Do It Yourself: A Handbook For Changing Our World
Do It Yourself: A Handbook For Changing Our World
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Overview
Ethical consumerism is now big business. But leading a sustainable and truly radical life encompasses a whole variety of things that challenge the mainstream. This book shows how we can make real changes to the way we live. In simple steps, it describes how you can create sustainable and equitable ways of living that can help transform not just your own life, but the culture around you.
The book weaves together analysis, stories and experiences. It combines in-depth analytical chapters followed by easy to follow 'How to Guides' with practical ideas for change. Taken together, these small steps can move us towards taking back control of our lives from governments and corporations.
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9780745348278 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Pluto Press |
| Publication date: | 05/20/2007 |
| Sold by: | Barnes & Noble |
| Format: | eBook |
| File size: | 10 MB |
About the Author
Trapese is a Popular Education collective based in the UK. Since 2004 they have been using participatory education to critically inform, inspire action and build sustainable alternatives to the current economic system. Do It Yourself (Pluto, 2007) is their first book.
Read an Excerpt
CHAPTER 1
why we need holistic solutions for a world in crisis
Andy Goldring
The premise of this chapter is that our world is facing massive ecological crises, as well as the potentially disastrous social and economic problems that stem from this. In understanding how we can change our world it is important to outline some of the enormous problems it faces and every species that inhabits it. The point of this chapter is not to feel overwhelmed by the extent of the problems, but to examine existing, easy to implement and inspiring approaches that we can use to both improve the environment and the lives we lead, looking at the holistic approach of permaculture in particular as a mechanism in creating change. Sustainable living is more than just a nice life for those that attempt it. It also offers a vision of a better world, and a daily, practical protest against the cultural, corporate and state structures that lay waste to the world.
the ecological crisis and how we got here
That we are living within a rapidly escalating ecological, social, political and economic crisis is beyond doubt. This has been outlined rigorously over the last few decades in reports like The Limits to Growth (1972), Our Common Future (better known as the Brundtland Report) (1987) or landmark books like Fritz Schumacher's Small is Beautiful (1973), as well as the WorldWatch Institute's annual State of the World report (www. worldwatch.org). How we came to be in this situation is less certain. A summary of my view, informed by 15 years of practice working with the Permaculture Association is this. From its earliest beginnings, humankind lived in relative harmony with nature, ruled by its laws, in tune with the seasons and with minimal disruption to the overall ecological system. At the end of the last ice age, climatic conditions changed and productivity increased, and humans in the Middle East, East Africa and China moved from gathering and hunting in small groups to settled agriculture. Impacts were huge and many writers of social and human ecology such as Murray Bookchin, John Zerzan and Michael Sahlins see this as the origins of our present civilisation and its trappings such as hierarchy, division of labour, oppression, trading and specialisation, more complex social organisation, and the first cities. Ultimately these civilisations were unable to manage their resource base and failed. Reasons included soil and tree loss, the collapse of agriculture, war with competing civilisations or an inability to change inappropriate social and environmental practices. These ideas have been eloquently outlined by Jared Diamond in a number of books such as Guns, Germs and Steel (1997) and Collapse (2005).
The 'Medieval Warm Period', alongside new inventions from China, such as the horse chest harness, in the tenth to fourteenth centuries enabled increases in European agricultural yields and the rapid expansion of larger human settlements. Other Chinese inventions such as gunpowder, paper, printing and the compass also had a transformative effect on medieval society. The combination of increased agricultural yields and new inventions enabled small European kingdoms to form the first nation states. Environmental and social limits were overcome through colonial expansion into new lands. The use of millions of mainly African slaves during the seventeenth century allowed companies to exploit the new lands and set up vast trading empires. During the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries inventor-scientists started to harness the power of water in new ways, with a major leap in industrial capacity occurring when the power of coal was harnessed to create steam engines. The Industrial Revolution had begun, and ushered in a new scale of environmental and social change. Companies flourished and became huge enterprises. The 'enlightenment' and other philosophical movements decided that humans were above nature and therefore it was ours to exploit as we saw fit. In the nineteenth century, we discovered a seemingly limitless supply of easily transportable explosive energy in the form of oil. Human population levels soared and a considerable middle class emerged with aspirations for comfort and a huge appetite for consumer goods (see classic works such as E.P. Thompson's The Making of the English Working Class (1968). World wars, the worldwide industrialisation of farming through the petrochemical-based 'green revolution', the 'triumph of capitalism' across the globe backed by new forms of international financial institutions like the World Bank and IMF, and mass media-based propaganda completed our divorce from nature and left most humans reeling from the effects of over-consumption or a life of poverty. There are many excellent commentaries which outline these changes and are included in the resources listed in Chapter 2.
At the beginning of the twenty-first century we face a huge list of interconnected challenges. Here are just a few of them:
* Climate change: The burning of coal, oil and gas, and the clearance of forest for agriculture is changing the climate through the 'greenhouse effect' and may soon reach a 'tipping point' beyond which humans can have no influence. There is now widespread agreement that climate change is the most urgent challenge facing the planet. The Stern report of 2006, written by former World Bank Chief Economist Nicholas Stern, suggests that there is now a 50 per cent chance of temperatures increasing by 5 °C, with catastrophic consequences for every species on the planet.
* Peak oil: A term popularised by scientist M. King Hubbert who, while working for the US Geological Survey, suggested that the world's supply of available oil would peak between 1990 and 2000. He got the date slightly wrong, but there is now wide consensus that we are within a few years of 'Hubbert's peak', with the gas peak following 15-20 years behind (Heinberg 2005). As a result of this peak the energy foundations of industrial society are dwindling. 'Alternatives like biofuels, ethanol or biomass can play a marginal supportive role but nowhere near on the scale required. When the oil runs out the economic and social dislocation will be unprecedented' (Michael Meacher, former UK Environment Minister, quoted in www.peakoil.net).
* Water: Water shortages and drought are becoming more prevalent, with many ancient aquifers that take thousands of years to recharge, near full depletion. 'Global freshwater use tripled during the second half of the twentieth century as population more than doubled and as technological advances let farmers and other water users pump groundwater from greater depths and harness river water with more and larger dams. As global demand soars, pressures on the world's water resources are straining aquatic systems worldwide. Rivers are running dry, lakes are disappearing, and water tables are dropping' (Elizabeth Mygatt, 26 July 2006, 'World's water resources face mounting pressure', Earth Policy Institute website). It is clear that water will be a key resource and a source of war and conflict in years to come.
* Industrial agriculture: Industrial farming has caused the destruction of whole ecosystems, made many species extinct and laid ruin once highly productive agricultural land. One recent example is our new demand for biofuel, which is leading to the widespread destruction of Indonesian rainforest and peatland to make way for huge monocultures of oil palm, all under the guise of an 'ecosolution'.
* Ocean ecosystems: Chemical agriculture, unprocessed sewerage and industrial fishing have created 'dead zones' covering hundreds of thousands of square kilometres of ocean. The majority of fish stocks are in decline. Global fish stocks could be almost eliminated within 50 years if current trends continue.
* Soils: Soils have been depleted of minerals leading to poor food quality, increased disease and fire susceptibility. Poor soils and diminishing water supplies are contributing to famines that now ravage many regions and are set to worsen with climate change.
* Environmental refugees: The number of environmental refugees is mushrooming as people desperately try to escape from areas no longer able to meet their basic human needs. The New Economics Foundation estimate that by 2050 there will be over 150 million environmental refugees unless pre-emptive action is taken. There are many underlying causes to this refugee crisis which go beyond short-term droughts: people are forced from their lands by wars often fuelled and funded by ex-colonial masters in the West, the expansion of cash crops continues to deprive people of land and force movements, and the effects of climate change such as long-term drought, flooding or extreme weather events is increasing mass movements of people.
* Ownership: Corporate control of key resources and utilities, such as seeds and water, undermine local efforts for self-reliance, and fuels the growing gap between rich and poor, both nationally and globally. The profits of Royal Dutch Shell now equal the GDP of Egypt (Guardian, 7 November 2006). George Monbiot in Captive State (2000), John Pilger in The New Rulers of the World (2002) and Naomi Klein in No Logo outlined the powerful role corporations play in shaping our lives.
* Culture and society: Our societies are largely based on a dysfunctional cultural model which is difficult to comprehend as it is so all-encompassing. Some of its premises include: endless economic growth, the primacy of profit and growth and the need for production and hence consumption, global trade and a wage economy which fosters individualism and competition, the nuclear family and all its trappings of suburban and out of town developments, and an education system that largely trains people for participation in narrow work tasks. This leaves us largely divorced from nature and each other, at the whim of corporations, neglectful states and global institutions, and a media system in the hands of dull, powerful companies that obscures rather than illuminates.
Struggling for sustainability
Given the enormity of the problems that are faced, many people are going to ask the question 'Is there any hope?' Is it possible to fundamentally change the economic/ industrial/military system? Can we move from a society based on the pursuit of power, profit and consumption to a society that has the well-being of society and the environment at its core? Can this be done at a global level? Is it fair to curb the Western style 'development' in other parts of the world, especially Africa and Asia? These are difficult questions to answer, but in my opinion, yes there is hope. All the ideas, techniques, technologies and cultural models we need to transform the world and steward the environment for the better exist already. They have developed throughout history and can be seen through several currents.
Firstly, there are the sustainable practices of human scale societies. These groups, generally numbering fewer than 300, meet the majority of their needs from within their own region. Human scale societies – both nomadic tribes and settled villages – were more prevalent in the pre-industrial world and made up the majority of the human population until just a few hundred years ago. They worked less than we do, met their needs without destroying their environment and had no need for standing armies or police forces. Their whole way of life was tuned to the local environment, each generation, from children to elders, had a role to play and everyone contributed to the well-being of the whole group. Strong group identity, strict taboos and an appreciation of the 'web of life' ensured that their way of life was sustained over hundreds of generations. However, we must also be careful not to over-romanticise such human scale societies as some kind of ideal template – no doubt they faced a different set of problems, such as food shortages, occasional outbursts of bloody conflict, more reliance on manual labour, none of the comforts that mark out consumer-based societies, nor the ease of mobility that we enjoy.
Having said that, there is much which our profoundly industrialised societies can learn about regaining a sense of simplicity, social integration, and cultural approaches to living within natural limits, autonomy and self-reliance. In her book Ancient Futures (1992) Helena Norberg-Hodge outlines how a planned process of development since the 1970s based around military expansion, tourism and resource use has undermined such human scale communities in Ladakh, northern India. Here, the Ladakh Project has been set up with the aim of what it calls 'counter-development' to re-establish the viability of these human scale communities connected to the rhythms of nature and regional trade and agriculture. Strong tendencies towards these types of human scale communities clearly still exist into the present, seen through this example and moves towards ecovillages, co-housing developments and intentional communities. The interesting question that arises, and what this and other chapters address, is how do we create the conditions to make these kinds of communities more viable on a wider level?
Secondly, there are groups that have rebelled against the ideas and power structures of the time, or developed new ideas that are then adopted by society at large. Even thousands of years ago, Socrates observed environmental destruction and called for the widespread reforestation of Greece. In the seventeenth century, the Diggers struggled to create a more democratic and fair society, and show that freedom from poverty, hunger and oppression could be won if the earth were made a 'Common Treasury for all'. In the nineteenth century, the Luddites rebelled against the new machines of the Industrial Revolution but were quickly quashed by the state and the 'march of progress' (see Christopher Hill's The World Turned Upside Down (1972) or Kirkpatrick Sale's Rebels Against the Future (1995)). By the twentieth century, the problems had become bigger, but so had the movements that sought a better way. The science of ecology led to a new appreciation of nature, organic agriculture re-emerged, natural farming was pioneered by people like Masanobu Fukuoka and Wes Jackson, and the self-sufficiency/back to the land movement was championed by John Seymour and others. Rachel Carson and her seminal work Silent Spring (1963) provoked a new interest in caring for the Earth and an ecological movement based around membership groups like the Sierra Club, Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth, as well as direct action groups such as Earth First! emerged.
permaculture as an holistic solution
Permaculture is revolution disguised as organic gardening. (Mike Feingold, community activist and designer)
Whilst many techniques and technologies for solving specific parts of our multifaceted problem exist, there are very few integrated or 'holistic' approaches that aim to tackle the problem as a whole. One such integrated approach is permaculture. The term was coined by two Australians, Bill Mollison and David Holmgren, to describe an ecological design approach to sustainability, and has been spreading across the world since the late 1970s:
Permaculture is the conscious design and maintenance of agriculturally productive ecosystems which have the diversity, stability, and resilience of natural ecosystems. It is the harmonious integration of landscape and people providing their food, energy, shelter, and other material and non-material needs in a sustainable way. (Bill Mollison 1997, ix)
Permaculture has three main ingredients:
1. Ethics
* People care: People care is about looking after yourself and the people around you and ensuring that your actions don't harm other people you don't see, such as when you buy food produced by workers on low wages using health damaging chemicals. It is also about considering our legacy and working to make the world better for future generations.
* Earth care: Opposition to further ecosystem destruction, rehabilitation of damaged land and a commitment to meet our needs on the smallest amount of land possible, so that we can leave space for all other species.
* Fair shares: This stresses the redistribution of skills, resources and money to enable more earth care and people care. It is also about limiting our consumption to that which the earth can sustain.
2. Ecological and attitudinal principles
Key principles include: direct observation of natural systems and an increased understanding of how they work; relative location because creating beneficial functional relationships between different elements within a system is vital; the support of important functions by many elements to ensure diversity and resilience; the provision of many functions by each element (for example, a shed becomes a water harvesting surface).
3. Design
Permaculture provides a new design language for observation and action that empowers people to co-design homes, neighborhoods, and communities full of truly abundant food, energy, habitat, water, income ... and yields enough to share. (Keith Johnson, editor/writer Permaculture Activist).
(Continues…)
Excerpted from "Do It Yourself"
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Copyright © 2007 The Trapese Collective.
Excerpted by permission of Pluto Press.
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Table of Contents
GlossaryIntroduction: Do it yourself
1. Why the party's over
2. How to get off the grid
3. Why do it without leaders
4. How to make decisions ourselves
5. Why society is making us sick
6. How to manage our own health
7. Why we've still got a lot to learn
8. How to inspire change through learning
9. Why we are what we eat
10. How to set up community gardens
11. Why we need cultural activism
12. How to prank, play and subvert the system
13. Why we have to reclaim the commons
14. How to set up autonomous spaces
15. Why we need to reclaim the media
16. How to communicate beyond TV
17. Why we need to take direct action
18. How to build active campaigns
Conclusions: Changing our world
Index