Visionary Inspiration and Practical Strategies for Direct Democracy: Winds of Change Book Review, by Marissa Mommaerts

Image by Dandelion Salad via Flickr

Sent to Dandelion Salad by Rivera Sun

by Marissa Mommaerts
Transition US National Network Organizer
Transition US, March 19, 2021
April 13, 2021

Winds of Change, the third part of the trilogy that began with The Dandelion Insurrection, is so rich that I simultaneously want to share it with every visionary changemaker I know, while at the same time rereading it over and over until I absorb every drop of wisdom, hope and strategy into the fabric of my being.

As always, Rivera Sun shines the spotlight of love into the shadows of humanity, inspiring readers with practical strategies to imagine and create a future beyond the pervading narrative of profits over people. But in this third book in the Dandelion Trilogy, the movement of activists, called the Dandelions, grow a powerful movement for direct democracy in the fertile soil of love and resistance they have cultivated through years of organizing.

Each poetic yet action-packed chapter presents an essential theme in the transformation of our culture, economy, and political system: the rights of nature, the rise of the sacred feminine, youth leadership, immigration reform, reparations, economic justice, reclaiming the commons, and community-based responses to climate change and natural disasters. All of these threads are woven into the struggle for direct democracy, “not just voting for smiling liars,” but actually governing ourselves in every aspect of our lives: our neighborhoods and communities, our workplaces, our schools, the lands we steward and our places of commerce, and so much more.

Reading Winds of Change opened my mind to possibilities and my heart to hope in a way that hasn’t happened since I took my first Permaculture Design Course. From envisioning urban neighborhoods that function as native ecosystems and urban wetlands that buffer the coastal impacts of climate change; to viscerally acknowledging—and even healing from—the legacy of patriarchy; to laying out a mass, creative, and strategic campaign to topple a christo-fascist presidential candidate (whom, by the way, feels uncannily familiar) and create the conditions for direct democracy to flourish, it is truly remarkable that Winds of Change can offer so many treasures to our growing movement for democracy, justice, and regeneration in just 347 pages.

Please, pick up a copy, devour it, dream it, share it, pick up another copy, host a book club, and bring direct democracy more deeply into your heart, your life, and your community, as I plan to do. Rivera Sun reminds us that love and courage go hand-in-hand, and that any one of us could be the catalyst of a mass movement that will change the world.

From the archives:

The Murmuration + The Winds of Change are Blowing! by Rivera Sun

Ralph Nader: What It Takes To Create Social Change Against All Odds

Beyond Voting by Howard Zinn + What Else You Can Do: 198 Methods of Nonviolent Action by David Swanson

Rise and Resist!

Dandelions and Plunder Monkeys by System Humanity

The Roots of Resistance: An Intense Journey Into The Vibrant Complexity Of Nonviolent Change by Tom Atlee

Rivera Sun’s The Roots of Resistance, reviewed by Guadamour

Rivera Sun’s The Dandelion Insurrection reviewed by Guadamour