The Gatekeeper Problem: When People Inside the Movement Slow the Change They Claim to Support

Some barriers to progress come from institutions — predictable, structural, and visible. But others come from inside the movement itself. This is the gatekeeper problem: when individuals who hold influence within a cause space slow down, redirect, or silence the very change they publicly support. It's a quiet form of resistance that protects comfort over justice — and it shows up in both disability advocacy and broader systems-change work.

7 min read
High Impact Insight

You've done the work. You've built momentum, engaged community, crafted the narrative, and created pressure for action. And just as change becomes possible, someone within the advocacy ecosystem leans in and says:

  • "We're not ready for that yet."
  • "You're being too confrontational."
  • "We're already managing this — don't complicate things."
Suddenly, the movement stalls. Not because government resisted. Not because systems refused to shift. But because a person who was supposed to be moving with you — chose to manage the pace instead of supporting the goal. That tension is the essence of gatekeeping.

What Is a Gatekeeper in Advocacy?

A gatekeeper in advocacy is a person who holds either formal authority or informal influence and uses it to control:

  • who gets access
  • which issues are prioritised
  • how change is framed
  • how quickly action is allowed to happen

They might be:

  • senior staff in advocacy organisations
  • "sector representatives" who maintain government relationships
  • professionals who speak about communities rather than with them
  • long-established voices positioned as the "reasonable" or "strategic" ones

Most gatekeepers believe they're protecting the movement. But more often, they're protecting their standing, their comfort, or their relationship with power.

Gatekeeping isn't about strategy. It's about control.

Case Study: Lois Curtis and the Cost of Gatekeeping in Disability Rights

1

Background

Lois Curtis — a Black woman with cognitive and developmental disabilities — spent nearly two decades in institutions, despite wanting and being able to live in her community. She repeatedly asked for inclusion. She repeatedly asked for freedom. She was repeatedly denied.

2

The Legal Breakthrough

Lois became the lead plaintiff in Olmstead v. L.C., a U.S. Supreme Court case that confirmed that unnecessary segregation of disabled people is discrimination. The ruling was transformational — a legal, moral, and human rights milestone.

3

The Slowdown

But the rollout was painfully slow. Behind closed doors, some disability organisations that celebrated the ruling publicly were quietly tempering its impact — negotiating delays, softening expectations, and protecting existing relationships. This is gatekeeping in its most damaging form: support in public, obstruction in practice.

How to Spot a Gatekeeper

Gatekeepers rarely say, "I want to control the movement."
Instead, they use language that sounds strategic but functions as resistance.

Here's what to listen for:

  • "Slow down" or "We need to wait" — delays protect institutions, not people.
  • Refusal to share access to media, meetings, or platforms — collaboration feels threatening to gatekeepers.
  • Dismissing lived experience as 'too emotional' — tone policing is a tool of power, not progress.
  • "This isn't the right way to do advocacy" — a phrase often used to defend a process that centres comfort over change.

Gatekeepers don't block the issue — they block the pace.

Why It Matters

Gatekeeping is one of the most overlooked barriers in disability advocacy.

It reframes urgency as impatience. It reframes dissent as risk. It reframes innovation as threat.

Most dangerously, it tells the people directly affected by injustice to "wait" — often indefinitely — while decision-makers stay comfortable and untouched by the consequences of delay.

Gatekeeping doesn't just slow progress. It preserves the very systems advocacy aims to change.

What to Do When You Encounter Gatekeeping

Gatekeeping isn't a signal to stop. It's a cue to shift strategy.

  1. Build your own pathways instead of waiting for theirs. If access is controlled, create alternative routes. Justice doesn't need a hall pass.
  2. Document conversations, commitments, and behaviour. Gatekeepers often rewrite history. Receipts protect truth.
  3. Distinguish between caution and control. Caution protects people. Control protects power.
  4. Move with people who share your urgency. Collective alignment outpaces internal resistance every time.

Gatekeeping thrives in silence. It loses power when you move with transparency and momentum.

Gatekeeping is not strategy.

Strategy is intentional, ethical, evidence-driven influence. Gatekeeping is simply the preservation of comfort.

Movements do not need more message-managers. They need people who are willing to act — not with permission, but with purpose.

If you've faced pushback from people "on your side," it doesn't mean you misread the room. It means you've encountered an internal barrier disguised as guidance.

The good news: gatekeepers cannot stop systemic change — they can only slow it. And you don't need their approval to keep moving forward.

Gatekeepers remind us that advocacy isn't just about confronting institutions. It's about challenging comfort wherever it blocks progress — even inside the movement itself.

Real change is made by people who act before consensus forms. By people who stop asking for permission. By people who move at the pace that justice requires.

The work belongs to those who are willing to shift power, not protect it.