Chief executive of the Young Women’s Trust Sophie Walker has released her new book “Five Rules for Rebellion – Let’s Change the World Ourselves” published by Icon Books Limited on March 5th 2020.
Sophie Walker was born in 1971 and grew up in Glasgow with her parents being campaigners for human rights and nuclear disarmament, and often attended protests with them. Through her mother, she learned the importance of speaking up and feminism. Her early career was in journalism, she reported from London, Paris, Washington, Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Her first book, “Grace Under pressure: Going the Distance as an Asperger’s Mum”, retraces her experiences when her daughter was diagnosed with autism when she was 8, a process that took her 5 years to navigate the bureaucratic red tape and misinformation. The book was written to raise awareness and funding for various autistic societies and groups.
In 2015, she was elected the first party leader for the Woman’s Equality Party and in 2016 ran for the London Mayoral election.
In 2018, she was named as one of the ‘new Suffragettes’ and was dubbed this generations Emmeline Pankhurst.
Her latest book “Five Rules for Rebellion – Let’s Change the World Ourselves” expresses that we shouldn’t wait for those in power to fix the problems in world such as climate change, inequality and poverty; instead we should embrace activism and get out and do something about it. The book is split into five chapters deemed as rules: 1 – Defeat Despair, 2 – Channel Rage, 3 – Wield Hope as Power, 4 – Collaborate with Compassion and 5 – Practice Perseverance.
As someone who has followed in the footsteps of Greta Thunberg by attending youth climate strikes and protests, this book is insightful and empowering, and I highly recommend it.
Emilie Brown
