Given how reactionary forces manipulate anti-immigrant sentiment to hide systemic capitalism’s role in exploitation, how can our movement effectively challenge this scapegoating while simultaneously exposing and dismantling the deeper economic and land thefts that perpetuate inequality?
Start by rerouting rage: pivot conversation from “foreign workers stole your job” to “capital pits us against each other to cheapen all labor.” Host shop-floor teach-ins where migrants and locals map the same supply chain, tracing profits from sweatshops abroad to zero-hour contracts at home. Then mock patriotic capitalists: stage a public “auction of loyalty” inviting CEOs to pledge they will not offshore profits; their silence exposes the sham.
Next, confront land robbery. Build a People’s Land Registry overlaying colonial dispossession, buy-to-leave real estate and present-day evictions. Tour it as a pop-up street museum; when residents see their rent hikes alongside foreign resource grabs bankrolled by domestic landlords, the nationalist spell cracks.
Finally, weaponise solidarity, not pity. Coordinate one-day transnational strikes along shared supply chains, pairing English warehouse crews with Peruvian miners on live streams. When production stutters at both ends, the story writes itself: immigrants are comrades in a common siege.
Which frontline (workplace, housing or narrative) will your group pierce first to rupture the scapegoating script?
How can we design our messaging and actions to cut through nationalist narratives in a way that not only exposes capitalism’s role in land theft and exploitation but also builds genuine solidarity across immigrant and local communities, especially when these narratives are deeply ingrained and reinforced by mainstream media?
Begin with a narrative swap: the soil, not the passport, feeds us. Show it visually. Print bilingual posters overlaying the local landlord’s holdings on a world map of the mines and sweatshops that enrich him. One headline in every language: Same boss, same theft.
Stage a public ritual that embodies the counter-story. Invite immigrant and local families to plant seedlings in a foreclosed lot while reading each other’s wage slips aloud. Livestream the “Borderless Harvest,” tagging journalists who usually chase culture-war clickbait. When tabloids try to spin the scene, they must defend hedge funds against kids planting tomatoes, and the nationalist frame buckles.
Link message to material gain. Rotate mutual-aid kitchens where recipes, strike updates and legal resources are exchanged. Solidarity becomes dinner, not dogma, and gossip spreads the idea faster than pamphlets.
Keep repeating the slogan at every action: “Land and labor have no flag.” It is memorable, singable, and cuts directly at patriotic capitalism’s throat.
Which abandoned lot, shuttered factory or underused churchyard in your town could sprout the first Borderless Harvest this year?
What specific stories and images can our movement craft to illustrate that land theft and economic exploitation are interconnected across borders, and how can we embed these stories into actions that foster shared ownership and responsibility among immigrant and local communities—especially in spaces where nationalist narratives are heavily reinforced?
Start with paired tales that mirror each other. Show the bulldozed allotment behind the local supermarket and the razed rainforest plot in Peru that feeds the same investment fund. One slide, two images, a single caption: “One landlord, two hemispheres, zero roots.” Follow it with a bottle blown in a new English factory set beside the bloody hand of a South African miner digging the silica that formed it. The moral lands viscerally: your cheaper pint glass is subsidised by someone else’s shattered lungs.
Now turn story into shared ritual. Recruit residents from both origins to paint a movable diptych mural: one panel depicts the local eviction, the other the distant extraction. Mount it on wheels and roll it through neighbourhoods where tabloids scream about migrants. Every stop becomes a forum where participants inscribe on the frame what sovereignty of land and labour should feel like. The act of co-authoring the artwork seeds collective ownership.
Layer material stakes. Launch a cooperative seed bank sourced half from immigrant gardens, half from heritage local varieties. Distribute packets during the mural tour, each labelled with the story of the land struggle it survived. When those seeds sprout on balconies and allotments, the narrative literally takes root, tethering livelihoods across borders.
Which intertwined image are you ready to paint first, and whose balcony will host the inaugural seed that insists land and labour have no flag?
From my experience, crafting stories that highlight how land theft and exploitation cross borders helps challenge nationalist narratives. We’ve shared images of corporate land grabs in our town alongside similar struggles overseas, emphasizing shared ownership. Embedding these stories into community actions—like joint planting projects—fosters collective responsibility. It’s about making the interconnectedness tangible, so both immigrant and local folks feel they’re part of a larger movement fighting for land and labor justice together.
You are already rehearsing the future: stories that braid a bulldozed allotment with a razed rainforest dissolve the border in people’s minds, and a shared seedling drives the point into the soil. To intensify impact, couple each planting with a measurable confrontation of the local land baron who profits from both sites. Imagine revealing the offshore shell company on banners that circle his downtown office the same day children water the seedlings; narrative solidarity meets direct pressure. Capture this two-step in a short film—root, rage, remedy—that volunteers can screen at pubs and mosques alike until the storyline becomes common sense.
Next, ask every participant to trace one object in their home back to the land it came from, then pin those photos on a public map. When kettled nationalism bangs its drum, the neighbourhood will see its own furniture, phones and flour radiating from Peru, Congo, Leicester. The flag shrinks beside that constellation.
Ready to escalate? Which local landlord or firm will you name in your next root-rage-remedy cycle, and how will you link their profit chain to a seed planted in collective soil?