Community

 

1. The need for community.

   From my own experience of being a 'lone wolf', I am able to state that having a supportive community working on shared goals is one the most important resources for a local self-sufficiency. There is physically a limit to what one person can do. In addition, two or more working participants looking at and working on a project will be able to provide different perspectives. In this context, however, it is key that the community members are in fact co-workers; supportive and trustworthy. Such issues as competition, coercion, lying, deception, back stabbing, or outright theft will sabotage an operation, sometimes irreparably. In an emergency/survival situation, 2 or more may survive where 1 cannot.

2. Can you afford it?

   I have been blessed; first, by living here as a child; second, with the resources to purchase the land and make what advances I have.
   People with resources have a choice; the price of this land was no higher than a condominium can go for in some cities; perhaps lower than most. If you have the coin and you want a condo, you get a condo. You want acreage and rustic, that's where you put your coin.
   But not everyone has that kind of coin. if people want to invest in land, how many can do it?
   It may be out of the reach of one person- alone. But in community; pooled resources could make it possible. The conceptualized and actual task is; to look at the ecosystem, goals, and people; and figure out the optimum size and design. 'Intentional Communities' and 'Ecovillages' are working in this direction.

   3. Recent History

   The 'Back to the land movement', and the communes of the 60s, were a mid-century version of intentional community. However, in some rural areas people on communes got the reputation of being 'dirty hippies'. There was a backlash. I am not sure of the root cause in all cases, but I am certain that for some, the communes represented a threat to the established order. 'Free love'? 'What's the world coming to?'  'There oughta be a law!'  'Make those people put clothes on!'  'Get a job, long hair!' I can still hear the echoes.
   Today, there is an upgrade to the image, with the movement out of the urban environment being more mainstream. For 'Yuppies', for example, having had jobs, and having some savings, is strategically valuable. This will not stop the cropping up of envy. But in present day, your neighbor is much more apt to be a transplant from the urban environment him- or her- self; or someone going from one suburban bedroom community to another in search of work. See the discussion under 'Ecological Footprint' for John Howe's writings on the subject of 'The End of Cheap Oil' and how communities may change in configuration and functional components.  
   So- today there may be a greater necessity, as well as a more open and accepting climate, for community self-sufficiency. However, as long as 'breadwinners' are forced into a transient lifestyle in order to pursue available jobs, there will continue to be a conflict between commitment to the community and a need to move on. One may hope that if the community is growing sufficient wheat and other necessities, the 'breadwinner' can at least actually make bread at home, perhaps in the community oven. We can do, what we have to do, locally, and do it quite well.

   4. Land speculation

   I was pondering this topic as I fed the cattle yesterday (2/7/12). I had a recent conversation with a co-worker concerning what is happening to the dollar value of farm land. (She is a transplant from a  mid western farm family, and hears everything from the folks back home.) She had said that speculators are buying up farm property at a rapid rate. A search online confirms this, and it's the same old story. It seems most of these people are not interested in sustainable agriculture, or ecosystem interaction. They are after money. Strictly buying and selling, turning over the land, to extract as much financial gain as possible from it, and then presumably moving on to the next get-rich scheme. It seemed like Wall Street taking to the rural environment but with the same rapacious motivations. What this could do is; a) drive the price of land up out of the reach of people searching for a way to come together in self-sustaining communities; and b) start the next bubble of speculation which will then burst, leaving more bankruptcies and further eroding the overall financial condition of the country. As long as people think in terms of dollars, and not real tangible value, trends like this will continue. There is a term on Wall Street; buying and selling 'futures'. We have to understand that such speculators are, indeed, buying and selling our future. Not the future price of hog bellies, cattle, or corn, but our actual future. This has got to stop.
   The old saying was 'Buy land. It will never go down in value, and they're not making any more of it'. From the perspective of the recent meltdown of the housing market, one must acknowledge that some property values have gone down; but not specifically farmland. From the perspective of real sustainability and value- not that driven by speculation, but that determined by becoming part of the ecosystem- the old saying is still true.  

5. Theory; 'Nuclear' vs 'extended' community.

   There has long been a differentiation in the structure of 'family' between the 'nuclear' family and the 'extended' family. The terminology itself was in use by the1950s; the nuclear family being mom, dad, and kids, the extended family having additional 'non-immediate' family members.
   In consideration of the 'farm' and its relation to community, this consideration of relatedness could be extended. For example, the 'farm' could be a 'nuclear' farm, with one central house/home. Outbuildings, gardens, and fields may surround it, but it would be a more or less monolithic operation. Alternatively, it could be an 'extended farm', with more than one central house/home, again surrounded by a more or less complex array of outbuildings, gardens, and fields. In this case, what I am envisioning is a structurally more complex arrangement, although there could still be a more or less monolithic functionality. That is to say, the gardens, fields, and herds could be held as 'common ground' and a common operation, with the separate householders almost acting like shareholders. This is, I believe, how most 'intentional communities' operate.
   Stepping out to the next 'wider circle', one comes to the traditional 'community', functionally equivalent to our small towns, where there is a central governing or supervising structure, a set of regulations, cultural or religious gathering places, but often little or no 'common ground' for agricultural production. At this level, the interrelatedness is minimal unless their is a central organization uniting the independent operations. Amish communities, Mennonites, and Hutterites have long had this type of central organization. 

6. Donella Meadows and 'The Global Village' 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donella_Meadows
http://www.empowermentresources.com/info2/theglobalvillage.html