A priceless resource for everyone ready to make a difference, environmental activist Aidan Ricketts offers a step-by-step handbook for citizens eager to start or get involved in grass-roots movements and beyond. Providing all essential practical tools, methods and strategies needed for a successful campaign and extensively discussing legal and ethical issues, this book empowers its readers to effectively promote their cause. Lots of ready-to-use documents and comprehensive information on digital activism and group strategy make this book an essential companion for any campaign. Including case studies from the US, UK, Canada and Australia, this is the ultimate guidebook to participatory democracy.

The Activist's Handbook: Winning Social Change in the 21st Century details the impact of specific strategies on campaigns across the country, from Occupy Wall Street to battles over sweatshops, the environment, AIDS policies, education reform, homelessness, and more: How should activists use new media tools to expose issues and mobilize grassroots support? When should activists form coalitions, and with whom? How are students?be they DREAMers seeking immigration reform or college activists battling ever-increasing tuition costs?winning major campaigns? Whether it?s by inspiring "fear and loathing" in politicians, building diverse coalitions, using ballot initiatives, or harnessing the media, the courts, and the electoral process towards social change, Shaw?a longtime activist for urban issues?shows that with a plan, positive change can be achieved. Century details the impact of specific strategies on campaigns across the country, from Occupy Wall Street to battles over sweatshops, the environment, AIDS policies, education reform, homelessness, and more: How should activists use new media tools to expose issues and mobilize grassroots support? When should activists form coalitions, and with whom? How are students?be they DREAMers seeking immigration reform or college activists battling ever-increasing tuition costs?winning major campaigns? Whether it?s by inspiring "fear and loathing" in politicians, building diverse coalitions, using ballot initiatives, or harnessing the media, the courts, and the electoral process towards social change, Shaw?a longtime activist for urban issues?shows that with a plan, positive change can be achieved.

We Want You! Will you join the ranks of design activists? Doing good is too important to think of as work better left to those fictitious "other" designers. People more famous. More talented. More connected. Richer. Younger. Braver. (Insert your own mental roadblock here.) In truth, anyone can be a design activist. It just starts with a commitment to yourself and your values. A commitment to making conscious choices and realizing how all the decisions you make as a graphic designer affect other people and the planet. It's about being awake instead of sliding by with the way things always have been done. This book is for every graphic designer who's ever sat at a computer, thinking: Is this it? Isn't there more? It's a tool to help you figure out how to start making a difference and making a living at the same time--no matter where you live and work right now. Just open this book and we'll help you start walking in the right direction. It doesn't have to be perfect. Little actions from a lot of people add up to big change. This isn't a contest about who's the greenest or the most radical. It's a movement, and we're inviting you to join right now.

The Activist's Handbook is a hard-hitting guide to making social change happen. Shaw, a longtime activist for urban issues, shows how positive change can still be accomplished— despite an increasingly grim political order—if activists employ the strategies set forth in this desperately needed primer. In a new preface, Shaw describes how the power of grassroots activism has won newfound respect. Mass protests against globalization and in favor of stricter gun controls have led once-invulnerable targets like the World Bank and the National Rifle Association to take citizen action more seriously. Inspiring "fear and loathing" in politicians, building diverse coalitions, and harnessing the media, the courts, and the electoral process to one's cause are only some of the key tactics Shaw advocates and explains. Central to all social-change activism, Shaw shows, is being proactive: rather than simply reacting to right-wing proposals, activists must develop an agenda and focus their resources on achieving it. The Activist's Handbook details the impact of specific strategies on campaigns across the country: battles over homelessness, the environment, AIDS policies, neighborhood preservation, and school reform among others. Though activist groups can have widely different aims, similar tactics are shown to produce success. Further, the book offers a sophisticated analysis of the American power structure by someone on the front lines. In showing how people can and must make a difference at both local and national levels, this is an indispensable guide not only for activists, but for everyone interested in the future of progressive politics in America.

Donald Trump’s election forced academics to confront the inadequacy of promoting social change through the traditional academic work of research, writing, and teaching. Scholars joined crowds of people who flooded the streets to protest the event. The present political moment recalls intellectual forbearers like Antonio Gramsci who, imprisoned during an earlier fascist era, demanded that intellectuals committed to justice “can no longer consist in eloquence ... but in active participation in practical life, as constructor, organizer, ‘permanent persuader’ and not just a simple orator" (Gramsci, 1971, p. 10). Indeed, in an era of corporate media and “alternative facts,” academics committed to justice cannot simply rely on disseminating new knowledge, but must step out of the ivory tower and enter the streets as activists. The Activist Academic serves as a guide for merging activism into academia. Following the journey of two academics, the book offers stories, frameworks and methods for how scholars can marry their academic selves, involved in scholarship, teaching and service, with their activist commitments to justice, while navigating the lived realities of raising families and navigating office politics. This volume invites academics across disciplines to enter into a dialogue about how to take knowledge to the streets. Perfect for courses such as: Introduction to Social Theory | Social Foundations | Certificate in Public Scholarship | Practicing Public Scholarship | Reimagining Public Engagement | Decentering the Public Humanities hrClick HERE to see a video of the book launch, moderated by Monisha Bajaj for Imagining America, with contributions from Margo Okazawa-Rey and John Saltmarsh. hrWatch the #CompactNationPod interview, which runs between minutes 9:35 and 48:45. In this episode, Marisol Morales chats with Colette Cann and Eric DeMeulenaere, as they share the true stories of their lives as activists, scholars, and parents who are trying to push forward social change through academic work.Compact Nation Podcast · The Activist Academic hr What does it mean to be both an activist and an academic? Watch the FreshEd podcast Becoming an Activist Academic, which features authors Colette Cann & Eric DeMeulenaere discussing their own journeys as a guide for merging activism and academia. hr

Kids want to do it. Parents want their kids to do it. Schools often require kids to do it. So do it: Do something and change the world. And here’s how, in a fist-in-the-air book for every young activist. DoSomething.org knows exactly how to reach kids. The largest Internet-based teen service organization, it supports 750,000 projects, receiving 15 million visitors a month, and, for the first time ever, broadcasting a Do Something Awards show on VH1. Do Something! takes aim at the next generation of do-gooders. Written in a lively, in-your-face style, designed to be edgy and hip, it’s the kind of interactive, educational book every parent will feel good about giving because it shows kids how to get involved, in language they understand. It’s an idea-to-execution guide. Quizzes help readers pinpoint their “thing”—a cause that fires them up. Then come the tools that show how to get something done, whether it’s making a poster, raising money, sending around a petition, or enlisting friends. There are 33 action plans, touching on areas such as the environment, human rights, poverty, animal welfare, education, disaster relief—plus worksheets, facts, and outlines to help socially conscious kids create their own projects, and, for inspiration, profiles of DoSomething.org grant winners. Additionally, DoSomething.org is setting up a separate website for this book’s readers. About DoSomething.org: DoSomething.org is one of the largest organizations in the US that helps young people rock causes they care about. A driving force in creating a culture of volunteerism, DoSomething.org is on track to activate two million young people in 2011. By leveraging the web, television, mobile, and pop culture, DoSomething.org inspires, empowers and celebrates a generation of doers: teenagers who recognize the need to do something, believe in their ability to get it done, and then take action. Plug in at www.DoSomething.org.

'Buy it. Read it. Act on it. Your world will never be the same again.' --Charles Secrett, Director, Friends of the Earth