This essay is written by and for developed world residents. We do not see domestic armed groups at war as typical. Most develop world residents have not participated in armed conflict, much less domestic ones. In this regard, the US stands out from other develop world countries, where organized armed conflict has plagued specific communities.
Protracted Social Conflicts are a type of war; in contrast with civil wars, which are fought over the control of the state, PSC is defined as self defined groups fighting for the needs of their respective identity group. PSC (and other technical terms like Counterinsurgency) are defined by unambiguous, quantifiable criteria. Therefore, these terms are completely unlike nebulous civil society concepts like "Ur Fascism". Think applied vs theoretical science. Not only can the clearly defined PSC model be used to diagnose whether a situation is Protracted Social Conflict, it is also a formula to create it.
PSCs are defined by their intractability and negative outcomes. The US federal state mechanism is applying this formula to the state of Minnesota (MN).
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Original paper analyzing the Palestine Israel relations, by Edward Azar et al, 1978.
Below is the slides from a lecture on PSC Theory. Phones can use landscape mode.
PSC Theory discusses 4 preconditions in its first stage, The Genesis, that are activated in the second stage. Slides 4-8 in the presentation.
People form identity-based communities that satisfy Human Needs which are deprived of them. Human Needs is a technical term here, describing needs that self defined identity groups require: security, development, political participation, expression of cultural identity, expression of religious identity.
This is the second precondition described in PSC Theory, because the first precondition defines how and why identity groups are formed, and is the seed of PSC.
Communal Content is the term Azar coined to describe people forming different identity groups to satisfy Human Needs. Individuals rely on the identity group they belong to respectively because the state failed in its role when it cannot or will not see to their needs. One group will come out with more resources than others and will isolate itself (elites). Another effect is that the state is disconnected from its society. A government/ state not providing for minority groups suffer a crisis of legitimacy which destablizes the regime. Finally, international linkages refer to dependencies that other states have on the destabilizing regime and vice versa.
Communal Content changed during the Obama administration, as more radical philosophical frameworks like Critical Race Theory, Queer Theory, and Intersectional Feminism were increasingly taught in schools. Prior to this presidency, substantial social control (counterinsurgency) through
To satisfy the
DACA gave a lot of people without legal status hope by offering a path to permanent residency. Illegal is being made into an identity instead of a status, but those who are labeled as such did not choose to be illegal, they made life choices. Like identity groups, they form community with similarly situated people who share common Human Needs that are unmet. DACA recepients became more included in the greater community.
All of this caused rapid transformation in people who were less empowered within their identity groups, to either express themselves more fully, or redefine and/ or adopt different identities that allow them to meet their Human Needs. This resulted in social inclusion for many more marginalized people, but it's not enough. Society may have expanded to its inclusivity limit within a nation state, ability, racial, gender and sexuality framework.
Simultaneously, ubiquitous social violence like bullying and racism, continued to be coddled systematically encouraged. Social media aside, l have witnessed young Neo-Nazi men, who likely joined the gang in prison, radicalizing their elderly sugar daddies in the early 2010s. LGBTQIA+ visibility attracted reactionary antagonism, as did Obama. School districts fail, on purpose and/ or by incompetence, in conflict resolution and centering student wellness, enabling bullying, racism, and teaching class reproduction as they always have.
Insisting on racial and gender identification come from the US government system itself. Just for contrast, it is illegal in France to have race information in paperwork. People are well aware that political participation is not the same as participating in party politics. In party politics, race, gender and sexuality are not just labels, they are categories which are primary considerations determining how one participates. In the 2010s, there was an effort by both parties to activate more people in the union to participate in them. Non-protected statuses like housing level, substance dependency, and wealth level do not get discussed as identities the same way. When party polics are incentivized by de facto satisfaction of Human Needs, it also incentivizes individuals to equate that with political participation.
l'm not from MN, and the above constitute observations about the US. They also apply to much of the developed world because of international linkages of US culture and policies upon the rest of the world.
Minnesota is where George Floyd was murdered in 2020 while people were locked down with their devices to witness the violence. Riots that directly forced the state of Minnesota to prosecute local police officers who killed Floyd with murder charges were further spectacle. In January 2026, ICE specifically deployed 3000+ agents in MN calling it Operation Metro Surge. The sitting governor for these 7 years is a Democrat, and MN has consistently voted for Democrats in presidential elections since Jimmy Carter in the late 1970s.
NoDAPL direct action in 2015-2016 was not only in physical proximity to MN. MN is home to Dakota, part of the Sioux Confederacy along with Nakota and the direct targets of DAPL, the Lakota. While the Dakotas are solid red states, MN has voted Democrat for the past 40 years; its transformation in communal content as described in the previous section was particularly strong while its neighbors became conservatively polarized.
The direct result of the 2020 riots -- forcing the state of Minnesota to prosecute and convict the 4 police officers responsible for George Floyd's death -- is a rare instance of law enforcement accountability.
Prosecutors and courts rarely seek police accountability. A public example of this is the sensational murder of 17 year old Trayvon Martin in 2012. The arrest of the responsible officer was itself forced by widespread outrage that included riots. Trial resulted in jury acquittal of the killer, police officer George Zimmerman. In the subsequent years, media is not only visibilizing law enforcement officers committing murders of civilians with increasing frequency, the lack of accountability are also spectacle. Such spectacles are perfectly timed in concert with other components of COIN.
The violence galvinized community organizing and solidarity, at least eliciting general tolerance, across identities in the state. Against the backdrop of the recent trauma of COVID lock downs, people place value on the connections formed during 2020 to continue building community for mutual aid.
Riots satisfy both the non-state actors and violence components of Protracted Social Conflict. The organizing that the murder galvinized is fomented to create a diadic adversary.
In January 2026, Trump plainly stated on Twitter that this operation is 'retribution'. The bilateral rivalry is already clear and known, but this statement bespectacled the dyadic relationship. It's part of the checklist, but the administration is well-practiced in following their north star-- sticking to the Protracted Social Conflict script.
Identity politics as a term got platformed and turned into a problem
The visual representation of insurgency is clear from 01/06/2021. People literally attack a functioning symbol of the state mechanism, the Capital building. The insurgents are then pardoned of treason charges by another insurgent, whom they voted into the presidency.
There is a strong push for non-fascist civilians to self identify as resistance, opposition, or uprisings.
The Atlantic publishes this article whose webpage title is "The Minneapolis Uprising" (the title on the article page is different). Google and other search engines use the webpage title not the article title; the webpage title is also displayed on the browser tab on desktop browsers. The hypelink itself is:
https://www.theatlantic.com/ politics/2026/01/ minneapolis-uprising/685755/
Common people are receiving counterinsurgency, but it does not equate to them being an uprising. Taking on that role is giving the actual insurgency legitimacy.
For one year, Immigration and Customs Enforcement abducted and disappeared integrated community members. Removal of people who have responsibilities create not only deep personalized disruption and traumas, it is also designed to systematically disrupt civilian economic activity.
The economy has already been suffering as a result of tariffs and other disturbances that Trump used as his platform for the second presidential campaign. It was even sold as protecting the economy to petit bourgeois, pivoting to xenophobia. ICE directly attacks the backbone of labor.
Taking the goal of fomenting mass movements into account, it becomes clear why the policies repeatedly self inflict harm to the economy. A terrible economy preempts the impact of a general strike.
ICE agents murdered 2 yt passing citizens who were aiding people being targeted by ICE. The murders of Renée Good and Alex Pretti were both recorded by witnesses in broad daylight and quickly distributed through social media. People record videos all by themselves, but governor Tim Walz (D) postured by urging citizens to do so to 'disrupt' ICE operations in an emergency broadcast. The intent of provocation and spectacle is clear.
Given that federal prosecutors are under the direct leadership of the president as part of the executive branch (the other 2 are legislative and judicial), the January 2026 murders of Renée Good and Alex Pretti would appear unlikely to receive parallel treatment. Some federal prosecutors in Minnesota and Washington DC have resigned in protest.
General strikes remain one of the most powerful tools at the disposal of the populace. Ever since the invasion of Gaza, and subsequent repression of (ultimately unsuccessful) protest encampments, there has been talk circulating of organizing a general strike. Predictably, massive street protests have taken place in Minneapolis, MN as well as other major US cities. There has been no rioting. Notably, the murders of yt citizens spur a predictably more political/ economic response compared to the murder of a black man, George Floyd. In ICE raids, the violence component has already been met by the state, it functions as the last straw that galvinizes the people of Minnesota to organize general strikes which included students and trade unions. Some are now calling for weekly strikes and economic activity black outs. The above public outrage has apparently forced ICE agents to withdraw from the state. The victory encourages the strengthening of organizing networks.
A coup d’etat is an internal seizure of state power from an incumbent power. Citizens hold the power in democracies. l have seldom seen the Trump administration described as a coup even though it is one. When civilians make the statement that they are opposing the federal government, it completes the narrative that they are an uprising/ rebellion. Citizens are in fact upholding civil society norms and order, their own incumbent power.
Civil society here refers to indivuals and organizations independent of the government, as well as normative civic values. l am not stating a qualitative assessment about civil society, only that it exists and is under attack.
The opposition/ resistance framing is not only self incrimination, it is a submissive role to a dominant identity. The Democratic Party models making itself a sub to the GOP. Yt and/ or privileged allies start out as peers to fascists, and end up under them. This role disempowers attempts at civil discourse about the abuse being dispensed, reducing them to complaints. The real insurgents become incumbent, the incumbents become insurgents.
Most people are not motivated to pay taxes/ be legal out of principle, they are motivated by the privileges it gives them. Now they are motivated to not become targets of a violent regime instead, which pivots from a type of mass trauma conditioning.
From early childhood, everyone in school experienced or witnessed systematically encouraged bullying; they got taught that’s how how things actually work. For those who have concepts of morality, moral injury occurs each time they do not speak up about targeted victimization, accumulating over a lifetime. A lot of public discourse place blame on digital platforms when most people have been educated/ traumatized to support and perpetuate bullying regardless of their level of digital access. When forced to, people use what they were taught, which is to make someone a scapegoat/ punch down. Many people's solution for conflict is silencing perceived weaker people from voicing their needs. The abusive, unreasonable, violent spectacle of violence in Minnesota activates trauma conditioned acquiescence,verbal consent, even active support of oppressive violence from among the previously unactivated majority of the US populace.
Another factor is most people do not connect civic duty to benefit. Maintainers of communities are often characterized as working a lot for little reward. This is often attributed to a the concept of Tragedy of the Commons, which has a strong connection to anti-immigration in the US. The commons is framed as problematic. The depletion the commons is not attributed to capitalist consumerism, or the burden of tributes in a feudal system, or a culture of centering certain people’s benefit while devaluating that of others. This concept is based on false premises of how commons function. The false premise that commons are doomed to be abused is treated as true because of the true conclusion that commons are often depleted, but it is because of exploitative behavior.
The murders of good semaritan yt citizens materially threatens those who want to perform civic duty. Again, moral injury occurs each time someone witnesses violence but does not intervene.
The fact that the spectacle of violence on Minnesota is constantly being forced upon the population should tip the observer off, that its affects on people’s perception is absolutely crucial. Further, it shows that the actual insurgency — those who seized the government mechanism— is operating from a precarious position, requiring high levels of effort to maintain their coup.
The narrative is always centered on fascism, along with real life first person experiences of witnessing abductions and feeling the effects, to force the general public into the false dilemma of resistance or support of fascism. Civilians in Minnesota are de facto opposing/ resisting the federal government as they are defending themselves. Supposedly left leaning media describe them as an uprising for defending themselves. The problem, as many can see, is that infrastructure and common resources are being eroded, attacked, and prevented from functioning.