Green Horizon Ecovillages Network

Toward a network of ecovillage communities

The objective of this Meetup is to foster a project with a vision of creating ecovillage communities. We’re based in New Jersey but would like to be a resource for the whole NYC-NJ-Philadelphia region. Thousands of ecovillages have been built worldwide (see: https://EcoVillage.org) and dozens in the United States, but not yet a single one in our own area.

Our project is about a better, more satisfying way of living -- but also about a much-needed social transformation. Humanity is facing a crisis of unsustainability. It’s a consequence of millennia of misguided civilizational trajectories -- toward over-growth, over-development, and over-centralization. For that reason Joanna Macy and David Korten, among others, talk about a movement for re-direction called The Great Turning.

See:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Korten#The_Great_Turning
and
https://workthatreconnects.org/dimensions-of-the-great-turning

From the latter website: “Like green shoots pushing up through the rubble, new social and economic arrangements are sprouting. They hold the seeds of resilience and generativity for the future.” Exemplary initiatives include: permaculture and other ecologically sound farming practices; economic cooperatives; Green politics; models of community living such as multi-generational households, ecovillages, cohousing, and co-living.

It’s of interest (and somewhat inspiring) to consider that history may date the era of the Great Turning to our own critical times. The initiation of the global Earth Day celebrations (1970) likely will be viewed as a landmark indication of a pending change in consciousness. Based on that, an international movement has been emerging. In broad aspect it could be called “the greening of society.” It encompasses social, economic, political, and spiritual dimensions.

The promotion of the ecovillage ethos is key. ‘Eco’ = ecology and ‘village’ = community. So the movement for a “greening” kind of social transformation can manifest under the banner of Ecology and Community.

Ethos and ideology

There’s an idea that the establishment of networks of ecovillage communities could become the basis for the ultimate bioregional (decentralized) transition of society. But it’s not a question of everyone needing to live in a newly-established settlement. The latter can tangibly model best practices, but the ecovillage ethos can inform the transformation of all our current living arrangements. Toward that end, let’s foster rural farming cooperatives, suburban Transition Towns, eco-neighborhoods within cities, etc. The ethos centers around the concepts of ecological responsibility and community revitalization. The overarching ideology (set of ideas ... as an alternative to extant liberalism, conservatism, nationalism, socialism, etc.) could be called: eco-communitarianism. Relatedly, the Green politics movement espouses a “new paradigm” type of socialism called eco-socialism. It’s a grassroots, decentralized ideal that’s conducive to a more egalitarian and participatory form of democracy.

In regard to social change, surely we want to be advocating some kind of post-capitalism. Socialism had been viewed as the alternative for over a hundred years, beginning in the middle of the 19th century. The New Left of “the Sixties” still talked about socialism, but something very new emerged during the 1970s and 1980s. Eco-activists and bioregionalists advocated that the left transition ideologically “from Red to Green” -- based on a notion of communitarian liberation rather than class struggle.

Unfortunately, the modern nation-state has been conflated with community -- thus the enduring appeal of nationalism. But most nation-states are too large-scale; their power centers are too remote, opaque, and bureaucratic. If we advocate living more simply, more lightly, and more locally, then the breakup of the mega-states (and mega-corporations) will be necessary. Sovereignty should devolve back to more humanly-scaled economic-political jurisdictions. That’s the essence of bioregionalism.

The Green Horizon Ecovillages Network

Our project centers around fostering the ecovillage ethos in a general kind of way. Just one aspect would be the establishment of residential ecovillage communities. They can (a) offer an immediate higher quality of life, and (b) serve as lifeboats (for enduring the coming Long Emergency crucible that humanity is facing) and as basecamps for positive social change.
It would be great to see synergy between Transition Towns and the ecovillage movement. Perhaps ecovillage creation could become a residential component of the Transition Network initiative; or part of the new Living Systems Alliance: https://news.transitionnetwork.org/launch-of-the-living-systems-alliance/

Transition. Transformation. Regeneration.

Hope for the future. Re-thinking of our civilizational values and lifeways: Many are recognizing that there’s much wisdom in the slogan, “It takes a village to raise a child.” Ditto for healthcare, right livelihood, consumption patterns, and constructive citizenship within the broad community of life. We need to “settle back” into an old-style cultural paradigm characterized by identification with a stable group of familiar others and with a particular place-on-earth as Home.

Related “greening” movements

With the “Transition” idea comes an image of a town consciously moving toward resilience and sustainability. See: https://transitionnetwork.org/

With the “Ecovillage” idea comes an image of a community striving to manifest and model best practices. See: https://EcoVillage.org/

With the “Bioregionalism” idea comes an image of devolution of power and culture away from the current mega-nation-states ... ultimately resulting in life-settings conducive to the values that our movement espouses:
. ecology, community, permaculture, sustainability
. responsibility, democracy, justice, nonviolence
. decentralization, egalitarianism, appreciation of diversity
See: https://cascadiabioregion.org/

These constitute guidelines and movement-generating inspirations; images to have in mind that spark the imagination. But we need to have perspective about how many steps can be taken in any generation toward our ultimate vision. Towns have far to go toward becoming real Transition Towns; extant ecovillage communities have far to go toward becoming full-scale villages; Cascadia has far to go toward becoming a bioregional sovereignty. The civilizational trajectories we are confronting entail many years of momentum needing re-direction. The current over-developed Leviathan will take generations to deconstruct. As Bioneers, our challenge is to retain perspective as we take heart from the Great Turning process that has just begun. Patiently but persistently we need to advocate for social change at all levels ... while steadfastly supporting and caring for each other as we endeavor to build the new society within the shell of the old.