10 Commandments of Commons Economics

Michel Bauwens.

How Peer Production can create a future that’s free, fair & sustainable

Photo by Lawrence OP under a Creative Commons license.

This is a synthesis of ten years of research by the P2P Foundation on the emerging practices of new productive communities and the ethical entrepreneurial coalitions that create livelihoods for shared resources. It was written for the Uncommons conference in Berlin last October by P2P  founder Michel Bauwens.

As we have tried to show elsewhere, the emergence of commons-oriented peer production has generated the emergence of a new logic of collaboration between open productive communities who created shared resources (commons) through contributions, and those market-oriented entities that created added value on top or along these shared commons.
This article addresses the emerging practices that should inspire these entities of the ‘ethical’ economy. The main aim it to create new forms that go beyond the traditional corporate form and its extractive profit-maximizing practices of value extraction. Instead of extractive forms of capital, we need generative forms, that co-create value with and for the commoners.
I am using the form of commandments to explain the new practices. All of them have already emerged in various forms, but need to be generalized and integrated.
What the world and humanity, and all those beings that are affected by our activities require is a mode of production, and relations of production, that are “free, fair and sustainable" at the same time.
I. OPEN AND FREE
1. Thou shalt practice open business models based on shared knowledge
Closed business models are based on artificial scarcity. Though knowledge is a non- or anti-rival good that gains in use value the more it is shared, and though it can be shared easily and at very low marginal cost when it is in digital form, many extractive firms still use artificial scarcity to extract rents from the creation or use of digitized knowledge. Through legal repression or technological sabotage, naturally shareable goods are made artificially scarce, so that extra profits can be generated. This is particularly galling in the context of life-saving or planet-regenerating technological knowledge. The first commandment is therefore the ethical commandment of sharing what can be shared, and of only creating market value from resources that are scarce and create added value on top or along these commons. Open business models are market strategies that are based on the recognition of natural abundance and the refusal to generate income and profits by making them artificially scarce.
Thou shalt find more information on this here 

II. FAIR
2. Thou shalt practice open co-operativism
Many new more ethical and generative forms are being created, that have a higher level of harmony with the contributory commons. The key here is to choose post-corporate forms that are able to generate livelihoods for the contributing commoners.
Open cooperatives in particular would be cooperatives that share the following characteristics:
1) they are mission-oriented and have a social goal that is related to the creation of shared resources
2) they are multi-stakeholder governed, and include all those that are affected by or contributing to the particular activity
3) they constitutionally, in their own rules, commit to co-create commons with the productive communities
I often add the fourth condition that they should be global in organisational scope in order to create counter-power to extractive multinational corporations.
Cooperatives are one of the potential forms that commons-friendly market entitities could take. We see the emergence of more open forms such as neo-tribes (think of the workings of the Ouishare community), or more tightly organized neo-builds, such as Enspiral.org, Las Indias or the Ethos Foundation. Yet more open is the network form chose by the Sensorica open scientific hardware community, which wants to more tightly couple contributions with generated income, by allowing all microtasked contributions in the reward system, through open value or contributory accounting (more below).
Thou shalt find more information on this here.

3. Thou shalt practice open value or contributory accounting
Peer production is based on distributed tasks, freely contributed by an open community-driven collaborative infrastructure. The tradition of salaries based on fixed job description may not be the most appropriate way to reward those that contribute to such processes. Hence, the emergence of open value accounting or contributory accounting. As practiced already by Sensorica, this means that any contributor may add contributions, log them according to project number, and after peer evaluation is assigned ‘karma points’. When income is generated, it flows into these weighted contributions, so that every contributor is fairly rewarded. Contributory accounting, or other similar solutions, are important to avoid that only a few contributors closely related to the market capture the value that has been co-created by a much larger community. Open book accounting ensure that the (re)distribution of value is transparent for all contributors.
Thou shalt find more information on this here.

4. Thou shalt insure fair distribution and benefit-sharing through Copyfair licensing
The copyleft licenses allow anyone to re-use the necessary knowledge commons on the condition that changes and improvements are added to that same commons. This is a great advance, but should not be abstracted from the need for fairness. When moving to physical production which involves finding resources for buildings, raw materials and payments to contributors, the unfettered commercial exploitation of such commons favours extractive models. Thus the need to maintain the knowledge sharing, but to ask reciprocity for the commercial exploitation of the commons, so that there is a level playing field for the ethical economic entities that do internalize social and environmental costs. This is achieved through copyfair licenses, which allow full sharing of the knowledge but ask for reciprocity in exchange for the right of commercialization.
Thou shalt find more information on this here. 

5. Thou shalt practice solidarity and mitigate the risks of work and life through Commonfare practices
One of the strong results of financial and neoliberal globalization is that the power of nation-states has gradually weakened, and there is now a strong and integrated effort to unwind the solidarity mechanisms that were embedded in the welfare state models. As long as we do not have the power to reverse this slide, it is imperative that we reconstruct solidarity mechanisms of distributed scope, a practice which we could call ‘commonfare’. Examples such as the Broodfonds (Netherlands), Friendsurance (Germany) and the health sharing ministries (U.S.), or cooperative entities such Coopaname in France, show us the new forms of distributed solidarity that can be developed to deal with the risks of life and work.
Thou shalt find more information on this here. 

III. SUSTAINABLE
6. Thou shalt use open and sustainable designs for an open source circular economy
Open productive communities insure maximum participation through modularity and granularity. Because they operate in a context of shared and abundant resources, the practice of planned obsolescence, which is a feature of profit-maximizing corporations, is alien to them. Ethical entrepreneurial entities will therefore use these open and sustainable designs and produce sustainable good and services.
Thou shalt find more information on this here. http://p2pfoundation.net/Category:Design

7. Thou shalt move beyond an exclusive reliance on imperfect market price signals towards mutual coordination of production through open supply chains and open book accounting
What decision-making is for planning, and pricing is for the market, mutual coordination is for the commons!
We will never achieve a sustainable ‘circular economy’--in which the output of one production process is used as an input for another-- with closed value chains in which every cooperation has to be painfully negotiated under conditions of little transparency. But entrepreneurial coalitions that are already co-dependent on a collaborative commons can create eco-systems of collaboration through open supply chains, in which the production process becomes transparent, and through which every participant can adapt his behaviour based on the knowledge available in the network. There is no need for over-production when the production realities of the network become common knowledge.
Thou shalt find more information on this here. 

8. Thou shalt practice cosmo-localization
“What is light is global, and what is heavy is local”: this is the new principle animating commons-based peer production in which knowledge is globally shared, but production can take place on demand and based on real needs through a network of distributed coworking and microfactories. Certain studies have shown that up to two-thirds of matter and energy goes not to production, but to transport, which is clearly unsustainable. A return to re-localized production is a sine qua non for the transition towards sustainable production.
Thou shalt find more information on this here.  

9. Thou shalt mutualize physical infrastructures
Platform cooperatives, data cooperatives and fairshare forms of distributed ownership can be used to co-own our infrastructures of production.
The misnamed sharing economy from AirBnB and Uber shows the potential of matching idle resources. Co-working, skillsharing, ridesharing are examples of the many ways in which we can re-use and share resources to dramatically augment the thermo-dynamic efficiencies of our consumption.
In the right context of co-ownership and co-governance, a real sharing economy can achieve dramatic advances in reduced resource use. Our means of production --inclusive machines -- can be mutualized and self-owned by all those that create value.
Thou shalt find more information on this here.  

10. Thou shalt mutualize generative capital
Generative forms of capital cannot rely on an extractive money supply that is based on compound interest that is due to extractive banks. We have to abolish the 38% financial tax that is owed on all goods and services and transform our monetary system, and substantively augment the use of mutual credit systems.
Thou shalt find more information on this here.

• Link: http://www.onthecommons.org/magazine/10-commandments-of-commons-economics

Livable Communities through Urban Forestry

By Suzanne H. Crowhurst Lennard, Ph.D.(Arch.), Director, IMCL

PART 1

WHY WE NEED TREES IN THE CITY

We know intuitively that we need trees in our cities. They enhance the public realm, provide shade, cool the air in summer, frame our experience of the city, and make the city more beautiful.

Most historic cities – especially in Europe – are graced by the presence of many trees. But it has been quite a fight to get modern architects and planners to accept these untidy, unruly, objects as co-inhabitants in the urban realm.

Modern cities around the world have been built as agglomerations of “objects in space”. Buildings are as large as possible to maximize real estate investment opportunities. Open space is used to showcase the architects’ daredevil, artistic, or outrageous fantasies. Trees would spoil the view, and moreover, they have an annoying habit of scattering their litter hither and thither in the fall.

Older, wealthy residential neighborhoods are usually filled with trees, and yet the poorest neighborhoods lack parks and street trees.

In our efforts to bring more trees into our cities, we have a great, new ally – Pope Francis – who in his encyclical[1] affirms: “We were not meant to be inundated by cement, asphalt, glass and metal, and deprived of physical contact with nature.“

The Pope speaks out against consumerist global development that benefits the economy at the expense not only of the poor – but of the earth: “…the earth herself, burdened and laid waste, is among the most abandoned and maltreated of our poor.”

Scientific Evidence:

Scientists in all manner of research fields – public health, pollution analysis, landscape architecture, child development, ecology, biology, etc … by now have published a plethora of research findings that show we humans need trees and other forms of nature in our lives in order to keep healthy; and that it is detrimental to the health of the earth to build cities without nature[2].

Air Pollution:

In highly air polluted areas (areas with high PM 2.5) you have about three times the rate of asthma, aggravation of heart or lung disease and premature mortality. The main causes are vehicles, industry, mining, and construction.

In Los Angeles, when the 405 freeway was closed, air quality improved 75% around the freeway, 25% across the region[3]. Now, it might be nice to solve this problem by closing all our freeways – but that would be a very long-term solution, if at all possible – involving re-planning our cities as “cities of short distances” and encouraging more people to accept alternate transportation modes. But in the short term, we need to get trees to help us.

Many studies show that trees remove air pollution[4] . This is of particular value in street canyons where vegetation can reduce particulate matter by as much as 60%.  AMEC Foster Wheeler [5] won an IMCL award at the 52^nd IMCL Conference for their work for the Greater London Authority illustrating how green infrastructure could improve air quality along some of London’s most polluted roads. In canyons, upper canopy trees are avoided because they can trap pollution below them, but more slender trees, as well as bushes and green walls can be invaluable.

Pine trees are especially effective – their needles pick up more particles than broad leafed trees[6]. Since particulates are heavier than air, pollution is worst close to the ground. Low bushes are therefore very efficient for cleaning the air for bicyclists and pedestrians, especially children.

Biodiversity:

Trees are keystone supports for wildlife habitat for breeding, shelter, and food. But a tree cannot be an ISLAND. One tree cannot provide all the food needed to support diverse birds, squirrels, and insects, so trees have to be linked to other trees, bushes, plants, flowers, and the earth.

We need to increase biodiversity in our cities[7]. Urban wildlife corridors are required to support the interaction of multiple species, supply diverse food sources, and provide safe routes for wildlife. This helps avoid habitat fragmentation, and territorial problems.

Not all trees are created equal. ‘Oaks benefit everything from caterpillars to songbirds. Even fish prosper, because the aquatic invertebrates they feed on favor oak leaves on stream bottoms’ reports Richard Conniff[8]. According to Douglas Tallamy, a University of Delaware entomologist, who published a ranking of trees and shrubs according to how many caterpillar species they harbor, In contrast to oaks, which accommodate 537 species, gingkoes host just three. Willows support over 450 species, including insects that provide food for birds.

Gingkoes may host just 3 species of caterpillars, but that is not to say we should ban gingkoes and other non-native trees from our streets entirely because they certainly are magnificently beautiful in the fall.

Beauty:

Beauty is also important. Where would Washington DC be without the Japanese cherry trees? And Portland’s Japanese garden would certainly be the poorer without the beautiful Japanese maple. And of course, beauty plays an important role in sustaining our psychological well-being.

Health:

We have known for many centuries that trees contribute to health and well-being. Hundreds of spa towns throughout Europe attest to this knowledge – and many of these spas have existed since Roman times. The treatment “prescription” that an Italian patient is given includes not only drinking the water, and taking mud baths, but also walking amid beautiful architecture in the park at Montecatini Terme and breathing deeply.

And a German patient may be prescribed treatment at Baden-Baden and told to take the waters, listen to the music at the café in the park, and take long walks beneath the massive trees along the banks of the rippling stream.

Numerous studies show that the availability of parks and green spaces increases the likelihood of physical exercise, and this results in better physical health, both for young and old[9].

Even the sight of a tree from one’s hospital room increases recovery from surgery[10] ,  and Kuo[11] has shown that a view of trees from one’s apartment reduces crime & aggression.

Almost all trees have medicinal properties[12] . The bark of the willow contains salicin, similar to the active ingredient in aspirin.  Eucalyptus is renowned for its antiseptic, antibacterial, anti-inflammatory and analgesic properties

Neighborhoods with more trees:

Research shows that the more trees you have in your neighborhood, and the larger the trees are, the better you rate your own health. Moreover, you are correct – because people living in neighborhoods with more and bigger trees have significantly fewer cardio-metabolic conditions[13].

While some trees produce a lot of pollen, and thus cause asthma, it has been found that in neighborhoods with more diverse trees[14], there is reduced asthma in kids.

In neighborhoods with more trees, mothers are significantly less likely to deliver undersized babies[15] , according to studies in 2011 by Geoffrey Donovan. This may in part have to do with reduced levels of stress. Being in green places among trees also protects emotional well-being in young and old[16].

Child development:

There is a tremendous amount of research on how all aspects of child development are affected by their access to trees and green areas. For example, play in nature improves balance & coordination[17] .

Contact with nature expands children’s sensory faculties and cognitive capacity[18] . Learning about nature requires a larger vocabulary than possibly any other subject (except, perhaps, learning about humans). Contact with nature has been shown to improve children’s concentration[19]  and emotional resilience[20].

Play in nature has been shown to encourage more social play[21] , and reduce[22] and relieve[23]  incidence of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). Play in nature also teaches responsibility and nurturing skills[24]  according to Cobb. 

Biophilia:

Edmund Wilson coined the term biophilia, explaining that bonding with nature that is alive – birds, animals, insects, and human beings increases love for the earth, sense of awe, and desire to protect the earth[25] .  At every age, we all feel more alive and enjoy life more when we are in touch with other living things.

Since trees are the cornerstone for biodiversity, we need trees to flourish in order for all other life to flourish.

Trees mediate air temperature:

“Large parks or residential neighborhoods with extensive vegetation can produce air temperature reductions as great as 10deg.F compared to nearby areas with little vegetation” according to McPherson and Simpson [26]. Trees shade buildings in summer and admit sun in winter reducing energy demands[27]. A large front yard tree can save about 9% of a typical home’s total air conditioning costs by shading the building from the afternoon sun and cooling the air around the building.

As a result of this air cooling effect, trees shape social life in public.  Outdoor cafes and restaurants benefit if they can take advantage of shade from trees in hot summer months. Benches that take advantage of shade will be more popular in the summer than those with no shade. In winter, the opposite is true.

Tree shade may also encourage spontaneous conversations in public: people are more likely to pause to talk if they are comfortable walking through a tree-shaded square on a summer day than if they are walking across the same square without trees; conversely, they are more likely to pause to converse if the square is sunny on a cold autumn or spring day. This argues for deciduous trees.

Trees hide ugly buildings:

Trees also offer us the most delightful advantage of hiding ugly buildings. I would have a lot of work for them if only they would grow taller!!!

                

This talk was presented at the Livable Communities through Urban Forestry Conference in Washington DC, August 6, 2015 by Suzanne H. Crowhurst Lennard, Ph.D. (Arch.), Director, International Making Cities Livable Conferences.

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[1]  http://w2.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/encyclicals/documents/papa-francesco_20150524_enciclica-laudato-si.html

[2] Kardan, O. et al. Neighborhood greenspace and health in a large urban center. Sci. Rep. 5, 11610; doi: 10.1038/srep11610 (2015).

[3]  Arthur Winer, Yifang Zhu and Suzanne Paulson. Carmageddon or Carmaheaven? Air Quality Results of a Freeway Closure. http://www.accessmagazine.org/articles/spring-2014/carmageddon-carmaheaven-air-quality-results-freeway-closure/

[4]  Nowak, D. J., Crane, D. E. & Stevens, J. C. Air pollution removal by urban trees and shrubs in the United States. Urban forestry & urban greening 4, 115–123 (2006)
Nowak, D. J., Hirabayashi, S., Bodine, A. & Greenfield, E. Tree and forest effects on air quality and human health in the United States. Environmental Pollution 193, 119–129 (2014).
 http://www.fs.fed.us/nrs/pubs/jrnl/2014/nrs_2014_nowak_001.pdf

[5] http://www.buildingcentre.co.uk/project/a-green-street-vision

[6]  Pugh, T. A. M., MacKenzie, A. R., Whyatt, J. D., Hewitt, C. N.: Effectiveness of Green Infrastructure for Improvement of Air Quality in Urban Street Canyons, Environ. Sci. Tech., 46, 7692-7699, http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/es300826w  , 2012.
See also http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-18873391   and http://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/121-a14/

[7]http://e360.yale.edu/feature/urban_nature_how_to_foster_biodiversity_in_worlds_cities/2725/

[8] http://e360.yale.edu/feature/urban_nature_how_to_foster_biodiversity_in_worlds_cities/2725/

[9]  Richardson, E.A.; Pearce, J,; Mitchell, R.; & Kingham, S. 2013. Role of physical activity in the relationship between urban green space and health. Public Health: doi: 10.1016/j.puhe.2013.01.004.
Epstein, Leonard H., S. Raja, S. Gold, R. Paluch, Y. Pak and James Roemmich  (2006). “Reducing Sedentary Behavior: The Relationship between Park Area and the Physical Activity of Youth.” Psychological Science, Vol 17, Issue 8: 654-659.

[10]  Ulrich RS. (1984) “View through a window may influence recovery from surgery.” Science.  224: 420-421

[11]  Kuo, Frances and Sullivan, William C., (2001). Aggression and Violence in the Inner City. Effects of Environment via Mental Fatigue. Environment & Behavior, Vol 33 No. 4. 543-571

[12]  http://treedoctorkc.com/how-trees-work-for-us/

[13] Kardan, O. et al. Neighborhood greenspace and health in a large urban center. Sci. Rep. 5, 11610; doi: 10.1038/srep11610 (2015).

[14]  Cariñanos, P., & Casares-Porcel, M. (2011). Urban green zones and related pollen allergy: A review. Some guidelines for designing spaces with low allergy impact. Landscape and Urban Planning, 101(3), 205–214

[15] http://www.oregonlive.com/health/index.ssf/2011/01/more_trees_in_a_city_bring_sur.html

[16]  Huynh, Q et al (2013). Exposure to public natural space as a protective factor for emotional well-being among young people in Canada. BMC Public Health. 2013 Apr 29;13:407. doi: 10.1186/1471-2458-13-407.

[17]  Grahn P., Martensson, F., Lindblad, B., Nilsson, P., & Ekman, A. (1997) “Ute på Dagis (Out in the Preschool)”. Stad and Land 145. Håssleholm, Sweden: Nora Skåne Offset
Fjortoft, I. (2001) “The Natural environment as a playground for children.” Early Childhood Education Journal 29 (3): 111-117.

[18]  Kellert, S. R., (2002). “Experiencing Nature: Affective, Cognitive, and Evaluative Development in Children.” In Kahn P, Kellert S eds. Children and Nature. Cambridge, MA, MIT Press

[19]  Wells, N. (2000) “At Home with Nature: Effects of ‘greenness’ on children’s cognitive functioning.” Environment and Behavior 32 (6): 775-795.

[20] Wells, N. & Evans. G. (2003) “Nearby nature: A buffer of life stress among rural children.” Environment and Behavior 35 (3): 311-330.

[21]  Kirkby, M. (1989) “Nature as Refuge in Children’s Environments.” Children’s Environments Quarterly 6 (1): 7-12.

[22]  Faber T. A  (2001) “Coping with ADD: The Surprising Connection to Green Play Settings.” Environment and Behavior. 22

[23] Kuo, F., & Faber Taylor, A. (2004). “A potential natural treatment for Attention- Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder: Evidence from a national study.” American Journal of Public Health, 94(9), 1580-1586.

[24]  Cobb E. (1977). The Ecology of Imagination in Childhood. New York: Columbia University Press

[25]  Wilson, Edward O. (1984). Biophilia. The Human Bond with other Species. Cambridge, MA & London, UK. Harvard University Press

[26]  McPherson, G. and J.R. Simpson, 1995. Shade trees as a demand-side resource. Home Energy Magazine. 12(2) (March/April). Available online at http://www.homeenergy.org/show/article/year/1995/magazine/90/id/1115

[27]  Pandit, R. & Laband, D. (2010). Energy Savings from Tree Shade. Ecological Economics 69 1324-1329

PART 2 

STRATEGIES FOR INCREASING THE URBAN FOREST

Parks are not the only way to increase the number of trees in the city, and the access to green areas. And indeed, the concept of the park – where it is, how large, what shape, and whether wild or cultivated - needs a little rethinking. Urban waterways, green streets, green buildings, community gardens also provide strategies for increasing the urban forest and access to nature.

 

Parks:
More important than just more, bigger parks is how accessible a park is. It is not sufficient to draw a quarter mile radius around the periphery of a park to determine how many people that park serves. Some large parks may be fenced, with only one or two entrances, so a quarter mile walk from that entrance may only reach a handful of homes. On the other hand, a small strip park alongside a stream in a densely populated area in the center of the city may offer easy access to thousands of families living within a quarter mile walk.



More trees and parks in poor neighborhoods:
The great scandal in the US is that while white and more affluent communities often have many old-growth trees and are well supplied with parks, low-income and ethnic neighborhoods have fewer parks[1] . This inequality clearly contributes to the lower health levels in poor neighborhoods. Poor neighborhoods are in greater need of street trees, and easy access to parks and community gardens than are wealthier neighborhoods. Following Kardan’s suggestions[2], one powerful way to make a city healthier would be to plant 10 trees per block in poor neighborhoods.

Create Green Fingers:

We need to follow the examples of new neighborhoods such as Vauban, in Freiburg, Germany that connect the green places, for the sake of humans and biodiversity. A small stream running along the southern edge of the Vauban neighborhood is protected as a natural area, and from this, three green fingers reach deep into the neighborhood, providing undisturbed natural habitat, natural play areas for different ages, and simple community areas for barbecues and social events.


The city of Portland is justly proud of its Park Blocks that run almost continuously for 17 blocks north to south through the city center. This extensive linear park contains 335 mature elm, oak, and maple trees and a rich assortment of wildlife, as well as human life. Portland is attempting to create additional natural corridors by linking neighborhood parks with green streets. The ultimate aim is to enable these green streets to function as biodiversity corridors.

Restore Urban Waterways:
Many of our cities used the river as their industrial heart. Rivers and river banks became polluted, unsuitable both for nature and for humans. Many cities have made major efforts to reclaim the industrial banks and clean the rivers, but there is much still to do. Trees such as willows need to be planted to help foster biodiversity, and to reconnect the regenerative power of the land-water interface. Ljubljana just won title of 2016 Green Capital of Europe in large part for their admirable restoration of their river banks.

Streams are biodiversity corridors but most streams in our cities have been channeled underground so as not to interfere with our use of the surface for construction and car access. Wherever possible we should try to bring them back to the surface as urban streams.

This has been accomplished in numerous European cities and towns. Freiburg, Germany uncovered the tiny streams called Bächle that run off the Black Forest through the streets of the old city, and these are now used to paddle in, and cool hot feet in the summer. The university town of Tübingen, Germany uncovered a stream that ran through the historic heart of the city. It now helps to cool the air in summer.

In slightly less dense urban areas it is possible to restore the stream’s natural banks. The reconstructed town of Plessis-Robinson, just south of Paris has restored streams and lakes as a central feature of their development, creating walkways, parks, and gardens along the banks.

 

Green Streets:
Streets are potential green fingers and biodiversity corridors. A few trees can encourage social life on the street. More trees, diverse trees, and a mix of bushes, earth, and rainwater ditches can foster greater species diversity. Street trees also help clean the air.

In Vauban, Freiburg, the narrow residential streets are an extension of the green fingers. These are Wohnstrasse (Living Streets), intended for children’s play, bikes and pedestrians. The only reason a vehicle is allowed in is for delivery or emergency access. Only handicapped residents are allowed to park there. Permeable stone lined rainwater channels are provided by the city, and residents may choose what tree they want in the strip owned by the city.

Vauban also has a network of traffic-free bike/pedestrian lanes through the most heavily wooded sections of the development.
Green pedestrian networks are also needed into and around the city center, to provide healthy pedestrian commuter routes. Almost every small town in England has a fine web of almost secret green rights of way that weave into the town center, nipping between houses and along the banks of streams in the suburban areas, through city blocks and along the borders of parks in the city center. Poundbury has created such a wealth of these pedestrian short cuts that the streets themselves sometimes seem deserted.

In Krakow, Poland a major pedestrian commuter route leads into the city center through a park.

In quiet neighborhoods, such as Carmel, or Berkeley, California trees also perform a grand job of calming traffic. This is a model easily adopted by residential neighborhoods.

Arterial roads carrying a great deal of traffic are in major need of greening to reduce pollution and slow traffic. This is especially important when the roads have stores and residential buildings on either side that require the ability to easily and safely cross the street. In these situations, even roads carrying heavy traffic need to widen sidewalks, add buffered bike lanes, reduce the number and width of traffic lanes, add crosswalks and roundabouts, and plant trees.

 

Green Buildings:
Trees can also help to provide green walls and roofs. In addition to climbers and vines trained on a scaffold across a façade, fruit trees have traditionally been grown in this way. Just imagine, leaning out of your bedroom window and picking a fresh pear for breakfast!

Trees can also be grown on roofs and terraces. Green roofs improve biodiversity, slow rainwater and keep buildings cool. Even green arbors, vines, small trees and gardens in pots on roof terraces – as can be seen on every other rooftop in Rome - help to cool the atmosphere, without requiring immensely high-tech structural solutions.


The most successful and well-tested projects I have seen are those by the artist Friedensreich Hundertwasser. The Hundertwasser House in Vienna is public housing commissioned by the City. It is human scale – 5 and 6 stories – with gardens and trees on terraces and on the roofs. The building is beloved by residents and tourists.

Hundertwasser has designed dozens of buildings all over Europe, but perhaps his most ambitious project is Bad Blumenau, an extensive spa village in Eastern Austria. Each building is a little hill, covered with grass and trees, creating a rolling green landscape. Here, the spa park is atop the buildings.

-Trees in Urban Public Places
We have a huge need in North America to rebuild community, regenerate a social network and increase democratic dialogue and civic engagement. This is important for many reasons, including the social and physical health of the population. Preventative action on the level of creating a healthy environment would also save billions of dollars in health care expenses.

Researchers in public health and social science have discovered that when people are tied into a rich daily pattern of face-to-face interaction with friends, familiars and neighbors, they do not fall ill so often, if they get sick it is not so serious, and they live to a riper old age. They have what is called a strong “Social Immune System”. 

It is a central tenet of IMCL that we desperately NEED more Community Places – squares and piazzas that generate social interaction. It is absolutely essential to bring people together, to build community in neighborhoods, to facilitate civic engagement and strengthen social immune systems.


Trees are an essential tool for achieving that goal. They shape social life.

In a community place, a tree creates the ideal location for an outdoor cafe or restaurant, or for public benches where elders can sit and watch the children playing, or lovers can embrace. A broad canopied tree filtering the sunlight will enhance a café or restaurant. A smaller tree giving dark shade will provide a cool corner for a couple of benches.

Trees keep the paving cooler. So a square with many trees supports many conversations on the move, peripatetic, as people’s paths cross, while they make errands, commute to and from work.



Whenever we want to bring people together in the city, trees must play a major part. Outdoor farmers markets, like those in Aix-en-Provence, or on Portland’s South Park blocks, benefit from the trees. The plane trees in Aix, and the oak, elm and maple trees in Portland keep the produce fresh, and make the market even more inviting for humans.

Munich’s Viktualienmarkt, a combination of a vast farmers market and beer garden, at the heart of Munich, is magnificently shaded by chestnut trees.

We need more public squares that are free of traffic, where people shop, meet, walk, eat out, meet friends, and enjoy their city, and these squares need trees!

This is the second part of a talk presented at the Livable Communities through Urban Forestry Conference in Washington DC, August 6, 2015 by Suzanne H. Crowhurst Lennard, Ph.D. (Arch.), Director, International Making Cities Livable Conferences.

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[1] Estabrooks PA1, Lee RE, Gyurcsik NC. (2003) Resources for physical activity participation: does availability and accessibility differ by neighborhood socioeconomic status? Ann Behav Med. 2003 Spring;25(2):100-4.
Powell LM, Slater S, Chaloupka FJ, Harper D. Availability of physical activity-related facilities and neighborhood demographic and socioeconomic characteristics: a national study. Am J Public Health. 2006;96:1676–80.

[2]  Kardan, O. et al. Neighborhood greenspace and health in a large urban center. Sci. Rep. 5, 11610; doi: 10.1038/srep11610 (2015).

Source links: 

http://www.livablecities.org/articles/livable-communities-through-urban-forestry-part-1

http://www.livablecities.org/articles/livable-communities-through-urban-forestry-part-2

 

Healthy Streets for Children

By Lamine Mahdjoubi

Lamine Mahdjoubi, Faculty of the Built Environment at the University of the West of England challenged the audience: “A lot of people say that a livable city is one that is livable for children. But as I am going to show, in cities around the world, children are disappearing from our urban environment. I will share with you some of the work we have been doing in looking at the link between child play, health and the built environment. 

“The Good Child Enquiry by the Children Society asked thousands of children throughout the UK “What is your definition of a good life?” The first thing is friendship. Socializing is a very powerful measure of a “good life” for children. The second important thing is play. Play is a powerful catalyst for children to socialize, exercise, etc.” The study also showed that children have fewer friends than before, said Lamine, so there are fewer opportunities for them to socialize. They are spending less time playing out of doors, and more time sitting indoors. Nearly twenty percent of children play outside less than one hour per week.

“Children used to play close to home on the street, so the rise of the car has had the biggest impact on children’s play. And we seem to have become obsessed with the idea that children have to play in ghettoized playgrounds. But our work at the University of the West of England has found that children find playgrounds boring.” Lamine examines the recent changes in patterns of child play nationally, where economic resources are going, and the various barriers to children’s play, including parental attitudes. He then presents his research that compares play in formal playgrounds, with informal play in the street.

He concludes that we have to find a way to make our streets safer and more attractive for children, to entice them back to the street, because this is where children’s health can benefit most from extensive physical activity, and where children can experience the most rewarding social interaction with their friends.

 

Source: http://www.livablecities.org/blog/healthy-streets-children-lamine-mahdjoubi

Loneliness is Life Threatening: We Can Design Cities to Foster Community

From Livale Cities

We urban planners need to stop creating a built environment that is making people sick and causing premature deaths. I am not talking here about the dangers of traffic or pollution, lack of healthy food, or damage to the eco-system. I am talking about how some of the most common forms of urban development – suburban sprawl and vertical high-rise sprawl - cause loneliness, which can lead to depression, chronic inflammation, and life-threatening diseases, including increased risk of cancer. “Loneliness”, says Steve Cole, a genomics researcher at the University of California, Los Angeles, “really is one of the most threatening experiences we can have.”

NPR recently reported on a study by Cole published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.  Cole noticed that when people felt lonely, they had significantly higher levels of norepinephrine in their blood. Norepinephrine is the chemical that protects us in life-threatening situations, and stimulates the production of white blood cells needed to heal wounds. The problem is, this process also shuts down immune defenses making us more vulnerable to infections.

These chemical reactions in the body may have evolved in prehistoric times when we lived in tribes. A lone individual was vulnerable to attack from animals or hostile tribes. But the human body’s responses are still the same today.

Cole’s study from the field of genomics explains the chemical changes in the body that account for a phenomenon long observed by researchers in public health and social sciences: persons with a strong social network involving daily face-to face interaction with a wide variety of people don’t get sick so often, if they get sick, it isn’t so serious, and they live to a greater old age. Social scientists have concluded that those with strong social networks have built up a strong “social immune system” that protects their mental and physical health.

Social isolation is associated with poor physical and mental health and early death. At its worst extreme, for example, prisoners who are held in social isolation, it is justly deemed torture and can lead to madness, self-immolation and suicide. In its less dramatic and more common situations, such as elders with limited mobility who live alone in a high-rise apartment, or children and youth in sprawling suburbs who are told to go straight home after school, not to play on the street, and to wait home alone for their commuting parents, loneliness can have more subtle, but nonetheless devastating effects on health.

And chronic loneliness may amplify chemicals in the brain associated with fear and anxiety, leading to more social avoidance – a vicious cycle.

So what should urban planners be doing to protect health? Every effort should be made to create a built environment that facilitates the development of social life and community in a safe and hospitable public realm. Social interactions should be facilitated by wide sidewalks, traffic-free or traffic-tamed streets and public squares. The public realm should be enclosed by human-scale buildings providing eyes on the street, and ensuring sunlight at street level. Children and elders should live within eyesight and earshot of people on the street. Streets should be well-populated by local shoppers and pedestrians on their way to school or work. This requires a compact urban fabric for the city center and neighborhood that brings everything within a walking radius, and neighborhoods that are interconnected with public transit so that part of every trip is made on foot in the public realm.

As a recent study on The Effects of the Urban Built Environment on Mental Health by Giulia Melis et al shows, there is less evidence of depression, particularly among women and elders, for those living in the dense heart of Turin, a mixed-use, urban fabric of five and six stories with a vibrant social life in the streets, squares and inner courtyards, compared to less compact peripheral areas of the city. 

This is the way the traditional city was constructed for millennia. Our current aberration of suburban sprawl and vertical sprawl – urban forms invented for the purpose of increasing economic wealth – have produced untold mental and physical ill health by generating loneliness. It is time we designed cities to increase social life, community, and well-being!  

Source link: http://www.livablecities.org/blog/loneliness-life-threatening-we-can-design-cities-foster-community

UNESCO Science Report - Towards 2030

The UNESCO Science Report: towards 2030 provides more country-level information than ever before. The trends and developments in science, technology and innovation policy and governance between 2009 and mid-2015 described here provide essential baseline information on the concerns and priorities of countries that should orient the implementation and drive the assessment of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development in the years to come.

• Download the full interactive PDF

Executive Summary

English | Français | Español | Русский | العربية | 中文
Portuguese | German
The executive summary will soon be available in Arabic and Catalan.

Contents

Foreword
Irina Bokova, Director-General of UNESCO

Perspectives on emerging issues

Universities: increasingly global players
Patrick Aebischer, President, Ecole polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne, Switzerland
A more developmental approach to science
Bhanu Neupane, Programme Specialist, Communication Sector, UNESCO
Science will play a key role in realizing Agenda 2030
Opinion piece based on a policy brief prepared by the Scientific Advisory Board of the Secretary-General of the United Nations
Science for a sustainable and just world: a new framework for global science policy?
Heide Hackmann, International Council for Science and Geoffrey Boulton, University of Edinburgh
Local and indigenous knowledge at the science–policy interface
Douglas Nakashima, Head, Local and Indigenous Knowledge Systems programme, UNESCO

Global overview

A world in search of an effective growth strategy
Luc Soete, Susan Schneegans, Deniz Eröcal, Baskaran Angathevar and Rajah Rasiah
Tracking trends in innovation and mobility
Elvis Korku Avenyo, Chiao-Ling Chien, Hugo Hollanders, Luciana Marins, Martin Schaaper and Bart Verspagen
Is the gender gap narrowing in science and engineering?
Sophia Huyer

A closer look at regions and countries

Canada
Paul Dufour
United States of America
Shannon Stewart and Stacy Springs
Caricom
Harold Ramkissoon and Ishenkumba A. Kahwa
Latin America
Guillermo A. Lemarchand
Brazil
Renato Hyuda de Luna Pedrosa and Hernan Chaimovich
European Union
Hugo Hollanders and Minna Kanerva
Southeast Europe
Djuro Kutlaca
European Free Trade Association
Hans Peter Hertig
Countries in the Black Sea basin
Deniz Eröcal and Igor Yegorov
Russian Federation
Leonid Gokhberg and Tatiana Kuznetsova
Central Asia
Nasibakhon Mukhitdinova
Iran
Kioomars Ashtarian
Israel
Daphne Getz and Zehev Tadmor
The Arab States
Moneef R. Zou’bi, Samia Mohamed-Nour, Jauad El-Kharraz and Nazar Hassan
West Africa
George Essegbey, Nouhou Diaby and Almamy Konte
East and Central Africa
Kevin Urama, Mammo Muchie and Remy Twiringiyimana
Southern Africa
Erika Kraemer–Mbula and Mario Scerri
South Asia
Dilupa Nakandala and Ammar Malik
India
Sunil Mani
China
Cong Cao
Japan
Yasushi Sato and Tateo Arimoto
Republic of Korea
Deok Soon Yim and Jaewon Lee
Malaysia
Rajah Rasiah and V.G.R. Chandran
Southeast Asia and Oceania
Tim Turpin, Jing A. Zhang, Bessie M. Burgos and Wasantha Amaradasa

Annexes

Composition of regions and subregions
Glossary
Statistical annex

Source: http://en.unesco.org/node/252168

Why You Should Not Throw Away Used Tea Bags

By Top home remedies

Prepackaged tea bags make it so easy to enjoy a cup of tasty tea. Whether it is green tea, black tea, chamomile tea, peppermint tea or any other herbal tea, drinking a few cups daily provides many health benefits.

Herbal teas have antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, astringent and antibiotic properties.

But did you know you can get many additional benefits from those little tea bags after you’ve had your tea? Instead of just throwing them away, you can use the damp, small tea bags in your beauty regimen and even gardening.


Here are the top 10 uses of used tea bags.

1. Treat Mild Acne

Used green tea bags can help protect and beautify your skin in a number of ways. In fact, they are one of the best home remedies for mild acne. The catechins in green tea have antibacterial properties that help fight acne-causing bacteria.
A 2009 study published in the Journal of Drugs in Dermatology suggests that green tea lotion can be an effective and safe treatment for mild acne.
Another study, published in the Journal of Investigative Dermatology in 2012, concluded that epigallocatechin-3-gallate (EGCG) in green tea helps modulate intracellular molecular targets and inhibit p. acnes bacteria that causes acne.

1. Brew a cup of green tea and set the tea bag aside for 30 minutes.
2. Place the used tea bag directly on the affected skin for 5 to 10 minutes.
3. Rinse off your skin with cool water.
4. Do this twice daily until you have acne-free skin.

2. Fight Aging Signs

Green tea has anti-aging and antioxidant properties that help improve skin complexion and elasticity. It even delays signs of skin aging, such as sagging skin, sun damage, age spots, fine lines and wrinkles.
A 2003 study by the Medical College of Georgia notes that green tea aids skin rejuvenation. It can be used to treat skin diseases and wounds.

1. Transfer the contents of 2 used green tea bags into a bowl.
2. Mix in 1 to 2 teaspoons of raw honey and a little lemon juice.
3. Apply it on your face and neck area.
4. Allow it to sit for 5 to 10 minutes, then rinse it off with lukewarm water.
5. Use this face mask once or twice a week.

Note: This face mask may not be suitable for people with sensitive skin.

3. Eliminate Bad Breath

You can enjoy fresh, minty breath using a soothing and mild mouthwash made with peppermint and green tea bags. The antiseptic and antibacterial properties in these teas help fight bad bacteria in the mouth that cause bad breath.
Also, a 2014 study published in the International Journal of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery noted that a green tea mouth rinse could be an appropriate and effective choice for controlling pain associated with acute pericoronitis.

1. Steep 2 or 3 used tea bags in a cup of hot water for 10 to 15 minutes to brew a weak tea.
2. Let the tea cool down.
3. Mix in a few drops of tea tree oil.
4. Use it as a mouthwash 2 times a day to fight bad breath.

4. Make Your Hair Shiny

Used black or green tea bags can add shine to dry and dull hair. The antioxidants in the tea promote hair growth as well as prevent common problems like dry scalp and dandruff.

1. Rebrew 2 or 3 used tea bags in 2 cups of water and allow it to cool.
2. After shampooing your hair, use the weak tea as a final hair rinse.
3. Massage your scalp for 5 minutes, then rinse your hair with plain water.
4. Allow your hair to air dry to enjoy smooth and shiny hair.
5. Use this hair treatment 2 times a week.

5. Soothe Puffy and Irritated Eyes

Any kind of tea bags can help soothe puffy and irritated eyes. Tea has anti-irritant and antioxidant properties that help reduce swelling around your eyes and relieve tiredness and inflammation.
Furthermore, it helps restore the natural glow and spark of your eyes.

1. Put 2 used tea bags in the refrigerator for 30 minutes.
2. Lie down and put the chilled tea bags over your closed eyelids.
3. Leave them in place for 10 to 15 minutes.
4. Repeat a few times a day.

6. Soothe Sunburns and Razor Burns

Moist green teabags can soothe sunburns as well as razor burns. Green tea contains tannins with astringent and mild anesthetic properties that can help combat itching and pain.
A 2001 study published in the Journal of American Academy of Dermatology notes that the polyphenolic extracts of green tea help reduce the number of sunburn cells and protect epidermal Langerhans cells from damage caused by ultraviolet sunrays.

1. Put 10 to 12 used green tea bags in your bathwater.
2. Soak in this healing water for about 20 minutes.
3. Do this once daily for a few days.

You can also try used chamomile tea bags for their anti-inflammatory qualities.

7. Fight Toenail Fungus

Instead of discarding used tea bags, you can use them to treat toenail fungus. The tannins in tea help kill the fungi responsible for fungal infections, while its antibiotic and astringent properties relieve symptoms like burning sensations, swelling and skin irritation.

1. Chill some used tea bags in the refrigerator for 20 to 30 minutes.
2. Put the cold tea bags on the affected toenails for 15 minutes.
3. Use this remedy 2 or 3 times daily until the infection clears up completely.

8. Exfoliate Your Skin

The slight rough texture of the contents of used tea bags is great for exfoliating your skin. This helps get rid of dead skin cells, dirt and other impurities.

Plus, its antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties help soothe your skin and give your skin an incredible glow.

1. Transfer the contents of 1 or 2 used green tea bags into a bowl.
2. Add a little olive oil and honey to make a paste.
3. Apply it on your face and neck and allow it to sit for 10 minutes.
4. Gently rub off the paste using circular motions.
5. Rinse off your skin with warm water.
6. Use this facial scrub once or twice a week.

9. Protect Plants from Pests and Infections

Whether you grow plants in pots or lush green gardens, used tea bags can help keep pests and fungal infections at bay.

• Make a mild brew from your used tea bags. Allow it to cool and transfer the solution into a spray bottle. Spray it on the leaves of your indoor or garden plants.
• Also, place a few used teabags in the bottom of a pot. They help the soil retain water in addition to adding valuable nutrients to it.

10. Add to Organic Compost

As long as the bags are made of paper or muslin, rather than polypropylene, used tea bags can be composted to speed up the decomposition process in plant material. They also encourage friendly bacteria to grow, which helps prevent fungal and pest problems.

Collect your used bags in a jar and add them to your compost at your convenience.

Resources:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19363854
http://www.nature.com/jid/journal/v133/n2/full/jid2012292a.html
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2003/04/030425071800.htm
http://www.ijoms.com/article/S0901-5027%2814%2900210-0/abstract
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11209110

Source: http://www.top10homeremedies.com/kitchen-ingredients/not-throw-used-tea-bags.html

The Blue Economy Ideas

BLUE ECONOMY - http://www.blueeconomy.eu/100ideas/

• http://www.theblueeconomy.org/Innovations.html

The Blue Economy® vision is to respond to the basic needs of all with what we have. As such, it stands for a new way of designing business: using the resources available in cascading systems, where the waste of one product becomes the input to create a new cash flow.

In this way, jobs are created, social capital is built and income rises – while the environment that provides the basis for our lives is no longer strained and polluted. Thus, we can evolve from an economy where the good is expensive, and the bad is cheap, to a system where the good and innovative is affordable.

About one third of the innovations presented has already been implemented in companies around the globe, one third is in prototyping status and one third has been scientifically proven but requires further research to create market-ready products. They all act as examples of the overall vision and philosophy of Blue Economy. Every day, we discover new inventions and exciting developments. Our aim is to inspire hundreds, thousands and even millions of entrepreneurs.

This website acts as a platform for information and exchange.


OUR PHILOSOPHY

The Earth’s limited resources pose “carrying capacities” for populations of species – the number of individuals an environment can sustain. Yet through efficient use of resources and energy, and evolving clever mechanisms to adapt to and overcome environmental conditions and challenges, ecosystems have maximised the sustainable sizes of diverse populations. Nature constantly increases its efficiency and has proven to be the most economic actor of our planet.

The first industrial revolution lead to modern day pollution; the second industrial revolution allowed humans to grasp the extent of threat this destruction poses to our own lives: we have recklessly passed our carrying capacity. The general public feels helpless in finding a way out. Human production and consumption patterns are no longer sustainable.

Numerous examples around the world prove that we can imitate nature’s designs, perfected over millions of years, in our own production – using the waste of one product as the input for another. These innovations will revolutionize the industries they are applied in, making consumption of those products a positive action. Thus, it will become possible to live in a sustainable way, responding to all basic needs for water, food, energy, health and shelter. Thinking in systems and cycles, we become witness to the dawn of the 3rd industrial revolution!

THE PRINCIPLES OF THE BLUE ECONOMY®

What are the principles of a Blue Economy with regards to practice and implementation?

To date, only rudimentary approaches for principles and criteria exist, coupled with statements of individuals.

Companies cannot rely on such a basis if they want guidance and orientation regarding the way forward.

Therefore, the need arises for a scientific catalogue of criteria and a stringent management system for a systemic, cascading economic model – scientifically evaluated and independent of individuals.

From the beginning of Blue Economy there were controversial discussions among experts, not least since different publications described different principles. Sometimes 12, sometimes 21 or maybe only ten, all without a scholarly basis.

As a consequense, the Blue Economy team converted this surge of principles into six basic modules:

•     local (use what you have)
•     efficient (substitute something with nothing)
•     systemic (mimic nature)
•     profitable (optimize & generate multiple cash flows)
•     abundant (satisfy all basic needs)
•     innovative (create change, seize opportunities)

Based on these six criteria, the Blue Economy Foundation will from 2015 develop a management system of Blue Economy principles and critera which can be used as instruction for companies during product development and process design.

Source: http://www.blueeconomy.eu/100ideas/

BLUE ECONOMY PRINCIPLES - GUNTER PAULI

    •Solutions are first and foremost based on physics. Deciding factors are Pressure and Temperature as found on site.

    •Substitute something with Nothing – question any resource regarding its necessity for production.

    •Natural systems cascade nutrients, matter and energy – waste does not exist. Any by-product is the source for a new product.

    •Nature evolved from a few species to a rich biodiversity. Wealth means diversity. Industrial standardization is the contrary.

    •Nature provides room for entrepreneurs who do more with less. Nature is contrary to monopolization.

    •Gravity is main source of energy, solar energy is the second renewable fuel.

    •Water is the primary solvent (no complex, chemical, toxic catalysts).

    •In nature the constant is change. Innovations take place in every moment.

    •Nature only works with what is locally available. Sustainable business evolves with respect not only for local resources, but also for culture and tradition.

    •Nature responds to basic needs and then evolves from sufficiency to abundance. The present economic model relies on scarcity as a basis for production and consumption.

    •Natural systems are non-linear.

    •In Nature everything is biodegradable – it is just a matter of time.

    •In natural systems everything is connected and evolving towards symbiosis.

    •In Nature water, air, and soil are the commons, free and abundant.

    •In Nature one process generates multiple benefits.

    •Natural systems share risks. Any risk is a motivator for innovations.

    •Nature is efficient. So sustainable business maximizes use of available material and energy, which reduces the unit price for the consumer.

    •Nature searches for the optimum for all involucrated elements.

    •In Nature negatives are converted into positives. Problems are opportunities.

    •Nature searches for economies of scope. One natural innovation carries various benefits for all.

    •Respond to basic needs with what you have, introducing innovations inspired by nature, generating multiple benefits, including jobs and social capital, offering more with less: This is the Blue Economy

New Education

By Dr. Terence Chivers

New Education Now is a paper based entirely on Education in the New Age. A central aim of the paper is to determine what it is that the Tibetan expects of the new education, the term He uses to describe His educational ideas. To my surprise, it becomes clear as one reads on, that He expects us to bring about the new education, and He means us to carry it out in the social realm. He believes that the emergence of enough advanced human beings now makes this possible. The paper moves from His theoretical basis to His broad understanding of the goals of education. His ideas about the new education then take over. The paper concludes with the implications of his stance for us.

This paper is based entirely on Education in the New Age, first published in 1954. The paper outlines His approach to the new education. At first, I took Him to be advocating a new education at two levels, a fairly superficial level for the here and now and a more advanced level for the more distant future. However, I now regard him to be suggesting that the new education can be developed in the here and now but doubtless on a limited scale. It is up to us to find the means and the scale which is possible. To the extent that it is possible, we shall be preparing the way for more developed stages.

His theory of educational change posits three stages based on the ideas of a group lotus. This lotus belongs to the human group of those societies where there is an educational system.

EDUCATION AND SCIENCE

1. KNOWLEDGE PETALS ………Civilisation…………Culture…………………Illumination

Plus RELIGION AND PHILOSOPHY

2. LOVE PETALS………………Co-operation………Loving understanding….. Group love

Plus GOVERNMENTS AND SOCIAL ORDER

3. WILL + SACRIFICE…     Participation………     Purpose……………………….. Precipitation of the Plan

PETALS                            (in the Plan)     (Directed will of the disciples)                         (by the Hierarchy)

(Simplified version of tabulation on p 56).

The above constitutes the theory on which his educational ideas are built. Civilisation is the reaction of humanity to the purpose of any particular world period (P 39). It is how humanity approximates to the ideas of the age. In each age some idea functions and expresses itself in both racial and national idealisms. The Plan is the real source of the idea but how it is received and dealt with by humanity is apt to yield a distorted form. Education systems are often decidedly materialistic in form. We therefore need to consider what education should be about. He indicates three goals:

The civilisation of the child to train and rightly direct his instincts. In worldly social sciences this is termed ‘socialisation’.

The bringing about of true culture by training him to use his intellect rightly.

The evocation and development of the intuition (p 50).

I’ll start by considering the civilisation of the child or ‘socialisation’, i.e. social learning. The basic truth here is that unless this were carried out, society would be impossible. Yet we need society – it provides the basic forms of organisation which are necessary in some way in all advanced societies. Part of the acceptable forms of behaviour, which we have to learn, include the feeling self. Kama-manas must follow acceptable ways, for example, sexual behaviour. The training of the mind is to some extent covered in some families. But most mental training is left to the school system.

But having accepted the need for socialisation we should also note that much social learning mediated through societies will take materialistic forms and forms which suit the need of societies while distorting spiritual understanding. HPB once said that to understand the way of life which an occult student would need to follow, it would be necessary to start again within the lap of nature. While accepting this it would seem that adaptation to socialisation is possible since various incarnated masters have achieved it in recent centuries. These initiates find ways of revising the social learning they are taught.

DK’s focus has much more to do with the other two aims of education – true culture and development of the intuition. This takes him into a consideration of the influence of education on civilisation. In this regard, His views on history are withering. Geography as taught receives short shrift too. Perhaps it’s as well that He doesn’t deal with modern literature, religion and philosophy. Modern science and mathematics are not dealt with though one imagines that He would have some comments on the teaching methods in respect of these subjects. The social sciences weren’t much developed within school systems at the time He was writing. However, we know how pleased He was at the advent of psychology in societies despite his caveats in respect of psycho-analysis. For Him, sociology was included in psychology. What He would say about the other social sciences as they have developed today, e.g. social anthropology, economics, political science?

Now we arrive at the study of the new education. He explains that the new education will deal with, analyse and interpret the laws of thought, because the mind will be regarded as the link between the soul and the brain. These laws are means whereby:

a. Ideas are united.

b. Ideals are promulgated.

c. Mental concepts or thought-forms are constructed which in due time will make their impact telepathically upon the minds of men.

 The new education will organise and develop the lower concrete mind. It will teach the human being to think from universals to particulars, as well as undertake the analysis of particulars. There will be less emphasis on memory in the future schools. Interest will help recall. The good citizen will be another aim. Above all else the new age will teach about the soul and how to unify the three aspects of the self:

a. The receptive mind or commonsense.

b. The individualised mind.

c. The illuminating mind.

d. The antahkarana.

People will be taught how to respond to the soul manifesting as wisdom. On the mental plane, the soul will function as the discriminating mind, on the astral plane as sensitive consciousness and on the physical plane as the active participator in physical life. He believes that the various schools of psychology will contribute to the science of the soul. There will also be a science of the seven rays and the constitution of man will be accepted (Chart III, p 117 TCF) as will esoteric astrology and reincarnation. He adds that It will be obvious to you that some decades must elapse before such a state of affairs can become possible and usual but you will note that I said decades and not centuries. (p 72).

Initially He believes the new education will start in a small way in busy schools. Much of the textbook material would need to change. So too would the school atmosphere. In place of competitiveness would be an atmosphere of love, patience, ordered activity and understanding. Many school problems will disappear; the child will understand because he is understood and is completely fearless.

The educators of the future will lay emphasis upon:

1. A developing mental control of the emotional nature.

2. Vision or the capacity to see beyond what is to what might be.

3. Inherited factual knowledge upon which it will be possible to superimpose the wisdom of the future.

4. Capacity wisely to handle relationships and to recognise and assume responsibly.

5. The power to use the mind in two ways: a. As the ‘commonsense’– analysing and synthesising the information conveyed by the five senses. b. As a searchlight, penetrating into the world of ideas and of abstract truth (p 81).

It therefore becomes increasingly apparent that the coming education
could be defined in a new and broader sense: As the Science of Right Human
Relations and of Social Organisation (p 84).

The social milieu is today relevant for the new education because of the increasing number of advanced humanity in manifestation. At the moment their views are contained within the context of lower mental interpretations because of the latter’s dominance in society. But if more spiritual interpretations could gain credence, educational opinions could broaden. In the coming world order, educators will prepare the young people in school and college for participation in an active and consciously realised group life (p 130).

Four factors are necessary for this to come about:

1. The recognition of hierarchical status – a sense of protection, which is one form of love.

2. The recognition of responsibility – so that knowledge can be unfolded.

3. The recognition of the faculty of forgiveness – a rudimentary expression of the quality of self-sacrifice.

4. The recognition of group interplay – a sense of right relations.


At the end of the book, the Science of the Antahkarana is elaborated.

The new education might therefore be said to be applicable to:

All parents and wider kin – developing and sustaining the culture.

All teachers – fostering the culture He indicates as best they are able.

All schools – developing the culture and topics in so far as is felt possible.

All institutions of higher education where the culture He advocates and the syllabuses will allow of suitable interpretation.

All people who are able to develop the culture He advocates in their social milieu.

Any persons who may be ready, willing and able to begin the revision of texts for those schools and colleges, which could apply the revised literature or relevant websites.

The new education is available in the here and now. It is up to us to find an appropriate form in which we can interpret the material. That’s a challenge! The arena is dangerous. Advocates must proceed with much caution and work out plans with great care. But we must proceed.

Terence Chivers spent most of his work life lecturing in sociology. After retirement in 1991, he took a further doctorate in Autobiography and Life Review so that he could lead a life story writing group in the University of the Third Age (which organises studies for older people) and returned to the Arcane School, where he is a secretary and commentator. He joined the teaching group of the Morya federation when it started work in 2008.

Email contact: t.chivers@hotmail.com
Source: http://www.brisbanegoodwill.com/esoteric-philosophy/new-education-now/

The Finland Phenomenon

Finnish Education Chief: "We Created a School System Based on Equality".
Here are excerpts from interview post:

Q.  I remember being struck by how many vocational or hands-on classes
(home economics, art, technology, and so forth) were available to students
at every Finnish school I visited.  At one secondary school I visited, kids were cooking breakfast; at another, I saw that all the kids had learned how to sew
their own bathing suits.  More than one teacher remarked, "It's important for
students to have different activities to do during the day." And there seems
to be no stigma about vocational education. Is this attitude true of all schools
in Finland?

A.  Yes, we definitely believe that for young people handcrafts, cooking,
creative pursuits, and sports, are all important. We believe these help young
people benefit more from the skills they're learning in school. 

Q.   Do you think that this takes time away from academics?

A.  Academics isn't all kids need. Kids need so much more. School should
be where we teach the meaning of life; where kids learn they are needed;
where they can learn community skills. We like to think that school is also
important for developing a good self-image, a strong sensitivity to other people's feelings. . . . and understanding it matters to take care of others. We definitely want to incorporate all those things in education.

*****

Next below is a top ten list via Cooperative Catalyst via via Parenting magazine's Mom Congress 2012 summarizing the traits of the much admired and controversial Finnish education.  The Finns seem to do exactly opposite the growing U.S. education agenda:

1. Finland does not give their kids standardized tests.
2. Individual schools have curriculum autonomy; individual teachers have classroom autonomy.
3. It is not mandatory to give students grades until they are in the 8th grade.
4. All teachers are required to have a master's degree.
5. Finland does not have a culture of negative accountability for their teachers. According to Partanen, "bad" teachers receive more professional development; they are not threatened with being fired.
6. Finland has a culture of collaboration between schools, not competition. Most schools, according to Partanen, perform at the same level, so there is no status in attending a particular facility.
7. Finland has no private schools.
8. Education emphasis is "equal opportunity to all."They value equality over excellence.
9. A much higher percentage of Finland's educational budget goes directly into the classroom than it does in the US, as administrators make approximately the same salary as teachers. This also makes Finland's education more affordable than it is in the US.
10. Finnish culture values childhood independence; one example: children mostly get themselves to school on their own, by walking or bicycling, etc. Helicopter parenting isn't really in their vocabulary.
11. Finnish schools don't assign homework, because it is assumed that mastery is attained in the classroom.
12. Finnish schools have sports, but no sports teams. Competition is not valued.
13. The focus is on the individual child. If a child is falling behind, the highly trained teaching staff recognizes this need and immediately creates a plan to address the child's individual needs. Likewise, if a child is soaring ahead and bored, the staff is trained and prepared to appropriately address this as well.
14. Partanen correlated the methods and success of their public schools to US private schools. We already have a model right here at home.
15. Compulsory school in Finland doesn't begin until children are 7 years old.

What are Finland's strengths?  Perhaps the quickest way to get the big picture is this slide show, or this new and the most in-depth being the above-titled documentary film, "The Finland Phenomenon."  Even if you read all the articles about the Finland school system, I highly recommend you watch the documentary - it fills in the blanks left bare by generalities.

Source: http://www.thedailyriff.com/articles/the-finland-phenomenon-inside-the-worlds-most-surprising-school-system-588.php