Blueprint for Revolution

How to Use Rice Pudding, Lego Men, and Other Nonviolent Techniques to Galvanize Communities, Overthrow Dictators, or Simply Change the World.

An urgent and accessible handbook for peaceful protesters, activists, and community organizers—anyone trying to defend their rights, hold their government accountable, or change the world.

Blueprint for Revolution will teach you how to:

• Make oppression backfire by playing your opponents’ strongest card against them
• Identify the “almighty pillars of power” in order to shift the balance of control
• Dream big, but start small: learn how to pick battles you can win
• Listen to what people actually care about in order to incorporate their needs into your revolutionary vision
• Master the art of compromise to bring together even the most disparate groups
• Recognize your allies and view your enemies as potential partners
• Use humor to make yourself heard, defuse potentially violent situations, and “laugh your way to victory”

It’s common for people launching nonviolent movements to cite Gandhi, say, or Martin Luther King, Jr., as their inspiration, but those guys, for all their many, many virtues, simply weren’t that hilarious. If you’re hoping to get a mass movement going within a very short span of time in the age of the Internet and other distractions, humor is a key strategy.

Serbians learned that fear is best fought with laughter, and if you don’t believe that, then try to think of the best way to reassure a friend who is about to be wheeled into an operating room for major surgery. If you act serious and concerned, his anxiety will spike. But if you crack a joke, suddenly he will relax, and maybe even smile. The same principle is true when it comes to movements.