A common feature of fantasy and sci-fi stories is oppression and rebellion. We love a good cause, and we love a good rebel. However, in my editing work, I’ve seen how it can be hard to write rebellion in a way that feels real. It’s too easy for the groups involved to lack compelling motives. Just like individual characters, a group with a weak motive will come across as unrealistic and unengaging.

Writing rebel groups (and any social group, for that matter) is much like writing individual characters: for them to come across as compelling, they need to have specific, nuanced, and well-developed motivations.

There are whole writing theories dedicated to answering the question, “How do you write compelling characters with compelling motives?” In this post, I’ll propose my own framework to answer the question, “How do you write compelling revolutions with compelling motives?”

Defining Rebellion

A single word can have multiple different meanings. In this discussion, the subtle differences in meaning will end up being significant. So, before we start, I should clarify what I mean by the terms “rebel group” and “rebellion.”

Here are the different ways that Online Merriam-Webster defines “rebellion”:

1. : opposition to one in authority or dominance
2. a: open, armed, and usually unsuccessful defiance of or resistance to an established government, b: an instance of such defiance or resistance

To rebel is to oppose a system of power—that’s the primary sense of the word. It can also mean to openly use weapons and violence against the dominant system of power. Usually, open, armed rebellion is illegal, which means that, under this definition, rebels are also criminals.

However, in more democratic and liberal societies, there are legal ways to oppose the current system of power and advocate for change. In many countries, it is legal to:

• petition the government,
• publish critiques of leaders,
• politically organize,
• go on strike,
• and lead other forms of peaceful protest.

When acts of resistance like these are legal, we don’t normally consider them to be acts of rebellion. However, even though they’re neither violent nor illegal, they are still acts of rebellion in that first sense: they’re still acts of opposition and defiance.

This is the key distinction I’m getting at here: legal actions can still oppose the current system of power. Whether a political organization is deemed “an acceptable social movement” or “a radical rebellion” isn’t actually a matter of the organization’s values—it’s a matter of their society’s local laws. What one government may treat as an acceptable peaceful protest another may treat as an illegal revolt.

Since we’re talking about speculative worlds with various fictitious governments, the distinction between a social movement and a rebellion is especially muddled. So, for the sake of simplicity, in this discussion, I’m going to use the term “rebellion” in that broad first sense. I’m going to talk about all resistance movements—legal or illegal, nonviolent or violent—as rebellions.

Using This Distinction in Worldbuilding

On a related note, this distinction between legal movements for social change and illegal rebellion can be really useful in worldbuilding. You can ask yourself:

• Does your world have legal and socially acceptable routes for expressing dissent and advocating for change?
• Do those legal mechanisms work, or are they corrupt or insufficient?
• Are the legal routes systemically more accessible to one group over another, leading to a representation issue for a minority group?

This legality aspect of rebellion is one of many ways you can add complexity and depth to your political worldbuilding.

But I digress. With this definition in place, let’s break down the specific motivations of rebellious groups.

What Motivates Rebellion: The Three M’s

When it comes to individual character arcs, we often talk about internal versus external goals. Internal goals are the heart of a character, the root that motivates their every choice. Internal goals could be “to see justice done,” “to build deep, meaningful relationships,” or “to be in control.”

External goals are the literal things that the character is currently trying to achieve. They can be broad story-level goals or narrow scene-level goals.

Let’s use The Lord of the Rings as an example. Frodo’s internal goal is “to keep the people and places he loves safe.” Frodo’s story-level external goal is “to destroy the One Ring and save Middle-earth from the forces of Mordor.” In the first book, one of Frodo’s scene-level goals is “to escape the Shire with the Ring without being caught and killed by the Ringwraiths.”

Rebellious groups have similar layered motivations, though I would frame them a bit differently. Here is how I would break down the structure of rebel groups’ motivations:

• The Mission: The broad societal ill that the rebels want to change
• The Mechanic: The targeted change that could address the larger societal ill
• The Method: The chosen paths to bring about the targeted change

Those definitions are quite abstract. Let’s unpack them further.

The Mission

A rebel group’s mission is the overarching societal ill that they aim to correct. You can think of it as a rebellion’s equivalent of an internal goal. It’s broad and fundamental to the group’s identity, yet its wide scope also makes it fairly abstract.

Here are some examples of rebellion missions:

• To end the exploitation of the working class
• To end discrimination and oppression against a specific minority group
• To compel the powerful to share resources (such as food, medicine, or access to education) with the suffering common people in need

The Mechanic

The mechanic is the rebel group’s more specific political objective. It’s the specific part of their society’s power structure that they hope to change. The rebels hope that, by changing this element of the power structure, they will address the larger societal ill. You can think of the mechanic as equivalent to a character’s story-level external goal.

Here are some examples of rebellion mechanics:

• To change a specific law or government policy (for example, to abolish slavery or to guarantee universal suffrage)
• To change the current leadership (for example, to force a politician to resign or to assassinate a monarch)
• To change the government structure (for example, to transform a monarchy into a democracy)

The Method

This is the rebel group’s modus operandi—the nitty-gritty ways they attempt to achieve mechanical political change and address societal ills. You can think of the rebels’ method as a character’s scene-level external goal.

Here are some examples of rebellion methods:

• To protest (peacefully or violently)
• To go on strike
• To organize and provide social services that the corrupt government is failing to provide (for example, providing free meals to impoverished schoolchildren or critical supplies to a community hit by a natural disaster)
• To educate the public, raise social awareness, and turn public opinion against the oppressive power structure
• To weaponize malicious compliance
• To destroy infrastructure that the oppressive power structure relies on to operate
• To violently overthrow the oppressive power structure

Applying This Theory to the Real World

You can use these three aspects—the mission, the mechanic, and the method—to give rebel groups specific, nuanced motivations. To show you these three M’s in action, here are some examples from real-world rebellions.

The French Revolution of the 1790s:

• The Mission: To redirect government resources away from aristocratic opulence and toward feeding the impoverished common people.
• The Mechanic: To replace the monarchy with an enlightened republic.
• The Method: To violently storm Versailles Palace, execute the monarchs, and put Robespierre (considered to be an incorruptible philosopher) in charge.

The Suffragette Movement of the 1890s to 1910s:

• The Mission: To address social inequality between the sexes.
• The Mechanic: To achieve female suffrage.
• The Method: Some peacefully protested while others violently blew up infrastructure. Those imprisoned also starved themselves as an act of self-violence to protest their treatment and force their release. One suffragette, Emily Davison, disrupted a derby by walking in front of a racing horse, and the collision killed her. However, from all the examples I’ve heard of, even the most desperate of the suffragettes limited their violence to infrastructure and themselves.

An important thing to note here is that, even though a rebel group may agree on the general mission, they often have internal disagreements about the mechanic and the method. That’s how you get internal conflict and splinter groups among various rebellious organizations.

Applying This Theory to Fiction

With this theory in hand, you’ll be able to ask yourself specific questions to help you develop nuanced and realistic rebellions in your writing.

Here are some questions to get you started:

• What is the central societal ill? How do those in power benefit from causing this societal ill? How does it impact their society at large?
• What is the mission that the rebel groups rally around?
• What are the rebellion’s main mechanics and methods?
• Is there any internal disagreement over mechanics and methods? Have these disagreements created internal fractures? Are any divided groups still able to work together despite their differences?
• To what degree are acts of rebellion legal or illegal in your world? What are the legal ways that the system of power can counteract the rebellion? What are the socially acceptable ways that the system of power can counteract the rebellion? (They’re not always the same!) What tactics will they ultimately use, overtly and covertly?
• How does the general public at large feel about the rebellion? To what degree are people sympathetic, disinterested, opposed, or simply too worried about their day-to-day lives to get involved?

After making this rebellion-motives framework for fiction, I’ve realized it’s also super helpful for navigating real-world issues. So, let’s close this post with a look at those practical applications.

Understanding Real-World Political Movements

Understanding Those You Disagree With

First, you can use this framework to help you better understand groups you disagree with. This understanding could also help you better communicate with them. You can ask yourself:

• Is there a group of political actors you disagree with?
• What specific aspects of their movement do you disagree with—their mission, their mechanics, or their methods?
• Are there any aspects of the other group’s perspective that you do agree with?
• If you’re seeking to find common ground with this group, could you use the areas of agreement to help you bridge your differences?

Understanding Your Own Values, Causes & Capacity to Help

You can also apply this framework to causes that are important to you.

• What are the missions you care about? Of all the causes you’ve listed, which are the most important to you?
• What mechanics would help us bring that better world into being? How sure are you that those mechanics would be effective? Are there other alternatives to consider? Is there more research we could do to find the most effective mechanic?
• What methods do you think would work to achieve your mission’s mechanic? Are all those methods ethical, or could they cause undesired harm? Which methods do you favour for both efficacy and ethics?
• Most importantly, how much time, energy, and money do you have to share in service of your larger community?

If you’re interested in supporting a cause, then that last question is a critical one to ask. If you are treading water and simply don’t have the time, energy, or money to support the causes you care about, then you should allow yourself to focus on prioritizing your immediate needs without guilt.

Throughout history, the leaders of social movements have been those who had the time and resources to do it. They’ve tended to be younger adults who haven’t started their own families yet and older retired people who have surplus time and resources. Everyone else chipped in where they could, and that was enough.

So, ask yourself: Is this a good season in your life to dedicate your precious time, energy, and money to the causes you care most about? If you have some resources to share, but they’re limited, what is one simple way you could give back to your community and to the causes you care most about?

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