An Evolving Exploration into the Head, Heart and Hands of Energy Descent
Transition Culture has moved
I no longer blog on this site. You can now find me, my general blogs, and the work I am doing researching my forthcoming book on imagination, on my new blog.
Here is an article I wrote for the latest edition of Resurgence. You can see the pdf. of it here, probably the best way to read it, as it is so beautifully laid out and designed.
In 2006, when we started what has since become the Transition movement, we imagined it as an environmental movement. It was conceived as a solutions-focused, bottom-up response to peak oil and climate change. Now, with five years of experimentation and experience under our belts, we see it more as a cultural movement, exploring what the culture of a place needs to look like in order for it to be best prepared for increasingly uncertain times (contracting energy supplies, price volatility, economic uncertainty, and so on).
Last week I did a course with the Media Trust on how to make podcasts (highly recommended). So, here, with some fanfare, is the first ‘Transition podcast’, I hope you like it. If so, do embed it in other places. It means I spent the time I would spend writing editing pieces of audio. Let me know what you think. So, the podcast is about a fascinating morning I spent visiting the sailing ship Tres Hombres which visited Brixham earlier this week. It explores the potential of sail-powered shipping as the price of oil rises and the economy tightens. It’s an exciting story.
Transition is now a worldwide grassroots movement that looks climate change and peak oil squarely in the face and dismisses the utter impossibility of endless economic growth on a planet of finite resources. It offers community based solutions to help people in villages, towns and cities adapt to the inevitable challenges of the oncoming reality of profound economic and social change unflinchingly and with a good degree of humility and good cheer. It’s a collection of recipes for building community, environmental regeneration, relocalised economies and so much more.
Last week Bill McKibben was in town, and I was lucky enough to get to interview him for half an hour before his talk to a packed St. John’s Church in Totnes (which Jay Tompt reflected on here). I had asked for some questions for Bill on Twitter, and apart from the frankly bizarre “will I ever play the piano again?”, tried to weave most of the questions people sent into the interview. My thanks to Bill for finding time in his hectic schedule:
Hi Bill… great to see you… what brings you to Totnes?
The two things that bring me to Totnes are wanting to get back to Schumacher College for a little while, which is a remarkable place, especially on this 100th year of Schumacher, and wanting to get back to Totnes and see the ‘Mother Church of Transition’! (laughs).
I’m just getting ready for tomorrow’s London book launch at Food from the Sky, hope to see you there. One of my favourite stories in The Transition Companion is that of Transition Kensal to Kilburn planting a ‘community allotment’ on the platform of Kilburn underground station. Here’s a great short film, ‘Underground Tomatoes’, by Jonathan Goldberg about the project … I love this.
How might our response to peak oil and climate change look more like a party than a protest march? This site explores the emerging transition model in its many manifestations
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In 2006, when we started what has since become the Transition movement, we imagined it as an environmental movement. It was conceived as a solutions-focused, bottom-up response to peak oil and climate change. Now, with five years of experimentation and experience under our belts, we see it more as a cultural movement, exploring what the culture of a place needs to look like in order for it to be best prepared for increasingly uncertain times (contracting energy supplies, price volatility, economic uncertainty, and so on).
