’s rights, Indigenous rights and labour rights. The powerful have always adjusted, building new systems of oppression in response. We have now reached such extremes that systemic change on that scale is needed again.
our values
How we organise
Seven commitments that shape how the alliance works — with each other, and with everyone we organise alongside.
01
We are inclusive and respectful for all, regardless of race, gender, age, religion, sexual identity, class, caste, disability, ethnicity or geographic location.
02
We collectively build a mass movement of people fighting inequality that engages a wide and diverse range of organisations and individuals.
03
We use a feminist and intersectional approach to our organising and movement building.
04
We act in solidarity and community with each other nationally and regionally, and act together globally on our shared agenda.
05
We foreground the leadership of those on the frontlines of inequality — women, young people, social movements — in our movement building.
06
We make decisions on a consensus basis at national, regional and global levels, with broad consultation with the membership.
07
We are non-violent in our approach.
our demands
We call on governments around the world to:
Ten demands, developed collectively across the alliance. Open each one to read the analysis behind it.
Inequality is out of control. In 2015 the richest 1% had more wealth than the rest of the world, and more than 700 million people were living in extreme poverty. That gulf has been widening with alarming speed over the past 30 years, and women and excluded groups are most impacted. Climate change is widening the gap further, as those who contributed least pay the highest price.
Drastically reducing inequality would benefit the whole of humanity. Extreme economic inequality corrupts politics, reduces media freedom, hinders economic growth and stifles social mobility. It fuels crime and violent conflict, and stands in the way of the fight against poverty. Change will only come if governments take deliberate action to redistribute wealth before inequality passes the point of no return.
We call for national plans to reduce extreme inequality, and for social and economic policy-making that factors in the impact on inequality.
Economic and political thinking remains dominated by a market fundamentalist ideology that insists deregulation, privatisation and a market free from government intervention is the only path to shared prosperity. The evidence shows this to be untrue, and the ideology stands in the way of poverty and inequality reduction.
Pro-market policies imposed by international financial institutions have created avenues for elite wealth creation at the expense of the majority. Latin America, Asia, Africa and the former Soviet bloc saw these policies imposed by creditors after the debt crises of the 80s and 90s. The result was soaring economic inequality and huge increases in poverty, directly resulting from a redistribution of wealth in favour of the richest.
We call for a just economic system that makes the market a servant of the people, and an end to the ideology that demands cuts in public spending, deregulation, privatisation and tax breaks for the wealthy.
The same market fundamentalism that creates the gap between the richest and the rest also relies on and entrenches patriarchy. It undermines the rights of women, achieving economic growth off the back of an unfair burden of unpaid care work and poverty wages.
For years, the faces of workers in the lowest-paid, most precarious and dangerous jobs, unprotected by labour laws, have been the faces of women and girls. Around the world they put in hours of unpaid care work each week that yields billions for the global economy and earns them no income. Rather than recognising and rewarding that contribution, market fundamentalism has stripped away paid maternity leave, childcare, and free health and education.
We call for a fair economy that recognises, reduces and redistributes unpaid care work, and for social and economic policies that invest in and protect women and girls.
Climate change is a crisis of inequality. The greenhouse gas emissions of the haves are creating dangerous changes to the climate that hit the have-nots hardest, as floods and droughts decimate lives and livelihoods.
Yet governments everywhere put the interests of corporations who benefit from the destructive status quo ahead of people. They spend billions of public money on fossil fuel subsidies rather than investing in the transition to sustainable alternatives. Meanwhile the companies and elites who profit from fossil fuels use the market fundamentalist rulebook to undermine the shift to clean, renewable energy. Communities must have a stake in these alternatives.
We call for climate justice, for an end to fossil fuel subsidies, and for public money to be reinvested in sustainable alternatives that protect people and planet.
The oppression of workers is a human injustice and an intentional strategy by rich elites and corporations to remove opposition to a system that offers dwindling wages to the many while corporations rake in record profits and pay executives obscene rewards. Work has become increasingly casualised and informal, with young people and women hit hardest.
Unions and collective bargaining help redress this imbalance and keep inequality in check, but workers around the world face violations of fundamental rights and a crackdown on their right to organise. For millions, the consequence of standing up against unfair conditions is total loss of income, and persecution.
We call for labour rights and the rule of law for all workers — a minimum living wage, social protection, collective bargaining and the right to strike — and for mandated due diligence for multinationals.
The shady world of tax havens and banking secrecy, and fiscal policy that hands tax cuts to the rich while hitting the poor with spending cuts, are among the most corrosive consequences of market fundamentalism. Our rigged economy uses the very tools needed to level the playing field to redistribute money upwards, within and between countries.
Countries have reduced income inequality by making the right tax and spending decisions. Cracking down on tax dodging by multinationals would fill gaping holes in the budgets of rich and poor countries alike. But while large corporations and the richest write the tax rules, inequality will keep accelerating.
We call for tax on wealth, capital and the profits of the richest, for progressive tax systems, and for an end to tax secrecy, tax havens and illicit financial flows.
The destruction of the role of the state, and the privatisation of services like health and education, is grounded in market fundamentalist dogma and an unquestioning belief that markets belong in all spheres of life. This zeal for privatisation takes away the tools and social protection needed to roll back the worst extremes of poverty and inequality.
Privatisation was a key ingredient in the structural adjustment policies introduced from the 80s and 90s that led to soaring inequality in the poorest countries. Yet governments and donors still pour billions of public money into private health and education initiatives. A system that lets companies make vast profits while pricing the poorest out of schools and hospitals has no place in a civilised society.
We call for states that provide social protection for everyone and free public health and education from cradle to grave, and for an end to the privatisation of public services.
Struggles to take ownership of land represent the oldest form of wealth inequality. Wealthy elites in rich and poor countries alike use political influence to secure land concessions and subsidies. While millions go hungry, investors and industrial agribusiness make vast profits from land grabbed from the poorest communities, Indigenous Peoples and smallholder farmers — land they used to feed themselves sustainably and supply local markets. Industrial agribusiness is also one of the largest contributors to the climate crisis.
This is not a new struggle, but it has been accelerated by growing inequality, market fundamentalism and speculation in agricultural commodities. Wealth in the form of land is being redistributed upwards, with poor countries losing vast areas to banks and private investors.
We call for governments to protect the land rights of women, Indigenous Peoples and communities, pursue deliberate land redistribution, and regulate investors and industrial agribusiness.
The rapid rise of inequality has gone hand in hand with the crushing of democracy and civil society space. Collusion between political and economic elites has eroded the freedom of expression, association and peaceful assembly in countries around the world.
In this context, hate speech, physical attacks, disappearances and assassinations are increasingly common. Citizens who speak truth to power, and challenge authoritarianism and market fundamentalism, face vilification, stigmatisation, arbitrary detention and criminalisation.
We call for governments to safeguard civil society and protect the right of all citizens to speak out, organise and take action — and for an end to legislation that prevents civil society holding governments accountable.
In a world of economic winners and losers, the blame for a lack of opportunity is too often laid at the door of migrants and refugees — victims of forced displacement — rather than at the door of governments engaged in conflict and war or pushing regressive policy.
Migrant workers often suffer the worst discrimination, low wages and insecure work without equal rights. Refugees and displaced people suffer perilous journeys and abandonment in unsafe camps, as stable countries refuse entry on the basis that there is not enough money to meet their needs. In a world of plenty, this is unacceptable.
Ensuring people’s rights and equal opportunity is the antidote to fear and xenophobia in a world where trust is breaking down — between people, between nations, and between people and their governments.