Creative Localization A Community-Based Approach to Ecological Civilization in Practice and Theory
Six Dimensions of Creative Localization
Energy: Generating power locally from renewable sources such as solar, wind and hydrogen, and where possible, using technology created and stored locally.
Food: Growing food locally or regionally using regenerative agriculture techniques that work cooperatively with nature and the earth.
Housing: Developing affordable housing in blended neighborhoods that encourage mutual support.
Education: Engaging all individuals in a life-long process of discovery to contribute creatively and meaningfully to society with values rooted in humanity, community and ecology, and to live joyously in harmony with diversity.
Culture: Developing a culture that values balance, sufficiency, human freedom and creative expression, rather than acquisition, consumption and servitude.
Economics: Pursuing economic policies that maximize the happiness of all and the ecological sustainability of the planet.
Michael Witmer and Lynn De Jonghe,, the Cobb Institute: A Community of Process and Practice
One example: The Transition Network
There are 900 initiatives registered and over 1800 around the world.
"In Transition 2.0 is an inspirational immersion in the Transition movement, gathering stories from around the world of ordinary people doing extraordinary things. You'll hear about communities printing their own money, growing food, localising their economies and setting up community power stations. It's an idea that has gone viral, a social experiment that is about responding to uncertain times with solutions and optimism. In a world of increasing uncertainty, here is a story of hope, ingenuity and the power of growing vegetables in unexpected places"
Reality is a process; nothing ever stays the same.
The process of reality is creative, emergent, evolutionary, and social.
There is a profound relationship between creativity, beauty, and life.
All life deserves respect; nothing in nature stands alone; everything is connected.
Thinking and feeling are connected; mind and body are not separate entities; aesthetic wisdom and rational inquiry are complementary.
Human experience begins by feeling the presence of the world and being affected by it.
Human happiness involves sharing experience with others and responding in harmony to these relationships.
Local communities in different parts of the world are making a constructive difference in responding to a plethora of crises: global climate change, political authoritarianism, economic disparities, poverty, war and the threat of nuclear war, consumerism, and a general sense of meaninglness.
Interestingly, these communities are having a good bit of fun along the way. Some of them are part of the transition network described above. Sparked by the creativity of their own ordinary citizens, these communities are inspired by the ideas of local livelihoods, local training, local food, local energy, and local currencies. They are interested in inner transformation as well as outer transformation. They are resilient.
But they are not resilient in a static or homogenized way. They embrace cultural, religious, and philosophical diversity; and they do not hide from enriching tensions. Even as they have their roots in the bonds of local affiliation, they have wings to fly. They are creatively and adventurously resilient.
Depth and Breadth
In the spirit of such resilience, they are hopeful but not naively optimistic. They encourage us to accept the hard parts of life, to be honest about suffering, to be serious about the challenges faced by a world that seems bent upon its own destruction; but also to plant ourselves in beauty, to embrace a spacious and gracious simplicity of living with less "stuff," cultivating what one of our columnists, Patricia Adams Farmer, calls "fat souls."
A fat soul is someone who can live in an open-minded and open-hearted way, filled with a sense of respect and care for the community of life. A fat soul has roots and wings.
Moreover, the people in these communities are committed to what another of our columnists, the philosopher C. Robert Mesle, calls "relational power." Relational power is the power to receive and absorb influences from others in a generous way, and then to respond with creative generosity, guided by the hope of mutual well-being. Relational power seeks win-win solutions, not win-lose solutions.
Indeed, in a Multi-Polar World, another of our columnists, Les Muray, points out that this kind of power also applies to international relations and hopes for the world. An appreciation of relational power entails a critique of colonizing and imperial rule --political, corporate, consumerist, or capitalist -- and, in local settings, a welcoming of consensus thinking over conflict thinking. Relational power does not hide from conflict, but it also knows that, in the last analysis, persuasion not coercion is the most lasting kind of power.
Improvising and the Open Future
In these and other ways relational philosophies have an important role to play to play in encouraging transitions to a post-petroleum world. Such philosophies emphasize that we humans dwell within, not apart from, the network of felt relations, human and ecological, that shape our lives; and that we have possibilities for living creatively and compassionately amid these relations. These philosophies see the future is influenced by the past, sometimes in deeply damaging ways, but believe that, in the present itself, there is a kernel creativity that can help create a different kind of future.
Thus, these philosophies are not mechanistic or deterministic. They see the universe as a whole, not only as a web of interconnected events, but also as a journey, a pilgrimage through time and space that creates time and space within the pilgrimage. The future doesn't exist until the universe creates it.
A Divine Lure toward Creative Transformation
There's a religious side to all of this. Some among these philosophies -- Whitehead's version, for example -- speak of a divine lure toward creative transformation, present in the cosmos and present in life on earth. The Whiteheadian version of relational thinking sees the transition movement itself as one way of responding to this lure. God calls toward peace among people and peace with the earth, toward creative frugality and adventurous living.
This does not mean that all participants in the transition movement are, or need to be, religious. Nor does it mean that they need belong to a single religion. From the Whiteheadian perspective the diversity of cultures and faiths in our world makes the whole of life, and the whole of the divine life, richer. Even God takes satisfaction in the multiplicity and is nourished by it.
This means that transition communities can be, and need to be, multi-faith communities and the inter-religious dialogue can have a practical aim: namely to draw from resources within and beyond religions toward the creation of what Martin Luther King, Jr. called beloved communities. Each religion has something to offer, and no religion has all the answers.
Perhaps it is ideas such as these -- wide souls, relational power, a creative universe in which all things are connected -- which can provide philosophical support for transition communities. In Five Foundations for a New Civilizationand Ten Ideas for Saving the Planet, John B. Cobb. Jr. offers more particular ideas that deepen what has been said above. There is a need for hospitable urban design, for sustainable economics, for a revitalization of rural life, for wise and responsive governance that moves in the direction of biocracy.
But it all begins with a combination of creative and experimental practice, guided by good intentions and courage of soul. It is the business of the future to be dangerous, says Whitehead. He adds that, with fortitude and spunk, creativity and resilience, the future can be beautiful, too.
-- Jay McDaniel. January 2020
Combining Theory and Practice in a new kind of Economics
Addendum: How Can I Persuade My Conservative Uncle That Global Climate Change is a Problem?
There are four narratives that will make sense to him:
The first focuses on localism – making connections between the conservation of our green and pleasant land, and the risks that climate change poses to it.
The second narrative uses the idea of energy security as an alternative frame for communicating climate change: investing now to create sustainable, secure jobs and a reliable energy supply.
The third narrative centres on a new type of environmentalism – one that is optimistic not guilt-ridden, hard-headed not hair-shirted, and that embraces rather than opposes progress.
Finally, the concept of the ‘Good Life’ – that happiness is about the health and wellbeing of our communities, not simply financial wealth – is also a potential frame for introducing the idea of climate change to conservative audiences.