Download Transition Towns Movement: Building Local Economies for Sustainability and Resilience and more Exercises Marketing in PDF only on Docsity!
The Transition Towns movement started around 2005 and is growing rapidly. It emerged in the UK mainly in response to increasing awareness ‘peak oil’ is likely to leave people in towns in a desperate situation, so it’s vital to strive to develop ways to survive with local economic self-sufficiency. Although Rob Hopkins and his colleagues in the UK receive most of the credit for getting the movement going, its rapid spread testifies to a strong general grassroots readiness to take up the idea. There are now towns in several other countries joining the movement, including Australia and New Zealand. The website (www.transitiontowns.org) is inspiring, linking many towns and projects, reflecting energy and enthusiasm. A handbook and other docu- ments have been published. The key concept is building town ‘resilience’ in the face of the coming peak oil crisis. Activities include: ‘re-skilling’ with courses on bread baking, planting the commons, e.g., nut trees on public land, local food production and marketing, especially community supported agriculture, and encouragement of volun- teering. These are not new ideas but it’s important they
are being linked together in whole town strategies for resilience. These initiatives have come from ordinary people, not states, governments or official bodies. For decades, some of us in the ‘deep green’ camp have been saying the key element in a sustainable and just world has to be small, highly self-sufficient, localised economies under local cooperative control. So it is very encouraging to find the Transition Town movement is not only underway but booming. If we make it through the next 50 years to sustainable and just ways it will be via some kind of Transition Towns’ process. But if the Transition Towns movement is to achieve sustainability some crucial issues must be ad- dressed or little or nothing of any social significance may be achieved. There is a need for a more focused, detailed action plan, giving clearer guidance to new- comers, and a more radical vision than is currently guiding the movement. These comments won’t make much sense unless I outline my perspective on the global situation which some people may reject as be- ing too extreme.
Where we are and the way out The many alarming global problems crowding in and threatening to destroy us are so big and serious they cannot be solved within or by consumer-capi- talist society. Our current way of life in rich countries is grossly unsustainable and unjust. There is no possibility of “living standards” of all people on earth ever rising to rich-world per capita consumption levels of energy, miner- als, timber, water, food, phosphorous
Strengthening the vital
Transition Towns movement
Global sustainability and justice can only be achieved through something like the
inspiring Transition Towns movement, but thought needs to be given to key issues or the
movement might fail to achieve its goals, suggests TED TRAINER. Unless the movement
works to replace consumer society it will collapse with it when it finally fails.
if the Transition Towns
movement is to achieve
sustainability some crucial
issues must be addressed
or little of any social
significance may be achieved
etc. Our way of life also would not be possible if rich countries were not taking far more than their fair share of world resources in an extremely unjust global economy which condemns most of the world’s people to deprivation. Given this analysis of our situ- ation, there must be an enormous and radical shift to a society that is not based on globalisation, market forces, the profit motive, centrali- sation, representative democracy, or competitive, individualistic acquisitiveness. Above all it must be a zero-growth economy and most difficult of all, it cannot be an affluent society. Yet almost everyone in the mainstream fails to recognise this situation and con- tinues with the comforting delusion that with more effort and technical advances we can solve problems like greenhouse gas emissions without jeopardising our high ‘living standards’ or the market economy or the obsession with growth. If I am right about our situation, we must work for transition to a very dif- ferent society, which I call The Simpler Way, its core principles must be:
Far simpler material living standards
High levels of self-sufficiency at household, national and especially neighbourhood and town levels, with relatively little travel, transport or trade. There must be mostly small, local economies where most things we need are produced by local labour from local resources, under participatory local control, geared to need, and with no growth at all.
Most problematic, a radically different culture, where competitive, acquisitive individualism is replaced by frugal, self-sufficient collectivism.
For a detailed discussion of The Simpler Way see http://tinyurl.com/m8kugq
Transition The contradiction between consumer-capitalist society and The Simpler Way is so huge our chances of making the transition in the time available are not encouraging. Yet we must work hard to achieve it. Following are key points to consider in thinking about transition strategy. Little will be gained by trying to fight against the current system directly. It’s too powerful, dissenting forces are overwhelmed and there isn’t time to beat it in head-on conflict. Even if we could for instance take state power, either by violent revolution or green parliamentary action, it would not be useful. State power cannot build self sufficient, self-governing local economies with conscientious, responsible, creative, happy citizens. Transition must therefore be a grassroots process with ordinary people slowly developing the con- sciousness, skills, local systems and infrastructures to enable them to run their own local communities in cooperative and participatory ways, with frugal lifestyles. The coming era of intense scarcity will force us in this direction whether we like it or. Meanwhile we can begin now building aspects of a sustainable society within the failing old system. There is no chance of significant change while supermarket shelves remain well-stocked. Almost everyone will stolidly continue purchasing, watching sport and playing electronic games until scarcity hits with a jolt. But as the old systems run into more serious prob- lems, people will come across to join us, seeing we are enjoying the benefits of the new ways. When oil starts to get se- riously scarce people will see they must either take up our examples or starve. So it’s very important to get alterna- tive examples up and running. Nothing will be more persuasive than examples here and there where the new ways can be seen to be more sensible and enjoy- able, within mainstream towns and suburbs. Until around 2000 the basic pioneer- ing work was done by the Global Eco- village Movement with its thousands of small communities. But the world’s
The coming era of
intense scarcity
will force us in this
direction whether we
like it or. Meanwhile
we can begin now
building aspects
of a sustainable
society within the
failing old system
descent plan” (Step 12) doesn’t help much when we need to know how to do this. I suggest the main concern of the movement be developing the town’s economic self-sufficiency and building a radically new economy within our town and running it to meet our needs. The solution is not primarily to do with energy and its coming scarcity. Our greatest insecurity is not oil, it’s the global economy which doesn’t need your town. It will relocate your jobs to where profits are greatest. It can flip into recession overnight and dump you and billions of others into unemployment and poverty. It will only give you whatever benefits trickle down from ventures which maximise corporate profits. It condemns much of your town to idleness with unem- ployment and wastes time and resources which could be devoted to meeting urgent needs. In the coming time of scarcity it will not look after you. You will only escape this fate if you build a radically new economy in your region, and run it to provide for the people living there. We have to build a local economy, guided by ra- tional planning and under participatory social control rather than leaving everything to the market, or driven by profit. This is the antithesis of capitalism, markets, profit motivation and corporate control. If we don’t plunge into building such an economy we will prob- ably not survive in the coming age of scarcity. The Transition Towns movement will come to nothing of great significance if it does not set itself to build such economies. Either your town will get control of its own affairs and organise local productive capacity to provide for you, or it will remain within and depend- ent on the mainstream economy, and be dumped. The goal in building new local Economy B is to en- able people to guarantee basic necessities are provided by using their labour, land, skills and local resources,
under their own control. Then when the old economy A collapses, we will still be able to provide for our- selves. This kind of vision and goal is not evident in the TT literature I have read. There is no concept of a Community Development Cooperative setting out to eventually run the town economy for the benefit of people via participatory means. Currently, the move- ment implicitly accepts the normal consumer-capital- ist economy, simply seeking to become more resilient within it.
Community Development Co-op We need to set-up mechanisms enabling us to design and operate a plan to achieve our goal of developing a local economy run by us to meet our needs. It will not be ideal if we proclaim the importance of town self-sufficiency, then run off as individuals to set up a bakery here and a garden there. There must be continual discussion about what the town needs to set-up to achieve its goals, what should be done first, what is feasible, how we might proceed to get the first and main things done, what are the most important ventures to set-up. Individual initiatives should be encouraged but bigger projects requiring whole-town efforts are likely to be more important. This means from the early stages we should set-up some form of Community Development Cooperative, a process where we come together often to discuss and think about the town plan and our progress, towards having a coordinated, unified approach that will help us decide on sub-goals and priorities, especially on the purposes of the early working bees. It does not need to be elaborate or prescriptive and would not discourage people from pursuing ventures other than the CDC goals. My impression from Transition Town literature is this theme needs urgent attention. It seems inspired and energetic people are doing good things, but as independent ‘entrepreneurs’, according to their indi- vidual interests and skills. There will always be plenty of scope for this and every reason to encourage it, but the most important projects will be collective, public works providing crucial services for the town, for example, build- ing community gardens, sheds, premises for little firms, orchards, ponds, wood- lots and the commons from which free food will come. These are whole-town projects to be carried out by voluntary committees and working bees. Before these projects can sensibly begin we need to make a plan, considering priority, logistics, geography, feasibility, research, resources etc.
our primary
concern is to raise
consciousness
regarding the
nature, functioning
and unacceptability
of consumer-
capitalist society
and the existence
of better ways
What should the CDC do? Below is a list of projects from The Simpler Way Tran- sition Strategy.
Identify unmet needs of the town, unused productive capacities and bring them together. Set-up many simple cooperatives enabling all unemployed, homeless, bored, retired people to work in com- munity gardens etc. This would help them start producing basic things they need. Can we set up co-ops to run a bakery, bike repair shop, home- help service, insulation operation, clothes-making and repair operation? Especially important are the cooperatives to organise leisure resources, con- certs, picnics, dances, festivals? Can we organise a market day? One of the worst contradictions in the present economy is it dumps many people into unem- ployment, boredom, homelessness, "retirement," mental illness and depression and to watching 4+ hours of TV daily. These are huge productive capacities going to waste. The CDC can pounce on these resources and harness them, allowing dumped people to start producing to meet some of their own needs and eliminating employment. This starts to set-up Economy B and we record their contributions which entitle people to proportion- ate shares of the output.
Help existing small firms shift to activities the town needs, setting up little firms, farms and markets. Establish a town bank to finance these ventures, ensuring no one goes bankrupt and no one is left without a livelihood. Organise Business Incubators; the voluntary panels of experts and advisers on gardening, small busi- ness, arts etc, so we can get new ventures up and running well.
Organise working bees to plant and maintain com- munity orchards and other commons, build the premises for the bee keeper and organise commit- tees to run concerts and look after old people...
Research what the town is importing, and the scope for local firms or new co-ops to start substituting local products. Decide what things will definitely not be left for market forces to determine, like unemployment, what firms we need, whether fast food outlets will be patronised if set- up. We won’t let market forces deprive anyone of a livelihood; if we have too many bakeries we work out how to redirect one of them. Stress the importance of reducing consumption, of
living more simply, making, growing, repairing, old things. The less we consume in the town, the less we must produce or import. Remember, the world can’t consume at anything like the average rate of rich countries. Besides explaining the im- portance of reducing consumption, the CDC must stress alternative satisfactions and develop these, e.g. concerts, festivals, crafts. It can also develop recipes for cheap, nutritious meals, teaching craft and gardening skills, preserving etc. The household economy should be upheld as the centre of our lives and the main source of life satisfaction, more important than career.
Work out procedures for making good town decisions for these developments, the referenda, consensus processes, town meetings.
In all these activities our primary concern is to raise consciousness regarding the nature, functioning and unacceptability of consumer-capitalist society and the existence of better ways.
One concern the CDC would have is what not to try to do. For example, it is not clear why in the early stages towns should make much effort to produce their own energy. Producing most forms of renewable energy in significant quantities is difficult and costly. Also, its significance for town independence or resilience is questionable. If your town builds a wind farm it will benefit the nation but is unlikely to benefit the town, other than as an export industry (sending surplus electricity to the grid, without which
Town resilience is
going to depend
more on the capacity
to get to work and
produce necessities
without using much
energy, than on
whether the town
can produce energy
