Direct Action: an Historical Novel

More than 7000 people were arrested in nonviolent protests in California in the early 1980s, developing the art of direct action to a peak not reached again until Seattle in 1999, and in many ways never surpassed.

Direct Action is the novelized history of a community of activists who helped lay the foundation for today’s vibrant direct action movement — from Seattle to the School of the Americas and back to the streets of San Francisco.

Direct action is more than getting arrested. It’s solidarity. It’s affinity groups and collective process. It’s nonhierarchy and respect for diversity. It’s coalitions and alliance-building. It isn’t just a political tactic — it’s a whole new practice.

Actions at over a dozen sites, including:
-- Livermore Nuclear Weapons Lab
-- Vandenberg Air Force Base
-- Concord Naval Weapons Station
-- Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant
-- San Francisco Financial District

"Brought back the experiences so vividly that I could smell the unwashed bodies, feel the cold and the rough wool of the blankets, and taste once again that inimitable combination of spam and fruit cocktail the guards called ‘The Empire Strikes Back!’" — Starhawk, from the Foreword

768 Pages. With more than 300 photos and images from the LAG archives, plus a 35-page direct action handbook. Foreword by Starhawk.

Luke Hauser is the pseudonym of a longtime San Francisco Bay Area activist.