Abahlali baseMjondolo (Shackdwellers Movement)

One of the movement's main strategies is organising road blockades to protest service delivery, land, and human rights abuses occurring in informal settlements. It also organises marches on offices of local councillors, police stations, municipal offices, newspaper offices, and the City Hall. In 2006, the movement held a boycott of the local government elections under the slogan "No Land, No House, No Vote."

According to organisers, the movement has democratised the governance of many settlements, stopped evictions in a number of settlements, won access to schools, stopped the industrial development of land promised to informal dwellers, and forced numerous government officials, offices, and projects to "come to the people." Although the movement's key demand is "Land and Housing in the City", it also works to: end forced removals; improve access to education and provision of water, electricity, sanitation, health care, and refuse removal; and strengthen bottom-up popular democracy. The movement also: produces press statements, pamphlets, and newspaper articles around shackdwellers' issues; holds discussions in community-level meetings; and develops songs to forward their cause.

In some settlements, the movement has also set up community-based projects like crèches, gardens, sewing collectives, support for people living with and orphaned by HIV/AIDS, a 16-team football league, and quarterly all-night multi-genre music competitions. For instance, in July 2008, the Western Cape chapter of Abahlali was officially launched at a community crèche built and funded by the movement. An additional aim of this movement is to build relationships between informal settlements and explore alternatives to the current developmental approach to government. Organisers plan to build more crèches in the community, as well as youth centres, toilets, and a library.

Organisers say that police reported more than 6,000 "illegal" protests in 2005. The vast majority of these protests were aimed at local targets, most were organised in shack settlements, and many took the form of road blockades.

Abahlali baseMjondolo, together with the Landless People's Movement (Gauteng), the Rural Network (KwaZulu-Natal), and the Western Cape Anti-Eviction Campaign, is part of the Poor People's Alliance - a network of radical economically poor people's movements.