Mutual aid may not be the form of protest that first comes to mind when the ideas of protest are invoked. In the US especially, protest tends to evoke ideas of riots or marches, typically consisting of chants and signs that most people have become numb too at this point. However, that is not the only form of protest that exists. Mutual aid was first laid out in principle by sociobiologist Perter Kropotkin, who argued that social cooperation was the first major evolution that allowed for the human race to experience the success that it has had today. His influential book “Mutual Aid” was highly influential in challenging the common ideas of social Darwinism, a mostly British political movement that argued for gutting welfare in order to have those who were the most “genetically superior” rise to the top of society. The radical idea of Mutual Aid was that humanity is strongest not when we are the most independently successful, but when we are willingly dependent upon each other. Independent of any other social ideals or movements this is not a particularity inherently radical idea, however, as modern liberalism has arisen within the United Sates, the highly individualistic politics and philosophy have been massively challenged by Mutual Aid movements around the United States.

The movement for Mutual Aid groups first arose within the United States through a pro Black organization called the Black Panthers. This group included many noted activists such as Huey P. Newton, Fred Hampton, and Angela Davis. This groups focus was on creating pro Black sentiment within the Black community, first within Califorina but then slowly throughout the entirety of the US. One of the large organizational components that allowed for the sweeping success of the movement was the free breakfast program, where the Panthers would serve free meals for the community. This created a community of people that made friends and found family around the meals the Panthers served. This challenged the US government and acted as a protest by adressing a failure that the US government has made. The community forming effects of these meals were what powered the Balck Panthers as all the other actions they took, such as more formal protests, reading programs, and other community work were made more efficient by the members of the community having built relationships with each other in a more informal manner before hand. After all, the main purposes of a protest are to intimidate legislators into enacting change, and this program worked just as well. It is why schools today have free breakfast programs across the country, a legacy that the Panthers have left even today. Modern movements have followed the Panthers blueprint, such as food not bombs and many other less famous organizations throughout the world. Mutual Aid protests run counter to many peoples preconception of a protest, and that is precisely what allows them to be as powerful as they are. In the modern day, Mutual aid is a large portion of how anti-war and anti-policing movements originate, given that they are much lower risk for those who may participate.