Sustainability and Sustainable Communities, or, "What is an Ecovillage, Anyway?"

compiled by Lois Arkin

O VER THE PAST FEW YEARS, ECOVILLAGERS everywhere have had to learn how to translate the vision of our communities into pragmatic everyday language. Here are descriptions from some of those who have been the most helpful in teaching us how to more easily share our visions.

Debbie Fryman and Linda Hicks Ashman describe sustainable community.

• Each person has access to nutritious food and adequate shelter and outlets for spiritual, cultural, and creative expression.
• There are many community-based businesses, and equal opportunities for fulfilling livelihood.
• Residents work, play, and learn in a safe and clean environment.
• Neighbors know each other and work together to identify and resolve community issues.
• Everyone feels a part of the decision-making process, and decisions are made based on the long-term well-being of the community.
• Residents understand how seemingly separate issues are connected, and that individual actions can affect the health and environment of people in other areas.
• While residents identify with their own neighborhood, which in many ways is self-reliant, they feel a kinship to communities across the region and across the globe.

Paul Hawken describes sustainability simply as a "golden rule": "Leave the world better than you found it, take no more than you need, try not to harm life or the environment, make amends if you do."
(The Ecology of Commerce: A Declaration of Sustainability, HarperBusiness, 1993.)

Elizabeth Klein identifies four characteristics of communities that are becoming more sustainable:

• Economic Security. A more sustainable community includes a variety of businesses, industries, and institutions which are environmentally sound (in all aspects); financially viable; provide training, education, and other forms of assistance to adjust to future needs; provide jobs and spend money within a community; and enable employees to have a voice in decisions which affect them. A more sustainable community also is one in which residents' money remains in the community.
• Ecological Integrity. A more sustainable community is in harmony with natural systems by reducing and converting waste into non-harmful and beneficial products and by utilizing the natural ability of environmental resources for human needs without undermining their ability to function over time.
• Quality of Life. A more sustainable community recognizes and supports people's evolving sense of well-being, which includes a sense of belonging, a sense of place, a sense of self-worth, a sense of safety, and a sense of connection with nature, and provides goods and services which meet peoples' needs both as they define them and as can be accommodated within the ecological integrity of natural systems.
• Empowerment and Responsibility. A more sustainable community enables people to feel empowered and take responsibility based on a shared vision, equal opportunity, ability to access expertise and knowledge for their own needs, and a capacity to affect the outcome of decisions that affect them.

(Defining a Sustainable Community.Center for Environmental Management, Tufts University, Medford, MA 02155, 617-627-3486. $15.)

Robert Gilman of the Context Institute defines a sustainable community or ecovillage as one with these qualities:

• Human scale;
• Full featured;
• Harmlessly integrates human activities into the natural world;
• Supports healthy human development;
• Can be successfully continued into the indefinite future.

Bill Leland of the Global Action and Information Network (GAIN) says that definitions of sustainability must take into account environmental, economic, and social factors. For example, sustainable agriculture must take into account stewardship of the land (environmental), equitable means of distribution (economics), and non-exploitative work relations (social factors).

This approach is complex but affords some promise of success. Bill also reminds us that technology will contribute to sustainability only if it is the servant of clear social vision.

Donella H. Meadows, Dennis L. Meadows, and Jergen Rander describe a sustainable society as one that can persist over generations, and is farseeing enough, flexible enough, and wise enough not to undermine either its physical or its social systems of support.
(Beyond the Limits: Confronting Global Collapse, Envisioning a Sustainable Future, Chelsea Green, date --to come.)

David Orr, Professor of Environmental Sciences at Oberlin College, cautions us to distinguish between "technological sustainability" and "ecological sustainability."

• "Technological sustainability"--the concept that humankind is dominant over nature and will find a "techno-fix" for every problem.
• "Ecological sustainability"--recognizing that humankind is part of nature; that there are limits to growth and carrying capacity; and that nature should be regarded as a model for the design of housing, cities, neighborhoods, technologies and regional economies.

According to Orr, sustainability depends upon replicating the structure and function of natural ecosystems.
(Ecological Literacy, SUNY Press, 1992.)

Architect Sim Van Der Ryn's equation:

"Sustainability equals Conservation plus Regeneration plus Stewardship."

• Conservation is frugality.
• Regeneration is healing.
• Stewardship is responsibility.

He identifies five steps to sustainability:

• Solutions grow out of knowing where you are. Look to local resources, skills, and knowledge for design solutions. Let the place and its inhabitants determine the whole context for design.
• Trace the footprint. Trace the ecological impacts of your actions.
• b>Design with nature. Look to the living world for design strategies. Actively incorporate living systems in designs.
• Participatory Design. Listen to every voice in the design process. As we engage the living world in community with others, we are rewoven in life's web.
• Make flows visible. Live with your design, find out how it works, and learn from it. The challenge is to make long-hidden natural processes both visible and viable.

(Ecological Design, with Stuart Cowan. Island Press, 1996.)