How We Win

A Guide to Nonviolent Direct Action Campaigning

George Lakey

A lifetime of activist experience informs this playbook for building and conducting nonviolent direct action campaigns — teaching us how to achieve real progressive change.

Today’s new direct action campaigns require a new, down-to-earth guide to effective campaigning. George Lakey’s How We Win is that timely guide. The Women’s March of January 21, 2017 was estimated at four million people — the largest assembly of activist protest in U.S. history. Many of those assembled were in the streets for the first time, or returning after a period of inactivity.

Lakey, a lifelong activist, helps us understand our political moment (extreme polarization, ripe for political change), teaches us how to plan a campaign to overcome that polarization, demonstrates how to launch these ideas into action, and shows us how to grow and sustain our movements. This is what democracy looks like.

GEORGE LAKEY has been active in direct action campaigns for six decades. Recently retired from Swarthmore College, where he was the Eugene M. Lang Visiting Professor for Issues in Social Change, Lakey was arrested for the first time at a civil rights demonstration in March 1963, and most recently on March 29, 2018 in the Power Local Green Jobs Campaign. He lives in Philadelphia.

“If you want to be a soldier, you can go to West Point. If you want to be a nonviolent change-maker — well, this is an awfully good place to start. George Lakey has been near the center of American resistance for decades, and so he has both remarkable stories and remarkable insights — not to mention some remarkable colleagues who add their perspective to this necessary manual!” –Bill McKibben, co-founder of 350.org

“Hard-won advice for community organizers…Clear, encouraging, and potentially empowering.” – Kirkus Review

“Inspiring stories of effective, successful campaigning…. I recommend George Lakey’s How We Win.” – Peace News

“Essential reading for anyone who seeks to contribute meaningfully to social movements… Reading it will be well worth your time. Applying its insights is even more useful.” – Friends Journal