The People Act: Legislative Theatre

The Campaign

The People Act: Legislative Theatre is a hub for creative civic practice, building towards the joyful, inclusive and equitable democracy that we urgently need. Democracy around the world is facing a crisis of legitimacy and representation, which is fueling populistic responses. Communities and policymakers across the UK increasingly recognize the limits of traditional expertise when it comes to addressing complex public and social policy issues. However, current efforts at engaging citizens struggle to genuinely influence policy change or meaningfully involve communities facing oppression. Legislative Theatre, originating in Brazil and growing around the UK over the past 5 years, brings residents and policymakers together to co-create innovative and effective solutions to complex challenges, promoting equity, creativity, and fun in local and national political spheres.   

Legislative Theatre combats political inequality by a) embedding lived-experience into formal policymaking spaces and b) re-designing those spaces to spark creative problem-solving and redistribute power in decision-making. 

In a legislative theatre process, communities directly impacted by unjust policies and practices create a play that articulates those problems; neighbours, peers, and policymakers watch and discuss the issues. Then, audiences act onstage to rehearse ways to confront the problems and test new strategies. Based on those improvisations, actors and audiences propose ideas for policies, working together with advocates and officials. Finally, participants vote and policymakers commit to specific actions. 

The Change

Local councils, national government and community groups around the UK – from Glasgow to Birmingham, from Manchester to Belfast, from Department for Education to the Home Office and from Shelter to Trussell Trust – are currently implementing legislative theatre processes on issues including housing and homelessness, food poverty and welfare systems, youth mental health, migration, labour rights, gender-based violence, disability rights, the climate crisis, and cultural equity. Since 2019, these processes have led to many concrete policy wins for communities including more accessible buses and parks, new roles for lived-experience leads in government, active bystander programs in public transport, rapid housing support systems for rough sleepers, and more. 

The Future

The People Act takes a three-pronged approach: building awareness and demand for creative participatory democracy, through implementing Legislative Theatre initiatives and disseminating outcomes; developing a strong network of practitioners and activists, through digital and in-person gatherings; and increasing capacity nationally and globally, through infrastructure, training, and resource hubs.  

The People Act: Legislative Theatre are building a movement of legislative theatre and other joyful, grassroots and creative participatory practices that will radically transform the dominant culture of politics, by becoming an integral part of governmental and institutional policymaking. Legislative theatre opens up exclusionary institutions, by shifting power to directly-impacted communities to frame problems and generate solutions. It creates much-needed space for hope and vision, by rehearsing radical new strategies and structures, changing policy on stage instead of behind the scenes, in a transparent and joyful way. In this future, every resident will have the power to shape the rules and design their communities to work for the people.