'Everything You Have to Do Yourself' is a book about people who say: Things can't go on like this – we're taking our destiny into our own hands. Whether in the streets of Paris in 1871, the factories of Petrograd in 1917, the towns and villages of northern Syria, or the jungles of Chiapas – everywhere, in the wake of social conflicts and uprisings, councils emerged: self-organized associations in all areas of society that not only protested but began to reshape their entire way of life. Christopher Wimmer vividly recounts how such movements arose, how they functioned – and why they often failed.