Independent family farming in Armstrong, Missouri, USA

Ncachelenga Women's Association in Namacula, Mozambique

Domesticated alpacas below Mount Sajama, Oruro, Bolivia

Workers and their camel in Ahmedabad, Gujarat, India

Welcome to a book that explores the connections
between creating food and creating democracy.

The Food Movement

One of the fastest growing movements in the U.S. is often not seen as a movement. People are taking back control of their personal and collective well-being by growing and raising their own food in the country, in towns, and cities.

This movement, which includes a growing understanding of nutrition and the negative aspects of our industrialized food system, has many connections to farmers, peasants and Indigenous people the world over. In this book you will meet people from many countries sharing their understanding of their history, their land, their culture. They articulate clearly how we and our planet are interconnected. They explain how our survival depends on how we treat each other.

Please visit the Read An Extract page to read three different extracts from and the echo follows and also see photographs.

We need to change the world …

The process of the book itself learns about food sovereignty, agroecology, La Vía Campesina, self-governance, and the exchange of seeds and experience – and how all of these make possible a world based on solidarity and reciprocity. People met in the book explain that there are alternatives to hierarchy, extraction, violence, and taking. The beauty of this understanding is revealed in learning about the connections between creating food and creating democracy.

This web site attempts to draw attention to a book which reflects/echoes some of this understanding. Please consider buying the book. The paperback has many meaningful photographs. The e-book, available for just $3.99, is a good deal if you like to read on your device. To see several pages with photos visit the Read An Extract page.

Educators & Students

Also, and the echo follows can contribute to education. Dr. Roberto Flores writes on the Reviews page about the book as a classroom text. He says, “Some of the points dealt with in and the echo follows include: self-determination, autonomy, self-sustainability, surplus capital, neoliberalism, verticality, horizontality. Part of the complexity of these terms is that they are seldom used or studied in academic settings. The reason that and the echo follows is able to present these terms with amazing clarity is that Nic explains them with and through the people he interviewed who are veterans in these struggles and then engages others in a discussion on the theoretical points.”

Visit the Resources page to access the book’s 432 endnotes. Click through to cited full-length interviews, referenced papers and books, videos, and organizational web sites.