Within the Soviet bloc, Václav Benda advocated for the creation of an invisible society as a form of resistance. To combat the atomization of the citizenry, he called for the construction of parallel structures. As he explained in a response published in Civic Freedom in Central Europe: Voices from Czechoslovakia:

To tear down or corrode these miniature iron curtains, to break through the communications and social blockade, to return to truth and justice, to a meaningful order of values, to value once more the inalienability of human dignity and the necessity for a sense of human community in mutual love and responsibility—these, in my opinion, are the present goals of the parallel polis.

Through the Charter 77 movement, Benda's vision came to life. Together with Václav Havel, fellow dissident and future president of Czechoslovakia, he emphasized the power of "living in truth"—the simple yet radical act of refusing to participate in the regime's lies. Charter 77 organized parallel educational structures, fostered a second culture through the performance of banned plays, and built underground networks that published forbidden books and journals. Though Charter 77 made cultural strides, Benda acknowledged the daunting challenge of bypassing the command-and-control economy in The Parallel Polis:

At the moment, the tasks facing us in the parallel economy are unimaginable, but though our opportunities are limited, the need to exploit them is urgent. The regime treats the economy as a key means of arbitrarily manipulating citizens and, at the same time, it regulates it as strictly as possible.

As in Czechoslovakia under the communist regime, parallel structures offer citizens in "liberal democracies" a way to resist the creeping authoritarianism unfolding before our eyes. From freedom of speech to freedom of contract, our civil liberties are being eroded by paternalistic bureaucrats and self-serving, power-mongering politicians. Countries that once championed classical liberalism have traded freedoms for dependency and sacrificed liberty for the illusion of safety.