A great problem with Westminster is that they have to lie in order to get elected — they have to promise growth and jobs, lying to themselves as well in the process that they know how to achieve this. The British spirit actually achieves great things by gritting its teeth into a foul wind, and if that spirit (rather than ‘it will be ok’) could be wakened, it might actually be an easier sell.

http://www.treehugger.com/files/2009/06/transition-towns-where-next.php?dcitc=daily_nl

I’m aware that I’m asking a lot, since to most Egalitarians, Fatalism, Individualism and Hierarchy can be lumped together as the Enemy. But there are instances of this kind of translation going on. To cite one example, I thought Amory Lovins’ Winning the Oil End Game was a great example of an Individualist take on Peak Oil. It’s full of a language – wealth, choice, security, ‘led by business for profit’ – which wouldn’t sit very easily with Egalitarian institutions or particularly with Hierarchical ones – but the policy prescriptions are very sensible. When we can see beyond our cultural biases and hammer out policies and practices that appeal to more than one cultural solidarity, that’s when we’re creating a progressive politics, even if we can’t ever satisfy the web comment snipers.
See the , Fourcultures website for more commentary, and the work of Michael Thompson, Marco Verweij and others on ‘clumsy solutions’.

When I first found out about the Transition movement I would have agreed with many of the comments on the Guardian website – “great unleashing – says it all really”, “this is the dawning of the age of Aquarius” etcetcetc. I’m sorry now to admit this but I did think the whole thing was rather New Age – based on fairies rather than facts. Even when I attended the training weekend I recoiled at many of the ‘touchy-feely’ stuff. I did it, but it terrified me.

After studying the facts – the science of peak-oil and climate change and observing the clear-thinking that developed this movement I concluded that transition is the right way forward.

But I’m constantly wondering how and if Transition will work in the rough West Midland manufacturing town where I grew up. Even in the beautiful ‘middle class’ tourist centre where I now live there is much more cynicism than in Totnes or in Stroud where progressive attitudes are positively encouraged. Our solution is to be pragmatic – we tend not to use unfamiliar terms such as ‘powerdown’ and ‘visioning’. Our meetings are exciting and enthusiastic but the exercises we use to encourage talk and participation are at the non-scary end of the scale.

Yes, I do know that this is the ‘let it go where it wants to’ principle in action, but I do think that it is worth considering how to reach out to people like me – before I did my homework.

Articles like this are really irrelevant IMO, except that a few might hear of something they hadn’t heard of.

Let me clarify: if communities cannot depend on politicians to defend their “security” (life chances, comforts, safety), then the community owes nothing to the state. Recall Thomas Hobbes’ Leviathan, the basis of the state’s claims to your quiescence: the sovereign lets you live as you do; so you owe the sovereign all but your life. If the sovereign fails to protect you (in Totnes or wherever) then the sovereign becomes irrelevant – and acting locally *is* your political activity. This seems to me the fundamental point she makes: politics is returning to its geography, its locale. The party system is tied to the macro of the state, and as Madeline notes, the L party is hardly holding to its premises. “Meet the new boss – same as the old boss.” How dull.

So if transition entails the localization of political identity and allegiance… and perhaps the decline of faith in fiat currency… the revolution may precede collapse after all… I see Totnes as nothing less than the lifeboat. I’m not sure, Stephen, that the political transition you seek (at the state level) is even in the cards. More likely, London will slowly lose track of England.

This appears in *todays* (Mondays) Guardian if you want to get a copy.

Cheers

Rob

I live in Poland where we had recently a prime minister who had inclinations for building a police state. He was voted out of the office. If it wasn’t for the people who casted their votes, he could have been a prime minister for many long, long years.

20 years ago we had the first free elections in Poland since the end of the Second World War. People casted their votes and the communism in Poland was over. It may seem now that voting is insignificant. However, if it really was insignificant than there would be free elections in China…

Its more than the emboldening cloak of anonymity, Rob, one look at the predictable comments that follow any article by George Monbiot and its obvious that these are orchestrated by the organised Climate Change Denial lobby, eg, the likes of Spiked Online, etc. I guess they are successful in their aims of stifling debate as I for one usually can’t be bothered to read beyond the first few posts vilifying ‘MMCCers’ (Man Made Climate Changers), so predictable, boring and personalised are the level of postings…

I’ve always been quite interested by this distinction. Is working in your community being political? I’ve never voted and you often hear not voting linked with apathy, yet i spend nearly all my working hours unpaid in my community. The distinction that interests me is, is there a time when we start to become a form of do-it-ourself or do-as-we-will politics?