So I wrote about “communal-tragedies” , and other obstacles-in-communal-living, but I’d like to condense it all to one or a few root problems/solutions, from which the others all originate. Maybe that’s my scientific reductionist tendency. Or maybe it would be useful to prioritize these. It does feel like I’ve seen many ICs which repeat the same mistakes that cause them to break apart, or lose their potential as radical alternatives to the mainstream, either not attracting new people, or having a high turnover, with many people getting dissatisfied and leaving (while new ones come in). Elinor Ostrom already came up with 8 principles to avoid the tragedy of the commons, so do we need more principles?
Perhaps what I’m looking for is one or a few meta-principles to give a chance of success. Maybe the previous principles (including Ostrom) can be reduced to some higher level ones?
0. Ostrom These address mainly how to not overexploit common resources (land, people, houses, etc), which is also related to how not to be destroyed by free riders (or those who are looking out for their own individual and family good more than the community's).
1. Dynamic self organization. For example, many of the “tragedies” were about going too far in one direction or another and failing to achieve a balance. Living systems seem to be good at finding balance (homeostasis), and when they break down it is extremely difficult to maintain that balance from outside, as any doctor will tell you (or as I have experienced with my dad when he was dying, and many with serious illness or injury). So we need communities that allow for evolutionary processes to seek all these different balances, within individuals, and within the community composed of different individual needs. A rigid vision or dogmatic individuals will not allow for this to happen. Or maybe sometimes rigidity is warranted, when foresight says “this way lies disaster”, but not based on dogma. I’ve seen too much rigidity at the Brotherhood of Christ and other conservative religious communities like the 12 tribes or Bruderhof, and even the Possibility Alliance.
One of the main evolutionary mechanisms is competition, which happens both internally and externally. People inside the community must have a bit of friendly competition (too much would lower the community's fitness relative to the rest of the world) with each other in order to improve their contribution. And the community must have some competition with the outside word (and other communities) in order to figure out how to optimally deal with free riders.
Another (more recently evolved mechanism) is forsight/wisdom, the ability to learn from the past and somewhat predict the future based on different scenarios. Elders are usually better at this than youngsters, especially in their field of expertise.
In general the ability to have feedback from both other community members and outsiders/nature is what makes it possible to adapt and improve.
2. Isolation. Not complete informational isolation, because the community needs to grow or multiply, and at least in the beginning it is not even possible to not need stuff and services from the mainstream (also see the next principle). More about being able to produce and use what people need in a sustainable way. Otherwise, the unity and interdependence is diluted when people give energy in the form of jobs or money or getting their needs met from the mainstream. Emotional and cultural interdependence may not be enough to keep people together. Economic interdependence is needed as well. Not only is interdependence diluted without enough isolation, but the mainstream acts like a gravitational well, pulling the community towards it in many subtle ways, because the mainstream too is a living system that tries to maintain itself. This principle is also general to life, using cell membranes to achieve a unity, an energetic and informational focus that can synergyze with homeostasis (previous principle). Most communities I’ve seen are not isolated enough and end up mainstream-like. Either they don’t value isolation, or they don’t have the skills to achieve it. One of the Ostrom principles addresses having a clear boundary.
3. A mythical orientation that is striving for something that is not quite present in the community. Life is an open system needing something outside (mythically sometimes, not just physically) of the organism or ecosystem to strive towards. There is the need for more people (from outside, since we have an overpopulation problem) in order to grow and multiply, but there is also a need for inspiration. I think Twin Oaks, Eastwind, and Dancing Rabbit have lost their mythical orientation.
4. An orientation of the people towards the community, willing to consider what is good for the community, not just what is good for themselves as individuals and families. Even better if they want to achieve some sort of tribal consciousness. Most secular communities lack this, most religious or spiritual ones have it. And most liberal people are worst at it than conservative people. This principle is important to avoid the community braking apart due to free loaders, an alternative to Ostrom principles, but probably not sufficient. Ostrom is probably also necessary in the range of 6-200 people. One way to encourage this orientation is to build trust and commitment. Besides engineering interdependence through commuity activities and economics, it is useful to have what sociologists call costly signalling (such as religious rites) that show how much members value being there, by doing things that are not easy.
5. An orientation of the community towards the individual and the family. Understanding that these subunits have their own needs, and tending to those needs. For example, individuals need to have some autonomy in their work, to feel productive and creative and appreciated for what they bring to the community, to have a sense of belonging to the community (and bigger forms of organization sometimes), to have good relationships with others in the community, to have good relationships with the natural world. Families need to feel like they have some autonomy with their children, and a sense of prioritizing members of the family at least emotionally.
A list of communities I’ve been at, been told about by people who have been there, or studied from history, along with which principle(s) they fail at (binary for now, later we can make it analog):
Dandelion (now defunct, a secular community in Ontario, Canada)0,2,5
Twin Oaks 2,3,4
Acorn 2,3
Eastwind 2,3,4
Cambia 2,5
Sikh community near Boston whose name I forgot 1,2
Bruderhof 1,2
12 Tribes 1,2
Possibility Alliance 0,2
Dancing Rabbit 2,3,4
Sandhill 2,3
Red Earth 2,4
Bear Creek 2,3,4
Skalitude 2,4
Kripalu 1,2,3,4
Earthaven 2,3,4
Wild Roots 2
Dancing Deer 1,2,3,4
Blue Heron 2,3,4
Vinelands 0,1,2,4, 5
ONeida 1,2
Amana 1,2
Brook Farm 1,2,4, 0
Camphill 1,2,5
East Lake Commons 1,2,3,4
Open Space Church 2,3,0
Ganas 2,3
Catholic Workers 0,1,2,5
Saturday, November 9, 2019
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