Another view on "communities"

[MacG]

This thing with words, their values, implicit meanings and associations is interesting indeed.

A word like "community" easily invoke associations of people sharing a certain geographical location, and I realise I have ignored that and have not been clear when using the word.

If we allow the word "community" to represent people who interact in some way, and cut loose from a stringent "shared geographic location", it get closer to the values I put in the word.

I consider myself to be part of a couple of communities which has little or nothing to do with "geographic location". PeakOil is one of those communities, science is another. The former is very, very loose, the latter is pretty abstract, but I still consider them as communities.

Aw, sorry. No conclusions here. Just a little clarification. Or an attempt at least.

[Bootstrapper]

You make a good point MacG.

In the context of PO, I use 'community' in the 'people sharing a certain geographical location' sense, simply because, in a post-petroleum society, that's about the only way a community will be able to form and function. However, that doesn't invalidate your point. Thanks for the clarification.

Paul

[isenhand]

I am deliberately vague with my use of the word ?community?, manly because people are so diverse I think the actual implementation of a community will vary from one group of people to another.

Personally, my ideal community would be a bit more like yours rather than being with a group of people all in the same house sharing meal. But there are people who would like that sort of community as well.

As far as talking about future communities, I think it is better to concentrate of the basic minimum needed in any community and there inter connection with out having to impose any formal structure and let people sort their own way of interacting.

[Bootstrapper]

G'day Isenhand,

I can't say I like the idea of co-housing with non-family , although a multi-generational family home would be tolerable.

Communities of geographically dispersed people are possible now because we have cheap, easy transport and communications. Take these things away and we'll all be forced to deal with the people who are physically near to us.

IMO, for a community to be self-sustaining, it has to provide adequate food, shelter, clothing and security for all it's inhabitants. The population must be large enough to permit at least a basic 'division of labour' so that these necessities can be produced efficiently.

As long as the population can be stabilised at a level where everyone personally knows everyone else, almost any social arrangement should have a good chance of succeeding without the need to impose a formal structure.

Studying pre-industrial societies can give us valuable insights into creating stable and sustainable socio-economic arrangements. Especially as we can apply modern knowledge of physics, chemistry and biology.

Paul - Expressing my opinion, not trying to change yours