The successor to the legendary activist Saul Alinsky, Edward T. Chambers pioneered a set of principles and practices that have guided community organizations throughout the US and the world. Roots for Radicals remains his definitive reflection on these fundamental principles of community activism: how, as public citizens, we can navigate the gap between the world as it is and as it should be, between self-interest and self-sacrifice and in doing so create lasting change for our communities.
In the face of the increasingly turbulent politics of the 21st-century, Chambers's book has never been more relevant.
Here is a how-to-book in the best sense: a primer in how to beat the dragons. It has been designed for community organizers: to know, to feel, and mostly to think creatively how, not so much to lead, as to incite the powerless to find the power and speak for themselves....Ed Chambers is something of a secular priest, with the community as his parish, teaching that the least of us have the right to lead decent lives.
