Tools for campaigers - Action ideas

• http://otesha.org.uk/17/tools-for-campaigning-/tools-for-campaigers.html
  

Want to get up and do something that matters, but could use a little help getting started? Never fear - we're here to help.

Campaigning resources

Presentations

Global Issues, Local Impacts (PDF)
This is the presentation to pull out when someone says 'Why do you care about all this social and environmental stuff anyway?'. It covers the main 8 Otesha themes (food, fashion, money, trade, transport, energy, media and water) and is guaranteed to hold peoples' attention, what with the bright colours and nice photos and all. We find that sometimes it's best to run through just 2 or 3 issues at a time, stopping for lots of discussion as you go along.

The Great Otesha Climate Change & Poverty Quiz (PDF)
This presentation focuses on two of the big underlying challenges that we hope to make better by re-thinking our day-to-day choices: climate change and poverty. We know these big issues can be scary, so this presentation helps introduce the issues to others in an accessible, non-intimidating way.

The Otesha 5 minute lifestyle check-up (PDF)
This short inventory and action pla encourages people to take a look at their day-to-day banking, eating and transport habits, and then get some quick and easy ideas for how to green them up. If you want to encourage people to make small changes in a positive way, this is a good place to start. The sheet works best if you can guide people through the questions and then make them a personal action plan by checking the boxes of the actions that most relate to their lives, but people can also go through the questions on their own. We designed this for 14-18 year olds, but it should work with other age groups too. If you use it, let us know how you get on!

Group functioning & communications

NVC: Our guide to non-violent communication
Jo and Liz took an NVC workshop at the European Social Forum and learnt a ton. We've tried to share as many nuggets of widsom as possible here, although we're definitely not experts in this area!

Tips for White Guys
These tips remind us that working to uncover hidden power structures in society is really central to the work we're doing, because issues around environmental justice, social justice, and equity are completely interconnected. As the tips say, none of us are free until all of us are free. And no, they're not just for white guys - they're relevant for most of the rest of us too.

Holding Meetings (word doc)
Thanks to our friends at Otesha Canada, we've got a fantastic guide to facilitating meetings and making group decisions using a consensus model. If you're part of a group, any group, this is a highly recommended read.

The art of getting stuff done

Tips for campaigners (PDF) This one's a simple sheet that you can read in 5 minutes.

And coming soon...
-Tips on how to set up and run a project
-More about group functioning and communications

More action ideas

If you're looking for inspiration, here are a bunch of things you can get on with right now.

Some will make a small difference & some will make a big one. Whatever thing you decide to do, you're in good company. Thousands of people are already part of this revolution - deciding to actually do something instead of just sitting around talking about it. Together, our impacts really do add up.

But beware: completing items on this list has been known to produce feelings of euphoria, hopefulness and self-satisfaction. So if you're cynical and apathetic and would like to stay that way, you should probably stop right here.

To get started, just choose a theme:

water | fashion | food | media | fair trade | transport | energy | money

Or visit our bonus recycling theme here

Water

We use most of our water showering, bathing and flushing the toilet. This means that following just the first three ideas here will make a huge difference to the amount of water you use each day.

• Get a hippo for your loo. If you live in London or southeast England, you can get a free hippo for your toilet from Thames Water and save 3 litres of water each time you flush. If you're in Scotland, Scottish Water will give you a free save-a-flush. If you live somewhere else, you can make your own toilet dam really easily by filling up a large jar with a heavy rock and some water, then sealing the lid tightly and dropping it in the back of your toilet (making sure not to block any of the moving parts inside). Or, if you've got one lying around, use a brick instead.

• Suds up responsibly. Install a low-flo showerhead & aim to cut your showering time in half (each minute uses 11 - 20 litres of water!). If you take baths, switch to showers and take that long deserving soak only when you really need it.
• Take staggered showers. While you're soaping up, turn off the tap. Then turn it back on to rinse off. You can even find showerheads with shut-off valves that make this really easy.
• Learn about your bottled water.
• Implement other water-saving devices, like highly efficient dishwashers, low-water use washing machines, and water butts for your garden.
• Let the yellow mellow. If your housemates or family don't mind, try not flushing every single time you pee (especially in the middle of the night!)
• Turn off the tap when you brush your teeth. This one's so easy that we can ALL do it today.
• To do even more, follow these tips for saving water.

Fashion

Luckily, there are a ton of options for people who don't want to support sweatshop labour, pesticides and the unnecessary waste from so much - literally - material stuff.

• Hold a clothes swap party with your friends.
• Buy second-hand clothes from a vintage shop or market.
• Make your own completely original designs. For bonus points, use recycled fabric and source your materials ethically.
• Or, if you'd rather, let someone else make your old worn clothes into something new. Donate them to TRAID and they'll be refashioned into something new, then sold at their charity shops (profits go to international development projects).
• Purchase sweat-free and child-labour-free clothing.
• Buy gear made from sustainable materials, like organic cotton or bamboo.
• Research your favourite clothes shop to see what you like or don't like about their practices. Then write them a letter and tell them so. (A really easy way to do this action is to sign up to The Nag & complete the Rag Nag.)
• Donate to an organization that fights sweatshop labour.
• Make your school sweatshop-free.
• Get the message out: hold a Buy Nothing Day or start a Free the Children club.
  

Food

Every food choice of every day gives opportunities to make yourself and the planet just a little healthier. Here are a few places to start:

• Buy local , organic and fair trade food.
• Buy in bulk to reduce packaging. If you live in London, go completely unpackaged.
• Grow your own!
• Break your meat dependency. Choose vegan or vegetarian food , eat less meat, or eat free-range organic meat.
• Make waste free lunches by packing food in reusable containers.
• Sign up to a veg box scheme and get fresh local produce (and other goodies) delivered to your door.
• Think twice before you buy genetically modified (GM) foods.

Media

Mass media, advertising and consumer culture permeate everything we do. Even so, there are some pretty simple things we can all do to help get corporate agendas and the things they want us to buy out of our media. For example:

• Divorce your TV, at least for one week a year.
• Read independent media to get a new perspective on the issues covered in mainstream news and to learn about issues that aren't covered at all.
• Do it yourself. Make a blog , ‘zine, film or post your views online to showcase your own perspective.
• Take action to get media education into your school.
  

Fair trade

It's ridiculously easy to do something about this one. Check out the Fairtrade Foundation website to learn more about the issues surrounding fair trade, the types of products that now come with Fairtrade certification (flowers! spices! footballs!) and where you can find fairly traded products.

Home energy use

Okay, so we've probably heard most of these tips before, but it's still good to be reminded every so often. Here are some quick things we can all do to cut our energy consumption and fight the serious threat of climate change:

• Become a guerrilla energy-saver. When others aren't looking, covertly turn appliances off standby, turn out lights and turn down the thermostat one degree. Chances are, no one will even notice.
• Conserve heating. In the winter, put on a jumper or cuddle with a friend to keep warm instead of turning up the heat.
• Be efficient. Buy energy efficient appliances and lightbulbs
• Get political. Write Gordon Brown to ask him to get tough on climate change (this takes you to the icount website, where you'll have to quickly login to continue)

Money

Here are a few interesting ways to change the way we collect, spent and save our pounds:

• Barter with your friends. Instead of spending money on things like haircuts, books and massages, find people with those skills and trade for services that you can offer. Your German or knitting know-how will never come in more handy!
• Freecycle. Find a group in your area and trade away.
• Put your money somewhere ethical. Bank with a co-operative or credit union instead of a high street bank.
• Free yourself from debt! Cut up that credit card or storecard, and stop consuming more than you earn. If you have to have a credit card, choose one that gives a percentage of profits to a good cause, like the Oxfam Visa card.
• Save resources. Call up your bank and ask to get paperless statements (make sure you're set up with internet banking first!)
  
• Be an informed consumer. When you buy something, make sure that you know what your pound is voting for.
  

Transport

There are many alternatives to sitting in traffic, breathing in exhaust fumes. Here are a few:

• Jump on your bicycle! Grab some national and local cycle route maps and start pedalling away. If you like to cycle in groups, find your nearest critical mass and join in on the last Friday of each month for a spontaneous ride through the streets.
• Get walking. You can even find walking route maps around London, Edinburgh and Birmingham online.
• Take public transport.
  

• Share rides. For the times when you need to drive, carshare or join a cooperative car scheme and gain access to pay-as-you-go shared vehicles
• Don't fly if you don't have to! If you only do one thing, do this. When it comes to long-distance travel, one small choice - like taking the train instead of a cheap flight - can make a HUGE difference. Even better, take the bus if you can.
• Lobby for your city or town to become more bike and pedestrian-friendly. Join a local campaign for better transport , or become part of the London Cycling Campaign or the Cycle Campaign Network.

And a small note about waste

Okay, so maybe you're on a roll. Or maybe you've already done everything on this list and are looking for a challenge. In either case, here are a few waste-reducing actions you can take every single day. Think about these as the new and improved "3-Rs":

• Rethink: Do I need this?
• Refuse: "No, I don't need a bag (I brought my own)."
• Restore: Try to fix things instead of just throwing them out.
• Reduce: Get library books instead of buying new ones, and buy vintage clothes instead of new gear. If you're a woman, you can also reduce your waste by buying yourself a keeper, mooncup or luna pads.
• Reuse: Scrap paper, lunch containers, etc.
• Compost: It's like reusing food.
  
• Then, only when you've exhausted all the other options: Recycle!
  

Want to do more? There are heaps of other action ideas in the Otesha Book, which you can download for free on the Otesha Canada website.

The Otesha Project

• http://otesha.org.uk/ (UK)

• http://otesha.org.au/ (Australia)
  
  
• http://www.otesha.ca/ (Canada)
  

We’re taking sustainable living personally. Sometimes we’re nomadic cyclists, other times we’re improv theatre wizards and every so often you can find us shamelessly sowing seeds. We want to spread and share good ideas - from cycling to free-cycling; from free-range to fair trade – and create social and environmental change through our everyday lives.

At the heart of the Otesha Project you'll find a two-wheeled revolution. Every summer, teams of wonderful young people are hopping on bikes and travelling across the UK, stopping at schools, festivals and communities along the way to perform the Otesha play and generally make the world a better place.

We do other stuff too. We’re writing a book (we want you to help). We’re supporting your projects (we want to help you). We’re building a movement (we want you in it). Come ride with us.

If you're looking for the Otesha Project in Canada, you can find them at www.otesha.ca. There's also an Otesha Project Australia up and running - their online home is www.otesha.org.au.

Introducing the Otesha Project UK

"Otesha" is a Swahili word that means "reason to dream."

The Otesha Project UK is a youth-led organisation that's mobilising our generation to create social and environmental change through our everyday lives.

I guess you could call us ambitious, or maybe just foolish. In either case, we decided that cycling across the world's second largest country just wasn't enough. You see, we were really inspired by the amazing, creative things the Otesha Project has been doing in Canada for the past five years. We wanted to do something here, too. Starting in the beginning of 2007, we gathered together a group of people from around the UK and took the project trans-Atlantic.

Our goals? To tackle big issues like climate change, injustice and poverty in creative ways, starting with our own lives and actions. To build a community of people who are all doing the same thing, to inspire others to take practical environmental actions, and to have a bit of fun at the same time. We want to challenge 'norms' we don't like, speak out against the things we don't agree with, and do it in an exciting, creative way. We want to create something big. A movement, even. Did I mention that we have big aspirations?

Here's how we're doing this:

1. Organising Otesha cycle tours that bring together teams of young people to travel around the UK in a mobile community, learn to live in a low-impact way and inspire thousands of others in schools, youth clubs & communities to make positive changes in their own lives.

2. Helping groups of young people start up projects about issues they care about, letting them develop leadership skills and make a real impact in their own communities at the same time. That's our Change Projects programme, which we've been piloting over the past two years and are about to scale up (and are bursting with excitment about!)

3. Providing ongoing support to our alumni (that's people who've been involved in cycle tours, local groups, or come into contact with us another way). Often once people get involved with Otesha, they want to keep on making positive change. Sometimes they want to start up their own projects, or give presentations at schools in their own communities, get work in the sustainability sector, find wicked volunteering opportunities, or even start up their own local groups. We help them do this.

4. Making great resources for all kinds of people that talk about social and environmental issues in a clear, practical and creative way. Who says living sustainably has to be boring? We've made a Handbook, a How to Change Things guidebook, Tools for Campaigners and we're currently developing resources for educators. We also have a monthly newsletter chock-full of interesting ideas, great local projects, and other thought-provoking nuggets.

From time to time, we also support special projects for new young leaders who want to tackle big social and environmental challenges. Last year, we helped to create, train and coordinate the first ever UK Youth Delegation to a UN Climate Change Conference.

• The Otesha Book
  • About the book
  • Food
  • Money
  • Fashion
  • Energy
  • Trade
  • Transport
  • Media
  • Water
• Otesha's Adventures

About the book

This is our shiny, brilliantly informative handbook. We'd like it to be as participatory and inclusive as possible, so we're inviting you to send us your stories too!

Download the Handbook here

(warning, it's a pretty big file)

Sometimes you gotta point out the downright daft things that society seems to have accepted as normal and try and shake some common sense into the world. We reckon, with a little bit of help from our friends (that includes you), we might just manage to do that. But we didn't want to stop there, so we've included loads of ideas of day-to-day actions we can easily take and gathered stories from other people who've started up projects that are so good, we wish we'd thought of 'em first. The Handbook follows on from the example set by our Canadian counterparts. (Otesha Canada wrote a book and we don't like to be outdone, so we wanted one too.)

We broke the book down into eight different themes, so that each chapter's written on an issue we really want to shout out about. You can download and read one theme at a time or tackle the whole kit and kaboodle at once.

It's free for the world to read, share, and contribute to. So please download freely, read it through, and then tell us what you think. Like everything we do, this handbook is copyrighted with Creative Commons Share & Share Alike. What can we say, we like to share!

Here's what it looks like:

Download the whole Handbook to read more

Pun Pun

• http://www.punpunthailand.org/

Pun Pun is an organic farm, seed-saving operation, and sustainable living and learning center. We feel that only by living in a sustainable way ourselves, is it possible for us to create a model from which others can learn and live. Through natural cultivation on our organic farm we display ways of transitioning to, and living more sustainably. Through the living and learning center we experiment with appropriate technologies, organic farming, and natural building techniques. We discover the practices that work well for people and are practical. We then spread this knowledge to those individuals and networks that will put it to use. Through our seed-saving operation we seek to bring back indigenous and rare species of all kinds of vegetables, fruits, and medicinal herbs. We propagate them at the farm and then exchange them for greater use amongst farmers and other interested people, thus empowering and improving the health of the general public.

Auroville - Ecovillage

"Auroville wants to be a universal town where men and women of all countries are able to live in peace and progressive harmony above all creeds, all politics and all nationalities. The purpose of Auroville is to realise human unity."

Auroville Charter

1. Auroville belongs to nobody in particular.
   Auroville belongs to humanity as a whole.
   But to live in Auroville, one must be the willing servitor of the Divine Consciousness.
2. Auroville will be the place of an unending education,
   of constant progress, and a youth that never ages.
3. Auroville wants to be the bridge between the past and the future. Taking advantage of all discoveries from without and from within, Auroville will boldly spring towards future realisations.
4. Auroville will be a site of material and spiritual researches for a living embodiment of an actual Human Unity.

• http://www.auroville.org/index.htm

Group Activities, Games, Exercises & Initiatives

• http://wilderdom.com/games/
  
  

  Categories (in order of popularity) Team building activities & exercises Icebreakers, warmups, & energizers Group games for fun Ideas for camp activities & games Name games & get to know each other Trust-building activities Psychological self-awareness exercises Environmental education games Physical activities for groups Multicultural, cross-cultural & intercultural Peace education experiential activities Indigenous games & activities Ropes Courses (Rope Challenge Courses)

  Wilderdom Store gear, books, kits There is no security on this earth. Only opportunity. - Douglas Macarthur

  Recently added products Re-Zoom Zoom Fortune Cookie Debrief Mass Pass Deluxe Pipeline Kit 101 of the Best Corporate Team-building Activities Toxic Waste Helium Stick Essentials of Team Building: Principles and Practices Escapades Activity Box Chiji Cards Employee Opinion Survey Desktop Coach Bean Baggers Red Beads Experiment Restoring Safe School Communities: A whole school response to bullying, violence and alienation Ultra Ball -Replacement Bladder 72" Onward Bound: The First 50 Years of Outward Bound Australia 50 More Ways to Use Your Noodle: Loads of Land and Water Games With Foam Noodle Toys 50 Ways To Use Your Noodle: Loads of Land Games With Foam Noodle Toys Raptor and Other Team Building Activities Executive Marbles and Other Team Building Activities Feeding the Zircon Gorilla and Other Team Building Activities Beam Potpourri Recently added games Categories Dice Your Way to Multiple Futures 2 Truths & a Lie Amoeba Race Get To Know You Sociometric Questions Hello in Different Languages All Aboard! World Meal Mirror Image Chicken Stretch Seed->Flower Stretch Have You Ever? Solo Walk

  Most popular games Helium Stick Toxic Waste Balloon Games Survival Scenarios Mine Field Zoom & Re-Zoom Fear in a Hat Locus of Control Group Mandala Great Egg Drop Warp Speed Multi-Way Tug-of-War Group Juggle Human Knot Create Your Own Group Activity Wink Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About One Another Chair Game Ha-ha Gotchya! (Grab the Finger) Write Your Own Eulogy The Story of Your Name Giants, Wizards, Elves Animal Sounds Illusions Slice 'n Dice Wobbly Broomstick Willow in the Wind People Map Cocktail Party Eating Bugs Trust Lean Running Free Sensual Awareness Inventory Name Pantomime Secret Smells Solo Hour in Nature Hug-A-Tree Natural Orchestra

  eGroup postings Team building for the blind and dumb person in forest. PickTeams.com, the best new team-based games site Thank you friends Training Activities Adventure-based experiential learning network Teambuilders for Obama Group game resources About this site Introduction to group games Group-dynamic games (Wikipedia) Mega-list of 2000+ games Articles about games Books about games Game curricula Other game description sites Game quotes Life is like a game of cards. The hand you are dealt is determinism; the way you play it is free will. - Jawaharlal Nehru Play for more than you can afford to lose, and you will learn the game. - Winston Churchill Once the game is over, the King and the pawn go back in the same box. - Italian proverb You can discover more about a person in an hour of play than in a year of conversation. -Plato My work is a game, a very serious game. - MC Escher Seek, above all, for a game worth playing. - Robert S. de Ropp Make games important but not predominant. - Kurt Hahn Whatever games are played with us, we must play no games with ourselves. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

  
  
  
• http://improvencyclopedia.org/

Improv Encyclopedia

Improv Encyclopedia is the largest collection or resources for improvisation theater on the web. Here you will find tons of stuff related to improvisation theatre.

For those not particularly looking for improv-related material we feature:

• Icebreakers: games or activities that help "break the ice" at events where there are lots of people who don't know each other
• Warm-ups: games to get people in a playful mood
• games and exercises to promote group Group Trust
• exercises and games to encourage Spontaneity
• lots of drama and theater Games
  

This site is organized in 3 large sections:

• Our encyclopedia of Improv Games, listing over 500 improv, drama and theater games & exercises, organized in 30-odd Categories
• A list of Improv References
• A comprehensive Improv Glossary
  

If you want access to the material when you're off line, you can download the whole site, either as HTML, or as a PDF Booklet. We even have a version for your PDA.

And best of all, it's free!

Sustainable Meeting Guide

Green Guide

A Place Called Ananda

The Trial by Fire that Forged One of the Most Successful Cooperative Communities in the World Today by J. Donald Walters (Swami Kriyananda) A Direct Disciple of Paramhansa Yogananda You can find a brief biography of J. Donald Walters, as well as books and videos, at the official Swami Kriyananda website.

Listen to J. Donald Walters (Swami Kriyananda) Read A Place Called Ananda Individual chapters are available for listening with RealPlayer streaming audio. This book shows that small communities of individuals seeking a new way of living can provide a model for the present age. A Place Called Ananda is dedicated to all those who want inner freedom. It proves that such freedom is attainable. Little groups of individuals can accomplish what large social groups have never been able to achieve. The Ananda communities, in their history of over thirty years, have demonstrated that attitudes of kindness, sharing, and cooperation actually work. J. Donald Walters (Swami Kriyananda), author of over 85 books and composer of over 400 works of music, has devoted his life primarily to helping develop the cooperative community movement. Eight model Ananda communities thrive in America, Italy, and India. After numerous "trials by fire"–figurative as well as literal–J. Donald Walters, and those who chose to share this dramatic adventure with him, have succeeded to the point where theirs is a story that needs to be heard. You will find in these pages a deeply meaningful story. If what you seek in life is greater inspiration and understanding, you will find here a fulfillment. The story is different, yes. In some ways it is highly unusual. Its underlying message, however, is universal. Part One Introduction Photos 1. Yogananda's Mission to the West 2. Master's Commission to Me 3. Organizing the Work 4. The Third Presidency 5. Polarization 6. Six Blind Boys and an Elephant 7. Rights and Wrongs 8. I Go to India 9. My First Year in India 10. My First Lecture Tour 11. Fresh Water for Dirty Drains 12. I Return to America 13. The Delhi Project 14. The Reaction 15. Retrospect 16. Afterthoughts Part Two 17. Getting My 'Sea Legs' 18. 'Your Work is Writing and Lecturing' 19. Seclusion vs. Outward Activity 20. A Choice is Thrust Upon Me 21. I Take Up Writing Music 22. I Dive Into the Water 23. "New Age" Movements 24. Crystal Clarity 25. Land Ahoy! 26. Domes and Self-Expansion 27. Ananda Retreat 28. Hidden Influences 29. Community Beginnings 30. Karmic Patterns Conclusion Afterword

Hope for a Better World - The Small Communities Solution

by J. Donald Walters
Read the entire book online. We will be posting a new chapter of this newly edited version each week. Preface It isn't usual, surely, for a book to go to a fourth revised edition in a year. Such has been the case with this book. It isn't that the former editions were faulty. Rather, I kept seeing ways of clarifying the thoughts with better wording and examples. In the over eighty books I've written, this is the first time I've so reworked what had seemed good copy. For one thing, however, with the earlier versions of this book I faced deadlines—the writer's curse! Reading the chapters at greater leisure, I saw points here and there that could have been expressed more interestingly. A book like this needs, I feel, to be not only clear and logical, but fun to read. Not an easy undertaking when the subject matter is—well, let's face it—pretty heavy. In fact, I see now that what I've done here is take on the big guns of Western thought. That isn't something one does lightly. I've labored many times now over these pages, and I do think I've got it where I want it—like a wrestler who, after great effort, gets his opponent pinned to the floor. Huff! Puff! My friends, I hope you agree. J. Donald Walters Hope for a Better World! ·Table of Contents ·Foreword ·Chapter 1 ·Chapter 2 ·Chapter 3 ·Chapter 4 ·Chapter 5 ·Chapter 6 ·Chapter 7 ·Chapter 8 ·Chapter 9 ·Chapter 10 Also See: Interview with the Author World Brotherhood Colonies
Hope for a Better World! The Small Communities Solution By J. Donald Walters Fourth, definitive edition Copyright 2002 by Hansa Trust

Intentional Communities: Lifestyles Based on Ideals

by Geoph Kozeny of Community Catalyst Project, San Francisco, California

Drawing on information from his visits to hundreds of communities across the continent, Geoph Kozeny gives an overview of the communities movement -- not only its current state, but also how it has evolved and its prospects for the future. He points out the common bonds that link communities in spite of their diversity.

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T ODAY MANY PEOPLE ARE QUESTIONING our society's values, and asking what gives meaning to life. They bemoan the "loss of community," and are looking for ways to reintroduce community values into their lives.

There are several options now available to the average person that satisfy at least the basic cravings: many folks get involved with various civic or social change groups; others get more deeply involved in the activities of their church; still others create friendships and support networks in their neighborhoods. Those with strong motivation to live their values "full time" often seek to join or create intentional communities.

An "intentional community" is a group of people who have chosen to live together with a common purpose, working cooperatively to create a lifestyle that reflects their shared core values. The people may live together on a piece of rural land, in a suburban home, or in an urban neighborhood, and they may share a single residence or live in a cluster of dwellings.

This definition spans a wide variety of groups, including (but not limited to) communes, student cooperatives, land co-ops, cohousing groups, monasteries and ashrams, and farming collectives. Although quite diverse in philosophy and lifestyle, each of these groups places a high priority on fostering a sense of community--a feeling of belonging and mutual support that is increasingly hard to find in mainstream Western society.

Intentional communities are like people--you can categorize them based on certain distinguishing characteristics, but no two are ever identical. Differences among them, whether obvious or subtle, can be attributed to variations in philosophy, in mission or project emphasis, in behavioral norms, or in the personality and style of the leaders (if the group has identified leaders), and the individual members. Each group is somehow unique.

A Time-Honored Idea

Mainstream media typically promote the popular myth that shared living began with the "hippie crash pads" of the '60s--and died with the arrival of "yuppies" in the late '70s and early '80s.

The truth, however, is quite different. Today there are literally thousands of groups, with hundreds of thousands of members, that live in intentional communities and extended families based on something other than blood ties. This type of living has been around for thousands of years, not just decades.

It is well documented that early followers of Jesus banded together to live in a "community of goods," simplifying their lives and sharing all that they owned. That tradition continues to this day, particularly through many inner-city Christian groups that live communally. These groups often pool resources and efforts in their ministry to the homeless, the poor, orphans, single parents, battered women, and otherwise neglected and oppressed minorities.

Yet shared living goes back much farther than that, predating the development of agriculture many thousands of years ago. Early hunter-gatherers banded together in tribes, not just blood-related families, and depended on cooperation for their very survival.

The advent of the isolated nuclear family is, in fact, a fairly recent phenomenon, having evolved primarily with the rise of industrialization, particularly the development of high-speed transportation. As transportation has become cheaper and faster, we've also witnessed an increase in transience, and the demise of the traditional neighborhood.

Roots & Realities

Although many contemporary community visions emphasize the creation of neighborhood and/or extended family ties, their philosophic roots are amazingly diverse. The range includes Christians, Quakers, and followers of Eastern religions, to '60s drop-outs, anarchists, psychologists, artists, back-to-the-land survivalists--and the list goes on.

The scope of their primary values is equally broad, including ecology, equality, appropriate technology, self-sufficiency, right livelihood, humanist psychology, creativity, spirituality, meditation, yoga, and the pursuit of global peace. However, even among groups that base their philosophy on "achieving a holistic view of the world," it would be quite surprising to discover a community that has achieved "perfection" amidst the fast-paced chaos of modern life. Communities draw their membership from society at large, and those members bring with them generations of social conditioning. The attitudes, behaviors, and institutions prevalent in the broader society--including the very things we seek alternatives to--are a significant part of our upbringing. Merely identifying a problem and expressing a desire to overcome it does not mean that we presently have the perspective or skills needed to transcend it. The problems we see "out there" in the mainstream--greed, dishonesty, excessive ego, lack of self-esteem, factionalism, inadequate resources, poor communication skills, you name it--all manage to find a significant role in alternative cultures as well.

What is encouraging about many intentional communities is their tendency to be open to new ideas, their willingness to be tolerant of other approaches, and their commitment to live in a way that reflects their idealism. Although communities exist that are close-minded and bigoted, they're the exception, not the rule. More often than not, people who consciously choose to live in an intentional community also have parallel interests in ecology, personal growth, cooperation, and peaceful social transformation--pursuing the work necessary to change destructive attitudes and behaviors often taken for granted in the prevailing culture.

Some Common Threads

Spirituality or religion, regardless of the specific sect or form, is probably the most common inspiration for launching a new community. Such groups bear a striking resemblance to their centuries-old predecessors--in spite of current developments in technology, education, psychology, and theology. Many of North America's leading centers for the study of meditation and yoga have been established by intentional communities based on the teachings of spiritual masters from the Far East. (Such centers include Kripalu in Massachusetts, Ananda Village in California, Satchidananda Ashram in Virginia, Ananda Marga in New York, and Maharishi University in Iowa. Each of these intentional communities serves a widely dispersed group of practitioners, including those who live in "sister" communities, and many who live "out there" in the wider society.)

Among secular communities, the inspiration is typically based on bold visions of creating a new social and economic order--establishing replicable models that will lead to the peaceful and ecological salvation of the planet. In some cases, however, secular groups may opt for isolation, seeking to escape the problems of the rest of the world by creating instead a life of self-sufficiency, simplicity, and serenity.

Most members of intentional communities share a deep-felt concern about home, family, and neighborhood. Beyond the obvious purpose of creating an extended-family environment for raising a family, communities create an environment of familiarity and trust sufficiently strong that doors can safely be left unlocked. In today's world of escalating crime, merely having that kind of security may be reason enough to join.

Dozens of intentional communities, alarmed by rising student/teacher ratios and falling literacy rates in public schools, have opted to establish alternative schools and to form communities as a base of support for that type of education. Intentional communities comprise a sizeable chunk of the membership of the National Coalition of Alternative Community Schools, an organization of private schools, families, and individuals who share a commitment to create a new and empowering structure for education. Coalition members publish a quarterly newsletter and organize an annual spring conference for sharing resources and skills for social change.

Other communities, usually smaller, have created rural homesteads where they can pursue homeschooling without fear of legal pressure from local school officials. State laws favorable to schooling at home have been promoted, and in some cases initiated, by members of intentional communities. Many communities that homeschool are active in national associations organized specifically to support parents' rights, promote topical networking, and to increase the nation's awareness of homeschooling as a viable educational option.

Another popular issue these days is ecology. Over 90 percent of contemporary communities I've visited, including those located in urban areas, practice recycling and composting. Many serve as model environments or teaching centers for sustainable agriculture and appropriate technology, and feature such concepts as permaculture, organic gardening, grey water systems, solar and wind power, and passive solar home design. Eco-Home, a small shared household in Los Angeles, is an inspiring model of how to live ecologically in an urban environment. "The Farm," a large cooperative community in rural Tennessee, has launched a wide range of environmentally focused projects, including the development of advanced radiation detection equipment; a solar electronics company; a solar car company; the Natural Rights Center (an environmental law project); and a publishing company that specializes in books about environmental issues, vegetarian cooking, natural health care, midwifery, Native Americans, children's stories, and pesticide-free gardening.

In the late 1960s, a wave of new communities influenced by the antiwar movement, the "sexual revolution," rock music, more permissive attitudes about drugs, and the popularization of Eastern religions sprung up to create cooperative lifestyles based on sexual liberation, born-again Christianity, and everything in between. In effect, these often naively idealistic utopian experiments functioned as a pressure cooker for personal and collective growth. Although many of the '60s groups folded during the creative but turbulent decade that followed, hundreds have survived into the '90s and are now thriving--having reevaluated, restructured, and matured over the years.

B.F. Skinner's book, Walden Two (a futurist novel based on his theories of behavioral psychology), inspired the creation of at least a dozen communal experiments. Los Horcones, one such community near Sonora, Mexico, is today one of the world's foremost experiments in behaviorist theory.

The Franchise Approach

Some communities hit upon a combination of philosophy and lifestyle that enables them to thrive. Occasionally one will embark on a program of systematic colonization to spread its message and its influence.

During the Reformation, a group of German Anabaptists decided to pool their goods and unite in Christian brotherhood. Jakob Hutter emerged as a primary leader five years later, in 1533. The community prospered, and subsequently formed many new colonies. Today there are nearly 400 colonies of the Hutterian Brethren in Canada and the United States, and a few more in South America and Europe. When a Hutterian community reaches its optimum capacity (100 - 150 members), the group acquires a new piece of land, builds a new set of structures (homes, barns, schools, etc.) acquires more agricultural equipment, and outfits an entire new facility. Then the population divides into two groups--one group staying at the original site, and one moving on to the new one. Neighboring colonies support each other with backup labor and various resources, an approach that yields a very high ratio of success for the new colonies.

Each colony has common work and a common purpose, and most have an economic base of large-scale, machine-powered agriculture within an organizational structure resembling that of a producer cooperative. They have been so successful in their endeavors that in the '80s some of their neighbors on the Canadian plains initiated lawsuits to prevent Hutterites from acquiring more land, claiming that their modernized agricultural base and communal economy amounted to "unfair competition." Because the Hutterites have retained many of their original customs--including dress, family structure, a simple lifestyle, and the German language--many outsiders find the Hutterites to be quite out of place when compared to their contemporary neighbors.

In contrast, members of Emissaries of Divine Light, another spiritually based association, manage to fit right in with the mainstream culture. The Emissaries, founded in the early '30s, have a network of 12 major communities plus a number of urban centers that span the globe. Their overall focus is directed toward achieving a more effective and creative life experience, developing spiritual awareness without rules or a specific belief system. Their lifestyle would be described by many as "upper middle class," and business oriented. Nuclear family units, though not mandated, are the norm. Emissaries pride themselves on being on good terms with their neighbors. One long-standing resident of an Emissary community at the edge of a small Canadian town was elected mayor of the town for 15 consecutive years. The Emissary business staff is well respected--so much so that government tax officials in British Columbia regularly consult Emissary personnel before deciding on strategies for implementing new tax laws and regulations concerning nonprofit corporations.

The connections between and among the various Emissary communities worldwide are maintained in many ways: inspirational talks and special events are always recorded, and transcripts are kept on file at each Emissary center; some events are recorded on video, with copies distributed by mail; on a weekly basis, several centers link up via satellite for instantaneous transmission of related presentations originating from multiple locations. Most active members receive regular Emissary publications, some of which provide a network overview, and others which document the work of special interest subgroups. For example, many of the major Emissary centers have agricultural operations, which grow much of the food consumed by residents and guests. Known as "stewardship farms," these separate operations are managed and staffed by members who regularly share ideas and information about long-term sustainable agriculture. This special interest group publishes a regular newsletter and organizes periodic conferences, planning meetings, and exchange visits.

Network Alliances

The popular myth that the intentional communities movement died in the early '80s has been discouraging to many of the intentional communities that survived and thrived on their own. Many contemporary groups have suffered a lack of contact and support due to their mistaken impression that they were among the few survivors of a bygone era. Fortunately, there is growing interest shared by a growing number of independent communities who desire contact with like-minded groups, both nearby and around the world. Regional, continental, and even intercontinental networks--alliances for the sharing of ideas, resources, and social interests--are gaining support and visibility, thus enabling groups to learn from each others' failures and long-term successes.

One network of more than 50 Catholic Worker houses publishes a periodic newspaper and organizes occasional gatherings for the sharing of ideas, skills, rituals, friendship, and solidarity. Another values-based network is the Fellowship for Intentional Community (FIC), a North American network created to promote shared living in whatever forms it may take. The Fellowship handles thousands of inquiries yearly from seekers hoping to find a community to join, from communities looking for new members, from academics doing research, and from media people gathering material for stories. A third organization of note is the Federation of Egalitarian Communities (FEC), established to promote and develop democratically run communities based on equality, income sharing, nonviolence, cooperation, ecology, and sustainability. FEC encourages the identification and elimination of the "isms" (racism, sexism, classism, ageism, etc.), and emphasizes the importance of ongoing contact among member groups.

FEC communities tax themselves $200 per year plus one percent of net revenues, using this fund to finance joint recruitment campaigns, fundraising, and travel to meetings and between communities. They have also created a voluntary joint security fund for protection against the economic strain of large medical bills. This fund has now grown to more than $100,000 and is used in part as a revolving loan fund that provides low-interest loans to projects and community businesses compatible with FEC values. Member communities also participate in a labor exchange program that allows residents of one community to visit another and receive labor credit at home for work done away. This is especially handy when one community's peak workload occurs during another's off season, and the labor flows back and forth when most appreciated. The exchange of personnel also offers an opportunity to take a mini-vacation, learn a new skill, make new friends, maintain old ones, and share insights about common experiences.

The Federation also aspires to document collectively acquired wisdom, making it available to the public for the cost of copying and postage. They have created a "Systems & Structures Package"--a compilation of written documents on bylaws, membership agreements, property codes, behavior norms, labor and governance systems, visitor policies, and ideas about what to do when you have too many dogs. The point of sharing this information is to help new (and even some not-so-new) communities ease through the struggles of creating appropriate structures, offering models for what to do when good will and best intentions are not enough.

A Contemporary Wave

Historically, participation in shared living communities has come in cycles. One major wave just ahead of the U.S. Civil War included Brook Farm, an educational experiment that attracted the likes of Henry David Thoreau, Nathaniel Hawthorne, and Ralph Waldo Emerson. Other notable waves followed--one at the end of the last century including some still existing "Single Tax Colonies" (based on the economic philosophy of Henry George), one immediately preceding World War I, and another during the Great Depression. The last wave came out of the counter-culture in the '60s, and now a new wave is beginning. This 1994 edition of the Communities Directory documents more than 50 new communities started during the past five years, and that's merely the tip of the iceberg. Also listed are more than 160 that have survived at least a decade, and 80 others that have been in existence for more than two decades.

It is apparent that people--dissatisfied with the gap between their ideals and reality--will keep trying out new approaches until they find lifestyles that solve most of the problems they see in the dominant culture. History suggests that the process is endless. To paraphrase Karl Marx: today's solutions to yesterday's problems introduce new dynamics that become tomorrow's problems. An exciting feature of today's intentional communities movement is that its members are actively seeking to identify problems, working to find solutions, and trying to implement new insights in their daily lives.

Many contemporary groups are exploring ways to achieve a true sense of community while maintaining a balance between privacy and cooperation, a concept quite compatible with values prevalent in mainstream society today. Perhaps by emphasizing common concerns rather than differences in our lifestyle choices, innovations will find their way more quickly across cultural lines.

Although shared living does not appeal to everyone, history confirms again and again that ongoing social experiments inevitably lead to a variety of new social and technical innovations--developments that will eventually find many useful applications in other segments of society. It's hard to predict just when an intentional community will come up with something new that will be assimilated by mainstream culture. However, if social experimenting results in a product, a process, or a philosophy that makes life a little easier or a bit more fulfilling, then we'd be well advised to keep an open mind as we monitor the progress.

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About the Author

Geoph Kozeny has been "on the road" since New Year's Day 1988, visiting over 250 intentional communities scattered across North America. He is himself a seasoned veteran of cooperative living -- having lived in communities of one kind or another for over 20 years. Geoph is coordinator for the FIC communities database, serves on the Fellowship board, and is a regular columnist for Communities magazine. He volunteers full-time for the Community Catalyst Project, a nonprofit organization he created to (1) help communities get in touch with each other, (2) provide technical assistance and support, (3) offer referrals for seekers, and (4) promote public awareness of community living as a viable lifestyle option. Geoph's primary educational tool is a slide show he compiled (and regularly updates) to provide a representative overview of the backgrounds, philosophies, and lifestyles currently available in shared living communities. Another version of this overview of intentional communities has been published in Claude Whitmyer's book, In the Company of Others (Jeremy Tarcher, San Francisco, 1993).