40 countries. It seems clear enough that regular mechanisms of governmental accountability have not brought citizens’ perspectives to bear on the policy responses to the cost of living crisis. For many, the answer has been to take space on the policy agenda through mass protests. It is a strategy that many have thought worthwhile despite the real risks and costs to protesters. The accountability of institutions of global economic governance must also be considered here: to what extent do IMF prescriptions take into account civic perspectives on the economic reforms necessary to qualify for IMF packages? Should multilateral development banks pay more systematic attention to the risk that citizens may be driven to dangerous protests when faced with commodity price shocks? If food and energy protests are an expected risk of policies or projects, what risk mitigation and grievance redress mechanisms are being put in place to protect people? The role of multilateral agencies in strengthening or undermining accountability to citizens is an area that merits further attention. The political effects of cost of living protests While these protests are an important indicator of the health of the global economy, they are also an indicator of the health of national politics worldwide. They mark the most visible point at which global economic governance shapes national political governance, or the relations between citizens and their states. It should be noted that protests are not the automatic response of angry people triggered by hardship. They require organisational capacity, a way of communicating shared grievances, and the courage and knowhow to have an impact without attracting deadly violence or sanctions by the state. And they require an aim and target. During 2022, it was mainly global forces – the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the post-pandemic supply crunch – that drove price rises, yet protests overwhelmingly demanded action by national governments. There was considerable variation across the world in how people were affected by these shocks, including how existing market and social protection mechanisms were working to protect people, but protests in general demanded their governments control price rises, cut taxes, reintroduce subsidies, raise wages or provide assistance to people struggling with the cost of living. Why did people protest against national governments when the immediate causes were to be found in the Russian invasion and the aftermath of the pandemic? The short answer appears to be that the crisis hit a great many people very hard and showed few signs of abating or being mitigated by government action. A common sense right to the basics of life, however defined, and of government action to protect that right, informs perspectives on why people protested in 2022. Most protests articulated broad grievances about the rising cost of living, in particular energy and, to a lesser extent, food. Where protesters’ voices have been recorded, they reported that rising costs were causing great suffering, an inability to provide for their families, and growing frustration with governments. In several cases, protesters were responding specifically to subsidy cuts, tax rises or other policies that stood to worsen the situation. Without affordable food and energy, the very substance and security of daily life are affected for the worse, with potentially profound social and wellbeing implications. These protests were broad aggregations of people from across many walks of life and regions. While political opposition and labour groups featured in a large number of events, farmers and fisherfolk, women and children, students, teachers, health workers, transport workers and indigenous people were among their numbers. The extremes to which people were being driven by the crisis were illustrated by the fact that women came out to protest in some of the world ’ s most patriarchal and violent countries. One message to emerge from the case studies that echoes with previous research is that governments earn their legitimacy through their efforts to protect citizens in these moments of crisis. For people from across