In 2016, Black Lives Matter expanded the democratic potential of occupation as a protest strategy by making it an active exercise in democratic world-building. Operating within the legacy of 2011’s Occupy Wall Street, BLM activists held a park in downtown Manhattan for two weeks with a list of demands that ultimately called for the abolition of the oppressive and corrupt police system in New York. Like the national structure of BLM, Abolition Square was also leaderless. The absence of a traditional leadership structure in the occupied space allowed for its usage to be decided entirely democratically. The camp became a test site for different strategies of resistance, embodied by posters, signs, banners, and chants. Using the vehicle of occupation, the abolitionists created an incubator where they built the type of community they hoped to inhabit. They built a community where power was diffuse and entirely held by those unqualified to rule–the people.