George Lakey

A memoir of a Quaker activist and master storyteller on his involvement in struggles for peace, civil rights, LGBTQ rights, labor justice, and the environment, whose life will be the subject of a new documentary film coming in 2022. From his first arrest in the Civil Rights era to his most recent during a climate justice march at the age of 83, George Lakey has committed his life to a mission of building a better world through movements for justice. Lakey draws readers into the center of history-making events, telling often serious stories with playfulness and intimacy. In this memoir, he describes the personal, political, and theoretical--coming out as bisexual to his Quaker community while known as a church leader and family man, protesting against the war in Vietnam by delivering medical supplies through the naval blockade in the South China Sea, and applying his academic study of nonviolent resistance to creative tactics in direct action campaigns. From strategies he learned as a young man facing violence in the streets to risking his life as an unarmed bodyguard for Sri Lankan human rights lawyers, Lakey recounts his experience living out the tension between commitment to family and mission. Drawing strength from his community to fight cancer, survive painful parenting struggles, and create networks to help prevent activist burnout, this book shows readers how to find hope in even the darkest times through strategic, joyful activism.

George Lakey presents the core principles and proven techniques of direct education, an approach he developed for effectively teaching adults in groups. To illustrate how it works in action, Lakey includes a wealth of compelling stories from his vast experience facilitating groups in a variety of situations. Direct education cuts through the pretense and needless complications that can distance learners from subject matter. This approach focuses the encounter between teacher and group; it replaces scattered attention with gathered attention. Unlike in other books on group facilitation, the author emphasizes critical issues related to diversity, as well as authenticity and emotions. Step by step, this groundbreaking book describes how to design effective learning experiences and shows what it takes to facilitate them. Ultimately, it brings all the elements of the author's direct education approach together. Facilitating Group Learning also contains material on sustaining the educator, addresses working with social movements, and includes the Training for Change toolkit of group learning techniques.

Powerful tools for spreading peace in your community Unfounded beliefs and hateful political and social divisions that can cascade into violence are threatening to pull the world apart. Responding to fear and aggression strategically and with compassion is vital if we are to push back against the politics of hate and live in greater safety and harmony. But how to do it? Are We Done Fighting? is brimming with the latest research, practical activities, and inspirational stories of success for cultivating inner change and spreading peace at the community level and beyond. Coverage includes: An explanation of the different styles of conflictCognitive biases that help explain polarized and lose-lose positionsPractical methods and activities for changing our own and others' mindsWhen punishment works and doesn't, and how to encourage discipline in children without using violenceThe skill of self-compassion and ways to reduce prejudice in ourselves and othersIncredible programs that are rebuilding trust between people after genocide. Packed with inspiration and cutting-edge findings from fields including neuroscience, social psychology, and behavioural economics, Are We Done Fighting? is an essential toolkit for activists, community and peace groups, and students and instructors working to build dialogue, understanding, and peace as the antidote to the politics of hate and division. AWARDS SILVER | 2019 Nautilus Book Awards: Social Change & Social Justice

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 Living Revolution 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.

Liberals worldwide invoke Scandinavia as a promised land of equality, while most conservatives fear it as a hotbed of liberty-threatening socialism. But the left and right can usually agree on one thing: that the Nordic system is impossible to replicate elsewhere. The US and UK are too big, or too individualistic, or too . . . something. In Viking Economics perhaps the most fun economics book you ve ever read George Lakey dispels these myths. He explores the inner-workings of the Nordic economies that boast the world s happiest, most productive workers, and explains how, if we can enact some of the changes the Scandinavians fought for surprisingly recently, we, too, can embrace equality in our economic policy.

This book is for everyone who cares about the health of their organisations, especially if their organisations work for social change. It draws on the experience of a variety of effective organisational development professionals, community organisers and leaders of non-profit organisations, teaching a proactive approach to organisational life -- an indispensable sourcebook for all leaders and active members of change organisations.