COMMUNES��f GREEN VISION

Counterculture, Lifestyle and the New Age DAVID PEPPER

Communes and the Green Vision provides a dramatic insight into the ideas and ideals of the members of twelve communes in England. Scotland and Wales. In a series of in­ depth interviews with over eighty members of communes set up in the wake of the environmental concerns of the seventies, David Pepper has tested one of the principal beliefs of the green movement today � that

communal lifestyles and small-scale organisation will be central to the socially JUSt and envjronmen�lIy sustainable society of the future.

Commune members from widely differing backgrounds talk about their hopes and fears for the future, the obstacles.they face in living a greener lifestyle, and the impact of the ecological crisis. The issues they face reflect the problems confronting society at large, and the author

assesses the potential of communes as forerunners of a green society in the light of a number of key questions that of us must answer, all including those of us committed to eI\vitonmental reform.

Such questions include whether it is a higher priority to change society's values or to change the economic system, and whether individual reform of one's own lifestyle is more important than collective action. Pepper goes beyond the immediate ideas and David activities of the communes and their members to describe a range of green perspectives and ideologies - induding liberal, socialist and anarchist - as well as the ideas and philosophy of the New Age movement.

David Pepper is Principal ucturer in Geography at Oxford Polytechnic. His previous books include ROO/Jo/Modem Environmentalism (Croom Helm. 1984). GeogTl1phy o/Peau and War (edited with AlanJenkins, Blackwell, 1985), and Nue/ear Power in CnsiJ (edited with Andrew Blowers, Croom Helm, 1987).

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David Pepper is principal lecturer in geography at Oxford Poly­ technic. Details of his other books appear on the back cover. GREEN VISION

Nickie flallam is part-time lecturer in geography at Oxford Poly­ technic, a post-graduate student at the School of Peace Studies, Counterculture, Lifestyle Bradford University, and a fonner member of the New University Project. and the New Age

David Pepper

Ba$ed on re�arch the aUlhor and Nickie HaUam by

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GREEP R I N NT ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS First published in 199 1 by Guen Print an imprint of The Merlin Press I am indebted to Peter de la Cour, lecturer and fonner communard Malden Road, London 10 NW5JHR who has now gone on to found the Green College, for spending many hours in conversation about this project and helping me to get David Pepper © it into shape. The research was made possible by a grant from The right of David Pepper to be identifiedas aumor ofmis work has been assened Oxford Polytechnic. I would also like to acknowledge with gratitude in accordance with the Copyright, Design and Patents Act 1988. the help and advice ofOennis Hardy, Frank Webster,john Gold,Jon in a . publication be reproduced, st�ud All rights reselVed No pan ofmis may Carpenter, Penny Bardsley, Andrew rugby,Peter Harper and Fiona any fonn or by any meanSelec �mc, .. utrieval s""tem or transmitted, in ,- , . Or Ou,el"Wlse, without me pnor pennlsslon Hay, and of course the communards themselves. They constandy mechanical, photocopymg, reconI' 109 .L · in writing ofme publisher. received both Nickie Hallam and myself into their homes with kindness, hospitality and humour, sparing us the worst excesses of ISBN I 85425 0515 that well-known communes phenomenon of 'visitor alienation'.

12 J 4 5 6 78 910:: 99 98 9796 95 94 9392 91 Their friendliness constituted a danger to academic disinterested_ ness, which I hope I have guarded sufficiendy against in the writing PhotOlypesctby Computerset, H:umondswonh, Middlesex and analysis of the interviews.Conversely, I hope I have not gone too Primed in England by BiddIes Ltd., Guildford, Su rrey on recycled paper far the other way in overscepticism, and that the need to be critical has not obliterated my underlying admiration and support for this way of living. As this book was written, so many Western political commentators and journalists were telling us that 'communism is dead'. This book shows that, even in this country, truecommune-ism is alive and - occasionally at least - kicking. Contents

Any utopia should have to allow Jor the dosest possible contact List of tables and abbreviations used viii between people alld the livillg earth. The seco"d elemem would be Introduction harkillg back to a popular tlteme ill mallY socialist utopias. That is 1 the 1I0tioll oj decetllralisalioll towards some killd oj comnllltlitariall CHAPTER 1 $ociety ill which people getlUinely do have tlte responsibility as well The Environmentally Sound Society as tlte right to put imo practice their own views itt rlleir own 7 commtmiry as to how they call best effect... the goals we [greens 1 CHAPTER Z },ave. I don't rllink YOIl can t/lvisage a gret/l world which iSIl't Communes, Utopias and Green Principles decentralised at one level a"d illtemariona/ised at tlte other level. 25

Jonathon Porritt, on 'Visions of Utopia' (BBC2, 'The Late Show" CHAPTER) 30 January 1990). Social Change and the Politics of Community and Communes 47 It's nice 10 talk about ecology, but to go out alld do it is difficult. Not until lots oj people do it will it befim. CHAPTER 4 Decline of Green Evangelism A communard from Monkton Wyld. 69

CHAPTER 5 I'm calling on people to be exceptiollal; to step Ollt oj their constraints How Green are the Communes? Ecological Values and alld set an example by living ill communes. They are a leadillg edge Practices 119 oj the green movement.

A communard from Redfield. CHAPTER 6 Changing Society: or Being Changed? 157

CHAPTER 7 A Vanguard for EcO[opia? 199

Appendix 1 221

Appendix 2 227

References 231 Index 237 LIST OF TABLES

Table Political philosophies of environmentalists 1: Table 19605 communes compared with the 19805 2: Table Society and community 3: Introduction Table The communes examined in this work 4: Table Main tenets of the Findhom consensus 5: Table Approximate ages of the interviewees 6: Table Length of time in communes The rudiments of an ecological society probably structured 7: will be Table elite? around the commune -freely created, human in scale, and intimate in 8: An Table Major training, jobs and skills before joining itsconsciously cultivated rel ationshps .. 9: i . Table Dissatisfaction as a motive for joining 10: Table Major reasons for joining 11: This is what the green anarchist Murray Bookchin (1982) thinks. Table Ideological beliefs 12: This book aims to see ifhe is correct. It reports on research done in a Tab/t What 'the environment' means 13: dozen communes in England. Scotland and Wales, which, with two TahIr Major influences 14: exceptions, were founded in the 19705- in the wake of the first wave Table Beliefs about nature 15: of mass publicity and concern about human impact on the environ­ Table Ecologically sound practices 16: ment.Extended interviews (each up to two-and-a-halfhours long) Table Summary of views on social change 17: with over eighty communards probed their belief systems, ide­ Table Attitudes to conventional politics 18: ologies and practices. Each conversation led up to the central concern of the work, the question: How important are communes in

Abbreviatioll8 used leadilJg the way to a SOcially //lore jUlt and ecologically more harmonious society? CAT Centre for A1ternarive Technology (The Quarry). Powys. Why ask it? Because a vast literature has appeared since Rachel Wales Carson's Silent Spring sparked off. in 1962. the present wave of CF Canon Frome, Herefordshire environmental concern; but much of it has been about the tech­ RF Redfield. Buckinghamshire nicalities and causes of the problems - whether they exist and how MW Monkton Wyld. Dorset bad they are. Relatively little has appeared on what do, but this is LSF Lower Shaw Farm. Swindon.Wilts to undoubtedly now the most pressing topic. This book's contribution PIC People in Common. Burnley. Lanes is to examine just one option, sl!ggested by some of the more radical CRAB Crabapple, Shropshire environmentalists, whom I call 'greens' throughout the book. They LAUR Laurieston Hall. Galloway, Scotland still form a minority among people who are concerned about the LSP Lifespan. Sheffield, Yorkshire environment - no more than sixteen per cent of the Americans GLAN Glaneirw. Wales surveyed in 1980, for example. thought that 'a completely new ZAP to A Project (formerly New University Project), Z [social-economic) system is needed' to solve our environmental Handsworth. Birmingham problems (Milbrath 1984, p82). But I think it increasingly probable FIND Findhorn, Forres, Scotland that they are right, and that the reformists - the 'technocentrics', 'cornucopians' and 'environmental managers' who believe that it is largely a matter of technological and managerial adjustments to the present system (O'Riordan 1989) - are wrong. The views of the viii I INTRODUCTION COMMUNES AND TUE: GREEN YISION featured the rural communes ofRedficld,Crabapple, Canon Frome, communards reportcd here amply suggest why this should be will Glaneirw and Laurieston that fann and garden organically, the last '0. being also an education centre; thc communes of the Z to A Project When I wrotc about the issue of the environment, and what (fonnerly the New University Project, now part of Radical Routes different groups of people said about it, I concluded that one way network) and People in Common, the uman-based though rurally towards an environmentally sound and socially just society might lie located printingcooperative of Lifespan; the now suburban organic in a 'network of alternative small communities where people try farm and education centre of Lower Shaw Fann; and the Centre for consciously to live along SUfllillolj-style principles' Blueprint {for A1ternative Technology (,The Quarry1, an education and demon­ (Peppcr 1984, p224). I echoed many others (see Chapter 2). some of stration centre in rural Wales. whom might as far as Erich Fromm (1956, p361), who thought go These communes were picked because they wcre founded within that 'our only alternative to the dangers of robotism [modem the last twenty years of high general environmcntal awareness, and industrial society) humanistic communitarianism'. It is, however, is were therefore likcly, among all communes, to show the effects of easy for theorists like me to say such things. This book gives the this consciousness. The exception is Findhom. Founded in the somewhat different views of those who are actually trying to do it. it might be said to belong particularlyto that group reviewed They may be morc realisticabout communes as grcen utopias and 19605, at the end of that decade in the excellent studies by Abrams and panaceas. The book does not ask how green are all the communes in McCulloch (1976) and Rigby (1974 a and b). They show that the the or clsewhere; it is not a statisticalsurvey. Rather, it enquires UK, sixties communes reflccted many concerns- anti-materialism, paci­ whether people in communes do or do not show, through their fism, feminism, for instance (see also Maclaughlin and Davidson attitudes, values and deeds. sufficient evidence for us to conclude (1985) - that are relevant to today's greens. But, interestingly, there that communes could be a significant, even major, part of a green are very few references to what are now the central and defining society - an E{%pio (Callenbach 1978, 1981). From it one can also green concerns (although Rigby's model of the world view of the decide whether or not the 'green movement' (Green Party, pressure communitarians does include the notion of ccological catastrophe groups and so forth)should or should not put much more time and as the main threat to future society among a dozen other compo­ effort into publicising, assisting and establishing communes; some­ nents of their belief system). Findhorn is different. It has persisted thing it has neglected to do hitherto. and grown, and itsoriginal roison d'ttr� has become a major facet of Of course, much has been written already about communes, and green ideology in the 19805.It cannot be omitted from any study like their ideology, sociology and practical organisation. It is clear from this one, since it is the self-proclaimed 'centre of light' for the New this literature that communcs have, throughout their history, em­ (ecological) Age. bodied somc green principlcs and practiccs. Nowhere, however, Chapters 1 to 3 of this book provide a bricf context and overview does there seem to be a book which examines these fonns of social for the research. The firstdescribes the beliefs, attitudes. values and organisation specifically from a green perspective. That is what is practices which might characterise an ideal environmentally sound done here. What is no/ attempted another sociological study, or a is society as defined by contemporary radical green writers. Evidence history. And one set of communes which undoubtedly does embody of the presence or absence of these in communes was noted in the many 'green' attitudes and practices omitted; this constitutes the is conversations with the communards (see Appendix 1 for the inter­ monasteries and other religious communities. This omission is �cw Structure used because I am interested in thc notion of communes as a possible way to shape these conversations). Chapter 2 surveys forward for the majority of ordinary people in the radical green literature on past communes and community-based movements, to note how implicitly or explicitly green their lifestyle may have been. movement, and I do not think that a life of total devotion and commitment to a religious cause is a remotely realistic option for It then demonstrates the importance that many radical green writers now most of us, green as it might incidcntally be. Life in a spiritually_ attach to communes and small communities for the future. Chapter 3 examines the theory behind the key idea of communes as a oriented commune might be an option, however, hence those at Monkton Wyld and Findhorn were included in the list. It also major force for social change. It demonstrates,too, that future green 3 2 COMMUNt;SAND TlIF. GREEN YISION INTRODUCTION

4. They share at least s communal society could vary considerably in its political orienta­ ome of the follOwing: housework, eating �II . . Chapters 4 to 6 covcr thc communes rescarched here. Chapter 4 nd cooking, resourc s, childcare, tion. � � leisure pursuits and, in some way, Income (for some thiS makes describes the original and prescnt intentionsof thcir members - how a crucial difference between a 'com­ green they were and are. It also examines their criticisms of conven­ mune' - total income pooling- and a 'community'). 5. hey are relatively tional society. In Chapter 5 their beliefs, values and practices are � withdrawn from the wider society; a discrete assessed alongside the theoretical yardstick of Chapter and then unu. I, 6 6. T e gro p has priority Chapter examines their views OD social change, and what they may � ." over other relations, except perhaps couple be doing to influence the wider society. The concluding chapter relatIOnships. 7. here is an unde oudines what message this study has for the green movement at � �tood purpose: living together and sharing both for Itself, and f r Wlder large. � social, political or spiritual purposes. This The cental part of the research method consisted of extended transcends the nme span of individual members. 8. Values and moral concerns 'interviews' with commune members. Mosdy, these were long (but (which are frequently 'alternative' to ' those of the wider not rambling) conversations about the interviewee s beliefs con­ society) are, with group solidarity and relations ' cerning what the world is and should be like, how to change it, and placed above instrumental and economic concerns. 9. Members attempt the role of communes in the process. They covered some deep and to establish an alternative social pattern, at least for themselves and perhaps abstract issues, as well as the practicalities of communal living and with a view to setting an example for the the communal entcrpriscs. Appendix 1 lays out the schedule of wider society. questions and issues which the conversationscovered. Many of them 10. How they do things - process - is usually as important as what were not put direcdy, in order to minimise leading intcrviewees into they do. discussing things that they would not otherwise have considered significant, but the interviewers had a clear idea of which questions Some of the communities discussed here do not fall into this and answers were of major relevance to the overall aim. In particular, definition of communes (e.g. they do Dot income share) and some the communards voiced concernabout environmental matters and do . For c nvenience and shorthand, and to avoid making sometimes if . � the attitudes and actionsof wider society, then this was the signal for arbitraryJudgements about which place is a commune and which a the interviewers to press for greater detail. community, the tenns 'commune' and 'communard' are used Clearly this research method is not principally a quantitativeone, throughout . H peful1y this lack of precision will be forgiven by . � and it does not lend itself totally to very refined quantitative state­ ose who bve m these communes (or communities): apan from ments, such as 'fifteenper cent of communards such and such'. Fmdhorn,� they all figure in Diggm a/1dDrtamm, the 1990-91 Com­ think However, broad statementslike this are sometimes made, and there mU/1tSDirectory. are tableswith 'quantitative'data. These should obviously be treated as indicative, but not without validity. Before going any further, the minimal defining features of a commune adopted here should be given. These are contentious, but this definition is based on conversations with communards and on definitions in Rigby, Abrams and McCulloch, Shenker (1986) and Kanter (1973).

1. Membership is voluntary. 2. It is small - commonly in Britain five to twenty-five adults. 3. They are committed to living together, and thcir home incorpor­ ates features designed for this purpose.

4 5 CHAPTER 1 The environmentally sound society

One aim of the work described in this book was to discoverwhether, and in what particular ways, the communardswe interviewed were green, and to build a profile oftheir world views and lifestyles which could be compared with theidealised greenworld view and lifestyle that we had in mind. The components of that ideal green world view and of sound green practices may be known to readers, since they have been so much publicised, discussed and developed in the literature and the media over the past quarter of a century. But they are so importamto the assessment which this research makes that they are briefly recapitulated below. A fuller description may be got from the standard works on which this summary is based (e.g. Schumacher 1973.1980, O'Riordan 1981, Capra 1982, Merchant 1982, Cotgrove

1982, Porritt 1984. Ekins 1986). The su mmary emphasises attirudes and values, because many greens echo Lyn White's %7) influential (1 'idealistic' assessment of the problem, that it is our attitudes and values towards naturewhich determine whatwe do to it and howwe treatit. Hence, we get our ideas sorted out so as to be 'environmen_ if tally sound', the practices appropriate to avertingan ecological crisis likely to follow. This may be contrasted with a more 'materialist' are approach, which emphasises how what we do influences what we /hink; our attitudes and values being conditioned by actions. This issue is explored in Chapter 3, and Pepper 1985. The summary also illustrates that much of the greenworld view is about society rather than focusing exclusively on nature and en­ vironment. This is consistent with the greens' radical approach; at root, unsound values and actions concerning nature link with the unsound way that we in the West, as individuals and in groups, value and behave towards each other. Hence, we can conceive of a specifically green critique of conventional Western society that may

7 THE ENVIRONMfNTALLY SOUND SOClfTY COMMUNES A.ND THE CREEN VISION

of progress is now equated with , rather than moral or spiritual have much in common with the critiques by other political ide­ this ologies, such as socialism, anarchism, or true conservatism. Then advancement. By extension, what is technically most complex, like there are fundamental 'alternative'green values about nature, WIth. nuclear power or weapons, is regarded as most progressive, regard­ corresponding broad alternative social and political principles. less of how much it destroys or pollutes. So there is a widespread These, in turn, would sustain, and be sustained by, the detailed misapprehension that high technology cannot and should not be specificpractices of a green lifestyle. of these things -a changed rejected; yet such technology often destroys theenvironment and is All not controllableby ordinary people, so that can be abused and used world view, a radically different socio-political-economic system it and, especially, ecologically sound personal lifestyles and practices­ to abuse others. Greens think that such beliefS, allied to human are the componentsof an ideal green society, the seeds of which may greed, underlie industrial society, which impoverishes both nature or may not be found in the communes of the 1970s and eighties. and social morality. Industrialism is founded on the too narrow objective of profitmaximisation, encouraging overconsumption. In blind pursuit of this, industries export their pollution to society at WHAT GREENS ARE AGAINST large. Given today's large-scale industrialisation,pollution and tox­ icity become unacceptably high. At the same time, materialsrecyc­ Greens consider that at the heart of the world's problems of poilu - ling and pollutioncontrol limited in the interests of cost cutting tion,resource depletionand environmental deteriorationare domi­ and competition.Yet resourcesare are used as if they were limitless, neering and exploitativeattitudes to nature. They are thought to be though clearly they are finite.The short-sightedness of this is never particularly Westernattitudes, and Western cultureis seen to have a fully appreciated in a system whose timeperspective for planning pernicious global influence.We see nature as an instrumentto be short - decades rather than centuries. Giantism, profit­is used for endless material gain. We see it way because we we maximisation, division of labour, the production line, mechanisa­ this think are separate from it; a view inherent in science and technology tion and de-skilling; aU these basic features of industrial society inherited from the seventeenth century, which followed Bacon's combine produce uncreative,unful filling and alienatingwork and creed that by observing nature analytically (splitting it into parts), drab, unifonnto environmen,tsin which to live. Citiesand suburbs are and reducing everything to its basic components (e.g. biology is a huge and impersonal, and the countryside is dominated by mono­ matter of chemistry,which is a matter of physics which is a matter of tonous agribusiness-produced landscapes that give us poisoned and mathematics), we know and manipulate natural laws for our low-value food and water. own ends. This approachcan gives tremendous technological power, The search for expanding markets,resources and cheap labour has which is used for ends that ignoble. It is based on an ignoble view extended the industrial-consumersociety across the globe,destroy­ of human nature - that it isare aggressive, selfish, competitive - and a ing rainforest and changing climate. The Third World is polluted society which is seen as naturally hierarchical and unequal. Wasteful and materially and culturally impoverished by the international consumerism is now the false god by which both individual and trade system, which many stillsee as progressive or inevitable, and social progress are measured. The spiritual, emotional, artistic, essentialto 'development'. It produces a political systemdominated loving and cooperativesides of our nature (the 'feminine' values) are by both narrow nationalism and by uncontrollable multinational neglected for this cold materialism, which overplays the role of companies; a strongcentralised state is also needed by every country rationality, 'hard facts' and calculating economic utilitarianism in to make the national and international economic and political deciding what is good or bad. We lack any deeper moral standards. systems work. But the .state interferes with the rights of individuals, Over-linear thinking leads to the false conclusion that if Some­ inhibitingour freedom,self-detennination and responsibility, pro­ thing is good, more of it is necessarily better. Hence more technol_ ducing an increasingly undemocratic politics where the wishes, ogy and economic growth are, unwisely, advocated as the way to needs and characteristics of regions, local communities and individ­ cure the social and environmental ills which have been side-effects uals are overridden and denied. Scientificexperts often play a part in of technological and economic advancement. Indeed the very idea the undemocratic processes,acting in defence of corporate interests

8 9 COMMUNES AND rifE GREEN VISION rilE ENVIRONMENTALLY SOUND SOCIETY

Hence plants and animaJs are respected of and for themselves. We against the mass of people, a role they can occupy by virtue of their speci31 knowledge. So. ultimately, the freedom, wellbeing, he31th have a moral obligation to respect. even revere, nature- perhaps as a and quality oflife of the majority is impaired. Frequently the nuclear manifestation of'God', whoever your god is. The right to existence family reinforces such alienation: it is unnatur31ly exclusive and of all species should be maintained wherever practicable, and that cannot relieve or be immune from the pressures of wider society. It existence should be as 'natural' as possible. This has substanti31 often becomes a structure in which people dominate and exploit implications:while it is not practicablefor us to respect the 'rights' of each other, replicating wider society. Greens might describe that the AIDS virus, for example, it is feasible to protect animals through society as fragmented and self-seeking, lacking a genuine sense of veganism, vegetarianism, or at least non-intensive 'humane' live­ community. stock husbandry. Thus aregreens estranged from society's fundamental v31ues, and This ethic may be linked to the notion of Gaia- the whole earth as the more radic31ly green they are, the more estranged they are. a living, self-regulating organism. Although humans depend on the Theirs is a protest against more than just the immediate effects of a rest of nature, are an intimate part of it, and not separate from or polluted, 'overpopulated' world where natural resources are above it, it follows from both the bioethic and Gaia that if humans to be running out. It is a revolt against the alienation thought of were removed from the earth, the rest of nature could continue and urban-industri31 capitalism: its materialism, competitive individu31- there would be every point in this continuation.However the reverse ism, lack of sufficient concern for soci31 justice and lack of re31 does not apply. But this does not mean that nature is immune from de cracy; its rou ne and mechanic31 daily life; its lack of oppor­ �� ? human influence. Far from it. There is an environmental crisis (of tuOlnes to cre te thtngs and use talents; its conditioning of people to � pollution, overpopulation and resource depletion) which threatens ac ept autho" and the status quo, with the entrapments of � '! all the global ecosystem, and society as part of that system. It calls for us middle-class eXlstence- marriage, house purchase and the soci31 and to adopt an appropriate humility; seeing nature as equally important career ladders. as ourselves and acting as its protector and steward. We need to Clearly the green critique is nothing new. It has affinities with all recognise and abide by the pervasive laws of nature that govern all the dissentingvoices that accompanied the rise of moderncapitalism nature, including ourselves. Such laws as carryingcapacity lay down over the past three hundred years, rangingfrom traditionalromantic limits to growth; economic. populationand technologic31.And they c servatism to romantic socialism, from the rationaJity of Marxist ".": tell us that both human and non-human systems derive strength cnnque to the views of anarchist-communists.But greens do claim a froln diversity: sameness (whether agricultural monocultures or in newness f?r their dissenting politics, based on two starting points. in the spread of unifonn Western industrialism to the detriment of The first that the natural environment is threatened as never IS local cultures) leads to a lack of robustness, and a destructive before (theyclaim), with near-tot31 ruin and desolation, nd there­ � instability. fore human society, ein� intimately part of the globaJ ecosystem. � We need to holistically, cather than in an over-an31yticaland m�st crash down th That is the pragmatic argument for think . ",? It. bUildtng a green sOCIety. The second one is not pragmatic but is reductionist way, in order to recognise the full implication of our based on the bioethic- a key aspect of the 'ecologism' (Dobso� 1990) place in the global ecosystem, which is that whatever we do to one which greens believe in. part of that system will affect all other parts,eventually reverberating on ourselves: the greenhouse and ozone layer effects are prime examples of this. WHAT GREENS STAND FOR A stronganti-urban bias may follow from 311 this (since cities often contravene ecological laws), and from the critique of conventional Core values about nature society oudined above. This bias may come out as love, respect and even reverence for countryside and wilderness as the repository of a The bioethic is the most fundamental of these. It is the belief that simple innocent life - expressed through art, emotion and mysticism nature has worth in iu own righI, regardless use value to humans. ants - and the reverse feelings toward urban, suburban and industrial- 10 1\ THE ENVIRONMENTALLY SOUND SOCIETY CQMMUNES AND THE CREE!� "'S'ON

involves socialjusticeand gettingrid of the economic dependency of commercial 50cietie5 and environments. Some leading greens, such South on the North: substituting the present trade, 'aid' and debt as Jonathon Porritt (in his 1990 BBC TV series), are currently trying the relationships by independent development. Fourth, none of this is to eradicate thi5 aspect of the green image, but it remain5 a persistent theme in the statements of many 'rank and file' greens. achievable without deep-rooted changes in Western values, social And there may be 5upport for feminism, 5temming fromthe ideas organisationand relationships.Living in hannony and non-violently of nature as female (Gaia is the Earth goddess) and/or from a belief with nature demands that we do the same with each other. The that an imbalance between 'masculine' and 'feminine' values is feminine (yin) values - contractive, responsive, cooperative, intui­ ultimately responsible for the environmental crisis. However, there tive, synthesising- should be emphasi5ed more, while the dominant are many other views about thi5 ultimate responsibility, or the masculine (yang) values - demanding, aggressive, competitive. ra­ ultimate 'scapegoat' as Bramwell (1989) puts it. Perceptively, she tional. analytic- should be de-emphasised. Just as much feminism suggests that the common link between them i5 the feeling in rejects hierarchy, so a green society maybe less hierarchical than the ecologism of humanity's 'fall from grace', as in Protestant tradition. present one, and more participative for all. Holistic thought must be Indeed, one frequentlyhears greens of ,our' greed, 'our' selfish­ talk emphasised, so that economic accounting naturally takes in the ness etc. as we were sinful. They often prefer to do this rather than if environmental impact of human activity. And, as the ecology of our exploring how the economic SY5tem draws out such characteristics surroundings must be valued. so should our inner ecology be from people and suppresses other, better, and equally innate ones. respected: a premium is to be put on personal health and wellbeing. Fifth, as part compensation for lower material standards for the implicationll The lIoeial rich, and following these major value changes, the concept of quality oj lift becomes all-important. Again, economics must be revised to Several stages of argument follow from these green concerns about account for so that wellbeing and personal fulfilment should be what Western society does to natural and social environments, and this, part measures of the worth of economic activity, govemingwhat we the green view of what our values concerning natute ought to be. produce. And only socially useful activity should be recognised in Th� first is that we must henceforth live in harmony with nature, concepts like gross national product. A social wage, paid to every­ whIch means that social behaviour and personal morality should observe ecological laws.The way that the rest of nature is organised one, would mean that housework, caring for the sick and needy, and should serve as a model for human society. Secondly, the broad tending the allottnentor garden would not be economically second philosophy of an environmentally sound society should de­ class activities. Manufacturing- taking nature's products and chang­ emphasise materialism and consumerism in order to make fewer ing their form - and services should be geared to social needs, rather demands on the planet's resources. This should be coupled with the than wants expressed solely through the market economy. Many practical features of populationcontrol and the development oflow­ wants are anyway artificial and inessential: deliberately inculcated impact non-polluting technology (featuring biodegradability and through such things as advertising. Since meaningful work is a basic recycling), together with the use of'soft',renewable energysources human need, work 5hould be designed not to be degrading, boring or alienating where at all possible. It should emphasise and and conservation techniques. Economic concepts must henceforth craft favour these features - so that they are incorporated in criteria for creativity. economic efficiency. Geographical reorganisation is desired, into Sixth, quality of life can be enhanced through giving people small economic, political and social structures: particularly self­ control over their own lives. Society should be a genuine participa­ reliant regions and ocal communities (perhaps commune-based), tory democracy. The local community should own local resources, . " for these have nummal ecological impact, are socially stable and not the state or large private corporations who will centralisewealth make for cultural variety. and power - both of these are enemies. Individuals must feel that Th rd, since th� sum total of material wealth based on making their views are heard and respected, whether they are 'experts' or earth :s resources mto goods and consuming them not grow, will not, and that they can tangibly influence decisions about their such wealth must be redistributed for, at least, the sake of peace. This community and local environment. Appropriate political structures 12 13 COMM UNES AND TilE GREEN YISION T"E ENYIRONMENTALl..Y SOUND SOCIETY

and mechanisms must be evolved to enable this. There is also a need Devall and Sessions (1985) sum up deep ecology in eight basic for collectivism centred round the small community and extended principles. They are: family, so that people can share resources, work, caring fo r each 1. The well-being and flourishing of human and nonhuman on life other and the young or old, and have a greater sense of belonging. earth have value in themselves (synonyms: intrinsic value, inherent More fu lfilling personal. including sexual, relationships should be value). These values are independent of the usefulness of the nonhu­ possible in the extended 'family', which may not be a blood-related man world for human purposes. fa mily. But, seventh, quality of life must come from self fu lfilment and 2. Richness and diversity oflife forms contribute to the realisation of 'actualisation' for the individual. Respect and love for other people, these values and are also values in themselves. the fo undation fo r such attitudes to nature, must itselfbefo unded in 3. Humans have no right to reduce this richness and diversity except selfrespect and love. This requires all possible means of self discov­ to satisfy vilal needs. ery and development. Inner-directed philosophies and practices 4. The flourishing of human and cultures is compatible with a should be embraced. especially holistic ones which link the individ­ life ual to nature. for the eighth. last, stage in the reasoning behind the substantial decrease of the human population. The flourishing of nonhuman requires such a decrease. fe atures of a green society concerns the importance of the individual life in social change. Personal lifestyles are important political state­ 5. Present human interference with the nonhuman world is exces­ ments. The fe minist slogan 'the personal is political' obtains. sive and the situation is rapidly worsening. Through changing lifestyle. it is held. we can contribute direcdy to social change. There is fa ith in this mechanism fo r change rather 6. Policies must therefore be changed. These policies affect basic than in mass collective political movements, which are seen as economic, technological, and ideological structures. The resulting state of affairs will be deeply different fr om the present. having failed us in the past. Coupled with this is the imponant role given to education of the 'right' sort, for example, along holistic, 7. The ideological change is mainly that of appreciating life quality Steiner principles. For, it is reasoned, the more that people know (dwelling in situations of inherent value) rather than adhering to an about how their own actions affect their environment, the more they increasingly higher standard of living. There will be a profound are likely to change them. The more they know ofhow nature works, awareness of the difference between big and great. the more they will respect and value it. 8. Those who subscribe to the fo regoing points have an obligation directly or indirectly to to implement the necessary changes. Deep ecology try As such. these principles do not signify a particularly deeply Radical greens at their most radical might overtly graft a political spiritual approach. However, one fu rther and vital element does, ideology such as socialism or anarchism onto their beliefs (see and it means that deep ecology leads into New Ageism (the elements below). Alternativelythey may emphasise the spiritual more than the ofwhich are describedlater in connection with Findhorn). Whereas material, in which case they wiD often describe themselves as 'deep' shallow ecologists believe that humans and nature are separate and ecologists. The adjective 'deep' self-assigned, to signitythat they that humans are the more imponant, deep ecologists believe that is ask what they regard as 'deep' questions about what lies at the roots there is no separation. They have a holistic 'total-field' view. Naess of our environmental predicament. whereas 'shallow' ecologists (1 988) declares that all organisms are 'knots in the biospherical net or (technocentrics or materialists) do not. Of course, whether their fieldofintrinsic relations', and the very notionof a world composed answers reaDy are deep is a matter of opinion: Marxists, fo r instance, of discrete separate things is denied. Fox (1984) puts it: 'The As might think them superficial because they do not seek to understand central intuition of deep ecology is that there no ontological is finn how the economic base of society conditions actions and percep­ divide in the fieldof existence'. 'Ontological'means concernedwith tions concerning nature (see Johnston 1989). the nature of being, so Fox is saying that there is no fU l1damel1tal

14 15 TilE ENYIRONMENTALLY SOUND SOCIETY COMMUNES AND TlIE GREElY YISION

bioethic in elevating animal above human interests. He goes on to difference between what humans are and what the rest of nature is. attack deep ecology for its intellectual flabbiness, incoherence and So there is no division into independent 'subjects' and 'objects'; no tendency to in vague, mystifying and meaningless language. The division between human and non-human realities. talk thrust of its mysticism, when applied for instance to the Gaia thesis, Devall says that 'deep ecology begins with the unity rather than the is to revive notions of supreme beings, gods and goddesses. or a 'Self dualism which has been the dominant theme of Western philoso­ absorbs all real existential selves', which arc fo unded on hier­ phy·. Hence there is a fu ndamental identity of self with the cosmos. who archical concepts. They very much hark back to the Renaissance This is atheistic spiriruality, for it does not mean identity with 'God'. New Ageism docs make this connection, though the identity is with view of the human-nature relationship: monistic but at the same any and all gods. It is true to say that the epistemological divide time fo unded on a hierarchical chain of being (see Cosgrove 1990). between 'scientific objective' knowledge and intuitive knowledge is One might add that they also, despite their shibboleths of 'oneness not valid either in deep ecology. Intuitive knowledge is highly wi th nature', imply a stparaletl tss between humans and nature. This is valued. as are emotions, fe elings and spiritual insights. apparent when one compares deep ecology with a Marxist view of Deep ecology is compatible with the Gaia hypothesis of the Earth the society/nature relationship. For in the latter nature is 50cially as a living, self-regulating system which, unusually among the produced, everything that is 'natural' is , in fact, produced by and known planets. adjusts itselfin the fa ce ofvariations in the external through social systems; but by the same token nothing that humans environment (e.g. long tenn increases in solar radiation) to maintain do to nature is 'un-natural' (Vogel 1988). The relationship of unity is stable and optimum conditions for life. O'Riordan (1989 p8S) dis­ metabolic - if nature is socially produced and what humans do is tinguishes radical environmentalists (ecocentrics) fr om ref ormists natural, then humans are nOt excluded from nature. Deep ecology's (technocentrics), but he also subdivides the first category into 'Gaia­ unity, by contrast, implies a nature to be revered by sinful humans who have violated 'her', so effectively nature elevated to a separate nism' and 'communalism'. The Gaian perspective is that of deep is ecology, with its 'faith in therights of nature and ofthe essentialneed and divine being. fo r co-evolution of human and natural ethics'. The primary em­ Mainstream greens like Porritt, Capra and Henderson would like phasis of' communalism' is more on society and 'faith in the cooper­ to embrace many elements of deep ecology as well as social ecology. ative capabilities of societies to establish self-reliant communities This seems to make sense because superficially there is not a huge based on renewable resource use and appropriate technologies'. difference between the two, as Young (1990 p132) suggests. But in

This division is reflected in the dispute between deep and 'social' fact Bookchin and social ecologists are on to what amounts to a �cologists. The social ecology position refutes deep ecology's relat­ profound political difference between the two. For when the position IVe emphases on the need fo r moral and spiritual changes ahead of of manyradical greens is closely scrutinised, serious political contra­ social policy changes. Social ecology would reverse these priorities. dictions can arise through their tendency effectively to subordinate The anarchist version of it perceives hierarchy and relationships of the social to the 'natural' (again, a fa lse separation) and to abandon the rational for the mystical. we discuss later, a 'Findhorn tend­ domination and subordination between people as the essential root AJ. of human domination of nature. It is most fo rcibly expressed by ency' penneates the whole movement. Bookchin, who says that spiritual and lifestyle changes byindividuals and groups do little to alter 'our grotesque imbalance with will Political variatiOD8 nature if they leave the patriarchal fa mily, the multinational COrpora­ tion, the bureaucratic and centralised political structure and the Not all greens think all of the things in this model of green values and prevailing technocratic rationality untouched' (1980 p78). ideas. What they would emphasise as important. and how they Bookchin and others, including socialist greens, also attack deep would act to change things, amounts to, and partly depends on, their political philosophy in the traditional sense of left and right, or ecol�gy for its calls for human population decrease; a potentially reacnonary and dangerous position (see Pepper 1984 pp208-21l). socialism, conservatism and liberalism (with small lctters; not in the And Bookchin (1987) also points out the potential dangers of the sense of party political labels which may be inaccurate as measures of

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fa ctured goods components) to lessen demand on raw materials. the real political philosophy of parties - for example, the Conser­ vatives today arc mainly 'market liberals'). And one would de-emphasise consumption generally, living on as Greens often argue that their values amount to a distinctive green little money as fe asible. Wholefoods can be bought collectively and political philosophy in its own right, 'above' traditional right-left cheaply through fo od coops, fo r instance, but then growing and divisions. This is not quite accurate, for while nature and environ­ home-producing fo ods may be even more preferable and would ment loom large in green politics, there are still some very traditional help in the ceaseless quest to avoid artificial additives, toxins and political questions to be answered, like who is to own natural contaminants. Obvious pollutants, like CFCs in aerosols, non­ resources, what is the relative role ofindividuals and the collective in biodegradable cleaners, lead in paint or fu el, or pesticides, would be a green society, is there a role for the state?- as Ryle (1988) points out. inadmissible. The cruelty-free principle might be thought to require Furthennore greens come from conventional society from which veganism, which however could be carried to almost unimaginable they will have acquired prior political positions on many issues, extremes like not using or watching films or not using or listening to whether they recognise this or not. There is not space here to review instruments like drums or violins, which use animal products. Con­ all the fu ndamental political issues, although some of them will be cern about North-South trade relationships could rule out all cash discussed in Chapters 3 and 6, on social change. crops, or products with tropical hardwoods, though some environ­ Table however, briefly summarises some political dimensions mentalists argue that to rob the latter of a market value will be t, will of environmentalism. It shows that concern fo rthe environment and the quickest way to ensure their total destruction. Energy conserva­ views on how to solve the problems occur right across the political tion measures range from not buying or using most electrical goods spectrum. It divides the concerned into those advocating radical (though while most people would probably see an electric nose-hair change from our current mixed, but free-market-oriented, economy trimmer as the ultimate in needlessness, there is a good argument and those who would merely revise the system, in the directions of that radio and TV arc necessities), to cutting down on consumption more or less intervention, to provide a better environmental fu ture. generally, fo r example by using less light and heat through frugality In terms of traditional political philosophies, the mainstream and insulation. A similar approach is appropriate to transport, greens seem mainly to straddle the welfare liberal and democratic making fewer journeys, walking or cycling where fe asible, prefer­ socialist traditions. However, the more anarchistic of them can be ring public transport to private, motor cycles to cars, small can to distinguished by their clear position on common ownership of larger, and so on. Alternative technology and medicine would be aU resources and on their unequivocal rejection of the state in fo nns favoured. and of traditional politics. Social and work practices ('second order') might include less division oflabour, more work sharing, individuals combining hand Lifeslyle implications and brainwork and sharing skills and expertise, while possession of the latter would not confer power over people through status or Notwithstanding differences in political emphasis, most greens would probably agree on a desirable set of ecologically sound ways disproportionately high income or undue influence over decision of daily living. These can be seen as 'first order' - directly trying to making. This last is a crucial issue in the ideal green society, which behave with, rather than against, nature, and minimising human wants to re-empower individuals in directly democratic ways. ecological impact - and 'second order' - organising and behaving Democratic participative political structures may involve non­ socially in a way compatible with the values ofa green society. The hierarchy, consensus decision making rather than majority voting, terms first and second order, used in way, apply only to obvious and using delegates rather than representatives in political assem­ this interconnectedness with environmental matten - they are not in­ blies. Mechanisms may be sought to avoid and resolve conflict, tended to imply that first order practices are more important than hence a consciousness of group dynamics, co-counselling, group second order ones. Indeed, the reverse is probably the case. The first therapy and so on may be encouraged. Attention will almost cer­ would obviously include such things as sharing resources (washing tainly be paid to the quality of relationships, with time taken specifi­ machines, TVs etc) and recycling wastes (paper, excrement, manu- cally to preserve and enhance them. Gentle, loving and non-

20 21 COMMUNES AND TilE GIlEEN VISION THE ENVIRONMENTALLY SOUND SOCIETY

aggressive behaviour be the ideal, but cultivating openness Nonetheless it is becoming quite fa shionable in comfortable will about fe elings and emotions may involve putting up with aggression middle class circles to adopt many 'first order' practices in a rather bad in others, and fe eling bited about showing minimal and even ostentatious way. 'Green consumerism' has al­ and temper uninhi these in oneself from time to time. Facilitating self-assertion and ways been a waiting trap by which ecological consciousness can helping others to assert themselves are important in creating a better become de-radicalised, from the early seventies �Yholt Earth Calalog quality of life. this connection, tOO, creative activity, active rather to the present Gretn ConSllmtrlSuptnnarJw Gllidts (Elkington and In than passive leisure, group recreation, and spiritual pursuits, from Hailes 1988). But the idea that through consuming we can retrieve collective ritual to individual meditation and prayer, could be im­ ourselves fr om the mess caused by a consumer society is fat uous. portant. So may be open and uninhibited sexuality and artistic While literature like Homt Ecology (Christensen 1989) can suggest expression. A studious mix of private and public activity, and a that a green lifestyle is cosy and not too difficult to attain, the reality tolerance of different viewpoints, sexual proclivities and religious is quite different. Truly to live out green principles may involve an convictions, would be major fe atures of the green lifestyle, asceticism more usually associated with strictest monasticism. though An racism and sexism would not be tolerated. account by two remarkable people who get very close fO it (Murtagh The matter of uninhibited sexuality is contentious. Some greens and Robinson 1984) amply demonstrates this. The 'living simply' see an instrumental link between this, the Iibention of women from lifestyle they choose to fo llow on account of their environmental gender role stereotyping and therefore a reduction in birth rates. awareness and concern to redistribute wealth to poor people world­ They argue that a less inhibited approach to sexuality removes wide involves all of the fo llowing and more: repressions and would therefore improve quality oflife. But Young (1990 p36), citing (Rent, second-hand clothes. cheap basic fo ods and basic heating! studies of existing pre-industrial societies in Oceania, cooking costs are necessities but] ...We cannot justify spending argues fo r sexual expression to be limited to the fa mily. A powerful money on records, record-playen, boob, TV, radio, newspapen, ingredient of SUCcess in those societies which have estab­ laundrenes,jewellery, haifCllts, drinking, restaurants, discos, theatre, lished the most successful relationships with the environment. he cinema, concens, aft exhibitions, places ofinterest, holidays, hobbies, says, is kinship, involving bonds of obligation to a large network of spons, Christmas/binhday presents ... We make u few phone calls as relatives both living and dead: 'kinship defines social fu nction and possible (saving energy], using public phone boxes. e sures � intergenerational and communal cooperation'. Young in­ Vltes those who seek a consistent environmental They be vegan and get fr uit and vegetables from the boxes philosophy to re­ try to evaluate the importance of the fa mily (preferably extended, but also thrown away by market traders and greengrocers. They boycott nuclear). Environmental responsibility in tribal society is not usually produce fr om the South, including tea, coffee, cocoa, sugar, ba­ an �bstract idea but a fu nction of extended family responsibility, in nanas, many sorts of rice, lenrils and beans, because of the current which blood ties are reinforced by rituals and ceremonies. Duty to unjust trading practices between North and South. By extension, the next generation is a key element here: but in conventional they boycott the products of m.dtinational corporations (including Western society utilitarian economic thinkingmilitates against such most processed and packaged fo ods). They would not buy fr om the a perspective (see Pearce tt a1 1989, on discounting the fu ture, Le. Eastern bloc (until recently) because of human rights denials, or how it makes economic 'sense' to shiftthe burden of costs to fu ture fr om the US because of its imperialism and role in the arms race. generations). Sanitary towels and toilet paper are reluctantly used - 'though I these things, and All many more, are hallmarks of a green lifestyle. should experiment with a sponge which would be much cheaper' in In th � c�ntemporary environment of individualistic, self-seeking the first instance, and although in the second instance scrap paper matenahsm most ofthem are difficult to do and sustain. Hence it is should be used ('or better still soap and water as we did in India'). necessary guard against a potential to fe eling of constant guilt about Transport is normally by walking or bike (even fr om the south to the n�t doing as �uch, as well, as one 'should' do - for guilt is ultimately north of EngJand), though sometimes lifts are hitched (admittedly dlsempowenng and therefore politically counter-revolutionary. benefitting from other people's expenditure on a car) or coach

22 23 COMMUNES A.ND THE GRUN YISION

transpon is purchased. They boycott the big fo ur banks, using the Co-op as a compromise, despite its Iitera[ure advocating materiaJist buying on credit, fo r the 'Whose World' project which they run in Manchester. Other activities can cause much agonising: CHAPTER 2

I went to a cheap benefit woman's di sco and went to great lengths to Communes, utopias and green justify the expenditure; I love dancing and I enjoyed the opportunity of being with my women friends. But deep down I knew I could not principles justify it and that if a woman had been outside begging fo r herself and her child hopefully I would not have been able to convince myself that

it was alright to go in ... I badly wanted to learn some modem history and economics to be able to understand current conflicts and injustices better, and toyed with the idea of starting an Open University course THE PAST ...I agonised over thi s £10 [fee for months. I wanted justify l to spending it but couldn't ... Rudolf Bahro thinks that communes be an integral part of a will fu ture green society. It does not matter to him that many past There are other difficulties, like going in cafes and pubs to share the attempts to fo nn and sustain communes fa iled. These attempts, he company offriends - who want to and eat out- when they do drink says, were premature, whereas the time is now ripe for communes, not think it right to spend more than they need on fo od and will with the breakdown of the expansionist capitalist culture (Habro never buy or accept - they 'drink water or nothing'. drinks 1986, pp92-3). In a way this argues that history is irrelevant; whatever of this done without a hint of holier-than-thou fe eling, and All is may have happened in the past, things are different now. While there on an extremelylow income - no state benefits are acceptable or may be some truth in this, it still instructive to consider the past, for is accepted. While most greens will admire the internal consistency if communes by their nature are conducive to a green utopia then we and coherence of such a lifestyle, few will be able to achieve it for would expect to see elements of green practices and principles in themselves, especially as members of conventionaJ society. Whether past communes and the movements they were parts of: even though one can come closer to it in a commune will be discussed in Chapter these were not specificallya response to a widely-perceived environ­ 5. mentaJ crisis, as is the present green movement.

Before ]800 Kanter's (1973) review of communes history emphasised h�w the tradition of utopia in Plato's Republichas been passed down through the centuries to the contemporary counterculture, so that there are striking resemblances between Plato's vision and today's commune movement. Of particular interest to us is the theme of coming close to the land, which is 'to come close to all that is natural'. This anti­ urban back-to-nature idea holds that utopia is fo und in an agrarian and simple life which emphasises voluntary poverty or asceticism to avoid competition and conflict. Plato's ideal community must also be small (maximum around 5,000members) so as to preserve unity. Kanter says that today's communal vil lages often number 150 to 200 members. rural communes range between twelve and fo rty, and

24 25 COMMUNES AND TtlE GREEN VISION COMMUNES, UTOPIAS A.NDGREEN PRINCIPLES

Nin eteenth twentie centuries urban groups are half this size. Shared values, self-awareness and and early th self-knowledge are other common themes linking Plato, the sixties Many of the communes and community experiments in this period communes described in Kanter's book and today's green movement, were associated with socialism, anarchism and the politica1 left. But as is the overarching theme of wholeness and integration in a this does not apply to all of them; communes and the community cooperative mutualistic extended family of work and living idea are also relevant to the thinking of the right and centre. Neither together. do socialism or anarchism equate exclusively with 'green'. However, These ideas all resonate with the monastic tradition which, says it does seem that when you combine socialist and anarchist ideas Mercer (1984), began with the Essenes two thousand years ago. He with the commune/community concept, you produce many princi­ describes monasticism as a withdrawal fr om society in search of an ples and practices relevant to modern green perspectives. idea, attainable by self-abnegation. Roszak (1979, pp288-292) advo­ We find socialist communes emerging strongly in the early nine­ cates 'monasticism',meaning 'civilised. durable communities where teenth century. The 1830 Paris Commune, fo unded by Baurd and a vital, new sense of human destiny could take root' to carry us Enfantin, does not seem a good green prototype since, according to through coming social uncertainty and economic dislocation. It Mercer, they fo llowed Saint-Simon (1760-1825), the fo under of involves a simple but ingenious economy, which balances 'technical French socialism, who wanted communal �xplojtatjo" of the earth. innovation and ecological intelligence', a communitarian culture of But the division between Baz.ard, who advocated a political road to nonviolence and spiritual growth, and the capacity to synthesise reform, and Enfantin, who sought prior social and moral change, qualities that have become polarised in today's world (personal and does seem topre-echo the important contemporary debate between 'convivial', practical and spiritual). The technology it invents has 'red-greens' and 'green-greens'. minimal ecological impact. productivityis not idolised. success does Robert Owen's utopian socialist ideas are perhaps (tnt-ISSS) not equate with profit, while manual labour is regarded as a spiritual more relevant. He wanted society re-organised into communes discipline. Though nature worship is fo rbidden, a commitment to ranging from 500 to 3,000 (ideally 800-1,200) people, embodying the sanctity of the person leads to a respect for the rights ofnature such 'green' principles as self-sufficiency, an agricultural base with and a 'comradely relationship' with iL There less production and small industry mixed in, public kitchens and communal eating and is consumption, and life is slower and more meditative. The green child-care (in New Lanark community), mixing town and country, perspective does indeed incorporate such values and approaches, and production and distribution according to social need. Hardy's though it may reject the hierarchical nature of monastic society and (1979) description of the Owenite commune at Harmony Hill non-nature-centred spiritualism. (1839-45) refers to careful and systematic organic fa rming, while Mercer also describes 'early migrating sects', from Taborites to Concordium in Surrey (1838-4S) is described as a centre fo r health Anabaptists to Huterites, Menonites and Amish, who set up com­ reform that prohibited salt, sugar and tea. The latter was also munes and communities in Europe and North America in the mystical, believing in the power of the 'love spirit' tochange society seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. While not recognisably and publishing in 1843-4 ajournal called Ntw Agt. with articles on 'green', they were often ascetic, craft-based, close to the land and mysticism and vegetarianism. George Ripley, who fo unded the non­ pacifist. They mi ght also share work, eating, propeny and wealth ­ religious Owenite Brook Farm commune near Boston in t84I, is but they were also often hierarchical, patriarchal and prey to charis­ described by Mercer as a leader ofthe transcendentalists, the roman­ matic leaders. Then there were the Diggers, communists of the tic fo llowers of nature mysticism. Rigby reminds us that mysticism 16505, who are often praised in green literature today for their beliefs infused many secular as well as religious communities early on. The and actions supporting land ownership as everyone's fu ndamental Diggers and early Quakers, for instance, were influenced by mystics right, and the idea that the land's fe rtility will be improved by like Boehme and Swedenborg, while Gurdjieff, Ouspensky, working it with love and a communal spirit. And Mercer's descrip­ Blavatsky and Steiner were other contributors to this perspective in tion of the Shakers and Dokhubers (founded around 1750) also community ventures. evokes some green ideas, particularly in their love for all creatures Hardy goes on to describe agrarian socialism, which in some and the tendemess with which they cared for plants and ttees. superficial ways, though not because of a root concern fo r nature,

26 27 COMMUNES IHVD TilE GREEN VISION COMMUNES. UTOPI,tS "ND GREEN PRINCIPLES was ecologically sound. Communal working and control of the land nature and romantic anti-urbanism. He wrote of London as a 'sordid was seen as the source of all economic power and therefore the key loathsome place' and wanted a Britain of 'little communities among to establishing socialism. Its idyll of peasant fu lfilment and village gardens and green fields'. His Nws from Nowhtrt utopian vision cooperation contrasted with the general reality of long-established closely parallels Ecotopiflin many geographical and social-economic rural enclosures and alienation of common people from the land, fe atures (pepper 1988). The socialist Edward Carpenter advocated against which the Diggers had fo ught. Its first strand, of Charrism, 'small communities of limited wants and needs' to cover the whole involved Feargus O'Connor's attempt to establish many fa milies in nation. while industry, too, should be run on communal or coopera­ self-sufficiency on two- to three-acre plots practising intensive tive lines (Gould p24). Carpenter's concerns for inner and world organic husbandry, with potatoes, pigs and sheep the staples of each consciousness, and organic unity between humans, animals. moun­ colony. New colonists at Chartervillewere promised 40 tons of dung tains, the earth and constellations, paralleled the present concerns of each. 'deep ecology'. The second strandwas fo unded onJohn Ruskin's romantic social­ Robert Blatchford, editor of the socialist newspaper Tht Cltm·oPl, ism, which often resembled traditional conservatism's yearning for wanted, says Gould (P39), to see 'socialism and nature as established fe udal, hierarchical communities. Lost values were to be restored institutions'. Like today's greens, he revolted against the environ­ through production; the land was to be labour-intensively consequences ofliberal laissez-faire economics, and thought craft mental fa rmedto restore its full potential, to save people fr om the alienation that material betterment for the working classes should be subordi­ of industrialism and to narrow the distance between humans and nate to their quality oflife, including imagination, simple pleasures nature. Ruskin's medieval-sounding Guild ofSt George had several and nature enj oyment. Blatchford supported and visited Starnth­ community experiments, e.g. atTodey, Sheffield. But the ecological waite Home Colony (1892-1901) in Westmorland, one of many set principles on which it was fo unded fo undered on the rock of some up to accommodate the urban poor and unemployed. He described very un-ecological disagreements among colonists and trustees. The it as a 'small utopia of green beauty'. Hardy says it practised real third strandof agrarian socialism was the home colonieslback-to­ communal living and eating, and carried out fruit and mixed fa rming in the-land movement of the 1880s and 1890s, which Gould (1988) calls in the beauty of nature. Gould points out that creating new low-population settlements in the most fe cund and im portant period of guen poli tics before 1980 the country to replace cities wasthe ultimate of the back-to-the­ ...During that period the philosophy ofindu5trialisrn, the aim land socialists, and was entirely compatible with Marx's call in the relationship between the individual and the social and physical environment, and the degree offunctions and successes of the city Commullist Maniftsto to abolish town-country antagonism as one of received an extraordinary degree of critical examination. the first conditions of communal life (modem green critics often overlook this aspect of Marxist analysis - e.g. Fry 1975). However, it Faced with rising unemployment, the decline of rural society and also had counter-revolutionaryand ameliorative implications. being concern fo r Britain's political and economic world role (a context a way to cope with unemployment and defuse the discontent it broadly paralleling that of the 19705 and eighties rise of green spawned. This movement was also compatible with Kropotkin's concerns), people turned to the natural world and the countryside to (1899) anarchist vision of a Britain based on self-sufficient commu­ solve individual and social problems. nities - of 200 fam ilies of five people each - intensively farming, The back-to-nature and back-to-the-Iand themes were adopted market gardening and producing manufactures from craft by socialists as part of a recipe for radical social change. They workshops. involved the simple life, an alternative to urbanism, harmony with One of the largest colonies of the period was at Purleigh in Essex. nature, liberal sexual and social relations, a sensitive approach to Tolstoy was its dominant inspiration, and its 75 members (in 1898) animals, and hankering for a past golden age offreedom to work on aimed to by-pass socialism and organise a million people into a the land of one's own choice and enj oy its produce. William Morris voluntary cooperative commonwealth. A breakaway group was set was the most important socialist social critic affected by love of up at Whiteway (Gloucestershire) in 1898, and it lasted into the 19205,

28 29 COMMUNES AI�D THE GREEN VISION COMMUNES, UTOPIAS AND GREEN I'IWVCIPLES steadily for saking collectivism and adopting private ownership. But did incorporate green elements of openness, communal ownership at the beginning its members embraced fe minism, vegetarianism, of goods, pacifism, simplicity and unity. non-aggression, worked communally and shared all possessions. The anarchist communes of Spain are more relevant. They were This very green pedigree seems to be shared by other 1890s anarchist fo nned by villagers during the Civil War who took over the land, communes which Hardy describes. Nonon Colony in Sheffield, for abolished money and lived ascetically. Their tradition continued example, was based on a 'return to nature', practical horticulture and into the post-war Mondragon Owenite cooperatives, which thrive crafts (sandal making). It was vegetarian, teetotal, no-smoking, and today and are often eulogised by green writers (e.g. Sale 1980, Pepper against salt, chemicals, drugs, minerals and fe rmenting and decom­ 1984). Once again, it is in social, economic and political organisation posing fo ods. Unlike some of the socialist communes, these had no that they come closest to a green utopia, minimising hierarchy, leaders, were non-hierarchical, without majority voting, and fa­ maximising participative democracy, and having a conception of voured small group cooperative relationships. Perhaps more than production with an environmental consciousness. Mondragon, for instance, not participate in any 'defence' related industries. any other communes of the period, these anarchists most closely will approximated in their social, economic and political relationships to Spanish communes, and the more socialist kibbutzim, are tenned 'communities of work' by Fromm (1956). Their accent is less on the green lifestyle, and fo llowed 'second order' practices. acquiring wealth than on working together for collective and per­ The back-to-the-Iand theme was continued the twentieth into sonal fu lfilment. Among organisational devices to minimise power century, especially in Germany. The youth movement of the 1920s concentration are consensus decisions, elected and rotating man­ stressed themes similar to that oftoday'$ American communal agers and officials, elected courts and neighbour groups of a few 'counterculture': the regeneration of the individual and the 50ciety; the fa milies. There is (in Mondragon) a size limit for cooperatives, and a need to leave the city and return to nature; an ascetici5m connected cooperative financial, educational and social service infrastructure. with self-purification; and the collective joy ofb eing t g er an o eth in Fromm considers the last as important for communities of work. immediate emotional way and building a new (Kanter 1973. pl7). life. together with a conviction that 'no man shall be entirely divorced from the soil'. The kibbutzim seem to embody all these fe atures, but Bramwell (1989) describes this movement's for ecological calls their position in relation to green principles is ambiguous. Apart awareness and the organic fa nning and vegetarian communes it from the sexism reported in some of them, it could be argued that started. A 'bio--dynamic' commune set up near Hamburg in 1930, for they were bornof an inherendy anti-ecological attitude to nature- as example, still exists today. The message of li ving according to a object to be dominated, conquered and exploited to fu rther the ecological ideas and maintaining ecological balance became wide­ Zionist cause. spread among a group ofhigh Tories, or 'Tory anarchists', in Britain and Germany, who were anti-capitalist and anti-establishment. The sixties They included proto-fascists like Rolf Gardiner, and socialists (H G Wells), and were motivated by a cocktail ofideas including a 'pro­ The hippy counterculture of the 1960s is frequendy seen as a major Nordic spirit' and Kropotkin's for intensive land settlements. call progenitor of seventies and eighties environmentalism (e.g. by Nash Bramwell correcdy notes (P122) that 'this cross fe rtilisation between 1974). And Rigby (1974a, p65) saw his 19605 British communes as a apparendy disparate people is common among ecological thinken', counterpart of that counterculture, Le. that 'island of deviant mean­ and we will consider it fu rther in relation to communes in Chapter 3. ing within the sea of society'. He describes how, in the sixties, a As the Nazis gained power, taking on some very green ideas such generation gap opened up where youth did not find their parents' as organic fa rming and gardening, the anti-capitalist Bruderhof role models or values attractive and they were worried at the unpre­ communes, fo unded in 1920, were closed down. The communards dictability of their own fu ture, faced with issues like the bomb and left Germany to fonn communes in America and in England ecological catastrophe. Rigby'S and Abrams and McCulloch's de­ (Wiltshire, Shropshire and Buckinghamshire (Mercer 1984». While tailed accounts of sixties and early seventies communes bear out their hierarchical and patriarchal organisation was un-green, they Bramwell's contention that the commune and ecological move-

30 31 COMMUNES A.NDTilE CHEf;N I'ISION COMMUNES. UTOPIAS A.ND GREEN I'HmCIPI..ES ments were linked in more than the obvious ways of caring about predetennined sequence oi life events centred round career and nuclear family. short these communards,like today's greens, had a pollution and self-sufficiency. Sixties communes were often com­ In patiblewith green values, the green critique of conventional society, deep, almost Marxian sense of alienation. Rigby's profile of the and green views about social relations. But these accounts also 'typical' communitarian's world view emphasises all these things, along with a basic faith in human nature and ultimate ability to suggest no u71trtll concern about the environment. This lack of ecological emphasis was hardly surprising if com­ change society. Politically, he thinks, they were either libertarian/ munes are seen as reactive to broad social concerns and as the anarchist/pacifist or revolutionary socialist. Though there was no product of the society of which they are part, rather than as a overa rching concern about environmental things, ecological catas­ vanguard for social change and therefore one step ahead of the wider trophe was seen as the main threat to social order, and there was society (whether the latter perspective is true is the question being some tende�cy to Eastern mysticism and elements of paganism - i.e. examined in this book). In the sixties there was little wider envi ron­ nature worship. mental concern toreact to: nowadays there is. Hence on the basis of Abrams and McCuUoch recognised links with other social protest the reactive model we would expect communards now to be cen­ movements-for women's liberation and nuclear disannament- that today natural aUies for most greens. They also described commu­ trallymotivated by such concern. arc Abrams and McCulloch (1976, p4) saw at least seven social issues nitarian values of great green relevance, not least a belief in the of the sixtiesand early seventies to which communes were relevant: organic unity of humans and nature, a concern for peaceful, intui­ youth's rejection of the established order; rejection of the nuclear tive, loving and sharing relationships, and an anti-rationalism. This family, because in it people transgress other people's freedom; last - a profound belief that the analytical and emotional sides of life feminism; the notion of play being as important as work; the need for are out of balance -led to an aversion to theory and to theoretical people to construct and express their individual identity; the need to structures based on rational systematic thought in favour of anar­ reStore a sense of community to society; and the possibility of radical chistic spontaneity. practice, this meant rejecting systematic and In social change, not by revolution but by detouring round conven­ consistent ways of solving problems in favour of letting things tionalpolitics and power structures. None of these were inspired by happen and dealing with them as seemed appropriate at the rime ­ environmental concerns, though, as discussed, they are more or less 'what happens, happens', and there are limits to the desirability of indirectly relevant to a green society. So too were the elements of trying to control events. This may or may not constitute a green sixties communes that were inherited from the more distant past. approach today, Studied chaos used to characterise many early Bramwell lists anarchism; the belief in individual values; and the pressure group and Green Party meetings,but this is less common as tendency towards spiritualism. Rigby adds high moral principles the movement gains conventional respectability and political power. (from the ascetics); self-awareness through yogic method and recog­ Other practices which Abrams and McCulloch document do nition of the unity of all things (from mystics); belief in exemplary relate to a green society, such as income sharing, affinningthe value action to change the world non-coercively, emphasising education's of domestic work and sharing it, creating a mutual aid system for role (from utopian socialists); individual autonomy; and belief in practical skills, and trying to abolish the di stinction between work social change and liberation via individual change and liberation and leisure- creating a 'play culture' (see Table 2 forsome features of (from anarcho-pacifism). t960s communes). All these feature strongly in green economic Rigby's account of their critique of conventional society does theory (Ekins1986). make it sound very like a green critique. There was dissatisfaction with its giantism, materialism, competitive individua lism, lack of concern for fellows, routine and mechanical daily lifestyle from which individuality, creativity and a sense of individual control have been shorn, lack of opportunity, for many, to develop talents, and entrapment into stereotyped roles, acceptance of authority, and a

32 33 COMMUN";SAND TilE GREEN YISION COMMUNES_ UTOPIAS AND GR";ENPRINCIPLES

Table Comparing commune. o(the 8ixtiea �d ei8/Jlie. the USA) • Uttle emphasis on personal growth • More psychologically sophisticated; Source;2: Mcl.a""hli" andDaci dMJ" (1985) (in techniques and therapeutic tools personal growth techniques In most communities

In tfHtir excell8nt book '8uikifHs oflhe Americanauthots Corinne Mclaughlin Dawn; Retum to a romanticized rural �t: • Closenessto nature highly valued, but and Gofdon Oavldson cameup with these gen6raJis8d comparisons basedon tfHtir • rejection oftechnology; lew oommuntea­ appropriate technology also wttIoomed; PfKSOfIa/ experi6ncesbetween communes. now8Ild/hen lion links with society more communication links With society (telephone:, TV, radio, some , .... , .... computers) • Freedomand "doing your ownthing" Gen8fally more mature respons­ • Cooperation withothers and"the good • Retum to innocence of childhood; re­ • and most Important value; "laying a on of thewhole " important: 8V8f)'Oneneeds jection01 responsibility ible adult attitudes; valuing some balance someone is a cardinal trip" sin to contribute his/her share; erratic be­ of playfulness, although sometimes too haviour less acceptable .. riou.

Few rules, restrictions, or expecta­ Well-developed belief system - • • Agreed-upon rules and expectations: • No formal ideology, except belief in • tions; largely unstructured; ''work only if fairly structured work and ftnandal " going with the now" -whatever happens usually spiritual and/or political you lee! like it"; spontaneity highly valued requirements Is meant to happen

Mainly eltemative lifestyle and values Creating a new social and/or economic • • Variation in lifestyle in different com­ • Personal liberation most important • - drugs, rock and roll, "lree sex" munities- ranging from altemative to mid­ order Is as important as personal dle class professional liberation

Primarily negative orientation - More of work-orlentation, with accom­ • • Primarily positive orientation-building • "Hanging oot" very valued and "IMng • reaction to a society seen as bad and a new society, new institutions andfor in the now" plishment mora highly valued and some harmful bridging with best in society retreat time available. Sometimes too "worItahoIic" Reltaat or withdrawal orientation • • Servlce-Io--othersorientation • Usually anti-intellectual:body and feel­ • Wholeness most Important In most More transient membership; com­ ings more emphasized than mind groops - Integration of mlndffoolingsl • • More committed membership and munesdissolve easily; "crashpads" very Iong-Iasting commuNties prevalent body/spirit • Emphasis on "dropping the ego" - • More acceptable 0I1herole 01 ego in usually anyone Itanscending egoneeds personaldevelopment: necessitylor ego • Non-exclusive: with More restrictive about membership _ • firstto be strong before trulygoing beyond same �festyle canJoin mustbe harmonious Wi t h group and c0m­ , mitted to group's purpose

• Anti-political (except for intentionalty • Some political Involvement in most • '0 tum anyvisitors away Open tovisitors by "BadKarma" • priorangement arr political communes organized around a groops: "ptanetary consciousness" 1m­ oo� specific ideology) portanl - awareness 01 earth ilseIf as a VI SItors not always requested to con­ ""'" • • VISitors usually requested to contrib­ money or no formal guest tribute labor; ute money and/or labor; more structured • ''Tribal'' orief'Itation- strong emphasis • More 01 a balancebetween individual programs guest programs on the group; togetherness emphasized; and group needs: private space more often over-crowding; privacy was respected "Free sex;" emphasis on leaming to • • Sexuality somewhat more restrained "bouf98Ois" one's inhibitions; sometimes group lose but looser than conventional standards: sex practiced celibacy In some groops • Order and cleanliness regarded as • Order and cleanliness valued in most "uptight" and "bourgeois" groups "Male chauvinist" attitudes; clear • • "Women's liberation" prevalent: male/female roles breakdown of traditional roles • Little true self-sufficiency: often food • Self·sufficiency in food and energy in­ stamps and contributions from parents creasing, but emphasis on intBfdepen­ Mostly single members and non­ • • Otten a majority of monogamous cou­ essential for survival dencewith local area (with someoolSide exclusive couples ples andfamilies donations if non-profil)

34 35 COMMUNES. UTOPIAS ANO GREEN PRINCIPLES COMMUNES AND TII/i GREEN VISION It would be sensible [0 promote the social conditions in which public THE FUTURE opinion and full public participation in decision making became as far as possible the means whereby communities are ordered ...(because] Why communes? [he long transitional stage thai we and our children must go Ihrough will impose a heavy burden on our moral courage and will re qui re Though communes and decentralised small communities fre­ great restraint. quently fe ature in green utopian visions, the rationale for their presence is sometimes assumed and not speltout. Goldsmith's (1972) This sounds ominous, especially when we are told that legislation Blluprillt fo r Survival, however, extensively justifies establishing a and the operation of the police fo rce will be needed to enforce network of self-sufficient self-regulating communities (by 2075AD), restraint. But these externally imposed methods. reasons Blueprirlt, albeit coloured by the traditional conservatism of its instigator. will not be as effective as voluntary restraint, worked out as the Bahro's (1986) advocacy ofcommunes as 'the main way to uproot the 'general by individuals in small directly democratic structures. will' extenninist peril' is justified from a l,11 ore socialist perspective, Here, then, small communities are a device fo r social control, 'the though emphasising the spiritual and moral aspects and therefore fo nn of social organisation in which internal/systemic controls mirroring Goldsmith's (1988) preoccupations. One can read these operate best'. Perhaps a drawback of this lies in the apparent as­ and other communes/small community advocates on a strictly ecol­ :mmption that genuine participatory democracy would necessarily ogically pragmatic basis, but it soon becomes clear that concern for lead to willingacceptance of the ascetic ecological imperative, but moral and spiritual welfare and social justice rate as high as, if not that is by the way. The argument becomes more attractive when it higher than. ecological soundness. emphasises the positive quality-of-life aspects of small ecological Ecologically, Blueprint argues that to deploy people in small com­ communities. There are probably lots of quite materialistic people munities is to minimise their environmental impact because the who would opt for the simpler life ifit involved being closer to a less 'actual urban superstructure required per inhabitant' goes up dra­ spoilt and polluted nature (wimess the common habit of stock­ matically as the size of a town increases beyond a certain threshold. brokers and captains ofindustry who take early retirement to go and And industrial 'economies of scale' usually become environmental work a country smallholding). As well as that, the small community diseconomies. But hugely polluting manufacture can become en­ dynamic 'is an essential source of stimulation and pleasure for the vironmentally friendly ifit is decentralised and scattered in with the individual. Indeed it is probable that only in a small community can a communities, 50 that no longer people have to choose between will man or woman be an individual' - by contrast with the alienating 'jobs or beauty'. (This is not China's experience; see Elsom 1987.) 'self-conscious individualism' oflarge societies. To this alternative And Blueprint reckons that communes and small communities are satisfaction can be added the rewards ofintimate fel lowship, intense the best structures for achieving the green ideal of regional and local relationships, and the sense of belonging to the group. self-s ufficiency. Nicholson-Lord (1987, p215) says that small farming saves land, and that labour-intensive agriculture produces more Such rewards should provide ample compensation for the decreasing food per acre than capital intensive farming. And if Britons switched emphasis on consumption ...so that resources may be conserved and to a 'green' meatless diet based on fruit, vegetables and fibre. this pollution minimised ... Rapid accumulation (of materia] goods] will would save 36 million acres of land. In Britain the average person no longer be a realisable, or indeed socially acceptable, goa] and needs 1.6 acres-worth offood, which could be reduced to 0.6 acres if alternative satisfactions will have to be sought. We believe a major the diet were vegetarian. Indeed, 'Only two per cent of the land now potential source ofthese satisfactions to be the rich and varied fa rmed would be needed intensive gardening for fo od was prac­ interchanges and responsibilities of community life, and that these are if tised'. Nicholson-Lord does not, however, discuss whether labour possible only when such communities are on a human scale. (para intensive agriculture would involve much drudgery. 263). The second pragmatic argument is to do with compensating Bahro thinks, even more metaphysically, that the fu nction of people for the losses, chiefly material, which they would suffer with commune life not be primarily economic. though it pro- the onset ofa green society. Blueprint (paras 260-3) argues: will will 36 37 COMMUNF.SAND Till': GR£EN VISION COMMUNES. UTOPIAS AND GHE£N PRINCIPLES duce fo od, jobs and welfare. Rather, communes are conducive to a Of the former, BlutpriMt's programme was highly ambitious, de­ new 'Benedictine' order, fu rnishing me 'real alternative to me tailed and specific about when its 25 proposed reforms should be Industrial Goliam'. They fo ster a spiritual culture not linked to a implemented. To meet its target date of2075 for a basic network of monolithic God but to God as male/female and in us all. This God is self-sufficient, self-regulating, ecologically sound communes, 22 of beauty, happiness, nature, creativity and all the finer parts of our lhe reforms should have been completed by 1990, but in that year spirit. Here Bahro echoes deep ecology rather as the Findhom only five could be said actually to have been started. Blueprint community conceives it: me divine being as a universal mind and suggested that Britain should be organised into neighbourhoods of energy source, the living fo rce immanent in all things (see Rigby 500 people, set into communities of 5,000, in regions of 500,000. 1974b, and Caddy 1988). For Bahro such mysticism, plus the ex­ Each region would be politically represented nationally, while the tended family, an all-pervasive fe minine element and uninhibited nation should be represented in a global fo rum. This (pre­ sensuality and sexuality are me major alternative satisfactions. They European-unity) arrangement would fa cilitate the twin green ideals fe ature strongly, too, in Callenbach's anarchistic, socialist - and of community fe eling and global awareness - 'think globally: act sometimes fas cist - fiction, &olopia. locally'. Blueprint's social and economic arrangements stemmed All Young (1990 pp 152-3) also stresses the environmentalsignificance fr om the imperatives ofminimum ecological disruption, maximum of communal life, as the vehicle for me extended fa mily. conservation ofenergy and materials and reducing the population level by about half. Central to the ethical system of allpeoples whose relationship with the Kirkpatrick Sale (1980) echoed Schumacher's call fo r 'highly self­ land has remained close is the attachment of great imponance to kinship and the obligations which go with it. These involve primary sufficient local communities' in his comprehensive review of the obligations to particular ancestors ... the duty to honour them by elements of a 'human scale' society, where avoiding social alienation using the land wisely for the continuous fulfilment of obligations to was as important as the environmental imperative. He advocated a particular members of contenlponry society. This ofitselfu a worker-owned and -controlled system, where it is important for guarantee that the method of use will be sustainable so that resources economic efficiency to build a sense of community and where the can be passed on, undiminished in value, to children in the future ... Translated into the context of modern industrial civilisation, this sense of control over economic life in tum fo sters community spirit makes the extended familyan excellent basic unit of a sustainable in the wider social life. Community ownership of economic ac­ society. tivities and communal1iving go hand in hand, especially wealth is if distributed according to need, as Sale fa voured, or to work contrib­ uted, or absolutely equally. He said that this is only fe asible on small Communes and the green millennium scales, so favouring a commune form like the kibbutz, whose general assemblies own and control property, its distribution, the allocation Green millennial writing fe atures communes as components of oflabour and the fruits oflabour. In such communes, ideally of5OO 'ceotopia' at various levels. For one, it paints with a broad brush me to 1,000 people, members could identify economically with others vision of a small-scale decenttalised society of which communes may form a significantbut not exclusive part. Another level more and create a coherent economy adjusted harmoniously to the eco­ is specific about the commune and its pivotal role, but is still fu turistic; system. They would constitute a close knit, stable, balanced and while a third level cites existing communes as evidence that the New predictable community where people appreciated their own inter­ Age is already upon us. dependence and the importance of the natural environment. Mini­ mal economic self-sufficiency for a local community, Sale The �mat�scale decentralised society calculated, might require from 5,000 to 10,000 people. From the Some visions of this are comprehensive and start fr om green pre­ resultant 2,()(H) to 4,000strong workforce could be provided me 1,000 mises like the need for self-sufficiency. Others cover less ground and workers who would have to run one plant in each of thirteen basic do not perhaps fo cus so much on ecology, but spring from, say, manufacturing industries. All this fo llows from statistics which, religious or economic concerns. claimed Sale, showed that in 1980 sixty-five per cent of US all 38 39 COMMUNF.SAND TilE GRF.EN VISION COMMUNES, UTOI'/ASAND GREEI\'PRINCIPLES

owned in common by 20 to residents, covering six acres, with a manufacturing plants operated with fe wer than twenty people - an 25 argument reminiscent of Kropotkin's, eighty years earlier, in sup­ 'minifarm' and sharing deep freeze units. food processing equip­ port of his claim that it was economically fe asible to decentralise ment, laundry, repair and maintenance workshops and transport. industry. Unlike Kropotkin, Sale saw a role for a free market to Clusters meet monthly to decide domestic and external questions: regulate inter-communal relationships. they seem almost exclusively peopled by middle class professionals, Sale also echoed Fromm's (1956) to counteract the growing reflectingperhaps the nature ofmany existing housing cooperatives. call alienation of a prosperous, materialistic post-war society with eco­ But it is a recognisably green vision of sustainable local economies, nomic decentralisation and meaningful participation. The 'robot' where aU are committed to developing their personal potential 'as society of the fifties where, Fromm asserted, 'Everybody is happy ­ part of planet earth'. Robertson's chiefinterest is in governmental, except that he does not fe el, does not reason, does not love' would rather than economic or political, structures. Another rather similar lead again to war. The time ripe, more so than the nineteenth was in vision sees a religious and moral revival in the twenty-first century. century, to set up communes where people shared profits,work and Robert van der Weyer's (1986) Wi(kwy" fe atures the looser idea of experience and owned their work community. Workers must be in community rather than communes in a repopulated countryside of groups small enough to enable an individual to relate to the whole, Britain where (nuclear) fa milies have their own houses, cultivate to give a lifetime's energy to something with meaning for the small gardens and fanns, produce goods in workshops, cooperate in individual, by dint ofbeing able to influence what is done and having daily work, communally own land and buildings, eat communally a sense of unity with fe llows. twice a week, worship together and decide policy by consensus. The Gorz (1985) also tackles the problems of alienation and loss of ecological balance theme in this utopia is muted but decidedly individual and communal autonomy, primarily through economic present. structures. A1ienation necessarilyfo llows from a social existence that people have not 'freely created through voluntary cooperation with Commune! emphasised everybody else'. In green fa shion, Gorz sees socialism and capitalism 'Dare to fo nn communes!' exhorts Bahro (1986, p86). These auto­ equally at fa ult for creating large production units. By contrast, a nomous basic units of social life are truly autonomous society would be 'exclusively composed of small enterprises, self-managed by their members in free cooperation ... the only chance in the long tcno of rcaring up the roots ofthe East­ litde islands ofperfection'. And a�tonomous production would be West conflict and above all of our opposition to thc Third World ... thc path ofreconciliation with thc Third World m ght consist in our handicraft production where the individual or 'convivial' group i becoming Third World oumlves. conrrols the means of production, labour process, and nature and quality of the product. But Gorz does not propose a whole society His anti-capitalist, anti-colonialist green future would be one of built on such principles. Too easily it could become institutionalised \vithdrawal from the world market to fo nn self-sufficient local, drudgerywithout the benefits of some high technology, like micro­ provincial and national economies, with markets for exchanging processors which are potentially liberatory Tomer 1981), that (cf activities between base communities of at most 3,000 people: a requires division onabour nationally or internationally. Other mod­ market economy for basic needs, built from the bottom up. He says, em essentials like electricity or railways must also be planned nation­ 'I think these commune-type things are, so to speak, the genu cells wide. Yet self-management is not possible in communities ofmore ofa new society' (P112). In rhem, people will be reunified with their than a few hundred people. Gorz concludes that self-management must therefore be limited: it docs not solve everything. But there is 'conditions of reproduction', which include the natural world. And an important role in his utopia fo r communes and producer cooper­ what is rational in the commune will be defined according to 'what atives, fo llowing principles of self-reliance and ecological harmony are the best conditions for a human being to be as happy as possible'. (GOtt 1980, p42). In this way Bahro places communes at the centre of the fu lfilment of James Robertson's (1983) vision of a 'sane, humane. ecological' green principles and lifestyles. Britain in 2050 does not fe ature communes but clusters of houses Bookchin (1982) does the same. In his anarchist green utopia

41 COMMUNES AND TIlE GRUN VISION COMMUN£S, UTOPIAS AND GRE£N PRINCIPLES communes be networked into bioregional confederations and be the commune. incorporating production units of not more than will 'artistically tailored' to their natura1 surroundings. Their squares will ftfteen people. Communes will be relatively autonomous in work, be interlaced by streams, their places of assembly surrounded by education 'and the other life processes'. They not be totally self­ will groves, and their physical contoun respectfully and tastefully land­ sufficient, and supply delegates to a council, supplying delegates will scaped. Their soils will be nurtured caringly to fo ster plant variety fo r to a higher council and so fo rth. However, theywiU be independent humans, domestic animals and wildlife. They will form a society fr om any industrial network. especially a world market. decentralised, scaled to human dimensions and obeying nature's as 'laws of return.' by recycling organic wastes and materials for craft By producing as many essentials oflife possible wi thin the commune itSelf (above fo od) the members would not only aJsure and industry. Solar, wind, hydraulic and methane-producing in­ all themselves of .. quasi-independent existence ... they would also, by stallations will be subtly integrated into a variegated pattern for being able to largely eliminate exchange in the market and by producing power. Agriculture, aquaculture, stockraising and hunt­ adopting the rotation principle in the allotment of work., be able to ing (sic) would be regarded as crafts: all kinds of useful things will abolish alienated work. the commodity chancter oflabour power and come principaJly through craft production, emphasising quality and the division between menW and manual labour in some vital areas. They would in way a1so be able to develop a rich permanence and diminishing the need fo r mechanised mass this production. personality.(Sukar 1983 pp161-8). The memben of these basic elementsof an ecological society, the 'free' communes (i.e. not necessarily fo unded on blood relation­ All of these fe atures are essential to purist visions of socialism of ships), will deal with each other in fa ce-ta-face relationships. the sort espoused, fo r instance, by the Socialist Party of Great Through them. the 'fetishization of needs' give way to freedom Britain. Networks of kindred-by-choice families fo rm an integral will part of communal vision, as does small-scale soft technology. to choose needs, quantity will give way to quality, mean-spirited this egotism to generosity and indifference to love. Physically onerous From a different political perspective, planner Peter Hall (1983) 2000. tasks be reworked into collective enterprises, more fe stive than makes communes a central fe ature of vision ofEurope after will his laborious. People choose either to share and ointly operate This is definitely a green and Bookcrun-like vision with homes will j industries like small-scale fo undries, machine shops and electronic producing and conserving their own energy, with less, more eco­ utilities or to return to more traditional but technically exciting nomical travel (by small cars and airships), more electronic com­ means ofproducing goods. The exact principles of fu ture commu­ munication, and work in small units, often in a local community: nities cannot be laid out: this will be for the fu ture communitarians The group of people living together and manning these varied to do. But this is a pretty complete vision and Bookchin insists that it workplaces could be described as an extended, non-blood-related has got to be realised - some ofthe elements on their own not all will fa mily or {ommlmt group. It will contain a nudeus of nuclear fa milies make an ecological society. For him, greens will uncompromisingly which dissolve and combine fo r different purposes, plus a number of be 'hein of a strong natural thrust towards association' having 'a more transient members. maternally biased need to associate, to care fo r our own kind, to collaborate'. Greenness and anarchism are synonymous. People will combine hand and brain and work-share in rather craft And so are greenness and socialism, according to Ulrich. He than mass production. Cities will continue to decentralise into the talks about a socialism which avoids all the undemocratic, inhumane and countryside. and 'rational', mechanised agriculture will continue to ecologically destructive effects of 'actually existing socialism' (as give way before a new concern for natural regeneration of the land. fo und in the USSR and Eastern Europe when he was writing in 1979). Socialists should not, he declares, abandon production in The New Age here i.s some back-to-nature romanticism, but they should recognise that Hall is extrapolating tTends which he believes already exist, and there scale and size ofproduction should be reduced. He envisages that the are other examples of this among green writers who are convinced perfect geographical fo rm for achieving size-sensitive socialism will that the 'New Age' is well on its way. This age will be based on all the

42 43 COMMUNES ANO TilE GREEN VISION COMMU,'tIES, UTOPIAS AND GREEN PRINCIPLES principles and practices described in Chapter I, and existing com­ a coming 'solar age', when there will be spontaneous devolution munes, together with other aspects of alternative lifestyles, are away from centralised capital-intensive production towards alterna­ offered as evidence of what Capra (1982) calls this 'rising culture'. tive lifestyles, including communes. Allaby's (1975) rather simple New Age-ism is couched in somewhat vague and inaccessible lan­ view of history is as the guage and concepts, but its essence lies in replacing a dualistic world story of a never-ending alternation between ... civilisation. or the view (e.g. humans and nature separate) by a holistic one, emphasis­ kind of life usociated with city cultures ...(and] non-cenlnliisation or ing the unity of everything in the cosmos. The fo nner is represented dispersal, within which people develop independently, free from the by the Piscean symbol of two fishes swimming in opposite direc­ rigidity of city li fe . Today we are at the poine of change between one tions, but we are leaving Pisces and entering the Age of Aquarius, civilisation and another. whose keynotes are unity-in-diversity, cooperation and global con­ Communes, he as part of the dispersal phase, are a tradi­ sciousness. The change is towards an environmental conservationl thinks, peace/feminist ethic and lifestyle based not only on rational but also tional fonn of organisation that has worked successfully for many on mystical, spiritual thinking. generarions. Such thinking sees all components in the universe linked as part of For Sale (pp48-52), the rise in 'communal and communitarian an energy flow. Maneris energy: so is prayer, and love, which is God. arrangements' is part of a general rise in pennissiveness, liberal and God is not one God, above and separate fr om humans, but all deities fe minine values and a new concern for the natural world and health and both sexes, and beauty, love, spirituality and so fo rth. Energy is fo od: part, in fa ct, of five 'pulses of our era' - fe minism, naturalism, the spirit of God, which flows through the whole planet, which is localism, populism and individualism. They reflect a 'real and alive. So life is one vast interconnecting unity and the universe is not powerful trend' to which the a mechanism but an affair of the mind, working out as huge entire societal pendulum may be swinging . . . A new period of human harmony. This perspective is not 'new', but owes much to the hi story in the not�too-distant future in which small communities and modem concept ofGaia (Lovelock 1979), and to the medieval one of self-sustai ni ng cities, locally rooted and ecologically sound, the Great Chain of Being (Lovejoy 1974), and to nineteenth-century cooperatively managed and democratically bued ...might evolve a interpretations of the doctrines of monism and vitalism, particularly society built to the human scale. by Haeckel, the fo under of ecology (Bramwell 1989). Nicholson-Lord, a TimtJ journalist, is no less sanguine about A key dement of New Ageism is the coming of the millennium, existing communes as part of environmentalism. They are, he fe els, not through traditional political fo rces but through autonomous a popular fo rce for social refonn, providing the political and philo­ changes in consciousness initially among scattered members of the sophical inspiration for 'many thousands of ordinary people' who 'alternative movement', embracing anything from meditation areeager to help remake their cities. It all amounts to a 'new vision of groups to Greenpeace to organic farmers,health food devotees and, our place in the world'. He cites Lighnnoor, the community-in-the­ importantly, existing communes. These people will eventually co­ making of twelve households on acres in Telford New Town, alesce to fo rm an irresistible social fo rce impelling the world finally 23 which is to be cooperatively run, and will be designed and built by its to the New Age - if we are lucky, that is, fo r residents to fa cilitate energy saving and recycling. This There are those who are lifting to the light and are being prepared to collection oflevel·headed people diuatisfied with urban life may serve set uide ego, will and desire and who are ng part in dedicating li fe taki as the symbol of a potential rural renaissance . . . Behind it, for wholeness, and there are those who, through free wil l, are stopping !O example, li e the dozens of communes, cooperatives and radical social it happening. On the highest level it's a vast cosmic battlefield. In ventures which, particularly since the 19705, have sought to revive spiritual terms the fo rces of good and evil are locked in a fight for communal identity through a new relationship with nature. man's soul. (Trevelyan 1987). (Nicholson-Lord 1987, p216).

This apocalyptic view of history is shared by other New Age Not to be outdone, a Cllardiollljournalist argues that a disparate ad greens like Capra, or Hazel Henderson (1981), who sees itin tenns of hoc alliance has arisen of 'unemployed people and their helpers'.

44 45 COMMUNf:SAND TIIF. GREEN YISION

This has generated 'a new sense of community' (Schwarz and Schwarz 1987). Urban self-help groups, workers' coops, city fa rms and rural communes are described, part of self-help 'de­ a1l as colonised' communities. They have in common cooperative eco­ CHAPTER 3 nomic relations, appropriate technology, radical politics, organic agriculture, holistic health and attention to spirituality and personal Social change and the politics of relations. They are part of this New Age paradigm shift. it is all argued: a 'breaking through' to an ecologica1ly sound society. The community and communes Schwarzes describe Crabapple and Lower Shaw communes, sub­ jects of this research, in such a context. Other communes studied here, Lifespan, Glaneirw, People in we can create a single valid community ...then children run If will Common, Laurieston and CAT. are described by Osmond and away from school to join it, soldiers will desen their regiments to serve Graham (1984) in their survey of the alternative movement. Com­ it, artists will sacrifice everything but their an to contribute to it, munes, they say, are the most difficult, challenging, controversial businessmen will topple their money gods to worship it, and the entire and idealistic components of the movement's prescriptions for an world be at war - but this timewith all of humanity on the same will alternative society. They are more fu ndamental than worker coops, side - against povcny, famine, disease, hate, fe ar. (Quoted by Rigby 1974a from 'Centre Nucleus', a New Age community in London but after being hit by recession in the late 19705, they have gained in 1966). fr esh impetus - the 1980s communes movement is 'tougher, more disciplined, structured and organised than its counterpart of the There is a persi51ent belief not only that the world needs to be 1970s'. Like the Schwarzes, these commentators see communes as changed, but that it can be changed; that a new type of person part of the breakthrough to the New Age. Or, as Kanter (1973 pxi) expressing an authentic fusion of the self and the social can be created puts it, they are part of'communal values and experiences' that have through the love and work of communal and thai once such life, people have been created, they serve as compelling examples fo r for the past centuries been repressed by urban industrialised sc­ will others to imitate. (Abrams and McCulloch 1976, pl06). cieties. But 'now these values return on an unprecedented scale. as hundreds and thousands of communes ... spring up across the These quotations illustrate that it is not only theorists but also globe'. practising communards in the past who have had a vision of a new This kind of sweeping, wild optimism fits illwith the reality of society, and that they thought they could play a leading part in Reagan-Thatcherite Bush-Major AngJo-America, but it seems to be changing society at large. A major aim of this book to examine the haUmark of many commentators on the New Age/green move­ is these ideas specifically in relation to the question of social change ment and the role of communes in it. The communes and commu­ towards an ideal green society. It be important to know the view nards described later should help us to see just how realistic their will of the communards on how this change come, and on whether views are. One of them is quoted in Osmond and Graham, describ­ will and how they playa role in it. This will shed light on the potential ing how communes might help to change wider society. Though the can effectiveness and importance of the communes and it tell us communal perspectives are 'ultimately revolutionary in their im­ will something about the politics of the communards themselves. plications ... the method of the communes, like so much in the Jeremy Seabrook (1990 p62) declares that 'new initiatives, experi­ alternative movement is - through example-to stimulate evolution­ ments in living practical alternatives' are green in inspiration, and ary change'. The strengths and weaknesses of such an approach to that their aims of self-re liance and sharing are essentially social change is an important aspect of this work and the questions it socialist aims. Indeed, it is often assumed that communes are socialist experi­ asks, and we now go on to examine the essence of the arguments on this controversial maUer. ments andlor are peopled by those on the political left, but this does not necessarily fo llow. In this chapter we will see how the ideas of

47 46 COMMUNES AND TilE CREEN VISION SOCIAL CHANGE Ai'

community and communes l:an infol'Tl1 socialist or liberal or conser­ when people associate together economic and social life then in vative philosophies. We will, [00, briefly examine views on social 'expected' patterns of conduct evolve, which stem from common change fr om a theoretical perspective, and also see how the sixties ways of perceiving and evaluating the world. There is a collective communards saw their role, ifany, in effectingit. And we touch will consensus of basic common values - a consensus view, or 'conven­ o what c mmunards would need to do changing or influencing � ? in tionalwisdom'. This constrains people's behaviour and makes them wtder SOCIety, and what problems may lie in their path. unlikely to go beyond the bounds of the established nonns, or what Many of the questions to be considered are relevant to the current appears to be 'common' sense (which is, however, common only for debate in and around the wider green movement between reds and greens (Ashton 1985). In conventional political tel'Tl1S, reds (or 'red­ that particular society). The fe eling that society exists over and above , reens ) are to the left of the spectrum: mainstream greens (or individual people is implicit in structuralist theories: a collective essence which amounts to more than just the sum of the individ­ �een-greens') are substantiallyin the liberal centre (Table 1). Their aU disagreements are less about ends than means, though in one respect uals in it. is your view, the implication, uyou want to change If this there is a fairly major difference over ends. Reds place more em­ society, is that you must change this collective consciousness -either phasis on the social rather than 'natural' in their very definition of directly (for example through education) or through the economic what are environmental problems. To them, poverty, crime, home­ structures to which it corresponds. l�ssness, housing, transport, inner cities are all unambiguously en­ Other, non-structuralist theories may put stress on the individual, VJro ental proble s: the miners' dispute in 1984 was, for example, � � seeing society more as the sum ofhow its members behave and not as an envIronmental dispute (see Weston 1986). Otherwise, most of the a structure that is partly transcendent of these members. So the differences occur in their respective approaches to social change as ' understanding of society comes down to understanding how and we shall examine below. why individuals behave and relate to one another. This might come in various ways: through understanding. for example, the meanings SOME BASIC POSITIONS ON SOCIALCIIANGE and the symbolism behind what people do, or people's socialisation process from childhood in and outside the family, or what has been T ese fa � ll int� fo ur broad areas of debate; (a) whether social change called the 'situational logic' behind people's actions- how and why come ma v:m inly through changing economic and social organisa­ behaviour is likely to be logical given the culture in which it occurs. tion and Structure or through changing the ways that individuals The psychology of perception and behaviour is important in all such behave; (b) whether it is material economic activity or ideas and approaches, and study methods involve trying to see the world as the consciousness which are most consequential in shaping society; (c) subjects of study understand and perceive it. Hence the attempt to wh er the collective approach, perhaps � � involving revolutionary change society comes down to the attempt to change the percep­ pol�cal mass movements, is desirable, or the less � conventionally tions of individuals through argument, persuasion and example: political approach ofindividuals and small groups setting examples unless. that is, one attempts the 'behaviourist' approach advocated for others to fo llow; (d) whether struggle and conflict or consensus and accommodation are more by B F Skinner (1948) in the mythical commune of Wafdtn II, where potent fo rces in social change. of these issues are related; All physical and moral inducements and disincentives were used to in each case those on the left would probably 'far' inculcate desired behaviour as a kind of automatic response in support the firstposition; liberals, the second. children. The prime importance attached in all this to the individual as the 'basic building block' of society, and the view that social (a) Structuralism change is thought to come about by changing the nature ofthe he vie that values, � � attitudes, activities and relationships are condi­ individual blocks, is compatible with liberal political philosophy, tIoned, not wholly If detennined, by the organisation and structure which holds the individual as supremely important (see next section, of society is a structuralist perspective. It contains the notion that on social change).

48 49 SOCIAL CHANGE AND TilE POUTfCS OF COMMUNITY AND COMMUNES COMMUNES AND THE GREEN VISION In a more idealistic view social change, Weber argued that a new (b) Materialism andidealism of set of religious ideals was influential in the change from fe udalism to . old question relates to all this. Which is the most important capitalism. Thus, Calvinism preached that hard wo k and matenal An � detenninant of society as it is and might be; the material circum­ success in this world proved that one was to be saved 10 the next, and stances or the prevailing ideas? An extreme idealist might claim that such an idea had a fundamental affinity with new, capitalistic fo nns the world can be changed by thinking about it. If people decide, fo r of economic behaviour. Hence the Protestant ethic was more fa­ instance, that it is a good idea to start behaving cooperatively, non­ voured by economic interests than belief systems that were antag­ aggre;;�ively and benignly towards nature, then they can do so. If you onistic to capitalistic behaviour (e.g. Hinduism, Catholicism). This want to change society in these directions, then, you need to change issue of the relative stress on idealism or materialism, will be attitudes and values, particularly those in the minds of people who pote tially important for greens and any others attempting �o run the institutionswhere we learn ourvalues and ideologies _ media change� society, for they decide they have to change t e economic and education,for in stance. extreme materialist would argue the if . � An system, then they are going to have to confront the pohtlcal power of converse - that what we do detennines what we think. In particular, those who benefit &om the present economic arrangements. the economic organisation of society leads to particular social and economic relations between the people engaged in producing (c) Collective or individual? things. This in tum detennines most people's ideas. Thus in days of slavery the beneficiaries -the slave owners - thought it obvious that This power is so fo nnidable that it might only be resisted by peo�le they were more noble than their slaves; people who do well in a acting rn maHe in conventional political ways, ranging from parlIa­ . particular economic situation generally come to see it as being mentary politics to extra-parliamentary pressure group a on or, .� judicious and 'natural'. So if people compete with each other (for more likely, revolution - withdrawing labour and/or selZmg the jobs, resources, markets) and exploit nature (because this is inherent instruments of power. These routes favour collective approaches, by in the economic system) then these competitive, exploitative rela­ contrast with the view that all political change starts with the tionships incline most people to believe that competition or will individual. According to the latter perspective, it is no good expend­ nature exploitation are good, or 'natural', hence unavoidable _ ing energy to get the masses to take politic�l pow�r you you:self especially if media and education constandy tell them so. Only have not changed the way you and live. ThiS IS�f because the under different material circumstances radically different sets of think will personal is political' - a fa vourite green and fe minist adage whi�h values and ideologies become widespread as distinct from beingjust means that all our thoughts and actions as individuals (e.g. m minority views. choosing the food we eat) have political ramifications. In a way this Marx's 'historical materialism' was something of a compromise could be regarded as a collectivist view, because it emphasises how between idealism and materialism. It said that ideas and conscious­ individuals are part ofwider society. Yet in practice this aspect of the ness can shape the world. So the promotionof new ideas can change adage is usually neglectedin favour of the implicit suggestion that it it, provided also that people act on them - and that it is recognised is the individual self that has the pivotal role in social change. The that the material (economic) fe atures of a particular society in a individualist approach also mistrusts mass revolution, arguing that it particularperiod must set limits on how much ideas, even backed by usually involves violence and oppression, the very things that re­ social action, can significandy reshape society. Even this compro­ volution probably intended to conquer in the firstplace (though in mise still implies that most of the appeal to people's reason and good the late-eighties revolutionary changes in Eastern Europe there was nature, by argument and by example, will not get the majority to be little violence). And it mistrustsparty politics, arguing that the search cooperative or benign to nature, unless at the same time the eco­ for political power irrevocably corrupts politicians,and that political nomic mode of production changes to one which by its nature partiesalways have to compromise their ideals. Individualism places should fu nction cooperatively and caringly for the environment. In fa ith, instead, in a continuous process of individuals changing their other words, the system must be changed to one where people no values and lifestyles, which should then produce a new aggregate longer have economic vested interests in being competitive and exploitative. society. Once again this has dose affinities with liberal philosophy. 51 50 COMMUNES AND THE GREEI\' VISION SOCIAL CHAiVGE AND TilE POLITICS OF COMMUNITY AND COMMUNES

In Britain, collective action for social change is most readily change, and those who do not, but have only their labour to sell. This associated with the trades union and labour movements. But it could conflict perspective sees social change arising from the struggle also imply the kind of local community politics that is seen more between these groups. And since this is the struggle that has been the effectively on the European mainland and was, according to Pa­ main concernof socialists and the labour movement, itwould fo llow padakis (1984), the precursor of the Gennan Green Party. In Britain, that new energies for social change - that come through green this community radicalism was strongly associated with the Liberal concerns, for instance - should be directed through these traditional Party in the sixties, though in the eighties it was socialist local channels. And. therefore. anyone who wants to change society authorities who worked with and on behalf of local community should show a consciousness of how their new concerns relate to the groups in an empowering capacity (and this is still the case with class struggle - the 'old' politics of poverty and wealth, left and right. Labour authorities in, for example. Sheffield and Bradford) . While Many regard this approach as simplistic and/or as denying the idea some greens strongly advocate the community-based collective that we live in a democratic, pluralist society. This is composed of a (Wall 1990), relatively few are happy about working through plurality of groups, related in a system, and when one group is politics all trades unions. Seabrook (1990), as a socialist, rightly identifies the particularly alienated or disadvantaged the system will adjust - not early struggles of the unions as environmental struggles - fo r better through revolutionary conflict but through appeal to the law, or housing, working conditions and sanitation. But he then takes on the through government responding to pressure group protest, or firms typical perspectiveof a liberal green in his rejection of themovement responding to consumer pressure, and so on -to lessen that group's now. What remains of their collectivisation, he thinks, is directed grievances. Thus a new 'consensus' is reached and the system only at screwing more out of capitalist employers with whom they remains stable, though changing and evolving. Hence social change have a common interest of growth based on exploitation of nature. requires changing the consensus by a new interest group (say, the Seabrook also bemoans the eclipse of the culture of collectivism in green movement or Charter 88), articulating new concerns and our society by the liberal myth of individualism (a myth because in its vigorously promoting its own interests. Again, the consensus model expression in mass consumerism people's real individuality is totally is consistentwith the liberal beliefin society as a pluralist democracy. submerged). The difference between it and a (socialist) conflict perspective was illustrated by Professor John Griffith's letter to The Guardian Qune (d) Consensu!! and eonffict 1990) about the Charter 88 campaigners' desire fo r a written consti­ tution that enshrines the right of individuals to fr ee speech and Rejecting mass action often goes hand in hand with rejecting a access to infonnation, to protest and fonn pressure groups, and so conflict model of social change. Proponents of such models will on. Griffiths said: argue about the inevitability of conflict in any radical social change process. Groups which want to change society will have to face up to I have been a member of the Labour Party longer than most, maybe the fact that there will be conflict between those who have power and all, of the Charter 88 signatories ... 'What we need', they say, 'is do not want to give it up, and those who seek power. Hence there fo rthright proclamation that the relative weakness of a culture ofliberty What may be conflict between 'ruling class' and 'employee class'. or inBritain is a shame and a scandal'. No it isn't. we need is hard­ nosed legislation that will drastically with the liberties of those between men and women. or between different race/ethnic groups, interfm who use corporate power to make large profits and promote or geographical core regions and peripheries, and so on. One unemployment. who hold monopolies in public utilities, who important conflict model is that of Marxism, which argues that prostitute the press, who pollute the atmosphere, who destroy the although society may be structured into classes or groups in various countryside, who create the poverty of inner cities, who exploit the ways, two classes particularly are significant in social change. Despite homeless. Their silly Charter is a trivial irrelevance. the complications of the rise of the middle classes and widespread share ownership. it is still broadly possible in advanced capitalism to this letter also suggests, it is likely that if one takes a structuralist As think in terms ofthose who effectively own and control the means of and materialist perspective on society and social change. one will production (including natural resources). distribution and ex- also think of huge economic and political fo rces that would want to

52 53 COMMU/\'ESA/\'D TilE GREEN VISIO/\' SOCIAL CIJANGF.AND TIlE POLITICS OF COMMUNITY AND COMMUNES

block social change because they derive advantage from the struc­ searching. Hammering out personal relations could involve slow ture of sOciety as it is. Hence one might also believe that some fo nn and hard taming of the rampant self-awareness and self-seeking that of conflict is inevitable and has to be fa ced up to, and that collective brought people together, and life was often at a high emotional solidarity and organisation is more essential than the efforts and pitch. Love, say Abrams and McCulloch cynically, resulted when examples of individuals in order to such a conflict. Hence win two people's selfishness pulled in the same direction: for communes Structuralist, materialist, collectivist and conflictperspectives tend to were an escape for the petty bourgeois fr om the alienation of go together. industrialism, but they did not want to escape alone. Rigby also observed that a lack of personal or fu lfilling family COMMUNES IN SOCIAL CIIANGE relationships in conventional society - resulting fr om its alienating urbanisation, bureaucratisation and centralisation of power which Literature on recent communes suggests that up to now the commu_ makes individuals fe el like cogs in a machine - was why some, ar s' pe � pective on social change has been especially the young, joined communes. His and Abrams and Mc­ � . � idealist, based on m JVI uahsm and believing in � � or seeking consensus and naive its Culloch's subjects sought freedom mainly through self­ re)ectlOn of conflict. This is so, in that is, where communards have been development, and security through strong emotional and psycho­ interested in the prospect of social change at aU: in fa ct this has not logical bonds with others. Their most frequent reason for joining always been any very significant pan of their motivation in fo nning was discontent with the conventional family and a desire to set up an and joining communes. alternative. However, excessively dependent members, like single mothers, were not welcomed. The communards might or might not Self-se eking also be 'activists' who wanted to change their local community and society through the commune. Most individual members ofmost : communes are, quite simply but In a profound way, in it Even Shenker's (1986) 'intentional communities', where there was for themselves', say Abrams and McCulloch of their lat� sixties/early seventies a communal authority and purpose that transcended the individual, examples. Their 'primary reality' was collecnve self-seeking, also had the same theme running through them of collective escape and Rigby also identified self-realisation at the centre of the 'underground's' spectrum, ofwhich communes from alienating conventional society and a collective search for self­ were a part. There was a rej ection identity. Lumley-Smith (1978) sees it, this 'obsession with per­ of conventional values and a search As for self-fulfilment in the fa ce of alienation. The impulse to sonal fre edom' is a fundamental weakness of modem communes. It communal living, say Abrams and McCulloch, sprang from personal is the antithesis offreedom in the sense of'service' to a higher cause. es ngement eelin � �n � � � ofthreatened and fr ustratedindividuality. Hence communes are seen primarily as a place where members hls need for mdlVldual ldentitywas ! often the uppennost issue and realise themselves, without submitting to any leadership or disci­ It c�m fr om 'the artificial antithesis � between the self and the s cial pline. This makes them 'irrelevant to society as a whole', offering no wh �ch IS at the heart of Westem capitalism'. Even the communes,� serious solution for an ecological fu ture. which were part of a counterculture, had imponed a central fe ature Young (1990 p36) makes a similar point. The environmental of the cul�re it Opposed, namely the demand for personal auto­ responsibility of tribal society is not an abstract idea: it is intimately omy, which is a moral ? imperative deriving fr om the advance of related to ties of kinship and communality which deeply penneate mdustry and culture since the Enlightenment. But there was also an all social life. However, in the West: wareness, lac ng in conventional � SOciety, that personal autonomy IS bound up � . With reiahng to others. This fu sion . of the self and the It is difficult for bonds of power such as this develop in the context sOClalwas thought to come about through the [0 right sort Ofliving and of a voluntary democratic communiI}' held by intellectual working. There was much about the together ti es talk conduct and state of alone, esp cially when the motivation for communal life is not so personal relations and work, which e could lead to endless soul much the welfare of society but. as it often is, redscov ry of sel£ the i e 54 55 COMMUNf:S AND TilE CItf:EN VISION SOCIA L CIIANCE AND THE POLITICS OF COMMUNITY AND COMMUNf:S

Changingsociely subsequent history in the seventies. Communes were seen as 'the one great hope' for the majority, and parliamentary politics, the vote This judgemcm may be correct, but it does not fo llow that self­ and the pressure group were universally dismissed as irrelevant, seeking is totally irrelevant to changing society at large. Fint, it does immoral and ineffective. Rigby thought that the social change theme not have to Icad to completc divorcing from the society which is to was common among all his communards, whether they were mainly be changed, and this is important, because if communes are to motivated by notions of changing society or by reasons connected demonstrate t e viability of a green lifestyle to conventional society � . fo remost with self. There was a common utopian goal: a noo­ they must be VISIble to that society. Abrams and McCulloch believe exploitative society oflove, cooperation and individual fulfilment, tha� �lth ?ugh their commuoards were idealistic, with unfocussed got through exemplary and non-violent personal action based on poh�cal ld�as. their withdrawal from the rest of the world was only there was common emphasis on value parnal. This was precisely because they were aware of their 'exem­ the power of love. And plary' role in the vanguard of change for the whole society. changes and the personal example mode of social change: And, as Ashton (1985 p18) has noted: You are changing society every day as you live your li fe - byliving and From Christianity acting the way I do, I influence people, and they influence to Gandhism, Owenite socialism to contemporary if in turn re communes and GLe IGreater London Council) economic initiatives othen then it sp ads. (Rigby, piS). the 'exemplary' p�ject and moral nand have been deployed to erre . d �oC1al change. ThIS form of practice not be undervalued. . is to It is an Rigby linked this individualist and partly idealistic (because it Important Ingredient in any stral:cgy for social change. needs the spread of different values as well as practices) approach to the utopian socialist as well as the anarchist tradition. Robert Owen Se ond, gby discovered, the counterculture strongly bclieved � .� � thought that the key lever for social change was the consciousness of that Its aCb bes w re revolutionary, and not just private, apolitical � � individuals and that the problems of social change revolved round fo rms of SOCIal deVl nce. heir argument went that onc cannot get � � the 'question of awareness, ofgradually ttyingto make others more freedo,:, for all sOCIety Without first getting it for oneself. 'The aware' (Rigby, p35). Rigby's communards finnIyre jected class con­ revolu �on must start with onc's own head and in one's daily life', flict as a motor of social change, again in common with Owen. They says Rigby (1974a, pSO), illustrating the communards' anarchist saw the working class as ignorant of the chains binding them: ap��oa to so al change, and he quotes one who might well be � � poverty was not the main problem of modem society, but lack of wnt:mg m today s green journals: personal identity and purpose to life. People, they thought, took to

It is not difficult to see that it is the in dividual who is the soun:.:e of materialism to compensate for the lack of these things, and because energy 1i e in society, that society has no volition or life apart from they were unaware of alternatives. �n� � . that of Ib mdlVldual memben, that the ecological problems which Such angst was as typical of the youth of the affiuent middle classes now fa ce us created by individual are aeb fr om minute to minute all in the sixties as it is typical of many greens today. And it will be over e �rld ...These same problems can only be solved so � � in far interesting to see the communards still are middle c1ass- alienated, as th� mdlVldual �n change his modus vivendi so that he no longer if contnbutes to their causes. as Abrams and McCulloch put it, from capital and also having little understanding of labour. Thus lacking class consciousness. they � wcll as echoing anarchism, this view of the individual and thought, communards had little potential for effecting widespread society evokes the liberal view articulated by Prime Minister Mar­ change. garet Thatcher in 1987: 'There is no society, there are only individ­ It has to be said that there are big flaws in the individualist-idealist­ uals the It is also the essence of the exemplary-consensus approach to social change. For instance. sup­ an� fa�ily'. green anarchist and green liberal dictum, 'the penonal is political' upon which wc posing that the green/communard example were to spread, it would commented earlier. pose a huge challenge to capitalism, and capital would fight back Ri gby's c m": unards thought that more and more people gencr­ with the power it wields to maintain the hegemony that it cnjoys o. , aU ally were ceJecnng conventional val ues, a view not borne out by today. Without the alliance of a mass political movement which at

56 57 SOCIAL CIIA.NGEAND TilE POLITICS 01' COMMUNITY AND COMMUN�S COMMUNES A.ND TilE GREEN VISION approach) become 'Christ' by achieving 'complete access to his own least has a potential revolutionary consciousness (realisable only if nucleus'. people stand together in effective solidarity), together with the How today's communards react to this debate on social change material means to achieve its end through the withdrawal oflabour will bear on their potential for moving society in a green direction. an d other coop�rativ� strategies, it is hard to see how any present , mmonty, can wm radical changes which oppose capital. And the Le88ening the potential for social change pres�nt spread of new ideas and lifestyles may, in fa ct, be severely restn ted, Green consumerism one thing, but it only be � is can The literature suggests four potential barriers to communes suc­ practIsed by that world minority that has any substantial consumer ceeding as agents for social change. First, they may lack a ,vider power, and it does not anyway convey the green message ofconsum­ audience for their example, through not relating fuDy enough to i g lcss- 'Let's ? all buy for a better world', the slogan ofNtw ConS.jlner conventional society. Second, they may lose clarity about what they (Issue I, October 1989), is a contradiction indeed fo r greens. for As stand for. Third, even if there is agreement on important principles cooperation and loving, the transfonnation of consciousness to­ for an alternative society, communards may not live by them, so the wards competition and violence under Thatcherism seems far more example fails. This may stem, fo urth, fr om the tension between the �owerful than any countercultural values in the nineties. And plac­ needs of individual discovery and fu lfilment (the private) and those mg so mu� ofthe onus fo r change on the individual as opposed to of group functioning and coherence (the public). This tension is the collecnve make for ilt if individuals fa il to live by their high . � � potentially most serious because it can break up the whole s ?dards. ThiS fe elIng be counter-revolutionary if it leads � . WIll to commune, dISllusIonmenti and withdrawal from the fight, as seems likely (pepper and Hallam 1989). A wider audience Murray Bookchin, an advocate of creating a green society via Rigby pointed out that the communards' counter-definitions of some fonn of communes, puts the case fo r a historical materialist social norms and values, and the 'alternative realities' of their life­ view of social change (1982, p346): styles, were potentially revolutionary. But clearly there had to be a wider audience, who saw them as living examples of their counter­ No mov�ment f�r freedom can even communicate its goals, much less definitions, fo r that potential to be realised. There waslittle audience . succeed In attalnmg them, unless hiuoric forcet are at work to alter in the late sixties because, thought Rigby, there were not enough unconscious hierarchical values and sensibilities. Ideas reach only communes and too many were on the point of collapse. Further­ people who are ready hear them. No individual, newspaper or book to more, what audience there was was young, educated and middle can und� a �ara�r structure shaped by the prevailing society unless class_ There was a failure to reach people en masse as part of a tbat sOCJety ItselfIS beleaguered by crisis. Thus ideas, as Man: shrewdly observed, really make us corucious of what we already know strategy of institutional and cultural change from the bottom up: unconsciously. failure to connect with movements for workers' control, for wo­ men's liberation, for tenants' control, for free (libertarian) education and fo r the rights of claimants. is a key issue which Abrams and Bahro, a socialist, argues a non-socialist, non-materialist view. He This wants (1986, p98) an 'accumulation of spiritual fo rces, the association McCulloch also pursued, pointing out that one of the communes' of people who create a common field ofenergy which confronts the major links with outside groups for social change was with the old world with a new pole of attraction'. This association will Campaign fo r Nuclear Disarmament, which they said was drawn from the educated middle class employed in non-profit organisa­ e�enrually exceed a 'critical mass' and 'then acquire under certain circumstances a transfonnative influence over the whole society. tions in welfare, education and the creative professions -exacdy the constituency of the radical green movement identified later by The only purpos� �f commune-type communities today would be to develop the splntual fo undation [for a] biophite culture'. In the Cotgrove (1982). Abrams and McCulloch's communards aimed to solve social problems a5 saw them. Therefore they were the process of this 'deep change in subjectivity' (P104) the individual thty problems of the 'petty bourgeois' rather than of the working class must, through 'therapy with a spiritual perspective' (William Reich's 59 58 COMMUNES "ND T"E GREEN "'S'ON SOCI"1.C""lVCt:. "ND T"E POLITICS OF COMMUNITY "ND COMMUNES

(spiritual alienation, not material lack) - hence their difficulty in their weight. Perhaps, these authors conclu de, there should have relating to that class. Indeed, thought these authors, the very aim of been more emphasis on working together and less talk about love. providing rich personal relations the commune militated Rigby (1990) describes how, in the search for anarchist strucrureless­ within against outside political activity. It encouraged a revolution in ness, de facto leaders may emerge; how, in the attempt to eliminate private life leading to personal salvation but not social change. sexism, sexual role stereotyping occurs; and how the collective ownership principle leads to individuals who do not take care of Ideological clarity communal property. these practical violations of principle stem All If people at large are to be converted to a new ideology, then the fr om a deeper clash between the public and private domains. communards who are converting should, presumably, have a clear definition of that ideology, of which they are a living example. PubLic and private However, Shenker's (1986, pp242-3) intentional communes, where Shenker (P247) puts this tension thus: one would expect a clear sense of purpose beyond daily living, sometimes lacked this clarity, either at the beginning or later on in To sustain collective efforts towards the attainment of supra-individual goals, the individual needs to be treated, and needs to see himself, as a their evolution. This could actually be an advantage, in that daily means to anend. For the community to penist over a lengthy period practices come under less scrutinising for 'ideological soundness', the individual must. up to a point. subordinate himself to the but it does perhaps decrease revolutionary potential and 'image' in satisfaction of collective, functional needs. the eyes of the outside world. Shenker also points out that the ideology could become taken for granted by members in order to So commune survival depends on sustaining members' stlf­ reduce the strain entailed by questioning every action or deviation interest, balanced with mutual attentiveness. Abrams and Mc­ from ideological purity - which led them to accommodate to Culloch pointed out the delicacy of this balance which, when it fails, pragmatic 'economic, social, personal, organisational and environ­ leads to breakup of the commune - unless, that is, communal mental demands'. attention can be diverted to higher goals than the personal.Religious or quasi-religious purposes would give the commune a beyond life Principle and practice that of individual members. However, the sixties communes were It may be pragmatism, or deeper reasons, which causes such devia­ fo unded on the general Western liberal philosophy which developed tion from principles in daily practice. Few of us can live by what we over the past 300 years, of'possessive individualism'. This means the believe in for most of the time, especially it puts us in constant 'individual as the proprietor of his own person or capacities' with if opposition to dominant social beliefs. But we proclaim the princi­ if freedom fr om any but self-interested and contractual relations with ples of an alternative value system, as communards might, our others. Sixties communards felt that if they could attain possessive failure to live by them often affirms a view among our audience that individualism by removing the problems of self-identity which there must be something wrong with the values themselves. So our existed for people in wider society, then the demonstration of this to failure may be understandable, but it is nonetheless 'counter­ the public would lead to social change. But there were contradic­ revolutionary'. Shenker (P244) highlights the problems for com­ tions, for full self-realisation by some communards (usually core munes seeking technological efficiency and economic success: to do members) led to stunting of others (usually fr inge members) in this so may 'vitiate the "we fe eling" of the community' and create a respect. Also. communes were fo rcing-houses fo r self-realisation, labour surplus which marginalises some members. In the case of the but those who achieved it very often then fo und others intolerable. Hutterites and kibbutzim, searching for economic efficiency con­ Abrams and McCulloch (P199) concluded that there needed to be a flicted wi th some of their basic principles - for example, fo rmer the more direcdy instrumental and explicitly revolutionary political opposed commercial practices. comminnent many communes, for as things stood communes in Abrams and McCulloch's communards often talked about doing were 'a movement of those petty bourgeois fo r whom the selfis all things and sharing tasks, but some did not feel that others pulled that matters'; and because of this 'the only fu ndamental obstacle to

60 61 SOCIAL C""NCE liND THE POLITICS OF COMMUNITY liND COMMUNES COMMUNES AND THE CREEN VISION

Table 3: ie and successful communal living is the sort of people who want to live So c ty eommunity communally'! GESELLSCHAFT OEMEIN$CHAFT Certainly this would be 3:1 obstacle to communes becoming part � (sum 01 the IndMduaIsIn �) Communitylhln!he ('llIn aum 01 the Inr:IvidoaIa . ., of a widespread revolutionary movement, for such a movement's (l) 1Wa� based on � 01 �..-.d '*-l ifIcIM(bIIs t..MdonIffection, revolutionary potential would depend on solidarity - collective connc:ts beIw .... �InI;IviduIIIIconauIWIg �Idoship or member$hip 0111McommunIIy. theirown seII .Jnleresl: relatlona become IOOIUalIy lJrIafienf,tedI_to-Iace 0fgiUIic rela�. identity - as fo r example does the labour movement. Sixties com­ bet'Nlllcial. munes, say Abrams and McCulloch, were an attempt by those petty (i) AIomisIicon NIdonItlII»baed iI'IdMruIII IntefeSI$- andrtgta .. � have � bourgeois who had belatedly discovered their true situation in lights .•.g. 10 property, poIf8ISIan oI....t11eh urries Iur1htrrIght$. material society to fo llow the example of the working classes and construct some power through combination. The attempt failed contrast comes through in the distinction introduced by sociologist because communards were not in practice prepared to sacrifice Ferdinand Tonnies in 1887 between the ideal types ofgemeinschlljtand enough of their possessive individualism to achieve collectivity. gtstllschtif/ (see Table 3). They did not see that the cause of their alienation from their own Broadly speaking, socialists fa vour gemeinschlljt communal rela­ true individual identity in wider society had been, specifically, tionships, though they would reject part (ii) of the definition of this cap italism. They blamed it instead on vague generalities like the concept, whereas the liberal notion of community embraces 'incomprehensibility of complex society' or the 'obliteration of ge5e/lschlljt. Traditional conservatism would embrace gemeinschlljt spontaneity by rourine' or the 'fragmentation of whole man by the completely as defined. The latter also conveys the idea of 'total division oflabour'. Hence they were not prepared to see themselves community' which Kanter (1972, p72) calls 'the submission ofpri­ as 'proletarian' in a revolutionary sense, and pact of a class struggle. vate states to social control, exchanging fo rmer identity fo r one These are very much the criticisms which 'red-greens' level at defined and form ulated by the community'. It incorporates Rou­ 'green-greens' today. The fonn er adopt a socialist approach to social sseau's view that change. like Ab rams and McCulloch, and the latter a liberal ap­ proach, and the disagreements hinge around the problems of indi­ The general will which should dominate all public life and detennine vidualism and collectivism, and the analysis of why people ace all public decisions was not the sum of individual wills. It was alienated from themselves, from each other. and from nature. something qualitatively different: an expression of man's social, universal nature, of status a5 a human being, li ving with others and his concerned for them, an expression ofms membership ofa collective and not ofms egoistic pursuit of personal advantage. Man, thi s meant, THE POLITICS OF COMMUNAL UTOPIAS expressed himself most fully, was most prope rly human, precisely in a community (Kamcnka 1982, p8). These fu ndamental political differences extend also to the question ofwhat kind offuture society communards may envisage. They may Socialism and community all believe that communes should figure strongly in it. but the notion of communes and community can have conservative, liberaJ or Kamenka believes that collectivism in the socialist tradition em­ socialist connotations. bodies precisely this sense of community. The socialist commu­ nitarian also thinks that property should be social rather than private,

labour has dignity, humans ace fund amentally equal, and austerity, GemeifUchaft and ge,ellAchaft modesty and devotion to the public good are virtuous. Funhermore, The differences referred to above, between individualism and col­ society should be fu ndamentally reorganised to make it cooperative lectivism, underlie a basic political difference between, on the one rather than competitive. Egalitarian communities were pan of the hand, socialist and traditional conservative approaches to com­ common ground shared by early socialists, be they romantically munity and, on the other, the liberal concept of community. This inclined to the pre-industrial past, or biased towards a technological

62 63 COMMUlYES AtW THE GREEN VISION SOCIAL CIIANGE AND THE POLITICS OF COMMUNITY AND COMMUNES fu ture. In fa ct the ultimate goal of nineteenth -century socialism was only those communards rejected; today's mainstream greens, as well the utopian commune, thOllgh after the middle of the century as democratic socialists, also �hy away from it. this became less of a mainstream concern. However, it was important in Marxism, for in Marx's desired fu ture of'truly human communism', Traditional conservatem private property, the town-country division, the state, the law and classes would all be replaced by self-regulating communities of In this view of an ideal society the notion of'natural' laws binding many-sided, all-round men and women working cooperatively for people together in an organic (slow-changing) unity is strong: as is the common good and expressing themselves fu lly as creative hu­ the idea of an organic unity between people and nature. The latter man beings. had come, says Kamenka (P13), to the comes out the concept of intimate links between people - in a Marx in Rousseauan-anarchist view of human nature as capable of living in nation, region or local community or commune -and 'their' soil and spontaneous, cooperative fellowship with others and seeing the landscape. The close bonds between them are represented in the common interest as one's own. But alienation, derived from the gemeil1Slhajt concept and in a romantic vision of medieval, pre­ material relations of production, prevented this from actually hap­ industrial society and, again, in national, regional and local chauvi­ pening. Socialists argue for an unhierarchical and secular ge­ nism (most extremely, in Nazism's 'Blood and Soil'). mtillJchajr, which Marx called gtmeillweJell (ultimate communism). Cotgrove (1983) describes it, there is a unity based on senti­ As The short-lived Paris Commune of1871 was a model. It embraced ments that grow out of the community, locality and shared physical fe deralism, decentralisation, participatorydemocracy, social justice, life. The general will of the community is the source of authority, yet and a rapid improvement in workers'living conditions. Still, today, it is a naturally hierarchical community, and so that will is expressed this is the preferred model among many Western inteUectual social­ by and through the leaden. Conservative utopian environmentalism ists, who dislike the socialism of the centralised state. Some red­ (e.g. Goldsmith 1988) says that there is a need to re-establish these greens, like Bahro, reject the state altogether in favour of anarchist values of small-scale 'traditional' (pre-industrial) communities, and self-sufficient communes interacting through barter. Others like to conserve nature, landscapes and the holistic relationships be­ Gon, Ryle, and Frankel (1987) believe that there must be some state tween them and their people. Such relationships go beyond rational presence to mediate between communes and represent supra­ explanation, but are appropriately expressed in nature mysticism, communal interests. creative art, fo lk legend, 'traditional' pagan ritual, fe stivals, and the But away from theory, in the actual history of socialism, trades idea of a community of comrades with shared values, goals and unions and mass political parties have been central, and theutopian emotions (Mosse 1982). This also is a venion of community which socialist decenttalised communal living tradition has been marginal fe d into the idea of'volk' - the national community - that became because, says Kamenka, the latter did not connect with the mass of part of the Gennan Youth Movement from 1900 and nourished people. It put too much stock in the independent power of moral National Socialism in the 19305. It also fed the back-to-the-Iand and example, had no conception of class struggle, but instead appealed communes movements in Europe during the thirties, fo rties and to the 'world at large', and rejected conflictpolitics and revolutionin fifties; and could have echoes in the deep ecology-based quasi­ fa vour of pacifist, incremental small experiments. But, Kamenka mystical communes of the eighties. Rolf Gardiner, fo r instance, (P24) believes, the world cannot be restructured piecemeal by well­ whom Bramwell (1989) describes as a 'right-wing proto fa scist', intentioned people who are not of the working class: attempted to make his Springhead estate a cooperative self­ sufficient commune. He was enthusiastic about many things - Those who seek an undifferentialed community as the ultimate oaJ of g penonal spiritual rebinh, holistic thinking, organic fanning-which sociali$m know fullwell thilltit willhillve to created, like the medieval characterise deep ecology today, as were many of his high Tory gtmtins,hil!f, by fo rce and fraud, by censorship, indoctrination and the ruthless suppression of contrary opinions. fr iends. Bramwell reminds us that the idea of giving land back to the

These criticisms are very similar to Abrams and McCulloch's of people - the fanner or labourer - sttms left-oriented, because it sixties communards. The revolutionary conclusion is one that not involves substantial wealth redistribution.

64 65 COMMUI'¥ESAND TilE GREEN VISION SOClA.L CIIA NGE AND TilE POI..tTfCS OF COMMUNITY ANV COMMUNES

But lO support the peasant, the yeoman or the agricultural labourer avoid the over-individualism which they see as ultimately counter­ was an emotionally conservative position. wually ba ed a deep revolutionary: part of the problem rather than its cure. And the view ck by sense of specifica.llyEngli sh patriotism. of what constiNtes the best way to effect social change will also be relevant to a commune's effectiveness. If it is an individualist It will be interesting to see if any spirit of back-ta-the-landl exemplary and 'apolitical' (in the sense of class politics) model, the yeoman repossession exisu in communes today and. if so, whether it � irwill have to answer some of the potential criticisms outlined above. really carries overtones of right-wing communitarianism. Again, if the communards' political position owes more to liberal­ ism or conservatism than to socialist-anarchism, then it may be Uberal communitarianism doub tful whether it can relate to a truly 'green' society, because the Cotgrove (1983) draws the same between anarchist liberatory green vision is ultimately based on cooperation, anti-capitalism, link communes (opposed to almost everything the traditional conserva­ egalitarianism, smaD-scale decentralist non-hierarchical organisa­ tive community concept stands for) and the liberation-of-the­ tion, common ownership of the means of production, and harmony

individual theme which Rigby and Ab rams and McCulloch identify with nature. Gould (1988) says: 'The relevance of paradigm to As this among their subject communards. Like them. Co tgrove places such the left-right division is obvious. Greens are better placed on the individualism in the liberal tradition. left'. Or we might add that despite tendencies to liberalism and Liberals bow to the collective they get something out of it conservatism, perhaps they slrould be on the left. will if for themselves. But they see human naNre as essentially auto­ nomous -having a set of standards or principles which are unique to the self. So they not (asconservatives or socialists sometimes do) These three chapters have reviewed such questions, along with the will blindly accept collective mores as part of tradition, without ques­ definitionof a green society and lifestyle, in abstract or related to past tioning them via their own critical rational judgement. communes. They fo rm the context for the fo llowing report of the This is all in keepingwith thegmllschaft concept, but incompatible research which was done in order to establish the present relation­ with the notion of total community or self-in-others. Any conces­ ship of communes to a green society of the future. We now go on to sion to the society, in the form of cooperation and communality, that research. is based on strict reciprocity and mutuality, so it relates to Proudhon's anarchism rather than Rousseau's or Kropotkin's. Mutuality can be seen as a fully participatory relationship where each party respects and values the other as full partner. It is an autonomous relationship, because people monitor their own behaviour towards others and adjust it accordingly (and, presumably, conditionally: depending on the reaction of the other, such adjusted behaviour may not be maintained, or may be further revised). The fo cus is very much, therefore, in the mutuality commune, on relationships themselves rather than on the grander enterprise, where 'total community' - loss-of-self in others and the enterprise - is more appropriate. It is only possible in a fa ce-ta-face community of, say, six to eighteen people where individuals can know the other members well. all discussed above, the type of communal relationships - their • A!; basic political naNre - may affect the potential of a commune for effecting social change: Abrams and McCulloch certain1y think so. Something more akin to a socialist or conservative conceptioncould

66 67 CHAPTER 4 Decline of green evangelism

TO FOUND A GREEN SOCIETY

We had this naive beliefin how ea it ght be to nd an alternative­ sy mi fi 'thewind is fre e'. But so is oil ...it isn't that simple; it doesn't work out that way. (CAT member).·

Were the communes which we examined set up in order to help change wider society (1.1-2]?t And, if so, did their fo unders see them as a route to an tcologicolly sound society [1.3, 1.6)? Did fo under­ members intend to be a vanguard for the rest of U5, settinga personal example like many of the movements outlined in Chapter 2? Alter­ natively, were 'self-seeking' motives uppermost - motives of indi­ vidual and group self-realisation; a petty-bourgeois escape from alienation, as the sixties movement was described in Chapter 3? The broad answer seems that these communes started as the fonner, but have drifted towards the latter. Table 4 shows, seven of the twelve were established between & 1972 and 1975 and a further two in 1978: aU hoton the heels ofthe first post-war period, 1967-74, of high media attention to, and public concern about, global environmental issues. Of the others, ZAP comes in the second period of such concern (1985 on), while Monkton Wyld started in between. Sixties Findhom was an early example of deep ecology ideas in action. Given this timing, we would expect, and do find, that most accounts of these conununes' fo unding are replete with the language ofgreen values, and that their fou nders nearly all wanted to change wider societY rather than just escaping from it. Nine out of twelve groups had strong green ideologies and intentions, six being inspired by back-to-the-landl self-sufficiency examples, hath fa ctual Oohn Seymour's 'Centre fo r

'Unless indicated differently, all quotations in the text fromnow on are direct quotationJ from imervieweu. tThfoughout. numben in square brackets refer to the questionnaire schedule _ Ue Appendices 1 and 2.

69 COMMUNES AND TilE CREE,'

Living') and fictional (BBC-TV's 'The Good Life'). And education order aspects of lifestyle - communality, non-hierarchy, consensus was seen as a big fa ctor in changing society- omy three groups did and anti-sexism (see Appendix 2) in particular. It is difficultfrom this nOt originally intend to operate as educational centres, even if that distance in time to disentangle the two 'orders'; as it is difficultto pin intention was lost early on. Five of the nine, Laurieston, Monkton down types and strengths of motivation. Though most groups had Wyld, CAT, LSF and Findhorn, are thriving educational centres several principles in common, one ofthem seems to have been that it today, ofwhich the last three became communes 'by accident' rather was valid (within the boundaries of an 'alternative' world view) fo r than original intent. each individual to think and do their own thing. Unlike some other A long-standing communard who remembers the seventies well purposive communes (religious communities, for example), there listed fo ur major motivations among fo under members: had to be great freedom to interpret aims and methods and develop individual interests, notwithstanding a strong sense of common (i) Many educated women, tied down by children, wanted more than purpose and even political ideology. the nuclear fa mily offered (see Phillips 1990). Canon Frome founders, many of whom came from Postlip HaU, (ii) Mistrust of the conventional educational system. were 'definitely Good Lifers of the late seventies'. Typically their Disgust with consumer society. complementary intents were to 'live together, ecologically soundly' [lii) (iv) Environmental concern. and, as an extended fa mily with collective childcare, and retaining the identity of individual fa milies, to practise non-hierarchy and In descending order, these have increasingly obvious relevance to consensus. 'We saw ourselves as role models, living out early seven­ green issues though 'second order'/social concerns like (i)-(Hi) may ties environmentalism'. There was an (overdone) evangelising in­ in the long term be more important for greens than direct environ­ tent, for the fo unders called a meeting oflocals and told them they mental concern. were bringing the 'alternative culture' to the area. This, we were CAT epitomised this strong green ideology. Its fo unders were told, did not go down too well! with the previous back-to-the­ As 'acutely aware of the environmental crisis: they saw it in urgent, land movements, there was colonising intent. Rural regeneration apocalyptic terms', said one member. Another said, 'they were was to be achieved, based on labour-intensive organic farming, worried about limits to growth and exponential curves; the philoso­ crafts, and education. A fo nner school building was used fo r the phy was "sustainability, trust, fu lfilment"'. They were utopian, Frome Society, which was pivotal and intended as a base for environ­ arcadian socialists at hean, though their money was put up by a mental courses for local people and other groups. 'green' industrialist ex-Guards officerand old Etonian! A1though the Redfield, Laurieston, Crabapple, LSF, and Glaneirw were similar. ahernativemovement had largely seen technology as the enemy, this They were, largely, fo unded by ex-urbanite (especially London) particular group did not. It started CAT on an old 4O-acre Welsh people - as a Lauriestonian put it, 'privileged middle-classes with a slate quarry as a demonstration centre for alternative technology­ sense of awareness that they could do what they wanted, and the particularly in energy, gardening and building. It wanted to show money to do it'. Phillips (1990) says that for such people. ordinary people what the implications of their lifestyles were -how, for example, using electrical appliances contributed to pollution. collective living was both a political st:uement and a practical solution Little about these intentions was written down: 'There was an . ..h was a challenge to the whole concept of the modem fa mily land) element of let-it-all-hang-out; pan of the anarchist legacy of early a collective household provides a practical means of sharing tasks, days'. But as the workers began to form an on-site community, the avoiding overconsumption and combining childcare the massive wi th purpose of demonstrating ecological lifestyles became important­ programme of meetings and events which filled the evenings and 'most important' according to one member who believes that CAT weekends. neglects this aspect today. This is true of most other ecologically oriented fo unding groups. Lower Shaw was a fa rmhouse saved from obliteration by the They wanted not only first order green practices, but also second spread of suburban Swindon through the intervention of a Swindon

70 71 COMMUNES AND TilE GREEN VISION DECLINE Of GIfEEN EVANGELISM

TilLie 4: The eornmune. e:o;amined in Ihis book (I.IJ

Commune No 01 No 01 Year SittJalion" Present ' OrganiC Founded with Was green II so, Educational Education ' '''''''''' � ""' cenlre now? �, """" started """. .... sharing? farming! maio .. Ideological gardening evangelical -strong? � originally ''''' 1 "'. """'. intent? planned?

CAT 10 1974 M� ecological pays wages ...... alternative ". , (2,/0, , , '" acres) 10",,_, ZIOA 5 1986 " anarchist . ". .. .".n no - " . Protect ' (allolmer1ts, , economics '" ) Canon Z7 20 1978 Mol """""'" no ". BUSS '" no From. (35 '"acres) '"

People In 4 2 1973 " """ " 'os no diffuse no -semi· ' '" (Mill gardens)'" no Common (nowrural) (3 acres) Crabapple 7 5 1975 no no Mol ecological .. .. no .. BliSS , (40, acres) , Laurieston 20 10 1972 rural mixed no .. ". .. BlJSS .. .. (120, acres) , , , Redfield ZZ 13 1978 rural mood no .. .. ". BUSS .. no (8 ,acres) , ,

Mon_ 6 1983 Mol mixed . . no diffuse . , .. . . . WyId , (10, acres) , , '"

Low" 7 1975 . . 'os • .. YO' . BlJSS . Shaw -- """,,

Ulespan 1974 M� " . . no diffuse 'os 00 , .... YO' . " , (2.5, acres) Gtaneirw • 3 1975 ru'" no no mixed no YO' BUSS '" '" (40 acres) ,""hom 200 NO "'.2 ru<� "" no . no spirituaVdeep " - ,. '" ' '" - Apart from Findhom, most these data - " 01 are drawn from the communes' sell. BUSS Back·to-the-landlSell sufficiency. descfiption in Ansell et aJ (1989).

politics' and comprising self-reliance, ecology, healthy diet, non- councillor who wanted it as a centre to run courses on self- violence, non-discrimination, spirituality, therapy, outside politics, sufficiency, organic fa rnling and 'alternative education' involving personal fu lfilment, cooperative living and fe minism. Excepting the yoga, massage, alternative medicine and vegetarian fo od. But the last item, which was sometimes ignored (Canon Frome did not others were decaying large country mansions, which could be challenge sexism), this list fo nns a model of most of the communes picked up cheaply at the time, Laurieston, costing £25,000, de- researched here. While Glan�irw was described as an escape for veloped its People Centre, running courses as a 'public service, 'middle management dropping out into the country', most of the disseminating infonnation relevant to our chosen lifestyle' - a rest were, like Redfield, to a major degree 'founded as a route to an lifestyle described in the written guidelines as based on 'green ecological society'. 72 73 COMMUNES AND TilE GREEN VISION DECLINE Of GREEN EVA.NCELISM

Cr-abapple members did not want to evangelise, but they were Table 5: Major tenet. or the rm dhorn eont.enaua 'ecologically and politically highly motivated'. They initially went as 1. The new (Aquarian) age is on its way - a technological andooo peralive age. far as espousing Wa ldt'll principles and practices. Based on be­ lJ 2. Findhom is a ·light centra' where people lfansfOfm themselves and tap into the havioural psychology- a 'scientific technology ofhuman conduct'­ 'new type 01 energy' 01 the Aquarian Age. (Ughl centres work towards the good 01 the planet; ·Iight' is a Ule-giving force thai pervades all beings andinanimate objects these would, according to Skinner's 1976 introduction to his novel, in the universe.) answer the question: 'How are people to be induced to use new We &femore than just material, but 01a greater spiritual rearrty, which Is caring fo nns ofenergy, to eat grain r-ather than meat, and to limit the size of 3. and intelligent. part their fa milies?' Among the answers which Crabapple tried were 4. Everything has purpose, love andunity (lhree principles behindall great religions). , some behavioural conditioning of children (mainly rewards for 5. Everything is part 01a whole - notseparate ( planetary consciousness'). desired behaviour), banning couple relationships, and a work credit 6. Alt people are membelll of the same biotic community, or 'planetary village'. There is a oneness behind all divisions. system whereby people who did the most unpalatable jobs accumu­ 7. Everything, including all dally tasks, should be done with'love'. lated most 'credits' entiding them to take holidays. These ideas were 8. 'Love' Includes spiritlJaI commitment and a sense of purpose. It involves being a soon abandoned as impracticable; for instance, people could not periectionislin everything because andeveryone has god(a divine spirit afford to take the holidays they became entided to! They were which is love) in them and Ih&reforeev&f)'thing isgood. among what a Redfield member calledmany 'grand green ideas and 9. 'Love' involves worIdng cooperatively in groups , by consensus. Fmclnom's 'sacred cuhure' features groups attuning a oommon goal. plans which have not been realised' by the seventies communes. 10 10. The prooess by which you do things Is Important as the end product. ptocess Education centres and renewable energy devices seem to be as The should bring lila and spirit into averything and always be open and honest. fore most among those green things that did not come about with the 11. The individual is where all social change starts. passing of time. That they are still favourites among the green 12. Individuals must love themselves and discover themselves, particularty their dreams of first-gener-ation communards was demonstrated by emotionalspiritual and potential, andthe blocks 10 it. Theseprocesses. ZAP togetherwith inlanse achievinggrowth andtion. transforma members, who were all under 25 in 1987 (see Table 6) when the emotionalcrises, lead spirirual 10 transformed individuals all belight centres, Birmingham commune was fo unded as the 'New University Pro­ 13. As we can 14. Individuals &fe luillified by working together and being subsumed in theoommunity ject'. Its patrons included Henryk Skolimowski, Sally Willington - bul lheir individualism musl notbe subsumed In the group identity. and other prominent advocates of green economics. For nearly two years its members led courses that talked of setting up green net­ works fo r organic food production and distribution, and of generat­ ing energy la CAT. But now, although one member approach to social change (see Chapters 5 and 6) are particularly Ii enthusiastically manages urban allotments, the renamed project is compatible with the principles of deep ecology (see Fox 1984, Devall practically centred on the more immediately anarchist than green and Sessions 1985 and Nacss 1988). Other aspects of Findhomis objective of enabling people collectively to buy houses which indi­ organisation - hierarchy and sexism, fo r instance -have been less so vidually they could not come near to affording. (sce Francis 1985). But a purpose evolved which included evangelis­ Paradoxically a 19805 commune, has many 1960s-style ing 'green' ideas, Findhom became what was described to us as a ZAP, characteristics, while Findhom, which started in 1962. is well de­ 'social laboratory' - experimenting with bringing spiritualism and scribed by the 'eighties' fe atures laid out in Table 2. The well­ love into everyday activities - and a 'demonstration centre' of documented history of Find horn (e,g. Hawken 1975) makes it clear communalism. spiritual and holistic education, and New Age cul­ that although its initiators and early fo llowers were not motivated by ture. all dedicated to awareness and appreciation of 'all the king­ political ecology, their brand of spiritualism incorporated some very doms - animal, mineral. vegetable and human'. The resolute basic 'green' philosophies. Their ideas oforganic unity and hannony spiritual ideology and purpose which developed carly on seemed to between humans and nature. animism (one of our interviewees U5 to be still evident, despite one veteran Findhomian's assertion that communes with the plant spirits, as did Dorothy McClean in the 'I have difficulties with the word "purpose": I really don't know what sixties), and the 'planetary vi llage', as well as their individualistic it means'.

74 75 COMMUNES A.ND TilE GREE:N VISION OF-CLINE OF GREEN EVA.NGELISM

The motive of contributing to a future green society was less ZAP and Redfield) the political ideology of anarchist-socialism prominent in the fo nnation of PIC, Monkton Wyld and Lifespan. seems to have been pan of the cementing fo rce: in two others Individuals in PIC were strongly influenced by Bllfeprilllfo r Survival, (Findhorn, Monkton Wyld) it was spiritualism. But whatever, most but the overall purpose among its fo unders was to 'provide an of the members had positive ideas about changing wider society, and alternativeto the capitalist way oflife'. PIC grew out of the squatting they wanted to help to create an ecological society, imagining that movement, and its practical priority (like ZAP, our other urban they could make a major contribution by their actions. commune) was to produce low cost housing. Beyond this there was As Harper (1986) puts it: no other save 'non-exploitative living' (green enough but grollp aim The early Quarry b ic a fund amenwist enterprise. It was unspecific). Each individual's separate concerns were equally para­ WlIIS as ally all good frontier stuff in them days - caravans and tents, old tinsheds with mount - but creating an anarchist-socialist society fo nned the un­ leaky roofs, begged and borrowed equipment, very little money, derlying ideological bond. Social change was an important theme in turbulent relationships, lentils and adrenalin. But the pure vision was the initial educational plans at Lifespan and Monkton Wyld. Life­ tested daily by the mud and rain and the need to succeed; and after span's plan was for its converted railway cottages on moorland near work the debates raged in the candle-light. Should ajCB used to be Sheffield to become a craft-centred education centre fo Uowing the excavate fo undations, or should it all be done by hand? Should principles ofA S Neil's Summerhill school. There would be 'ecolo­ compost toiletsbe provided fo r the pub li c, or would only WCs be gical study' which, according to a leaflet describing the project (April acceptable? Should we have wages or put everything back in the common pot? What about plastics? Could the restaurant use tinned 1974) 'would grow out of the ground' through the agricultural and tomatoes in its recycling methods developed by the community. 'Alternative to the pizzas? nuclear fa mily', 'outside patriarchy' and 'against the nuclear state' were other phrases that the fo unders often used. Although 'self­ RUNNING OUT OF STEAM sufficiency', 'solar energy', 'anti-pollution'and 'proper use ofecolo­ gical resources' were further phrases, and organic gardening and a A decade or more later, nearly all of these communes had changed wholefood shop were early institutions, when the educationidea fell greacly [1.7]. While, as we show later, there are stiU ideologically through it was cooperative livingthat became the main motivation­ committed and evangelical individuals in them, asa whole nearly all collectivity, cooperation and control over one's own life: important the communes have lost ideological intensity and fo cus, while the 'second' rather than 'first-order' green principles. commionent to wider social change is now muted. Almost alone,

Monkton Wyld grew fr om the ashes of what had been a progres­ Findhom perhaps remains as intense as itwas; while it has shifted sive boarding school (part of the Darrington movement) from fo cus towards relations between people rather than with plants, it 1940-80j then for two years an alternative education centre for the has a dear sense of mission and an increased conviction about its local community. Itsfo unders wanted to maintain this function and central role in the coming of a New Age. At the other end of the time provide courses and fa cilities for other groups - on self-knowledge scale, it is too early to tell with ZAP, though there have already been and development, relationships, healing, yoga, tai-chi, rebirthing many personnel changes, and a change of purpose noted above. and Reichian therapy. They stood for a mix of things, among which Each of the remaining communes approaches environmental specifically green principles figured, but not prominencly. The im­ issues with less sense ofurgency. They have seen the crisis expected portant thing was liberal progressive non-hierarchical cooperative in the seventies developing gradually rather than apocalyptically in education, emphasising a message about people taking charge of the eighties. CA T's overall aim of demonstrating 50ft technology their own lives. One member had come fr om Findhorn, and spir­ gathers pace, but not without some agonising among membersj ituality became a significant sub-theme. partly because, as some put it, 'we have less to show in the way of What comes through, repeatedly and universally, about these first­ innovations; we were at the forefront but others have overtaken us­ generation communards is their huge level of energy and commit­ everyone's into ATnow'. Ideological coherency has diminished too; ' ment as well as idealism and political motivation. In fo ur (CAT, PIC, ;I. lot of the standard left-wing baggage has been dropped', and 'CAT

76 77 COMMUNE:S AND TilE: GR£l:N VISION DE:CLlNE: OF" GRE:E:NF.:YA.NGF.:LlSM

is an exhibition of political bias which draws back softly fr om the ...he [Harper] gives me the impression that the Quarry as a whole politics' (meaning that the bias is no longer obvious) were indicative hu fallen from grace over the put few years, and that we have buried our early ideals beneath a heap of pragmatism. I simply don't believe statements. Similar things were said of Redfield and Canon Frome, that he is right. At the hean of his article is a suggestion that we have where the 'broad socialist' approach of the fo unders has been vying improved what we do - displays, courses and so on - at the expense of a more liberal individualistic view (see Table t). with how we do it - collective working and community living. I think we The outward missionary ze31 of the Frome Society waned early. have improved what we do but I don't agree that the quality of our life The evangelising quietly together - both in and out of work - has suffered ...Peter ...is judging our standards ofliving together against a standard that never ran OUI of steam ...We were a bunch of do-gooders bringing 'the existed in the first place, except through rose coloured glasses. word' of rural regeneration bUI we didn't apprec.:iale the extent to which people in the countryside already knew what they were about. While the current Director, Roger Kelly, said at the 1988 Quarry AGM: Loss of communality here is evident: Canon Fromers now eat together fo rmally but once a week. More spectacularly, Laurieston The Quarry exists as a rrvollilionary fo rce. It seeks to bring about ,-"di(ol changes the individual and society - change an evolving ceased as a commune in 1987: it is now a housing coop and 'work in towards understanding of planet in its ecological complexity, and a collective' fo cused around the fa rm, garden and People Centre. this transaction of that understanding into new ways of thinking. (Reported While one member thought that there is now no remaining common in Hay 1989, emphases added). bond or ideology, others insisted on the integrity of their very ecologically-oriented constitution. However, the fo rmer believed And in advertising literature written in 1990 to promote 'alterna­ that this gave a more committed impression than the lived reality, tive investment' in the Centre this was reinforced. 'In many ways the which was not green. 'The maintenance fo rtnight is what bonds Centre for Alternative Technology is a model of what a green world people now- and in summer, lying on the lawn'. Another thought, Earth could be like', said an advert in Friends of the Eanh's MatltrS, more positively, that the Lauricston 'guidelines' written in 1988 while Roger Kelly, time in a letter to Alternative Technology this attempted to 'salvage a distinct ideologyand character- they are an Association members, said that 'the Centre for Alternative Technol­ achievement'. ogy has been [since 1975] a working model for positive solutions to We came across a similar difference of opinion at CAT. Peter the environmental problems fa ced by people and nations 311 over the News/titer Harper wrote in 1986's Quarry that revisionism had taken world'. over from fundamentalism at the Quarry, and: Despite such insistences on CAT's remaining fu ndamentalism, the weight of our evidence suggests that Harper is fairly accurate in There seems to be a general waning offundamentalism in the describing a trend in communes generally. movement as a whole, and it is true for the Quarry. We come here a150 But then, given the 'problem' of frequent personnel changes for a job, and we are chosen and later judged primarily on the all which communes have, ideologic31 coherence and unity of quality of our work. Community matters are not recognised nor all accorded respel;( by the general body of opinion ...Even with the on­ purpose is almost bound to dissipate and change. To getnewcomen siters themselves there is little sense of common purpose or to agree to a set of ideological 'guidelincs', as at Laurieston, is quite community spirit ... Nobody seems interested in contributing much unusual. Rather more common now, when members are hard to get, to community life . ..N a lapsed fu ndamentalist myself. and with is the Redfield entry criterion, where the nothing to be proud ofin my own achievements, I neverthelus mourn thi s fa ll from grace ...Sadly, but inevitably, I see a time of revisionism level [ofideological commitment) might not be the level you started ahead ...The Quarry will become more efficient, hannonious, off with. It comes down to (accepting] anyone whose views and consistent, respectable and boring. It will be a successful institution, behaviour aren't outrageous - the question of whether you get on with not a community. people is the paramount one.

He met a barrage of refutations from fe llow communards in the However, none of this means that an extreme ideological entropy same Newsletter and the then Director, Peter Raine, wrote: has replaced earlier coherence. For in most places we heard about a

78 79 COMMUNES AND TilE GREEN YISION DECLINE OF GREEN EYANGELISM

'subculture detenniningwho comes and goes' as at CAT, where it is the initiators first parked their caravan, and buying the very hotel more important to be part of the 'tribe' than to have impeccable from which Peter Caddy W:l.S originally sacked, while a spinoff ideological credentials. At Monkton Wyld it was described as 'no community has grown in Forres, and Foundation members and associates ply 'alternative' trades throughout the surrounding area. common spiritual or political binding,but we're linked br a� u�der­ the-surface thing which we don't acknowledge'. The lllng e­ In stark contrast to our other subjects of study, Findhorn's mild quendy amounts negatively to 'Thatcher bashing: the maID� pohncal. ?" asceticism is set amidst the underlying wealth of tl.6m worth of bias' (Redfield); or positively to being 'left-green', as at LSF where assets and debts of only to.25m. we were reminded of the obvious: Hence, this study did not repeat McLaughlin and Davidson's (1985) American findings that whereas sixties communes had no If people di dn't have similar ideals they wouldn't get on -we all have fo rmal ideology and went with the flow, eighties communes had the same vision of the future but maybe di fferent ideas on how to get well-developed belief systems - spiritual or political. there.

In fa ct there was a wide tendency to claim great diversity of opinions and world views on behalf of the commune as a whole, but THE PROCESS OF CHANGE this fr equently was not evident to an outsideobserver. A� PIC, whe�e a most significant change of direction from u�an locano to seml­ , . ? Splitting into factions rural converted mill got underway in 1989, a 'wide IdeolOgIcal cr�ss section was claimed, but actually described as 'green/anarc lstl ?. The processes of changing ideological and practical direction and labour', thus really accounting fo r a small minority of the Bnnsh losing ideological intensity have not necessarily been smooth or people. .' gradual. They often started with the appearance ofintemal fa ctions, More unsettling to us, however, was the fe ehng we had at Fl?d­ representing divisions over the aims themselves or how they should hom that people had been almost brainwashed into a common VIew be achieved. A common divide was between pragmatists and hard­ 5 for the during their period of being 'student me�bers' (see able liners (replicatingthe realist/fundamentalist split in the green move­ ;People are not main elements ofthis consensus). Our guide told us: ment) . At CAT, fo r instance, some fundamentalists opposed a visit things'. We did taught here: ifyou talked to 200 people they'd say 200 by Prince Philip; they wanted to abandon the Quarry's upper-class fact used the not talk to so many but all those we did interview in connectionswith which itwas initiated.On other occasions practical Pavlovian responses to c rtain q es­ same key phrases in seemingly � . � measures to make life more convenient by, for instance, removing nons, a manner reminiscent ofAmerican fu ndamentalist rehgtous in obstacles to driving a Land Rover around the site, were opposed by sects. 'purists' wanting, it was suggested, things remain difficult. At This is not to say that Findhom has been without similar disagree­ to CAT also, early difficult anarchist ideas about spontaneous organ­ ments over changes in practical emphases to those in the other isation were abandoned by pragmatists: communes, such as the shift from emphasising the natural to the

social world mentioned above, increased educational activity and Anarchism didn't imply no suucrure at But this {in early days] was all. self-advancement, and less driving of people in the way of Peter idiot anarchism; it was naive. You get this in anarchist communes Caddy'S original manic 'work is love in action' ethic. N�mbers of today - they have no idea of the power that could be theirs, because Findhom Foundation members have fluctuated fr om 350 ID the late they have this illusion it will work out spontaneously. It's still anarchist seventies ('we were undiscriminating about membership, including here; we don't have a leader but we have SUUctures -it takes a long hippy dropouts - people who wouldn't work. And our prices were rime to become mature in the culture of collective living. too low') to 120 in the early eighties, when some departments closed. Now there are about 200, as there were in the early seventies. At Canon Frome one of the more recent members denied any Physical growth has included acquiring the camping site on which broad ideological shift, but said that by contrastwith the 'oldies', the

80 81 COMMUNES AND TilE GREEN VISION DECLINE OF GREEN EVANGELISM

'newies' were no longer 'big in principle; small in practice, but the practice will be continually scrutinised for ideological purity, result­ reverse - more selective, more eclectic, with smaller ambitions and ing in the kinds of fa ctional division described above. Hence, fr om bigger achievements'. Canon Frome: Pragmatism, too, showed in splits between meat eaters and vege­ One of the things that keeps this place going is the lack of intensity, of tarians, or the latter and vegans. The last were excluded from scrutinising navels ...We tty to steer clear of dissent: we don't Redfield on the grounds that they would be too much tro uble to tolerate it. cater for. At Laurieston, meat eatingwasvigorously defended as part of 'counny living old style' - meat was what was growable and While some thought that aims and principles were not discussed available fr om the surrounding land. By contrast those who just enough, a Lauriestonian's view that 'there isn't much to be gained liked 'living in the counny' boughttheir lentils from town, infring­ fr om trying to about what we're doing' was common. Discus­ talk ing self-sustainability. sion was nearly always about practical things -ideology and purpose Another common divide ofmajor significancehere concernedthe being either assumed, not explicitly worked out, or only rarely or approach to social relationships and social change, which be ineffectually dea1t with as side issues. They made many uncomfort­ will discussed fu rther in Chapter 6. Opposing schools of thought ap­ able: 'I don't go in for analysing a lot', said a Lifespanner. 'There can peared at Canon Frome, Monkton Wyld, Redfield and LSF. On one be suspicion about ideas and talking', thought a Crabapple member. side were those who emphasised the individual, and 'personal 'Every now and then we do talk about fu ndamental principles, but growth' through therapy, holistic medicine and personal hea1th. The it's considered slightly bad fonn to raise them', a CAT worker said: other side emphasised the community, and collective politica1 ac­ 'We're so busy keeping the ship afloat that we haven't time to discuss ti on. This led to a 'major rift' at Redfield and a 'stonny period' at things'. LSF. At the fo nner, some had proclaimed, 'the individual is dead, The down side of this apparently sensible approach also came long live the party': others that 'Redfieldisn't about the place - we through - in the very enjoyment which many interviewees showed don't want proplr sacrificed to the community'. on being invited to talk about their ideologies and beliefs. The Crabapple person summed up the problem:

Don't talk about it It's like being in a relationship - you're so busy having a good time 'I haven't much time for talk - I'd rather see what the community that you don't recognise the point at which you've stopped stimulating each other, and you need stimulation. We're caught up daily living ­ does', said a Monkton Wyld person: in shut olEtoo down-to-eanh and basic.

Some people are doctrinaire - they about 'raking responsibility', talk A Redfieldveteran complained: 'It's very philistine here:you can't then walk out and leave their dirty teacup on the side. The talk's a load have a conversation above the commonplace. To get on youhave to ofboloney. It's what we do that's more important. place doesn't This suppress sides of your personality, like my interest in the arts'. In this halle a message: messages are dangerous. It's a tolerant place. way much of the early ideological intensity and intellectual energy In these communes as in any daily personal living-together rela­ has now been dissipated, at least at group level. Partiy, said the tionship, so, in these communes what people do, not say, is what Redfield member: soon becomes more important. This partly explains why, in all of The ideology is no benefit to anybody. It reduces choices. In earlier them except Findhom, where there were weekly 'attunentent meet­ days it would be a rum-on, but now we can't get personal satisfaction ings', questions of overall purpose and ideology were rarely ad­ doing it this way. Ellen if someone makes a resolution if often lapses. dressed by the group [1.12]. This may surprise romantic outsiders We don't like to nag each other. who might see communes as seething hotbeds of revolutionary theory. Another reason is that given by Shenker (see Chapter 3): if And, partly, the daily struggle is more important ...'there's been you do not discuss ideology and purpose it is less likely that daily a steady slide towards convenience' at CAT, while at Glaneirw the

82 83 DECLINE Of' GREEN EVA.NGEl.ISM COMMVNES "ND THE GREEN YISION at, the commune (sec Tables 6 and 7). There seems to be a 'bulge' of distant ide 1 because in self-sufficiency aim has now become a more � people in their late thirties and fo rties, a time oflife where material there 15 no colle ­ practising it they 'could not mect the bills'. Here � considerations typically begin to outweigh matters of principle and and much the same w said rive goal except to take care ofGlaneirw, � ideology. Also, nearly two-thirds of interviewees were medium- to here had chan ed; It was at Monkton Wyld. Ideas about simplicity � long-stay (five to seventeen years), and as such they may be expected was 'c mfortable, Wlth no 5 lf- 'spartan' in its early days, but it now � � to have ti red of talking about the same ideas and to have developed a retam the strong anarchlst- sac c.e' At PIC • though individuals . daily and yearly routinewhose assumptionswould be unchallenged. rifi unifying and all-con5unu g socialist leanings noted above, the � Mter all, this is what happens in conventional life, and commu­ the conversion of a lo al twelve-year group proj ect had been � mill nards are not immune fr om such fa ctors. Nor can they remain rtuallY quarters. Practical a£fai have also into comfortable living � . :-" . unaffected by developments in the conventiona1 society which they expansion of Its pnot bUSI­ taken over Lifespan, where the sudden oppose. less time to be happy here: ness 'has run away with us ... there's This tendency identified here also partly relates to changes in had different ideas about the there is more stress', Everyone there membership. This was described by an experienced communard, were united in not wanting to community aim, but ironicaIly they now at Laurieston: Lifespan is 'not a crusade for a live in the rat race. However, now n social alternative'. In genenl, over time, ideological stre gth and consistency di ssipates in communities. One reason is that the natural structure and life of Phases of development groups is that people with strong ideas set them up. Th ey then leave because they're the kind of people who are motivated to start things ­ with obtain ng preoccupation with the practical and The growing � they want to move on and start something else. And also, if they are been partly born ofnece 5S1 . material sustenance and comfort has � strongly idealistic they'll eventually get frustrated because things never individuals to draw sooal instance it now more difficult for tum out as you want. For is all the time, while the com­ security and work on the commune so people have had to do munes have had to avoid financial deficits- This kind of sequence occurred at Redfield. The early core mem­ originally bargainedfor. d bers were 'very political': socialists,Marxists and green They 'ruled more conventional outside work than � . of, and length oftune this trend may partly relate to the age structure the roost' fo r about four years, and then a second wave ofpractically oriented and motivated people moved and took centre stage. The in 6: Approl-29 relationship issues, being of the self-realisation and self-discovery­ ,,% 3<>-3' through-therapy school. U1timatelyan unspoken conflict developed 32% ...,..., between them and the previous waves. At Monkton Wyld the first 50-59 3" wave people were described 'politicallwant-to-change-the­ 60+ 1.5% as world', the second wave as 'just nice people', and the third wave as 'specialists' brought in to work as such rather than because of their ideological leanings. Canon Frome had also experienced power Table 7: Length oftime in eon,mune' [2.11 conflicts and big upheavals since the mid eighties,which rumbled on Up 10 4 years 42.7% for years. Many people came and went around 1984-5, but the core years 27.2% 5-9 influential group remained. Power centred on a small group of 10-17 years 29.8% had in other women, and policies were worked out in their kitchens rather than at Seventy p809le answered this question, 01 whom seven been of service e 0 xearscomm��, mass belore their present one. Themost common � 1 meetings. When eventually the 'newies' pressed fo r decision by lengthseach were In their Ihlfd, fiflh and years (10 peopleeach) white 6 or more people irs!, consensus (an original aim), they met rejection and resistance on the eleVenth years. 85

84 COMMUNES AND TUE GREEN VISION DECLINE: OF GREEN EVANGELISM

grounds that the 'oldies' had tried their suggestions before and fo und At Canon Frome this has been accompanied by an increase in the them impracticable. They had power because of their knowledge nends to material comfon and individual self-realisation referred to and experience, but eventually the newies asserted themselves and above. Similar things have happened elsewhere, 50 that our Lau­ the oldies were eclipsed and marginalised and most of them left. a rieston As commentator described communes now as places where result, Canon Frome now may be less stressful, but the ideologi­ life 'people live together because it's nice. Ideology comes second, cal aspect is more subdued and channelled, as described above. although a common ideological purpose is a great unifYing fa ctor'. Similarly, at Crabapple: 'A middle dass wank' People don't feel strongly about ideology now - things become have There seems to have been a double irony at Canon Frome. The first relaxed ...What we're about making ourselves happier people: to is is that the fo unders had their missionary zeal to change society look after the environment we first h ve look after ourselves , ..and a to blunted by the need to spend most oftheir energy in settingthe place we're cagey about the notion that we're showing something good to up. The second is that their efforts created an especially attractive the outside world. place to live, which has drawn middle class professionals with far less mi ssionary zeal. A 1989 advert offered for sale one of the living units At Monkton Wyld we were told that while the original members here in the Herefordshire countryside at £80,000 - a price then had wanted to change the world, people were now there for them­ affordable only by the amuent. selves as well as society: 'Unless you feel powerful, you can't do Canon Frome operates best for someone with professional anything about il [society]', This summarises a popular view from qualifications who can exercise them pan-time: social workers, across the communes - one which a socialist at Redfield put in teachers, designers, who can work two to three days a week for high context: wages (see Tables 8 and 9). This is probably true of other communes,

like Redfield or Laurieston. When the members first came they may Early people (sixties and early seventies] thought that they could have had visions of doing relatively little outside work. What actually change something out thtrt - society, But this degenerated in the late happened was described by one member. seventies and eighties in to the 'me generation' - people who saw as wrong, and believed that they could change themselves thmlst/lJes if Many thought when they came that they'd give up their jobs and do then society would change. but at this level (of accommodation and lifestyle] you can't earn crafts, enough, so they continued with nonnaljobs. Hence it has become the middle class wank that w many people have described [c.( Abn.ms and McCulloch, though not in these words!). JOINING, MOTIVATIONS AND BACKGROUNDS

The clasll issue

8: Anelite? [2.2] Table 9 seems clearly to confirm that communards are a middle class Table 'elite', As a Canon Fromer put it, 'Being middle class and having Proportion ofint8fViewees entering highef education '''' Getting degrees Of equiYaJef1l .. " money gives you the confidence to give up affiuence and come here', Dropping outI1ailing "" But both this view and these data should be treated with caution, Getting higher degrees '" Most people we met were not conspicuously amuent, while the data Describing themselves andtheir background as 60" we collected were not based on rigorous sociological criteria - 'middle class' neither was our sample random, since our interviewees were self­ Not describing themselves butclearly identifiable as "" ,..., selected (albeit on the basis of an initial letter which was deliberately Total 'middle class' 70" vague about our purpose).

86 87 COMMUNES AND TIlE GREEN VISIO,'V DECLINE OF GREEN EVANGELISM education courses and creating anarchistic skills and knowledge Table 9: �bjorIrainiJ'8 and/or job. and/or ikill.denloped berore joining the sharing opponunitiesfor people fo r instance). commune for why people join communes,(ZAP, Chapter2 has shown two This list of descriptions does not Include the skills which respondents may have learned broadAs and related categories of motivation. First were the 'positive' from scratch since joining the commune. Several respondents had more than one maJor skillltraining. reasons. They included gettingcloser to the land and countryside,

Writer/editor(e.g. for Commen::ial rep. with and owning it and being self-sufficient.They emphasised 'doing it'­ Universityresearch scientific Undercurrents) large firm living out alternative economics, soci81 relations and va1ues - in Antarctic SUivey(4) Technical writer (3) Holel fll8nagemenl (2) order to furnisha lived example for conventional society to follow. IndustrialltXJsiness Dtt�, Retail management ",.,""" lhB8/re) Airline ITI8IJ898ITIBnt This was oftencoupled with assertiveevangelism: a positiveintent to Actor (fringe Electronics/computers Teacher fmc. special Sma/I busineSS0WfI#1f broadcast, and educate for, radical soci81 change usu81ly in a nt ne«1s, chi/dcSre. Organic gardener Engineer__ (2) university /ectUrBf) Disc jockey/musJcaJ socialist�anarchist-feminist direction. Second were more 'negative' Bui/der(2) Probation (10) lechnid8n reasons involving rejection of, or being outcast from,or misfit in, Town SodsJW/JI'X9f officer (2) S8aetary planner convention81society. Materi81ism, hierarchy, competition,conflict ArchittICt _ IN H _ Design consul/ant(4) Radiographer Manus/ worlc9f and structural violence, as fo cused in the nuclcar family, scxual Graph;c d6signer NHS therapist Housewife (3) stereotyping and role-models, and the career ladder/rat race, have CommerciBIartist Na/ufBl therapiSt(2) Res1aunJIll W/JI'X9f been particulartargets of dislike. They led to suppression of the true Paint9f-8ltist AstrologiCSJcounseIting Hotel W/JI'Xet' Screenprinter Army (subs8qoont self and to loneliness, so that sclf-discovery and self-realisation, Sculptor P8fSO(lai1'1 growth deserter) companionship and deep relationships were persistent obsessions Pholograp/!er counselling among communards. Only about twenty per cent of respondentshere said that theyhad not been dissatisfied or disillusioned with convention81 life and Nonetheless the apparent soci81 profile of these communes bore societywhcn they joined the communes (Table 10). Of the othen' little resemblance to 'average' conventional society (see 8150 Table reasons fo r discontent, only fifteen percent were directly to do with 8). many communards had been in higher educa�on as �ad nature and the ecologic81 crisis, but over a third concerned aspects of identifiedAs themselvcs as 'middle class' (i.c. most). On thiS cntenon,. society which are particular targets of the green critique, namely they are middle-class profession81/inte�igentsiarather th�n �ddle­ 'second' order issues like materialism and consumerism, competi­ class in the purely economic sense. Table 9 shows that their skills -at tion,the nature of work.the nature andscale of cities,and unholistic least the initially acquired ones -lean towards academia, the and attitudes. Another third had mainly rejected relationships and roles arts in conventional society for the most person81 reasons - though. the 'caring professions' rather than business and commerce:just the again, not irrelevant to the general green critique. kind of middle classes who fo nn the constituencyof radicalenviron­ When reasons for joining are analysed (Table 11), a large propor­ mentalism, according to Cotgrove (1982). Or as Hays (1987) put it, tion (a third) specific81lyconcern ecology and nature, though such they are members of the 'humanisticintelligentsia' who are strug­ reasoning may often be afterthe event since intervieweesfrequendy gling against the world view of the 'technicaUmanagerial in�e1- Iigentsia' over the environment, peace and so fo rth. The high confessed to linle ecological awareness when they joined. Few mentionedonly one important reason and it is hard to tell which, if proportion of'drop-outs' fr om higher educ�tioni n Ta�le 8 should not deceive. 1n very many of the cases, disconnnuanon. was the any, might have been paramount at the time. Two experienced conscious act of obviously highly intelligent and capable people who communards told us: 'Most peoplc camc for individual reasons; not could have 'walked' conventional degreecourses had they persisted. to change society', and 'most people get into communes because of personal crises'. The data in Table 10 could bear out: nearly 85 But they could not stand the context of structuralviolence in which this 'education' commonly occurred: hence the emphasis now on them­ per cent of the reasons given could be described as 'personaU selves running 'alternative' (i.e. non-hierarchical, non-competitive) individual', while at bcstonly about a quarter represent the catcgory 88 89 COMMUNES AND TII£ GREEN VISION DECLINE OF GHEEN EVANGELISM

Dihllli�(lIdiUlI IiI a molive ror joining communel: the re .....n. which Table II: Major re ...... gi"en for joini"fj:the commune [2.3, 2.6, 2.IOJ Table 10; relllKmtielll' 1110-' emphaliJled (2.5. 3.1) (A) Specificalty mentioning ecologyOf nalurB Number of peoplegiving thla reply Number of people giving thll reply 'To be a force for social change to an ecological society, because of the 12 Notdissa tisfied with convenOOnaJ 15 'enviroomeotal crisis' society when they joined 'To help create an ecological society andto we communally 5 (inc. never experienced conventional lifestyle (9) 'Contributing to thespiritual (AQuarianl revolutionin order create an 2 aller leaving home) ecological society 10 'To creale an ecological society and beaffirmed as a person 2 Dissatisfied aspects with of 'To create a feminist/anarchist/green society a broken society convenrioflal and because 01 2 onjoining, particularly nuclear family Ecological crises and the Iteatment 01 naMa 12 (inc. animals) To wm, lram interest, withalternative technologyand to have deep relationships personal 'Role traps' and limiting sex relationships in 14 lhe conventional marriage To NYe ecologically- especially healthy lood- and share childcare 2 Materialist/consumerist/competitive lifestyle 12 To live ecologically - especiallyhealthy food- and practice therapy nearby 1 Emotional/spiritual dissatisfaction inc. 9 To live soundly withand enjoy nature and oounttyside 2 difficulty in making relationships The same and living communally

Constraints on Individual expressionfcontrol 5 (8) specificallymentioning ecologyor nalUrB over own lile Not 'To live a lifestyle (unspecified) as a political act change society) Wor1t - unuselul. antisocial or boring 3 (10 5 'To live out socialism and non·exploitatlvely as a political act 2 Cities (esp. the South·east) as unattractive, 8 unhealthy, crowded, physically Impure 'Contributing to the spiritual (Aquarian) revolution by helping individuals to 2 environment salf-discovery Looking for personal (inc. spiritual) growth and salf·realisation Theoretical rather than practical nature 01 4 7 conventional political activism To take power/conltoi over own tife 3 Analytical rather than holistic approach to life 3 To live communally and share 5 (e.g. medicine or To have many deep friendships (extended family) just one, and share science) not 2 Various aspectSof conventional education 5 childcare (e.g. corecurriculum, velues taught) To have friends and be with them 2 'MIddle class conventionality' Because 01the breakup 01a marriage (single parent) 6 A conventional career Bored with conventional nuclear family -wanted shared childcare and more 2 Private property ,,,.,Iom To be a was jotning Large scate organisation with partnerwho 7 To work wanted and be own TheArmy as a way 01 defending Britain when boss 3 To beable to do lois of ditf91"ent jobs, just one (NB. respondents gave more than one particularty dissalisf)YIg aspect of not Some To benefit people (inc. having to be qualified conventional society.] self)without To form a workers coop To be agraphic designer and have deep friendships which most interests us - people who joined communes specifically To be a gardener and work where there's a sense 01community change wider society [0 an ecologically sound one. All this is, [0 To learn cooperative management techniques and work In a spiritual way 1 N th ss, perhaps, to overgeneralise. one ele when we examine particu­ Lell education and didn't want to go into conventional tilestyle 3 lar cases we can discern several fa irly distinctive - th ough not Seemed a nalural thing to do, as was brought up In a commtlnity environment 3 mutually exclusive - types of motivation and background [2.1-6, It was somewhere to live (among like·minded people) 5 2.10j. Had nothing better to do at the time 3 'These answers specifically mentioned changing wider society. Ecologically motivated [N.B. All the reasons which people considered 10 be Importent are listed here. Some people defined twoor three major reasons.) Among those who joined particularly from a prior concern about

90 91 DECLINE Of' GREEN EYA.NGELISM COMMUNES AND TilE CREEN YISfON a fo under-member of the Conservation Society in 1967, and his fo rties clearly the society-environment relationship, some in their conviction for green politics is unabated. We also met fo ur American by the apocalyptic identifiedwith the 1960s culture and were affected One that concerning ex-hippies, still deeply motivated by environmental concern. environmentalist literature of the time, especially growth. A second had joined Laurieston after planning restrictions in the English the population-resources ratio and limits to self-sufficiency and village she had moved to prevented her from building a sauna, group, in their thirties and younger, espoused and were windmill and non-flushing 100 and planting trees on the village organic fanning (the back-to-the-Iand urban escapees) groups like Green­ green! The other three were Findhomians. One, a veteran of, and influenced by the peace movement and pressure the motivation of profoundly affected by, the Kent State riots, had been an inner city peace and Friends of the Earth. In most of them and community development activist in Indianapolis. Another had influencing and changing wider society are present. attraction to written a book about nuclear technology, pollution and the lack of Of the first group, several acknowledged an early e.g. membership of 'truth, love and spirituality in the USA' as long ago as 1955, when he hippie culture, coupled with radical left politics, and the original Al­ left college having had a 'spiritual experience'. He 'had been looking the Communist Party, anti-apartheid groups, after the events of for something like Findhom for twenty years' when he met the dennaston marches. One had been in Francejust and the fo unders in 1975. Because 'the planet is threatened' he works at '68. Some wistful talk of'swingin' London', anti-materialism courses slightly Findhom 'to develop global structures above the national level' . joys of dropping out fr om architecture degree our conversations, The younger primarily-ecologically-motivated members show a evoked the 'laid back' ambience of that time in itching to put but on the whole these had been practical people, more diffuse set of influences. Only one described himselfas having to the test, to head theories (especially about alternative technology) been 'a raving eco-activist'. In the seventies he had written for and disaster. One CAT member edited and had fo unded a local alternative newspaper offperceived imminent environmental U"dercum�l1tJ, revolu­ soon lost romantic ideas about hippydom and theoretical in Aylesbury. Hcjoined Redfield in 1984, panly to develop it as an hippies - I tried to tionary politics: 'CAT was a loose community of environmental srudy centre and partly to share resources with oth­ environ­ organise a workers coop'. Today he does not panic about ers. The latter is very frequendy an important element of environ­ nor does he despise the benefits of modem mental motivation: 'Living communally more economical on the mentaJ Annageddon, is 'civilisation'. Over the years he began environment. You can grow your own fo od' said an LSF member, describing that commune as an 'oasis of green in Swindon'. its is too hard - All to undentand why modern life is as it is - the alternative members embraced a strong ethos of'environment, consensus and be bred to it [communallecological living] it's boring. You've got to communality', partly stemming from fo nner nurturing work with generations. We're too soft. Wejust can't take it. through young and/or disabled children. But they shed romantic illusions quickly: 'I had visions of people dancing and singing together. It of his, however, came to it from a spiritual, non­ A colleague would be spiritual and meaningfuL It sounds quite twee now' - this 'I'm naive about social issues'. He has not gained political route: afterjust four months in the commune. for conventional life, but lives in an idyllic Thoreauvian enthusiasm Although such communards are generally too young to have been in the a fo rested Welsh hillside and works bio-dynamically setting on active in the sixties, the influence of those times may have been university garden at CAT. After private school and a distinguished transferred to them via their teachers or parents. Several acknowl­ insec­ career in biology he went on to work for Shell, developing edged stimulation towards alternative ideas fr om higher education for eight years, ticides, but then joined the British Antarctic Survey aware­ courses in architecture. human ecology, environmental science, where he became imbued with the bioethic. He developed different down economics and Marxist geography. Others acknowledged unusual ness 'ofthe planet as a whole. The atmosphere is very from parents, for instance a British Telecom supervisor and a cleansing there, with the bulk of humanity on the other side of the planet supervisor 'very much into green things'; a university classics pro­ you'. to the fe ssor and a laundry manager - both Communist Party members; a Another distinguished environmental pedigree belongs 60 now, he was mother deputy Mayor of Cambridge - Liberal but fo nnerly Com- oldest communard we interviewed, at Redfield. Over 93 92 DECI./NE OF GREEN EVANGELISM COMMUNES AND THE GREEN VISION

D ected munist; a fa ther who ran a Cyrenians hostel in London. This, isaff however, was nOt common among the communards we talked to, Then there are those who have become disaffected with quite most having middle class parents with conventional values. And specific aspects of conventional society - its organisation and world there is the ubiquitous influence of the environmental and associ­ view - such disaffection figuring strongly in their defection to ated pressure groups which came to prominence in the eighties. communes. Boredom and frustration with conventional marriage Very many communards have worked for Greenpeace, Friends of and family life is ofcoune a major theme. For many this contributed the Earth and CND in particular. to mid-life crises - see below - but many also opted positively for fr eedom rather than treating the commune as a refuge. Here the values of sharing (including shared children) and 'people working Other ahernative influences together towards important things' were actively sought. A small group came to these communes not necessarily through Disillusionment with hypocrisy impelled a highJy lucid and edu­ disaffection with conventiona.l life, nor as ecological crusaden, but cated communard to leave South Africa and discover his roots in because of early influences making it seem a natural thing to do, or Wales, where he worked on bio-dynamic fanns and smaUholdings after a long and varied 'alternative' career. Prominent among the before joining Glaneirw to live out his anarchistic. ecological and latter is the CAT penon who left school at fifteen to become an bioregional beliefs for a while. Hi s disgust was evoked by the engineer apprentice at Lucas Aerospace and a shop steward. After examples ofprof essing socialists in East Europe who flouted human sixteen yean and the breakdown of a conventional marriage. he left rights, and professing liberals in South Mr ica like the proprietor of to be a builder and set up a collective house. He had already been the bookshop where he worked, who supported the ANC yet paid heavily influenced by the fe minist and anti-Vietnam movements in his own employees slave wages. the sixties. In 1971 he helped to occupy Binningham Univenity and And there is disaffection with conventional education. For one attempted to start an alternative. free univenity. 1976 he started In 'Rapid Transfonnations', a group which, every summer since then, fo nner higher education lecturer it came after a long college career, has in a most practical way punued 'ecstasy and the total transfonna­ where his attempts to introduce student-centred teaching methods tion of society' by visiting d ifferent communes and doing re-roofing had been an uphill struggle. After jectingre sixties radicalism on the work on their buildings. grounds that it was most1y 'rabble-rousing nonsense' he eventually rejected the scientific rationalism and conservatism which under­ Another striking alternative route was taken by a PIC member who turned downa conventionaljobwith Lucas after school to be an pinned higher education, and trod the path to the New Age via self­ actor, but was refused admission to drama college because 'I had too programmes in humanistic psychology. encounter groups. and many ideas of my own'. Mter a National Youth Theatre summer astrology as keys to self-underst2nding. Mter some broken relation­ school he became a squatter and joined an acting company that ships, and running smallholdings, he finished up in Monkton Wyld. For members. disillusionment with education came earlier. played in prisons. Politicised through the prison refonn movement. ZAP he eventually decided that 'building a community was more import­ while at university. One characterised it as 'screwing my head up-I ant than community thean-e'. A few othen. radicalised by university couldn't cope with the pressure. competitiveness and narrowness. I counes and green/feminist student politics, travelling and in one wanted to explore ideas and university was stopping me'. Another, case going to prison,joined communes because it seemed 'natural'­ who had trained as a doctor fo r six years rebelled over 'useless the way to have control over their lives and be their own boss. One of irrelevant stuff about biochemical changes. I, however, wanted t� these more-or-less 'direct entrants' to alternative and communal broaden my mind and learn how to make bread'. He did, and also lifestyles joined Canon Frome to work in an alternative therapy developed an interest in alternative medicine which he carried back practice nearby, and because 'it's right to grow your own fo od - it's into the mainstream as a junior hospital doctor in London in 1989 healthy'. Despite this, and some genera1 ecological awareness, none (where he also struck a blow for all junior doctors by suing the of these people joined through ecological motivation. nor do they Secretary of State for Health in a test case over the long hours which particularly want to change society. they have to work).

95 94 COMMUNES AND rilE GREEN VISION DECLINE Of GREEN EVANGELISM

Abandoned careers but I thought it was the end ofmy problems. I had no sense ofcontrol over myself. At twenty she felt trapped and isolated on a suburban Still others abandoned conventional careers after a long time in housing estate, not having really wanted marriage or a house. She them - not always with any disaffection, bUl for the sake ofa change started reading, off her own bat, and became aware of ecology, in mid-life. A probation officer for twenty years, for instance, was fe minism and vegetarianism. Her husband moved out so she threw not dissatisfied with the job, but 'wanted a change' and liked the idea the house open to people who were 'into drugs, anti-police and anti­ ofliving cooperatively. A fe llow member of Canon Frome gave up and she had some harrowing experiences at this stage. But after six years with Courtaulds' textiles. but 'not from a desire Nazi', now: change the world', and then discovered at the commune that he had[0 a practical talent fo r joinery. Findhom has fo nner longstanding Coming here (Crabapple) was culmination of yean of sclf­ the professionaJs from advertising and marketing and airline manage­ politicisation. my values were lived our here. For me was All thu ment, none of whom was actively dissatisfied with these careers. perfection. But I'm no longer idcalistic -living day day to is Elsewhere arc ex-teachers of five to ten years standing who joined important. because their partners did, or through meeting and having a rela­ tionship with a communard. We heard another remarkable story of liberation unconnected with fa mily entrapment. Afterleaving school with no quaJifications. this man had signed on with the Anny for three yean, but soon Liberation from crisi8 wanted to leave. Driven to desert, he ended up serving fo ur months Very many more people, however,joined after personal crises, most in jail. There he struck up a correspondence with an unknown typically in their conventionaJ marriages and fam ilies. Comments outsider. The letten soon became deep and thoughtful. In them, the about experiences of nuclear fa milies were often particularly damn­ correspondents started to envisage what an ideal society would be ing and biner, especially from women: like. They came round to decentralist ideas, communalism and a 'cooperative village'. With no prior influence he had identified a My rwenty ycan married with a family were wasted. It got dullcr and need for anarchistic communes, deciding that the 'guidelin�s that dullcr. I wish I hadn't donc it. I wish kids wcre warned about it at the human race needs are minimaJ' and that the Anny an 'irra­ school. is tional, expensive and irrelevant way of protecting Britain - there is It was a hopcJc5S marriage . J left my husband and startcd looking at no need fo r annies to roam around countries'. Eventually, on communcs. I decided to stop looking fo r one man. release, he contacted communes and lived on-and-off in several.

I was veryj aded with the nuclear family. It was restricting and in equitable - one partner more exploited than the other . roamer8 and traveUen is 'MiefiIS', This last woman now takes pleasure in living in her own space This is but one example of a communard whom conventionaJ with her children from a previous marriage. She has a close relation­ society would probably label as a 'misfit' - a potentiaJ 'problem'. We ship with someone, but is independent. a way of escape from the encountered very few of these, and in fact they had had interesting As isolation and emotional problems ofthe nuclear fa mily, communes and diverse, unsettled, experiences. Though the above example if are not easy options, as other studies have amply shown. It does not was motivated by anarchisticideas, most saw communes primarily as always work: 'being here I thought I'd be able to sort mYielf out but just somewhere to live: but also a place in which to be valued, to play that hasn't happened' was not uncommonly heard. However, as was a valuable, hard-working role, and not to be controlled by anything explained at Redfield: 'A community does have emotional problems except a voluntary sense of duty to community. 'I've alwaYi strug­ but it also offers a wide circle of people, access to land, and is a more gled to fit in with how things are ... My head's too loose for a open fa mily'. A particularly poignant story of self-liberation came conventional life and career', said one drifter from a middle class from someone married at nineteen: 'It was a very naive relationship, background, 'but it fe lt really good and wann here. I fe lt at home'.

96 97 DECl.INE Of GREEN F,V,tNCF.l.ISM COMMVNF.S AND TIlE GRF.EN VISION

Lack of self-wonh was clearly a problem to some. One, for had uncovered her psyche and revealed 'things that should stay example, had been 22 years in manual jobs and travelling, and as 'a covered up', including a death preoccupation. On her first bad trip first few hours had been beautiful, intense, revealing and professional dole receiver'. He joined the squatting movement the mind­ expanding. But bad hallucinations had fo llowed, of physical things panty because ofits anarchistic politics and worked for environmen­ disintegrating. She spent twelve horrific hours, then recovered phys­ tal groups, mainly to get companionship. Eventually he joined a ically, but her mental health had been marred for sixfeen years, commune hoping to get self-esteem, but had not fo und it: 'I don't sufferingperiodically from depression and a 'damaged ability to see feel a wonhwhile person. I don't get on with anyone here -I'm really anything as being imponant'. Seven years in a commune had tem­ good at finding fa ult with people and fallingoutwith them'. Another porarily given her a sense of direction and liberation, but she was spoke of his difficulty in making friends: don't fe el confident or '{ afraid oflosing it again, and lived a day-to-day existence. intelligent', he said. though, if nothing else, he played the violin extremely well. He had dropped out from veterinary school in the early seventies, and had gone on the dole and around major fe stivals. Getting guidance Then, after dropping out of teacher training and influenced by One final class of motivation was unique to Findhom among these courses of meditation under Guru Maharaji, he went to the USA to communes - thaf of a spiritual/mystical revelation or calling which find an Ashram community and spiritual fulfilment; but 'it was too some describe as an attractive fo rce impelling them to go there. uncivilised: it was near New York and I got mugged'. Once there they feel at home -it fe els 'right', and a 'better place fr om which to change the world', and they stay. Not all Findhomians describe such experiences but those who do find them powerful: Oru@:8 Very few interviewees mentioned drugs as a major influence, con­ I just got guidance to join. My spiritual life in Rorida was growing. I got an inner voice like Eileen (Caddy] ...I did some reading and one to the popular image of communards. But for one person they trary day I had an amazing two-minule experience. The steel door in my had been positively liberating. Thrown out of home at sixteen, he head opened and I tappedinlo !he univenal infonnation and did not believe he had intelligence or creativity, but discovered he knowledge ...I had a spiritual group who helped me 10 reali se my had after taking LSD in the Canaries, where he bad become a hippy purpose. I didn't have to worry about the future. I learned automatic in the early seventies: writing. I got attuned to the highest vibrationalle vel, to let love come through. Living naked, long-flowing hair, aware of nature, LSD wa.s a major This Findhomian visited ostensibly to see how cooperative man­ part of my chancter fo rmation. I realised I no longer needed to control myself; I could smile. I then discovered thi s son inside me and agement could work, and she never left. Now she gardens, and decided to come bac;:k to England and look fo r mother. She was communicates with the plant spirits in the process. his sixteen and living in a squat. I fo und her making love in thi s room Another woman had left her husband in Spain, where they man­ with lots of other people. After she finished she stared at me. She aged a hotel. She had Ce lt a spiritual emptiness which was 'cracked knew then that she wa.s going to have me - she was fascinated with me. open' in encounter groups in a sister community to Findhom. This provided motivation, along with the highly religious nature oCher Mt er adventures in Greece and Wales and another relationship second panner. She kept hearing about Findhorn and the two of with someone (a 'princess'), he went to prison having runoff with his them impulsively drove to Scotland: 'When we arrived I suddenly son. Then there was more travelling, and studying Chinese philoso­ recognised it-I'd always known it; I'd been guided here'. From then phy, before joining a commune where he looks after children. Drugs on herlif e appears to have developed considerable parallels with that had, he thought, brought out the yin characteristics in him. of Eileen Caddy, even to the extent of conniving with her panner in But another communard had her life marred by 'bad trips' on his efforts to take a new lover, and meekly moving out of their LSD. She had left university in 1971 for hippydom and the drug caravan when the lover moved in (see Caddy 1988) - all the rime culture. Two vivid experiences with LSD followed. The chemical professing to be 'guided by God' in such actions.

98 99 DECLINE COMMUNES AND THE GREEN VISION OF' CRA''';N EVANGELISM

Table A more prosaic story came fr om a disc jockey whose twin motives 12: Ideological belief. [2.7-9J for joining had been music and ecology. He had wanted to use and Category Percent ot ell respondents develop the considerable recording fa cilities at the newly-built Anarchist (a) 16.0 20.4 Universal Hall, and bad also been profoundly affected by a visit to his Anarchist (b) 4.4 family fro m Richard St Barbe Baker, the 'man ofthe trees'. Even this Feminist } 6.0 very down-to-earth findbornian tended to in predestination Green (a) 14.7 talk Green (b) 22.0 terms: 'I didn't want to be here - everything dictated that I had to be 7.3 Socialist (a) 14.7 } here and use my brain to get music at Findhorn'. Butthere does also 17.7 Socialist (b) 3.0 seem to have been a more negative side to these stories of positive Spiritual New Age (a) 10.3 } 16,3 calling. Tbe self-discovery and discovery of destiny that they recount Spiritual New Age (b) 6.0 was often preceded by deep personal crises. They involved not only Eclecticor professed } 17.6 "apolitical" the usual break-up of family relationships, but also drugs and Percentage of aJi respond&nts spontaneously mentioning alcohol abuse. These crises were described in equally graphic terms: environmental issuesconcerns and whenasked what they felt mosl My psych iatrist called it a psychotic episode. I was totally flooded over strongly about 41.2 with unconscious contents of an extremely unpleasant kind. I became NB panlnoid and schizophrenic: couldn't cope. I fe lt rej ected by God. 1. Each Ideological category except 'eclectic' corresponds to beliefs, i.e. the calegories are not totally exclusive. msjcx Again, there is a parallel with Caddy'S experiences, almost a 2. 'Uberal' and 'OOf\Servative' beliefs are subsumed undef the other categories green ' struggle between good and evil, even though Findhornians do not ' ' and Table especiaUy3. Where categories are'spiritual' divided, (see (a) means1), self-pro/essad, (b) means not sell. believe in the latter. professed butadjudged by Ihe interviewer. The above accounts put the present communards into context, in 4. Party membership: only Green and Labour werementioned. 5. Pressure group membership: Greenpeace, Friends o/the Earth. the Campaign tenns of the relative unimportance for them of ecological matters and for Nuclear Disarmament were themost common. and creating a green society. Such matters fonn a large part of the initial motivation of only a minority of the new wave of members. sion takes political philosophy under each category: within 'green' However, this does not necessarily mean that their world views and and 'spiritual', particularly, are several political shades. However, philosophies of are incompatible with green principles, as we life traditional conservatism, green or otherwise (see Table 1), was not now see. well represented among these communards, neither was their view of community generally a conservative one (Table 3). Socialism of the social democratic/state type more evident, but mosdy it was IDEOWGIES was decentralist and anarchist. so that itwas not easy to draw boundaries (for instance, 'I may be into anarchism, but I've never read about it', We asked the communards a very open questionabout their deepest said one socialist). A grem/anarchist/socialist continuum describes convictions and concerns (2.7], to find out if green issues and most people's dispositions. The following discussion mainly illus­ principles loomed large among them. Table 12 shows. over forty Ie; trates some differences of emphasis within this continuum. per cent did spontaneously raise the treatment of nature and en­ vironment in this discussion. From this and other parts of the Socialism interviews it was generally possible to judge people's overall ide­ ologies- even ifthey did not label themselvees, which they often did. A dozen or so socialists were distinguishable by their overriding The categories in Table 12 seem the most appropriate to describe concern fo r social justice, which over half of them put above these ideologies: apart from socialist and anarchist they do not environmental worries. The rich-poor gap in Britain was what most constitute political philosophies alone, though the fo llowing discus- concerned them and they saw responsibility fo r all people's health

100 lOl ' COllfMUI'VES AND rilE GREEN VISION DECI.INE OF GREEN EVANGELISM and welfare lying with the healthy and wealthy, not the sick and but against the centralist large-scale version. Its necessity, in order to poor. Consequendy, Labour was fa voured over the Green Party, redistribute wealm and make large-scale decisions, was generally though cynicism and disillusion about the Labour Party was rife, conceded, but an equal or greater need for small-scale community with several past but few present Party members. fo nns was usually voiced -except in one case: 'Small-scale organisa­ Their socialism carried over into some doubt about greens, be­ tions like neighbourhood watch and Steiner schools worry me cause they might put 'narure'(non-human) above people. 'I'm at because they're only appropriate fo r the well-off. privileged and well odds with people who definethemselves in tenns ofnarure', said one educated'. socialist; 'I don't believe in narure' [as a separate category], said The socialists also put blame squarely on capitalism, not just fo r another; while a third believed that 'we should exploit narure - can't social-environmental problems but for 'distorting the movements J stand hypocrisy, I likematerial things'. Relevant here are the answers opposed to it'; the Body Shop was cited as a perversion ofme green to a difficult question onwhat the tenn 'the environment' meant and movement. However, only one described themselves as revolution­ evoked (2.13-14). Part of recent socialist criticisms of greens is based ary Marxist ('Benn, Ruddock, Livingstone1. Othen saw a role for a on this issue: the fo nner suspect the latter of a middJe-dass under­ market economy and large-scale industry. Neither planning nor standing of what 'nature' is, missing out the social, political, eco­ small-scale decentralism could do everything, but coops, industrial nomic and human-constructed world in favour of wildlife and a democracy, a 'people's power fo rum, as in Cuba' and street-level romantic rural vision, and downpJaying the importance ofinner city groups and projects all needed emphasis. Only a few specifically and suburban conditions, which are, however, the conditions of required, in their revised fo nn of industrial market economy, land most people's 'environment' (fable 1 and Weston 1986). nationalisation or other methods of common ownership - the Table 13 shows that only a tenth of the communards took a dear Chartist's caUSt dlebrt (see Chapter 2) has apparcndy slipped well socialist position on this (though more might have done if coaxed), down the agenda ofgrass-roots radicalism here, as it has in the wider with such answers as: Labour movement. We had to look to the anarchists fo r finner commitment on this issue. I'm more concerned about inner environments: racism rather than city aerosols.

The environmental crisis isn't about nature: social and racial Anarchism oppression are environmental crises. What people in these communes have attempted, above all, to take is I'm unclear. To me it's nature and the countryside- but the minen' 'control over their own lives'. And in this phrase, which was uttered strike was an environmentaJ issue. more often than any other, communards expressed their anarchistic The environment is my use of opportunities to become myself: I'm leanings: leanings which also tiein somewhat ambiguously with the not a birds-and-bees penon. liberal politicalphilosophy and view of community (Table 3) as well In their prime concern for social justice, the socialists here were as the socialist or even conservativeview. 'Self-help is the idea. What very divided on the role of the state, reflecting their real situation of matters is people taking control and doing it for themselves', we living in a small-scale commune. Most were pro-state in some way, were frcquendy told, and 'People must have responsibility fo r their own actions'. Many communards labelled here as 'green', 'feminist' and 'spirirual' said exacdy the same, but their interpretation ofhow it

13: �e Environnumt' mean. [2.13-14} was to be achieved varied - more than one supported Thatcher's (N,B.Tahle Only What",,/[(39) .. 1M �e,po de,," "mwered ,"qq..ulio .. ) fr ee-market-Iiberalism version of the 'taking responsibility' idea. Percentage emphasising socIalfhuman elements 18 Generally the anarchist's rejection ofpower relations came out in Percentage emphasising non·human elements positive ways - in practice as an attempt to fo rge non-hierarchical 33 Percentago emphasising both. Of giving vaguo answ8fS (e.g. 'peopIe and lito'. relationships in the daily round, in decision making and in sexual ·the planet in a global sense'). 49 relations. Even an angry young anarchist fo llowed

102 103 COMMUNES AND TtlE GREEN VISION DECLINE OF GItEEN EVANGELISM

Everything about the whole fu cking world stinks -we've got to rum it However, anti-materialism was a recurrent anarchist theme. A few upside down basically. For me, power is at the root of molt thing1 had come to their anarchism fr om a definite spiritual background, rather than a materialist perspective. This spiritualism varied from with Christian anarchy to Taoist-inspired; in both cases with a 'planetary, ecological oudook'. But rather than react agains, things I decided to ask what I ,"ysdj could do to build an alternative society. Feminism Hence he tried to live communally and to enable others, by This is virtually impossible to treat as a separate category. Although campaigning for animal rights, peace, homosexuals and black peo­ fo ur or five women clearly labelled themselves as fe minists, most of ple. About a third of the anarchists had squatted in the past for the other interviewees, men and women, expressed strong views in political reasons, not just because they needed accommodation. support of what are fem inist (as well as anarchist) principles of non­ Mter the nuclear fa mily, the state was their main bugbear, seen as hierarchy, non-violence to people and the earth, and non-sexual­ the major usurper of people's power. the nation-state and as stereotyping. The desire for autonomy which characterises femi­ As all government its decision making was too remote, and it was a war nism was very prominent in the ideologies which were described. all machine that had to be fe d. And the idea that he or others were While such fe minism, implicit or explicit, often coupled itselfwith 'living otT the state' was roundly rejected by the 'professional dole anarchist, green or spiritual philosophies it tended to reject socialism receiver' quoted above: as synonymous with Labouror old-style Eastern state socialism. One fe minist said: 'I fe el that if Thatcher had such an appeal then there I have a basic right to a piece of Britain ...At my present level of must be something wrong with socialism. It's like collective living: affi uence [the dole , lam subsidising someotlt rIse to take more than their l you can't run things by guilt'. share of resources. I potter round vegetables and do g odd growing in jobs. I'm fairly productive and useful, whereas an advertising executive or the Chainnan useful. So I'm subsidising ,IItm. lei isn', Green By applying the criteria outlined in Chapter 1 and Appendix 2 it was He was, in effect, a 'ragged-trousered philanthropist'. possible to distinguish a 'green' group, though again there were few Social and economic devolution and decentralism were the anar­ clear boundaries with other ideological tendencies described here, chists' answers to state power, thus the way they lived amounted to a particularly anarchist, spiritual and apoliticalleclectic. However, political statement. 'I'm a communalist [voluntary sharing) rather although most of the communards had views about nature and than a communist (imposed sharing]' was how one put it. This environment, which we discuss especially in Chapter 5, this group, meant enthusiasm fo r collective ownership of land as the key to a described below, identified green principles and issues as of particular more responsible attitude to the environment, and to wealth concern to them. They thought similarly about some key matters, redistribution: though theywere more divided over a precise political philosophy. Most were worried about perceived resource crises and pollution. I fe el wealthy here: I own land, control and infl uence what should be The world 'cannot go on taking, taking. The way we live isn't dOlle and I have ill car (share d six others), tools and a colour TV wi th sustainable, cutting down tropical rainforest and building bombs'. (shared with 25 others). You can have lou if oy u share and you don't have to work so hard to get it. The West's unequal share of wealth was to blame, and could lead to world conflict, yet in principle 'it's possible to be satisfied [simplY1 , Again, this theme was taken up by non-anarchists: one CAT have a good time and keep the planet going'. From there, and a member, for instance, had calculated that he was materially far universal concern about fo od production and quality, people tended wealthier than a middle-management fr iend who lived in a house in to emphasise anarchist or spiritual/deep ecology approaches. Small London. scale, grass-roots politics, non-hierarchy, consensus, cooperation,

104 105 DECLINE Of' CHf;EN EVIINC";USM

Britain. There would be blueprint in a country of self-sustaining craft production and blurring the town-country distinction were /10 constantly reiterated themes. They were sometimes mixed in with bioregions and communes provided that they all bowed to the deep ecology, blurring the polarised 'deep ve�us social ecology' imperative of universal laws of ecology. Beyond that, anything debate in the green movement generally. Hence, the communard arrived at by true local consensus would go. If a community wished who strongly advocated anarchist social organisation also said, to base its lifestyle on child abuse, for instance, this would be fo r its somewhat apolitically: 'I'm a solitary person. I think more about members to decide, and was not for outsiders to gainsay (see also nature than I do about other people ...IfI do what is morally right Chapter 5). the planet will look after me'. Similar thoughts came from a 'green­ Other green pragmatists declared themselves mixtures of every anarchist-feminist' who belonged to a women's psychic group based political philosophy, or that they were 'anti-ideology: things always on wicca practices. Typically, they were misunderstood and per­ tum out differently from what you think so if you start off deter­ secuted by local Christians, hut she spelled out why paganism and mined to stick to a particular ideology you come unstuck'. deep ecology are compatible:

Paganism is a way offeding how you are part ofnarure's whole, and Apolitical/eclectic getting touch with yourself. You have week1y meditations deciding in Other communards thought this about ideologies, including what part of yourselfto give away. And you take on an animal as part all anti of your personality; it's not based on logical thought. green. Some were 'extremism', saying 'I can see all sides of the arguments, including National Front - I don't knock everything I Others spoke of, being part of the earth and the earth part of us' or see', or 'There's no common sense: everyone's pushed to one 'an integra] part of the planet - I worry about poisoning the planet; extreme or the other'. Some were pragmatic; 'I'm not a pursuer of I'm really worried about it'. And the essence of deep ecology and its fu ndamental truths; all beliefs are provisional and not unshakable'. connection with rural communes came in the view that: And there were 'apolitical' people for whom everythingrevolved around a need to attack problems at a practical level, or who had There's an almost religious value living a celUin kind of life - being in arrived at their position through clear frustration. The latter spoke of in nature. People think about political change in temu of ' tune with politics as 'not saying what you art, but saying what you're /lot , or as themselves whether it different after a revolution. Green and willful things are about morality in politics. a male thing. When I was growing up the men around me made me feel stupid by talking an in teUectual-political-philosophicai way. There was no consensus, however, about where in the political in spectrum that morality lies. well as the anarchist preferences And t

Spiritual/New Age immanent (in everything) consciousness, a universal collective mind of which we all can be part. This idea is akin to Hegel's idealistic This ideology was best represented at Findhorn, although a sprin­ concept of the universal spirit or geist, which one Findhornian kling of communards fr om elsewhere (who had sometimes visited specifically invoked while also repudiating Marx's materialism (see Findhorn) expressed it strongly. It has several elements. There is an Chapter 3 on idealism and materialism and Chapter 6 on social evolutionary view both of human history, which is entering the New change). Age (Aquarius) oflove, cooperation, hannony and spiritual aware­ World history is shaped by this spirit or consciousness: conse­ ness, and in some cases of the human soul evolving to greater heights quently if we want to change society - to influence the course of of consciousness through reincarnation. New Age deep ecology history - we must open ourselves up to the flow of cosmic energy hinges on a revival of the seventeenth century (and earlier) doctrine which represents planetary consciousness. To do this we must first of monism, a theory that there is only oue basic thing in the universe, discover ourselves as individuals. Only after finding out what we a single reality, whether it be material subsumce or spiritual 'God' or really are, and loving ourselves, can we change ourselves - towards both. For the Findhornians the common reality of the material and spiritual, loving people. Thus enabled, we can things, such as spiritual is mugy. One ramification of that everything is part of do this is loving others and the planet, working cooperatively, and spreading a unitary system. Monism is an extteme fo nn of holism (see Chapter the new consciousness. We can also make things happen materially. 1), ofwhich tel'lllJilike 'wholeness', 'interdependence' (ofpeople and Collective meditation, for example, can bring down the crime rate in nature), and 'the planetary culture/village' are deep ecology expres­ a district. Individual meditation can bring us to communicate with sions (see the discussion of deep ecology in Chapter 1). the spirits in plants (devas, which are also part of planetary con­ It fo llows that matter is seen as a manifestationof energy, or 'spirit' sciousness), helping us to grow things well (a revival of pagan as Findhornians sometimes put it. Spirit is a 'higher frequency animism which seemed actually to work spectacularly in the early vibration' than emotion, but the door spirituality is through the to days of Findhom - see Hawken 1975 and Chapter 5). Or, if we need heart, the fe elings, intuition and heightened consciousness via medi­ (as opposed to merely want) material things or the money (another tation and 'attunement'. Love, too, is a form of energy (,not the form of energy) to get them, we can manifest them. This does not lovey-dovey type we feel emotionally,). Knowledge of the world as this whole does no/ come from rational thought, which in the West is mean that we can conjure them up out of nothing, but we can indirect1y, and in a way of which we not necessarily conscious, based not on monism but dualism. Dualism means a tendency to are think in terms of opposites which are also separate fr om each other. influence events so that what we need becomes available. (While we (Hence the two fishes swimming away from each other- the symbol were at Findhorn, two communards advertised in their bulletin for of the 'old age' of Pisces which is drawing to a close.) Dualism places colleagues to help 'manifest' enough money for them to go on a humans separate from nature, masculine from fe minine, mind from holiday.) Again. this idea seems to have succeeded, if measured in matter etc. - and it tends also to see one side of such opposites as terms ofFindhom's own wealth. more important than the other. New Agers think that growing planetary consciousness is already Hence Westerners are generally out of balance because they think leading to significantworld changes in the 19905.Gorbachev's peace and openness initiatives seen as part of this inexorable trend. dualistically, in the classical scientific way. This hinders us from are gaining true 'New Age consciousness'. But when people do gain it Given all this, politics and economics are irrelevant and meaningless, through meditations and 'peak' emotional experiences that bring for the world is more mind than matter. Politics, fu rthermore, is revelation and insight, they have a holistic sense of how they based on dualistic confrontation rather than holistic 'love'. Findhor­ are intimately part ofthe rest of human and non-human existence - the nians refuse to think in ternlS of conflict, confrontation, evil, sin or rest of the planet. They now have 'planetary consciousness', appre­ the devil. If you should object to other people's actions, you must ciating that they are part of this collective consisting of Earth and all build up a sympathetic understanding with them, to influence them its creatures (Gaia). 'God', of whatever religion, is another term fo r by your view, and hope that they too take on planetary con­ will that consciousness, consequently if we have it, we God. God is an sciousness. This is 'positive thinking'. 'I try to be compassionate and are 108 109 COM'"UNES A ND TH E C R EEN VISION DECLINE Of' CREt;NEVANCELISM sensitive to iliings around me and to be more understanding - T.ble 14: Major influence. j[ (Fi6"�. i" pore,,'�' imlU:au ..lUItber makes me less critical of things and relieves me of stress', said one: a 0/ _",;"",) remark which sceptics might well reimerpret as 'I find political booQ Speclftc Otherpublic.tlon. (8) Small is Beautiful (Sdlumachef) thinking uncomfortable'. Such sceptics might be outraged at the Resurgence (4) Blueprint lor Survival (Ecologist) fo llowing typical response to our quuestions about the plight of TheLlIvelier (4) Turning Point (Capra) people in the Third World: (4) Practical Self Sufficiency Peace News (Seymour) UndefCIJffenfs Magic Findhorn (Hawkan) Third World peoplle arre exploited. They can't control this. But they (4) 01 The Ecologist (3) Seeing Green (Pornn) Christian Ecology Group can control how they ful. They can walk around in a victim (2) Awakening Earth (Russell) Publications cconsciousness or they can walk around enjoying everything. You go to (2) Silent Spring Gr88f1pe8ceINflttts (Garson) SriiLanka and you see the kid� happy, happy, happyy. You goto (1) Population: Resources: People metor heIIrdIn public meet ing. Environment (Ehrlichs) America and they're not happy al a race ... You can be happy li ving Pedlar Economic Growth KiI in cardboard boxes. Costs 01 Schumacher (t) (Mishan) Fritz Eve Balfour (1) PersonlPtanet of Bradford (1) Ufetide (Watson)(Roszak) Earl Findhomian New Ageism is, thus, ostensibly an in dividualistic, Richard SI. Bak8f (1) Fear Freedom (Fromm) Bartle fr ee will doctrine of self-liberation (for example, from 'negative of (1) Guide lor the Perplexed T.V. programme. thoughts,) which, it is claimed, is also liberating the world slowly but (Schumacher) 'Doomwatch' Kit Pedlar (1) Good Wor1I: (Schumacher) with surely. Other communards we interviewed were often doubtful ·Due to lac!< Inleresl, Anarchy in Action (Ward) of (1) Has Been Cancelled· when they heard we were to visit Findhorn., for they mistrusted this Post·Scarcity Anarchism Tomorrow (1) (5) Unspecified environmental (Bookchin) kind of'apolitical' (in reality, deeply conservative) spiritualism, and programmes (1) News from Nowhele (Morris) the apparent elitism which fo llows from the high prices that are (1) Jesus, Gandhi andthe Nuclear 0Ihe<. charged for the self-discovery/therapy courses - an elitism which Age (Douglas) (2) Potytechniclunlversity coune (1) Woman on the Edge ofTl ITle several Findhornians themselves were uneasy about. But, as we have (2) VISit toFlndhom argued elsewhere (pepper and 1989), we think that most (2) SoilAssoci ation Meetings (1) Wisdom(PieWilliam Godwin association with the Foundation, and the business mentality and (1) Taoism (1) Herbert Marcuse Zen philosophy language which their members (especially the American ones) tend (1) Patrick Rivers Astrology to use to express their world view. (1) Martin Cecil Paganism (1) Theodore Roszak (1) EriC Fromm Influences (1) E.P. Thompson (1) Jill Tweedie (1) MarlJllrel Mead This Findhom tendency is borne out by the list (Table 14) of books Alvin Tomer and people which most influenced communards' views on the (t) Rudolf Steiner (1) society-environment relationship [2.12]. Approximately two-thirds fall broadly into the category of calling for a spiritual-moral revival: a change in consciousness away fr om traditional Western dualistic and materialist thinking, towards holism, achieved not through 'tradi

110 III COMMUNES AND TilE GREEN VISION DECLINE OF GREEN EVA.NGELISM tional' left-right politics but by individuaJs transforming themselves. monly the welfare state was included in with the oppressive struc­ Few 'political' or social ecology, rather than deep ecology, books are tures: though socialists did not do this, more liberal greens and chosen, although the anarchism of Bookchin and Colin Ward are anarchists did. Perhaps, however, only anarchism could reconcile presem. There is also a slight 'old-fashioned' feel about the list (most this concern for loss of individual identity with an almost equal set of books were published in the seventies), perhaps reflecting the lim­ worries about loss of community and extended fa mily, and too mllcli ited time which the daily communal round gives for reading. While individualism and privateness. Anarchism might attack individuaJ­ this does not imply that older books are not extremely relevant, it ism as self-interest, but applaud it as self-fulfilment, where that partly involves relating to others a non-materiaJ, non-monetary does suggest that communards may neglect some of the newer and in more complex politicaJ developments the green debate. way. Hence another target of opprobrium was conventional social in relationships between people, especially in the nuclear fa mily and between men and women. They were seen as unequal, oppressive WHAT'S WRONG WITH THE OUTSIDE WORLD? power relationships where people did not really listen to each other. Among a wide range of other concerns, the more directly 'green' another indication of the 'greenness' or otherwise of these ones of lack of holism (specifically medicine) and unsustainable As in communards, we asked them about their critique of conventionaJ lifestyles were well to the fo re. society (3.1]. As our account below shows, it agreed closely with the Few Fi ndhornians responded to this section of the interview 'standard' radical green critique we described in Chapter 1. schedule. Where they were prepared to identity bad aspects of society they added that things were rapidly changing for the better. Society [3.4] But they also refused to 'condemn, judge or disapprove' on the grounds that 'this is a lack oflove in me: everyone has a right to the The most fre quent criticism from these people who were trying to way they are', and 'I get angry when i see pain and misery, but 1 work live frugal lifestyles was that conventionaJ society is hopelessly over­ hard at not doing so. IfJ can't do anything about it then it doesn't materialistic. Though only two communes (Findhom and Monkton serve by gettingemotional about it'. Wyld) had overtly spirituaJ approaches, nearly a fifth of our respond­ ents bemoaned the lack of value which society places on spiritual EconomiCII and work [3.3, 3.5] matters. 'Money is a religion today, but it must change', and 'The quest fo r materiaJ things doesn't bring satisfaction but problems like Following the force of criticisms about society in general, when it

Chemobyl', were typical comments. However there was aJso a came to economics, we fo und that wealth maJdistribution, excessive significant minority from two of the more private communes (Lau­ consumerism, growth and waste, and production for profit rather rieston and Monkton Wyld) who did not reject materialism out of than 'real needs' or quality of life were the most common targets of hand. For example, we heard that: disapprovaJ.

This commune is a rich environment - a half-way house from Economics isn't about social responsibility, but greed and profits. apitalism, which is why it works. I don't want a new Cal' every two Basic needs get perverted by the power interests of a fe w. ycan but I do want a reliable car ...Our level of materialism in the West can't be sustained globally, but it's not a bad ambition. Economics is about the abstr.lctionmoney of rather than real needs: this is an out-of-b alance malignancy. equally important concern was with fo rms of alienation, An particularly, in anarchistic vein, resulting from people's lack of These observations were typical. They condemned 'economics' power and control over their own lives. Correspondingly, hier­ rather than capitalist economics, although competition and multi­ archies, bureaucracies, the military-industrial complex and, in two national corporations or 'big business' were blamed most often. On cases, religion were attacked as fo rms of oppression. Not uncom- the other hand little was said about small businesses. Their role if any

112 113 COMMUNES AND THE GRH;N VISION DECLINE OF GREEN EVANGELISM in the destructive system went unconsidered, or there was indif­ Technology [3.7, 3.1 1] fe rence to the proposition that it was in the nature of capitalist Given how trenchant the above criticisms were, the view oftechnol­ economics that small often tends to become large or otherwise oro:was surprisingly bland. There was virtually no trace of romantic extinct. Since most communards depend on small businesses this antl-technologism - the kind of view that 'technology has alienated was hardly surprising. As EllUngtonand Burke (1987) put it, quoting �s fr om e Earth' being a rare one. More commonly 'alternative/ Rosabeth Kantner, 'A lot of sixties phenomena -the co)\ectives, the mtermedlate/appropriate'� technology was fav oured rather than high altemative institutions, the small enterprises -were entrepreneurial technology. But many benefits of conventional technology were activities'. However, our communards did point to the cooperative also applauded. It was generally seen as neutral or even 'convivial' nature of their businesses, and the view that tllty were producing for (after IIIich), but abused by those in controlofit- used to make profit need. The idea that 'business' itself'destroys society- it reduces us to or con ol people. A more radical view, that some technology, n: far digits', which one person proposed, would probably have been fr om bemg neutral,is inherendy bad or exploitative (see Albury and denied by most, since thtir businesses, they fe lt, involved what the Schwartz 1982) was seldom encountered. though on the other hand Findhornians called 'love' and spiritual values. No more than half a nearly all the communards made their opposition to nuclear tech­ dozen came out against capitalism in any fo rm. Most popularly itwas nologyvery clear. By about three to one, communards supponed the the imaginedabstract motive of'greed', rather than the system itself technocentric idea that technology would be able [0 find ways out of that inspires it, which was denounced. any environmental predicament - the 'technofix'. However, again, that would often be seen in the form of altemative and local But the nature of work under capitalism - which communal fix working practises tried to correct - was often roundly condemned technology that requires radically di fferent social and economic for its overspecialisation and division oflabour and the way it makes organi�a�on. The computer occupies an ambiguous position here, people cogs in a machine. It was thought boring, undignified and and thiS 15 how most communards see it, as do greens in general. alienating. Anarchists, particularly,went further, attacking the work ethic itself (though many communards seemed to display that ethic Education [3.6] par txcdltnu). Again, relatively little really incisive criticism was voiced on this topic, except in two People should not feel they must work to justify their existence. of the communes with a special educational fo cus - � and Monkton Wyld. Here there was opposition to Work and education are defined according to in stitutions and compulsonness. compartmentalisation ofknowledge, boring irrele­ framtworks. People who aren't these are [wrongly] regarded as not in vance, assessment, grading, the hidden curriculum which educated or working. moulds peo�le into roles where they exploit others or are exploited, hier­ People are valued according to their material conaibution, but it is archical organisation. stiOingoffree expression, of creativeness and absurd to pay people more for doing one thing rather than another. of children's sense that they have control over their own lives all anarchistic criticisms which Thoreau voiced a hundred and _fifty In one way or another, many communards supported these senti­ years ago. Little, it seems, has changed! ments. Whether they called themselves anarchistsor green or what­ Elsewhe e t rrent of criticism dwindled . � this � to a steady trickle ever, most fo llowed the 'green economics' line unswervingly (Ekins aImed against seXism, the core curriculum (centralised control), 1986) - down to paying people fo r work in the informal economy, neglec� 0: subjective expression in children, and unchallenging, the concept of the social wage, and the call fo r independent, not regurg:.tatlve, undemocratic learning. The common 'academic' bias as against the practical, was dependent, Third World development. Yet few mentioned the key also disliked. Just occasionally there had question of ownership of the means of production, especially land, been good e�periences, particularly ofDartington and Stantonbury though the idea that communes are specifically a way for the Campus (Milton Keynes) schools, and of some higher education majority of people to own land was popular. Courses (see above).

114 115 COMfoIUNES A 1\'0 TilE CREEN VISION DECLINE OF GREEN EVANGELISM

Why? [3.10J consumerism as a fe alUre of this system, with its attachment of the notions of self-gratification and self-fulfilment to material things. A clue to the communards' position on social change -particularly One Lauriestonian proclaimed that this is what material things how much change for the good they think is possible and likely ­ bring: 'People want the quality of their lives to be good, and this came fr om their answers to the question 'why do these things [the involves money and getting a car'. But this view was rare. Almost as fa ults of conventional society) occur?'. There is not as much optim­ rare, however, was the idea that private ownership, especially of ism about the state of'human nature' (and therefore the potential for land, was the major cause of society'S ills; although one person said, change) as one might expect from individuals who believe in their 'Multinationa1s are not taking into account the needs ofthe land. I'd OW" potential for change. Greed, selfishness, competitiveness and like to do away with multinationals'. tendency to error were most commonly invoked. And explanations Explanations based less on economics and more on history re­ for these commonly came down to the level of the individual where a volved around the Enlightenment, the development of classical person's inherent nature is unpleasant, rather than to socio­ science and the development by Descartes and others of a philoso­ economic structures, though structuralism was evident too (see phy of separation from nature, reinforced by a Judaeo-Christian Chapter 3). message of dominance over it. Scientific reductionism and the mechanica1 view of nature, together with a love affairwith machines, Me and you are the cause. I'm greedy and 50 is the world. I'm here to were blamed too - a reflection, perhaps, of wide readership of some s ighten myse fout, which is necessary before the world gets tra l green literature (such as Capra's Tht Turning Poil1f). This sense of straighter. Govemments must get it wrong because they composed are history also extended to the industrial revolution, and the idea that of human beings and full of en-or. Somewhere illJidt they and I are too-rapid technological change had overtaken people. It tended making the wrong decisions. (Author'S emphasis1 . towards technologica1 detenninism: 'It wasn't planned; if just hap­ pened fo Uowing technologica1 developments'. This reflects the essential psyche of many communards, it seems, Without saying why they had developed, several communards saw as does this: power structures as the chief problem. Once in place they led to

We're sick. I'm sick and I know other people are. We go on killing and built-in reinforcement mechanisms that discouraged the majority maiming people. I don't know why we are as we are - why our culture from recognising either their own inherent power, or the possibility is as it is. We've got out of balance. I can't thinkof any other Teason of socia1 change. This argument ran as fonows: apart from original sin. It's beyond me, we're not in control over where we are. People are asleep and they never wake up. Society is constructed to keep them asleep. Asleep people are not problems.

After so many explanations like this from mild people who The problem is that only one way oflife is presented as possible and is obviously were not inherent maimers and killers, the Findhornians' thought possible. insistence that there is no such thing as origina1 sin came as a The Government, who control education, want people tobe welcome relief. Predictably, they saw the lack of spirituality in subservient. They want a whole nation full of subservient worken. The people as a reflection that society has not yet reached the right stage nuclear fa mily is a fonn of social control. of evolution. They also suggested that a sense of insecurity had entered earlier in history, making humans fo rget their 'interconnec­ These perspectives on causation, with their relative emphasis on tedness'. This theme was taken up by people elsewhere. It was a individuals and their values, and on the nature of human nature, but 'vicious circle which started from people being too poor'. They had with a more minor subset of explanations invoking structures of become frightened oflack of enough, and fearful of being exploited political power and sometimes economics, confonn to a typically and invaded, so they had done those things to others. green understanding of why things are wrong. Just a few were prepared to attribute this to the development of One Green Party member invoked virtually all of them, together specific modes of production - particularly capitalism. They saw with 'overpopulation': 'Malthus' views are coming true'. Marx's, by

116 117 COMMUNES AND TilE GRfEN VISION contrast, were regarded as relevant to the past but 'ludicrous' in application to the fu ture, fo r 'capita1ism may be a cause of �nvir�n­ mental problems but communism is just as bad'. The Manuan VIew CHAPTER 5 of the relationship between ideas and social structures had value, but the 'economic structure is but a reflection of mass psychology', said this green, shying away from placing too much importance on the How green are the communes? historical development of the economic mode of production. Such a Ecological values and practices pot-pourri of causes was because 'There's no one explanation: it's spiritual, material and psychological - its the hubris of mankind'.

This chapter asks whether communards are by and large 'eco­ This chapter has shown that the communes we visited Jess are centrics', in other words radical greens, in thought and deed (see oriented to social change and green ideals and practices now than Chapter 1 and Appendix 2). It presents what they described as their they were when fo unded. There has, overall, been a Joss ofideologi­ beliefS and fe elings towards nature, and what environmental prob­ cal coherence and evangelising energy. The present communards lems most worry them. It also tells us what theydo in 'living green'­ have joined more fo r reasons to do with their individual situation or, rather, Iry to do. For just as we all find it difficultto practice what than with a desire to change society or live a 'green' lifestyle we believe, so do these communards, sometimes. Not least difficult although such desires are there with a minority. Ideological beliefs_ are the very processes of living together, trying to share, to relate are particularly consistent with a green anarchist and/or deep ecol­ harmoniously and peacefully, and to achieve high qualin' of life at ogy perspective, as are the criticisms which the communards make low material levels - aUimportant 'second order' elementsof a green generally of society and their analyses of what is wrong. We will society. discuss their specificviews of the society-nature relationship [3.9] in This account ofbelief systems about nature and environment, of the next chapter, which fo cuses on attitudes to nature and environ­ attempts at ecological 'soundneSJ' and of some of the realities and ment, on how much green principles lated into practice, and are trans complexities of social relations, give some insight into other on what difficulties and obstacles stand in the way. will issues raised in Chapters 1 to 3. For instance, we may be able to see what historical phase of communal living most parallels this phase. and we may determine what view of community (Le. gemeitlJchflfior gestlluhflJI) most of the communards hold. Such considerations feed into the discussion in Chapter 6 where, having asked communes if conform to green ideology and practice, we go on to consider various fa ctors affecting their potential to encourage and be part of wider social change to a green fu ture, a potential which many outsiders maintain there. is

CONVENTIONAL ATTITUDES TO NATURE [3.9]

The communards roundly condemned the way that conventional Western society thinks about and behaves towards nature. It was deScribed as violent, destructive, ungrateful, exploitative, oppressive

119 liB flOW GREEN A.RE TilE COMMUNES? COMMUNES A.ND TilE GREEN "'SION was usually seen as a faw problem - particularly fCOurse, by those and domineering. Trying to control nature was, of itself, often mvolved educatlon ventures. CAT membe" ,0 o " . In'. ed thIS V1ew� regarded as wrong. 'We hunt and shoot it-just can't leave it alone'. typI "6

'We' destroy its beauty and resources, and the latter are running out. People are quite into nature conservation'u but they don', nd erst;an d . . . the mdIrect connections between themselves and na'",.. re, I.e. wh at We treat narure as a fo unt into which we di p; we take and then throw happens when ey on a !ighl switch ... Few people consciously � flick rubbish back - iI's a frontier mentality. the enVlronme:ntwhen they really aware of degrade 're what it me:ans ...unawareness ofthe planet is the problem ...lack of planet;a h's live now, pay later- there is no long-tenn view on behalf offuNre ry generations. consciousness.

Just a few people blamed economics and the fa ct that 'it's easy Such comments echo strongly the mainstream green critique and, fOO make money out of nature. Life-damaging initiatives (Concorde again true to green idealism, they see our attitudes and values as the fO or the Channel Tu el) are profitable, but life-enhancing things are first and fo remost causes of environmental iUs. 'The way you treat � done on a shoestnng, or voluntarily'. This fact, which Galbraith the environment stems fr om the way you Stt it', said one commu­ recognised in The AIfi uent Socitty, explains why, in reality, people nard, thus speaking (or many. often �ann nature in fu ll knowledge of what they are doing. People 'do not value nature enough and are arrogant towards it', While one communard bemoaned the lack of romanticism in the was a common complaint. 'We think we're the most important thing common view of nature, another thought 'Our approach is too on the planet and nature is dispensable'. Some attributed this atti­ . sennmental; we are interested in fluffy m als, but not habitats as tude to an alienation from nature which arose through a historically amm a whole'. A third saw Jack of holism as ultimately fa tal to us: 'lfwe specific period and process - that of 'industrialism'. Industrialism keep messing with Gaia, she'll throw us out - nuclear weapons and now gives us the power (technology) to 'completely destroy' our �S are all pa�ofGaia'_ This interpretation of the Gaia hypothesis environment, yet our 'mental adaptation' to this new situation over IS not unknown green thinking. Itconveys - almost with relish _ a the past two hundred years has been minimal. In disdain for humanity (at least in any numbers) which smacks of

Society is alienated from plants. You can hear them crying out under romantic ecocentrism and is rather unpleasant to humanists ' social- the conditions of artificial cultivation [this from FindhomJ. is ts, liberals and technocentrics alike.

We treat nature as an object - as dead material having no eiTect on us. We don't rulise how interrelated we are. AVERTING ENVIRONMENTAL CRISIS, THE seen a day in the country. People don't understand the Narure is as APPROPRIATE VALUES connection between it and our daily lives. [4,0., 1.3]

People are too removed from narure. So much of what we get is pacuged, selected and purchased fo r us. We get nature's provisioru in Thecris.is. artificial dollops, i.e. from garden centres. Nearly half o� our interviewees strongly believed that these 'wrong' values and atnrudes to nature, just described, have led to an environ­ An astrologer's view fr om Glaneirw regarded alienation from mental crisis. Few disagreed (see Table 15). nature as a legacy of the development of rational thought and the The catalogue of elements which comprisc this 'crisis' contained metaphor of science as a machine (i.e. during the scientific revolu­ , s�rprises. Pollution topped the list - in general, and of water and tion of the 'Enlightenment ). This analysis seems to reflect the ".0aIr (mcluding acid rain), in particular. There were also many con­ impact of the green critique developed by such mainstream writers cerns about global wanning and ozonc depletion, which were as Capra, Schumacher and Skolimowski, as does the solution to the correctly linked with deforestation and desertification. These, the problem which was most commonly raised - that of education. Lack particular worries ofthe late-eighties environmentalists, were mixed of understanding of our 'real' relationship (that of interdependence) 121 120 COMMU,VES AND THE GREE,V VISION I/Oif'GREEN ARE TilE COMMUNES? with early-seventies fears about resources running out, but only one There isn't a crisis - what does that meolll? The inner city hasgone beyond oisis to devastation, while oises Ethiopia are not respondent anticipated nuclear war, the early-eighties preoccupa­ like poU/itai: to do with nature and weather. tion (though several fo resaw danger from the nuclear power industry). The oisis is in the polarintion ofptople ...... The apocalyptic language which particularly marked early­ However, this kind of perspective was more evident ovcr the seventies environmentalism was also evident: particular issues ofeconomic growth, resources and population. For every respondent who believed that the world is overpopulated If we don't stop treating nature as we do things will be terrible. (,The whole world, including this country, is incredibly overpopu­ lated. and this leads to crime1, about three did not. Many emphas­ We're making an awful mess of th e world. ised maldistribution of resources in relation to people, particularly Everything is out of c;:ontrol. blaming high levels of Western consumptionand advocatingW'ealth

The eanh is in serious danger. redisttibution. Others worried about economic growth and 'over­ consumption' rather than too many people. They generally agrecd Nature's being raped and plundered. that 'cconomic growth can't continue'; 'We're in a finite system'; 'uncontrolled growth a cancer'; and 'the present way of life is is Such comments were mingled with insistent demands for action unsustainable', although a few counselled caution. Stopping W'orld now. This perspective- 'ofdisaster at a global scale -was sometimes industrialisation would hann poor people: one does not hllve to live argued and rationalised: fo r instance mismanagement of Third 'like a peasant': there is room fo r growth in miniaturised and low­ World land at the end of a chain of causes and effects initiated energy technology; and there is room for growth in services (this last, through economic development of the West. But itwas also strongly predictably, from a commune whose members mosdy work in the and clearly justJtlt: in ways sometimes graphically described, people caring professions). Just one respondent specificallyconfronted the were worried that things are out of control: system of economic organisation rather than 'economics' in general:

Yes, there's going be a resou rce oisi5. A toW breakdown ofli e in 10 f I feel that tenrades ofhannful a<=tivities area re ing out from the the city. They'll be a towly unsustainable system. The only m in way fO south-cast of En and, and we being pushed towards the Irish sea survive will be to prey on other people - mugging and robbing gl are for Ifrom a Lauriestonian, li ving near the rim of that sea]. fo od. This won't be bec;:ause of a total lack of re5ources, but the breakdown of (olpi/a/ism, which c;:an't keep on endlessly expanding. Such bleakness bec;:ame nihilism in a Canon Fromer: The bioethic and animal rights Table 15 shows stronggeneral support for the bioethic-the idea that I'd like to of my family and DNA going on, but if they're dead in thi nk nature has intrinsic value and a right to existence of itself (see a pull'of smoke what di fferenc;:e does it make? Onc;:e the Eanh has gone it doesn't matter - thi s is a pric;:eiess piec;:e of knowledge. If my Chapter I). Some ont was unqualified: kids were Ethiopians I wouldn't be wild about their surviving - be I absolutely believe the bioethlc. Humam are hopeless, they c;:an't quite a good idea ifthey snuffed it. It's hard to know how we're in 10 even live in hannony with nature. avoid World War Three - it ought to be Al;ia and venus the rest. Afri<=a The wellb e g of the planel comes before an amuent lifestyle. in What was generally lacking was the more socialist view (sec We must respect nature: it is alive. Like primitive cultures we must ask pennission before e loiting it. Chapter 4) that sees any 'crisis' essentially in social, nOI 'natural', xp tenns, though there were two exceptions, from Canon Frome and If n'lan blew hi mself off the fa ce of the Eanh, morally I wo uldn't Lifespan: object.

122 123 COMMUNES AND THE CREEN VISION /lOWCREEN ARE: TIlE COMMUNF;S?

Table 15: Belief, about nature new thing: a way of giving attention to yourself and getting it from others'. (fi,J/ ..."d" ecocentrit priM:ipkl! I« AppentIU 2. f ....__ "f" to ,,,, number of in"",ie�. '''O,,! .upport fo, foUo",� pnncipkl While some emphasised how respect for nature might connect Up" "� (0' "ject�J ,he and intimatelywith respect for people, others felt that it militates against belief· ) the human species: There is an environmental crisiS 33 (Th8fe is not 4) Humans are part of, andare globally Interdependent with, nature; we should be 27 I put my own species first- I'd rather kill a cow than see a human its steward Starve. (Disagree 1) Bioethlc - respectl'worshiplmoral obIigalion to nature 22 'Yes' to respect but 'no' to worship of nature - I like to be on my own (Rejecting the bioethic 10) in nature, but thi s isn't healthy: it's to do with shunning people. There are �mitsto growth 21 Nature is va1uable because it gives us pleasure - it's not got intrinsic (There ale not 2) value. And I'd fo rego this pleasure for less hardship in the world. I care Nature is a self-regulating system - Gaia - arD'or is female " {Disagree 14) more about Eskimo l;Ommunities thanwhales. Anti-urban/pf

t But there were also qualifications, particul arly from those who saw I'm not interested in guil about nature. At the end of the day it doesn't matter if world disappean in a puffof smoke, because I that to believe in 'nature's rights' must imply 'animal rights'_ They this came from communes in or near an upland fa nning economy,where don't have any consciousness after my death. gr.wgrows best, sheep and canle are therefore appropriate and 'the ...there can't be anintrinsic value for natuR:. You can't place value meat fo llows from the milk'. Such communes consume outside a .rocialframework - i.e. your OW1I framework. It's in our all animals and their produas (though they are not the only ones) and heads - it's our creation. communards stoutly defended the practice -partly because it contributes to self-sufficiency, and panty becawe: Both legally and existentiallythese are compelling arguments, but most communards rejected them for the more conventiona1ly green The defence of animal life is not mirrored in nature. Animals don't think it wrong to animals. Providing fo od for people is a basic view. kill principle, not defending animal life. If you carried thi� to its ultimate we'd pick berries. Mother Eartb

Such arguments emphasised that killinganimals is pan of nature 's I'm struggling to tty and see nature and the planet as a living cycle. It does not equate with exploitation agribusiness techniques organism. To get back the more ancient view. To change if consciousness from mechanistic to organic. are shunned and, possibly, if those that eat meat are prepared to do the killingthemselves (they generally are in communes). Further­ I like the idea of Mother Earth: it's good symbolism. more, it does not infringe the bioethic, interpreted in defence of if species rather than just preservation ofindividuals. General support for the first view did not always extend to the Occasionally vegetarianism or veganism was attacked as 'holier­ second. The idea of Earth as a living organism, which humans are a than-thou'. or as hypocrisy or attention-seeking. To drink expensive relatively unimportant part of, was very common. Human pollution soya milk, for instance. is not only elitist. it may use Third World and control of the planet is but transient, part of the system's products as substitutes fo r something indigenous to the local area. 'adolescence'. Gaia will adapt and survive, but possibly without And: 'There's too much fuss about getting a diet together. Diet's the humans. (Here, Russell's Awokenittg Earth was often mentioned.)

124 125 COMMUNES AND TilE GREEN VISION 1I01f'C REEfY " HE THE COMMUNES? deep ecology, monism andthe New Age However, though Gaia is the Greek tenn for 'Mother' Earth,some of Holism, these Gaians surprisingly had never linked fe minism with nature, or The deep ecology idea that humans are intimately part ofnature and did not like the idea of so doing: 'The Mother Earth image is totally interdependent with it was the strongest and most common dangerous - it suggests that, in our patriarchal culture, nature is but view (Table 15) of the society-nature relationship. One or two passive'; 'Nature as fe male is as much a stereotype as God being people had reservations, warning that humans are positively dif­ ma1e'. Our interviewees did not like the dualistic masculine­ fe rent fr om and either above or equal to nature, or that 'Ifyou get too fe minine split. However, this did not preclude positive discrimina­ much into this big picture you fo rget "smaller" issues like racism and tion towards fe minine Vililits to achieve a holistic balance with inner cities', or (correctly) that seeing society as an organism or part masculine ones, a sentiment which could shade into the anti­ of it leans towards right-wing conservatism and legitimation of intellectualism which Abrams and McCuUoch noted among their meritocracy. communards: 'We need holism (feminine] and less theorising and But, from most, holism was evident in some fo rm, such as 'Every­ intellectualising [masculine]'. thing is connected to everything else', with the coronary that society should cooperate with and steward nature, leaving it alone as much Anti-urbanism as possible. Dualism was finn1y rejected: 'The concept of nature as something outside oneselfis handing over our responsibility for it to It also shaded into a distinctly romantic pastoral idea1ism, not a bigger power. That's wrong'. surprising for a group which has generaUy chosen to live in the There were also many 'New Age' responses where, as described in countty, but remarkable for the rawness with which itwas expressed: Chapter 4, holism stretches towards monism, emphasising how completely intimately humans are part of nature: part of the same I go into unspoilt countryside once a week. This contact energises me: it's therapeutic. I like wild country and mountains. It's about survival; conective 'planetary' consciousness as the whole universe, of the fe eling the wind and the ravages of weather. same material cosmic energy flow, of the same Chain of Being:

I love the countryside and don't like cities . ..1 sometimes fe el cosmic I don't believe 'nature'. are our environment. nature in We TV about nature. programmes encourage us to believe nature's 'out there', but thi s is unsatisfactory voyeurism. People weren't meant to live in large conurbations likeMilton Keynes. LSD showed me I was a 1001 in the process of drawing spirit into Country dwellers aremorally better than urban ones. matter. It transfonned my fe elings about nature - as something to There's little crime villages, but you become anonymous cities. in in love, wonhip and recognise with my emotions. It helped me to fe el a unity with nature and experience it as part ofa whole and part of Cities are identical to cancer cells. Like the latter, cities and the people myself. in them take no notice of the whole organism {i.e. Gaia]. My relationship to the planet as a whole has become very strong. I Such sentiments hark back to Muir, Emerson, Thoreau, Carlyle think about it as much as I do my relationships with my family. It is helped by living a beautiful spot across the valley. I fe el a strong and other romantics and to the sixties counterculture. They are in deeply ecocentric, but they often display a (subconscious?) anti­ sense of something good and relaxing ...the same fe eling oflove for the planet as I have fo r my wife and children. I believe I fe el a people bias which suggests the rural commune as a place of escape Ami rcsponse ...when I raise my consciousness ofnature, which I'm from an environment of masses of people. They contrast with tryingto do. I love the rainnow - in it I fe el heightened consciousness another 'anti-urban', but explicitly pro-people, that sees social ...there a planetary force that turns things way. Once I was view is your alienation in the city, but also cultura1 and economic advantages open 10 this ...things (like a new car) constantly manifested there. To retain the second but minimise the first, anarchist planning themselves. is fa voured. This view also came across in a few interviews; 'We could have living in the countryside: a house in every field. This last was fr om a CAT gardener. Gardeners at Findhom everyolle You can free a lot of land for this by getting rid of the meat similarly expressed heightened consciousness of'the nature realms: production which is excessive now'. the unseen fo rces of nature':

126 127 COMMUNES A.ND THE GREEN VISION HOW GREEN A.RE THt: COMMUNt:S?

Working in the garden, I see that there's an energy that brings A Findhomian who did not herself profess a deep relationship

something from spirit to form - that helps things . All thought is grow with nature put it this way: energy, so I think, 'I want abundance', and things wil l (I can can grow also think'I want a red car'). The nature spirits bring this about. They There's consciousness in everything, for example in a 5tone. There's [;Ike the energy, which is vibration, and made it denser. As it gets love in a stone. Love attncts things rogether. It makes subatomic denser it rums into fo rm. panicles stick together. There's an essential unity and interconnectedness in all- the planet is one living organism. I'm not Here is a clear statement of New Age animism (owing something separate from nature. I came fr om the Earth. also to modern physics), which is also pantheism. The latter because this spiritual energy is described by the tenn 'God', and so 'God' specificallyis the spirit which is in evetything. So the plant spirits or SOCIAL IMPLICATIONS 'devas' are also 'God'. This gardener described her communion with the devas. The belief systems described above overwhelmingly suggest green radicalism. Many communards dearly have 'deep ecology' green Animals and nature are my family ...My higher self and the garden spirits are the same, we're energy anyway. manifested them and attitudes to nature. But when they were asked about the implications all J c ated with them: they are co-workers. Through growing and of such attitudes for social organisation [4.0b], they had generally fa r o-cre meditating in the garden, and drawing them, 1 made contact with the less strong and dear ideas. Some avoided answering on the grounds deva of the garden - an energy overlooking it - and with the nature that they had no idea of what the implications are. More often they spirits in charge of each individua1 plant. bringing life-force to it and felt that there are social implications, but could not express them. making it grow. Over each individual plant spirit is the deva of all Those few (about half-a-dozen) who could findthe words put the those same plants everywhere (e.g. cabbages) ... I told to open wu connection in three ways. First and fo remost, it is a matter of myself to the deva of each plant and find out what they wanted ...I tell the ndish deva 'Welcome: I'm open to you, come and work with relationships. People must relate well to and feel good about thtm­ me'. selves before they can take care of the environment:

The vegetables she grew were not ofthe proportions celebl1ltedin If we did what made us more profoundly satisfied then the Earth early Findhorn legend, but they were produced after she had been would start healing up. If you love and communiOlte with other gardening for only six months with no prior expertise. humans then you won't mess the Earth up. Stay outside and fe el healthy rather than working in a fa ctory. Follow your intuition and Her reference to 'life-force' evoked one more element of the New self-i nterest and have fun. That's the best thing for the Earth and for Age conception of nature: the beliefin vitalism. Popular before the us. It's as simple as that; it's not mystical at all. twentieth century, this proposed that living things cannot be ex­ Relationships between people are important. It's do with health, plained merely in terms of their constituent parts, but that an un­ to whole people and vision. If you are soned out emotiona1ly you won't analysable life fo rce suffuses them. Sometimes this was extended to be an exploiter. the notion that such a fo rce was in tvtrylhing, albeit of a lower The environmental crisis must be dealt with by loving, sharing, and intensity in those things which we of as'inanimate'. think other aspects of an Aquarian lifestyle - by being in touch with your Some New Agers appear to believe too. astrological this An core. communard from Glaneirw said: These answers and others like them did not spell out specifically I'm just another portion of life. There's no overall spirit eXCept the why better personal relationships would make us treat the environ­ common collective consciousneu of not juSt humans but animals, plants, pieces of wood , stone ...Life is in everything, communication ment better. Two communards did however. Cooperation, they

occurs within it . ..J stopped being a vegetarian because I experienced said, between people leads to lower material consumption; or, the discomfon plants went through. conversely, the lower material standards which have to come will 128 129 COMMUNES A.ND THE GREF:I"; VISION HOW CREEN ARE TUE CQMMUN£S? because of the environmental crisis be compensated fo r by munity. supported at least in theory, suggests either an underlying wiU higher quality oflife, including better human relationships. This is socialism or conservatism. Such ambiguity reinforces the impression the all-important pragmatic connection between social and ecologi­ of ideological incoherence - within broad limits - suggested in cal wellbeing which Bluf'prill/ spelled out twenty years ago. Chapter 4. It was conveyed graphically by one particular commu­ This leads to the second social implication - that people should nard, who was a veteran of the movement and also a Green Party live in small communities, hence closer to the land and less alienated luminary. He had a very clear but eclectic image of his fu ture 'ideal' from it. This, plus closeness to what you produce from naNre in society. It would be both green and communal, and it had strong labour-intensive hand and cnft work, 'lead to understanding, elements of liberalism (individual freedom) combined vigorously will which creates less likelihood of disturbing nature'. Third, collective with dashes of anarcho-communism, eco-fascism, and a non­ living is implied. Groups share resources, using less. And a collective ecocentric beliefin the supremacy of'objective' science. The ideal green society be marked, he told us, by big increases and consensual approach should also be a better framework in which will people relate to nature because it encourages holism. In collectivism in personal freedom, and an end of state domination. Most things people tend to value each other nature: 'It's shallow to save the "\vill be allowed, but not for money-making. While capitalism is a tmJ whale and not people'. Another respondent put it that while individ­ form of enoblement whereby labour creates things, in the ideal uals maximise material gains, groups optimise them, and the latter is green society this will be done locally by the community using its what Trag­ own labour for its own priorities. leads to long-term environmental stability (c.f. Hardin's I'dy oj tht Commons). A third held that overindividualism is a problem The only things which will not be allowed will be those which do for nature. But ifyou can live in a group with other people then you not fit in with the ecological imperative. People will be pennitted, can also cooperate with nature. These communards clearly have a but nOt encouraged, to bugger their children ifthey want to, though theoretical idea of community which accords with gemf'ituchajl 'if the local community went in the direction of heavy exploitation (Table 3), as does ecocentrism generally. Though many could not you might have to do something about it'. However, 'you can't express this in words, by implication from the lifestyle they had repress people on some beautiful idea ofwhat morality happens to chosen, this probably goes for most of our interviewees. be'. There are no social imperatives. People, choosing fo r them­ Other observations on the social fe atures which should fo llow selves, can set up communities of buggers, rapists or cannibals. However there are ecological imperatives which form some fr om the attitudes to nature described above conformed closely to will the ecocentric 'second order' list in Appendix 2, as has already been heavy restraints on fre edom. An absolute ecological code will be implied in the description of the critique of conventional society. enforced by an ecological police. What they enforce will not be ideologies but scientifically verifiable truths. Science is the fo unt of Most reference was made to the needs for fe minist principles, and balancing yin and yang, for fu ndamental changes in human relation­ ecological wisdom because it is objective. ships. and for small-scale organisation. There was, too, particular When you want to know what to do you look for fa cts and information support for less consumerism, industrialism, giantism and high ...Science is a fieldwhere propositions are testable and replicable ... technology, fo r self-actualisation. for self-reliant communities and If you want to scoff at science you would go back to the world where countries, and for the concepts of community and extended family. the Eanh was thought to be flat ...Debunking nuclear scientists is a Most of the other items on this list were also mentioned, only once, form ofLuddism unfortunately. The process of de stabilising belief in if except for holistic economics, low impact technology, population science is going on in the grel'n mOVl'ml'nt, via religion and mysticism. conrrol, education for change, and. interestingly, social justice and Indeed it is, abetted by such events as Chernobyl, which is why we the state as an enemy. believe that many of our interviewees with green leanings would not support most of this remarkable but highly individual vision, al­ Green utopia or distopia: right, left or centre? though elements might be to their taste. At this stage. perhaps, it This lack of the social justice theme suggests no strong socialist would be politic to leave the realm of speculative ideas and turn to consensus among communards (Table 12). Their concept of com- the question of how much communards try to live them out.

130 131 COMMVNES AND TIlE GREEN l' lSION HOW GREEN ARE THE COMMVNES?

LIVING GREEN, THE ECOLOGICAL PROFILE railway and for an expanded education programme, and Findhorn. Findhorn's July 1989 newsletter, described a Allgels and Mortals, rolling programme We asked communards how their attitudes to nature, environment to improve its poor environmental record by replacing all its caravans with ecologically sound (insulated, sewage and related issues of social organisation translated into practice recycling) houses, building a wind park, planting thousands of trees, through individual or group action [5.1-2]. No leading questions and using recycled paper and ecologically sound cleansers. The were asked, so that Table 16 represents what activities the commu­ rogramme had already started, and was supplemented by an 'en­ nards themselves highlighted. The absence of any category from p vironmental excellence audit' of the Foundation's many activities. Appendix 2 in the description of specific communes in this table The fo llowing more detailed account of ecological practices also does not therefore necessarily mean that it is not practised, but panty draws (with perntission) on Fiona Hay's (1989) survey of simply that for one reason or another it was not raised by respond­ ecological practices in eight communes - six covered here, plus ents. It should also be realised that where practices are entered this Birchwood Hall near Malvern and Shindig in Edinburgh. does not imply that they are unerringly observed or that what is intended always fo llows, a point we shall discuss later. Organic cultivation and self-8ufficiency Clearly the communes have notionally a strong ecological profile.

Sharing and recycling resources (including clothes) and using less ­ Table 16 shows. cultivation is a central fe ature of aU the com­ As especially energy - fe ature consistently, as do non-polluting prac­ munes, whether large-scale as at Laurieston (120 acres -see Table 4) tices and home production of crafts and (invariably organic) fo od. or small, as at Shindig, which has a small tenement garden in Minimal or shared car use, alternative technology and medicine, soft Edinburgh's centre. For the urban communards of Shindig, cultivat­ energy, using food coops orexchanging labour between countryand ing their own food is not central. But runs six allotments, the ZAP city; all these had few mentions, however. While the minority of products of which supply the Project's wholefood cafe in communes arevegetarian or vegan, all of them have high dietary and Binningham. health and consumer consciousness. For all communes, cultivation is a centra! concern. Many organic The Appendix 2 list is not exhaustive. Seven communes added to members had been influenced by green ilideas which stressed the the list tree or hedge planting, coppice renovation or woodland or undesirabilitty of chemicals and machines in cultivation, and ·the lake/marsh conservation and management. Five emphasised that desirabilityoflaboourinntensiveness-asgoodforthesoiland(moreto their animals were fr ee-range (though all were). Other 'sound' the point) good for the soul of the labourer. The fo od produced is agricultural practices include fo lding sheep after cattle to control also more healthy, it is said, than the products ofagribusiness, and pests (artificial fe rtilisers or pesticides are rejected in fa vour of this answers a major concern oflate-eighties environmentalism. In natural means), urine collection and its application to the land, using both respects, then, organic agriculture soothes the phobias of the much labour instead of few machines, and minimum-maintenance urban intellectuals who form the backbone of these communes. It farming. was also part of the self-sufficiency craze which characterised early­ General awareness of the effects of lifestyle on the environment seventies environmentalism and infused most of these communes and of world resource inequality was translated into support fo r Oohn Seymour's influence was strong in Canon Frome and Redfield, environmental and peace groups, 'gardening with fa ith', running for instance). environmental education courses, bringing nature into the class­ However self-sufficiency has not been achieved. Lifespan, Canon room (Monkton Wyld) and celebrating the relationship with nature Frome, Lower Shaw and Redfield are benveen 30 and 50 per cent at solstice, equinox and harvest. self-sufficient in vegetables during summer and autumn, fo r exam­ ple, while Monkton Wyld is so for half the year and Glaneirw fo r While most communes are doing less than their members would all like to see, a few arc expanding their list of environmentally sound year, except in oats and flour (it grows wheat). But self-sufficiency is practices. They include PIC, on its new rural site, CAT, with its not as important as it was to green thinkers and doers, and commu­ ambitious expansion plan for more houses, for a water-driven cable nards generally reflect this change in cmphasis. They do not hold

132 133 COM�I(JNESAND TilE GREEN VISION "0'" GREEN ARE T"E COMMUNESl

self-sufficiency as particularly desirable, for it could encourage

x X X X X X X X X X X X inwardness and discourage external interdependence: 'We don't � want to be self-sufficient, we want to be part of the world'. said a z Findhornian. x X X X x x x As for the 'virtues' ofhard labour. these seem to have become part � of a routine of self-exploitation on occasions. especially where is involved: for instance at Crabapple or Canon Frome or X X X X X X X X x x livestock � Laurieston. where some individuals have to be up and milking at six

� or seven in the morning from one end of the year to another. � X X X X X X x Communards who did want more produce stressed thatthis fa ctor of � labour was the limiting one. At Redfield, CAT, Monkton Wyld and elsewhere, volunteer labour fr om outside is used, for instance fr om C;. X X X X X X X x � the 'Working Weekends on Organic Farms' network. U Livestock is a contentious issue. creating divisions among groups. While Canon Frome needs livestock for their manure. others do not. X X X X X X X x � Findhom. for instance, satisfies the plant spirits through a diet of greens, seaweed and kitchen wastes. At Crabapple. Canon Frome X X X X X X x x � and Laurieston some communards argue along classic ecocentric lines that to use livestock for fo od is inefficient: up to ten times as � X X X X X X x x much land is needed to produce a given amount of caJories. by comparison with growing crops for direct consumption. This argu­ X X X x x x ment incurs the scorn, referred to earlier, of those in a western location who argue that here livestock production is traditional, b X X X X x X x X most in sympathy with soil and climate. and essential for any degree of self-reliance. Nonetheless there can be arguments over the exact proportions ofland used. At Canon Frome nearly ninety per cent of X X X X X X X X x the land is used for livestock, and only two acres for direct� consumption crops. Q Z x x x x x x The issue is bound up with vegetarianism and animal rights. Our � Monkton Wyld interviews suggested that this would have been a non-livestock commune were it not for the visitors who attend E • courses. They are often meat-eaters. and to impose a vegetarian! 0 • vegan diet would alienate them. This does not seem to matter at E , • ., 1 • • CAT, however. where normally carnivorous visitors consistent1y • < < ! �• • � ; � �, i! I § • • eulogise the vegetarian fo od -Egon Ronay having been among their " • • • ;; number. It is the at CAT who eat meat - but very occasion­ � � � I f i" ..• rtJidtNts g • � • 1 1l • ally. and it is home grown, free-range. humanely treated and killed • •� � �� � f • I� I "- �• j E by the eaters. This is the pattern for most communes. who thus • n �• "� f t � .� .�� I i � deviate but slightly fr om hard-line ecocentrism. Morally based vege­ W � % i a � J � I Jl " I!l Z a � � � j tarians cause problems of separate catering at Redfield. and so are � '" ,; � .. � � " .; .,; .; '" ,; � excluded. as they are at Canon Frome (see below). 134 135 CQMMUNES AND TilE GRf;J-;N VISION HOIf!GREEN ARE TilE COMMUNES?

The centrality of organic cultivation and a degree of self­ ZAP's thoughtfulness is fa r-reaching. Not only do its members use sufficiency at such places as Canon Frome, LaurieSlon, Crabapple, recycled lavatory and other paper, they re-use envelopes, use scrap Glaneirw. Monkton Wyld, Redfield, CAT, LSF and Findhorn paper fu lly, avoid buying packaging, and separate out fo od, glass and strongly suggests affinities with some back-to-the-Iand movements tin. though they try to boycott tins in the first place on account of the described in Chapter 3, especially when bio-dynamic principles are conditions under which Bolivian tin miners work. invoked. These imply a mystical relationship between cultivator and Buying second-hand clothes is also a very common form of cultivated, and we met gardeners and fa rmers at Findhorn, Glaneirw, recycling, mainly through economic necessity, as is scavenging CAT and Monkton Wyld who fe lt this relationship. The mix of materials from local waste dumps. At Glaneirw a profitable business organic cultivation, vegetarianism, mysticism and self-sufficiency serving the local area has been built around restoring Rayburn fe atured strongly in many utopian and romantic socialist and anar­ stoves. Their green-style commitment to the local economy is chist communes which were part of the 'early green' home coloniesl emphasised by using a local blacksmith to make stove parts. rather back-to-the-Iand movement of the 1880s and nineties. But perhaps than ordering from suppliers seventy miles away. the strongest parallels are with that movement as it developed in Britain and more especially Germany the 1920s and thirties. in Energy For a group of people generally committed to energy conservation Recyclin@; and using renewable sources for the sake of the environment, energy Commitment to recycling and re-using resources is at least nomi­ is a problem area. CAT was established to be a shining example of nally strong for both ecological and economic reasons. All com­ both principles, which it largely is: the building programme of the munes separate out domestic 'wastes' to an extent, especially paper late eighties and early nineties incorporates highly workable conser­ and card. food and perhaps bottles and cans; the last two depend vation fe atures. as distinct from more experimental earlier buildings particularlyon the local availability of collection points. Waste fo od with their quadruple glazing, thick walls. or walls consisting entirely is used religiously to supplement animal feed where appropriate, or of solar panels. The site, through wind, SUD and water, generatesjust as compost. At Crabapple, Canon Frome and CAT human sewage is enough energy to keep its visitors and residents in a frugal but not used fo r fe rtiliser. The first puts it on to the land via a septic ascetic lifest yle. Happily. compact disc players and hi-fis are seen as tank, notwithSlanding potential contamination by heavy metals. The sec­ virtual necessities, but electric hair dryers draw opprobrium. The ond removes these, and pathogens, by a trickling filter plant, then communards are unusually thoughtful about the implications of puts the sewage deep into the soil at the rate of haifa field a year. At everything they do for energy supply. They have to be, fo r if they are not they sit in the dark to eat their evening meal. That, however, CAT they can use the sewage from their visitors - over 50,000 a year. will Their public lavatories flow into a septic tank and the sewage is is cooked on imported bottled gas, but the extension of such use for stored fo r up to a year, then composted with straw or bracken. The more than back-up purposes is often a subject of principled debate, end result is an odourless, dry, crumbly compost rich in nutrients as is the matter of whether the site should connect to the National and organic matter. In 1989 CAT built a partly self-contained Electricity Grid - a development which is now planned, but as donor complex for visiting schoolchildren. It consists of log cabins, a rather than receiver of supplies. reservoir from which they get some power and water, and, down­ Elsewhere, only Laurieston generates itsown energy, from a small slope, a series of sewage reed filter beds. The water from these goes hydro-electric plant. Notwithstanding its fo rthcoming wind, solar with its nutrients to vegetable plots fu rther downslo pe. There are and insulation projects, Findhom is at rime of writing woefully sewage plants at Redfield, Lifespan and Monkton Wyld, too, but not unsound in its energy practices from a green point of view. for fe rtilising. At the last, the local water board places restrictions on However all communards spoke of a commitment to energy use. fr ugality. They will put on several layers of clothes rather than use an Many communes suppOrt local wastepaper recycling schemes electric or gas fire, though rural communes all have their wood­ organised by green pressure groups, and use local bottle banks. burning stoves supplied from local sources. Many woods are owned

136 137 HOWGREEN ARE THE COMMUNES? COMMUNES AND THE GREEN VISION - though how much this happens varies according to different by the communes themselves and are rigorously scavenged fo r dead intentions and abilities to practise principles. Both of these fa ctors wood or sustainably cropped. are discussed below; they make a crucial difference in the case of car sharing, for instance. Lifespan shares one car between eleven people Ethical and environmental buying and PIC used to share two between fifteen. But the grounds of Many of the 'green consumer' products that now supcnnarket Laurieston or CAT, by contrast, are nowadays littered with cars. fill shelves have been on the shelves ofcommune kitchens for years, and Ecologically sound action in this critical area is hampered because they continue to be. Organic fo ods, biodegradable cleansers and conununards are influenced by the mores ofwiderso ciety, including 'ethical' coffee and tea (from Third World producer coops) - or the infatuation with mobility and what Mrs Thatcher called 'the substitutes such as herbal teas and chicory or barley drinks; these are great car economy' (see below), and for the practical reason that universal. But we have already seen that communards are, fo remost, most of them live in the country. where cars are vinually essential. opposed to consumerism. Consequently electric gadgets, cosmetics Hence urban communes like Shindig can score highly: they have far and overpackaged goods, for instance, are not as common as in less need for motor vehicles for most of the time, and can use conventional households. bicycles. Indeed all communards are pro-bike, and most either have car-sharing schemes or (as with Canon Frome) to. but But the green consumer philosophy, that the individual can effect try social change through purchasing power, was widely supponed by unsuccessfully. our interviewees. And, as Fiona Hay says, communards generally At Canon Frome shared fo od production and purchase was de­ seem to have a high awareness of green and/or health issues, so that scribed as a 'true communistic system. Each puts in according to ability they are knowledgeable on the links between manufacturing pro­ and draws out according to need'. The system makes for less cesses and sources and the end products. This allows them to waste, and it generally works (as it does fo r Findhom) - except, that is. in the case ofmeat, which has to be allocated because some people discriminate in what they do buy. However such awareness has tend to forget their communal essence when contemplating a suc­ limits, and will boycott products, or chocolate and other few tin culent roast dinner. tropical cash crops, as ZAP has done, for ethical reasons. In fact deeper economic or political boycotts, such as a refusal to consume cash crops, do not seem popular, except for the 'easy' case of South African goods. Partly this is to avoid endless debates. But in Find­ FALLING SHORT hom's case,

that's not the level we operate at. What you should do is bless the fruit The above account paints a picture of strongly green communes in of the planet and help people to appreciate that they are part of the both theory and practice, but as fa ras the latter is concerned the paint planet. Then apartheid would disappear. often wears thin. There are some practical difficulties in living green [6.1-3]. but. more imponant. the spirit's willingness often runs up against weak flesh and there are many gaps between intentions and Sharing and non-materialism outcomes [6.4] . Failure to live up to principles can produce guilt, but Sharing resources and fu nctions like eating make for reduced en­ it is arguable whether guilt helps or hinders the attempt at living vironmental impact. But generally this reasoning is less important green. than economic necessity, or the ideology of sharing itsel( Vinually all communards declared that sharing was the major practice by Poverty which they were environmentally sound, and this is the major way Surprisingly few people mentioned limitations oflack of money on that their environmentalism distinguishes them from green non­ the group's potential to be green. Nevertheless this was a possible communal households. They share land. washing machines, TVs, fa ctor in energy matters. For rural communes the sheer size of their cooking and fo od, cars, income (sometimes), and many otherthings 139 138 COMMUN£S "NO TH£ GRE£N VISION 1I0W GREEN A.RE TilE COMMUNES? country houses is a problem. There is never enough money to have It was difficult to assess just how poor people really were. Income them properly insulated, while lack of both cash and labour for sharing schemes. with or without pocket money, meant low dispos­ maintenance and decoration can often make them drab environ­ able incomes, often around £40 to £50 per month; though to those ments. This is usually why new energy projects involving wind or involved, lacking the common worries about money management solar power have not come about, although it may be said that soft could be compensation in itself. Salary schemes like that at CAT energy generation methods and equipment such as those demon­ (£3,000 to £4,000 a year for single people; double this for those with strated at CAT are commonly very cheap. Old radiators and glass twO children) also seem to give little fat to live off, despite the panels, for instance, can be made into solar panels, provided there is richness of having access to many shared things. sufficient expertise or self-confidence. The communes constitute a However, for middle-class communards private money (for ex­ huge reservoir of expertise brought in via fo nnal training or picked ample, from parents) could often be available. Appearances were no up subsequendy. And if expertise was not there from the start, then guide to this. 'Smart' people could have very little; 'scruffy' (but confidence was: 'It was to leap into the country without invariably with crazy clean!) people might have a legacy. The equanimity knowing how to fann it, but we did succeed'. So perhaps, instead, which some younger ones accepted apparent poverty could be lack of time or inclination have contributed most to the lack of connected with fu ture material expectations or parental safety nets, energy technology. which might make communalism a sort of game. But older commu­ Personal poverty and lack of material or spiritual comfort can also nards more often push for private and material consumption, largely be debilitating, and a drag on achieving group principles. Opinions to gain comfort: divided very evenly on whether relative poverty was or was not a problem. 'I don't hanker for material things: we've got all we need' I'd prefer wes rather than ecologically-sound C()mpost 1005, they're and 'I'm never tempted to go out and spend lots of money' were more comfortable. minority statements. But so were the other extremes: Over the years our consumer side has got richer- it's partly age and wanting more home comforts. You can't keep up ideological purity We sufferfrom being poor: I'd more money. like fo r long. It's not rnlturll/ to desire material things: some people don'l. Bu t I till, and doub y difficult as I'm o not be we have discussed, spirirual rightness is supposed to compen­ it's l fo r me C()nsciOU5 f the need to As materialistic. sate for material poverty. However, many communards said or

It's very difficult living on a tiny pension, bue my fo rtune and affiuence implied that the fo nner was deficient: are good compared with othen. However, it's difficult not giving in to The moral and religious side of the issue is the cutting edge of the temptation. ecology debate, and every so often I take a trip to Findhom. But our communal awareness ge lost in the daily round. It's a happy life, but Many others described such temptations as minimal, or as im­ u the cutting edge mi ssing. pulses which ought to be given in to sometimes: is

This was echoed by others who bemoaned a lack of intelligent At times I don t wane to eat vegetarian fo od, and I wane a new pair of ' jearu for £25 - ob ous ly I can't, but give som e mes tomy urge conversation, or of discussion of principles, or, more often, of deep vi I'll in ti to eat meat. We must be nice to ourselves, and it's very difficult to get fri endships and open discussion of fe elings. This vital question of oue of the middle class mould. personal relationships, important to greens for material and spirirual reasons, is discussed below. 'Middle class avarice' was how one communard described the desire for more money. Most, however, see money as a justifiable Not practising what you don't preach enabler: to look after a fa mily, to take education courses, to travel to see fr iends or have holidays. The last is an especially heartfelt want Despite notional and real gains on the road to ecologically-sound for money. lifestyles, communards very commonly fe el that they themselves and

\40 \4\ COMMUNES AND THE GREEN VISION 1I01f' GREEN ARE Tm: COMMUNES?

their colleagues fa ll short of living up to their principles, whether other. 'That's OK ifyou make and sell teddy bears, but it's not OK to they preach them or not: and they usually do not preach. The sharing charge fo r spiritual healing: we are too conservative and middle process itself can be difficult. Sharing things, particularly cars, can class'. fa il, and a blunt view fr om Laurieston was echoed more mildly Elsewhere there were long catalogues of fa ilure to live up to Too many can are used. People want independence and around most other communes: principle. not share them. Too much petrol is consumed in too many will I got fed up with being the only one to the car. I stopped: now no­ journeys in 'clapped out cars which emit all sorts offumes'. How­ fix one does it. Vehicle sharing has gone wrong ...there's no ecological ever, the caris so tempting: 'I just get the use ofa car, but itwould be purpose here, it's JUSt written on a piece of paper. attractive to have my own'. There is energy waste - in cooking (pressure cooken not used), in central heating ('we're getting too Elsewhere, communal bikes and tools are the most common soft') or generally, when it's 'free' (the HEP scheme at Laurieston victims ofa 'no-one owns, so no-one cares' syndrome. 'encourages people to use too much'). At some communes increased Sharing space is also a problem for some: privateness has meant individual TVs and fr eezers, as in conven­ tional Or there are heaters in every room: 'this isn't very life. An ecologically sound fu ture doesn't necessitateliving on top of one ecological. We don't put on extra sweaters, and we should all be in . . , another, so I have withdrawn and detached myself. one room In WInter . Often it is a case of not being bothered, an absence of that This problem is almost invariably recognised and appreciated; a meticulousness which the ecological lifestyle calls fo r. So paper is high premium is put on individuals having their private space and not recycled, or biodegradable cleansers not used. 'We'll have to their inalienable right to withdraw to it. Similarly, sharing control of change our way ofHfe if we're to set an example', said one commu­ one's own children in communal childcare could cause agonising. nard, using coal on his heating/cooking range. But at another The basic problem of'bourgeois' people trying to be communists commune itwas the children who got blamed, the 10to 14 age group was summarised thus: being particularly contemptuous about 'sound practice'. Perhaps this was why a further group thought that they had 'too many h's difficult to share sometimes, because I I deserve more, children ...thus restricting the advantages of communal living' . think because I put more work. It's a difficultywith the communistic in However, elsewhere an older communard professed difficulty in principle - each person has a different concept of what they or recognising any of'what the younger generation here call conserva­ someone else call put in. tion. We're all hypocrites' - profligate with electricity, using cars instead of a horse and cart, and having milk and butter yet believing Hence there is the problem of whether everyone pulls their in respect for animals. weight. While this is much discussed among commentators on This last issue bothered others: 'People at Canon Frome walk communal living, we fo und few examples of it being a bone of around with guns, shooting animals. There isn't the respect fo r contention, though it possibly often simmered below the surface. It nature which you'd would fo llow from organic gardening'. think appears at Findhorn, ofall places, however: Aspiring vegans and vegetarians at several other communes de­ scribed how they reluctantly had to abandon their principles, either Findhom i� a great cop-out for some people. They waft around in because the majority did not share them or because it was impracti-· airy-fairy spirituali�m ...saying 'I don't feel like work today: I need cal to operate them in grasslandllivestock fa nning regions. Fromer some space' - and they go and relate to the beach. (1989), writing about a community he called 'The Lodge', showed why simple pragmatism has to hold sway over green principle in the Another Findhomian saw strong conflict between a professed Inatter of veganism: ethic of communality - reflected in attitudes of S[ewardship towards he Iand, s�ch that people cannot make money out of it- and strong When considering possible new members for the community, we are � . . mdlVlduahsm, where people profit fr om selling their work to each very clear on our reasons for rejecting vegans. It's nothing to do with

142 143 COMMUNf:S ANO THE: GREE:N VISION HOW GRE:ENARE THE COMMUNES?

prejudice of course; some of our best friends ...But vegans would But most see guilt as negative. Here they make a major, and wise, make life far too difficult for cooks. Cooks al The Lodge don't need departure from conventional values: 'For people who don't feel life to become any harder ...Depending on who's in and who'l out good about themselves, fa ilure to live up to principles can lead to and whether there are guests and whether it's Sunday or Wednesday one criticism after another, which is bad'. (in which case the 'smalls' eat with the adults), you're usually cooking So, many communards have abandoned guilt. One justification fo r anything between eight and eighteen people ... So we tty to keep for deviation may be pragmatism: things simple and give the cooks the freest possible hand ... In other words, in the best traditions of communal living we comprorniu for We flew on an ai'Plane to Rhodes, and use the car for shopping and the sake of the common good. children, and our commune is terribly sexist and it hasn't put solar panels on the roof, but you have co be realistic about where people are Exploitation of people, as wen as animals, occasionally led to ... concern. At Crabapple. fo r instance. 'We say we're non-exploitative, I sometimes drop standards but I've let go my guile-I 'm a pragmatist, but those who work in ourwholefood shop have long hours and low and I don't believe in fu ndamentalism. wages'. At Lifespan the worry is over self-exploitation fo r the I feel dreadful about what we do to nature, but I partly a achievement of no greatly revolutionary - long hours worked in 11m aim competitive and manipulative person. 1 get a kick out ofit. the successful printing business, but sometimes printing sexist or otherwise ethically unsound material. Another justification is that having the right context is more More generally, what can become a sheer grind of self-reliant important than individual striving: living leads to insularity and fa ilure to practise the principle of outreach which many believe in, either through action in pressure­ I'm not worried about personal behaviour inconsistent with beliefs ­ group politics or more local community involvement: a group 'As you don't have to be so conscious for yourselfthat every single act is we don't do enough to live up to our principles. We're not going environmentally sound: the institution rCA T) is set up 50 that you anywhere, and we are cut ofT from our local community'. This can't help being environmentally sound. important issue will be discussed Chapter 6. in Or there is fatalism: 'Yes I have a car and I know I shouldn't: it causes a bit of a problem. But since the carwas manifested it means it Guilt must be a good thing'. Or a more familiar justification, that others do Some communards expressed guilt over their failings: it:

I'm guilty about using disposable Dappies for my child ...and we You think: 'I had better not bum this piece of polythene and pollute don't eat as simply u I'd like. the atmosphere' - then you remember that the Americans have just bombed oilfields in the Middle Eut. So you think: 'Why bother?' I smoke, and miss having a vehicle: 1 feel guilty about this. think And, most of all: 'We don't about where we get food I"m full of inner conflicts -what other people you should be and familiar talk what you think. Because 1 came in with a lot ofhlgh ideals, but in fact from. We don't have the energy'. then: aren't that many differences between what happens here and outside. LIVING TOGETHER Some see guilt as positive: So far we have emphasised 'first order' ecocentric practices. But in Our high cOllsciousness lcvel labout what is environmentally and Chapter 1 we pointed out how second-order, lil.lillg together practices socially sound) leads to high gUilt levels, especially in the area of work. arc also pivotal to ecocentrism in action. Here, however, can be Everyone is self-regulating in their work hours Ithis goes for all some communes) because they are driven by guilt. of the greatest gaps between principle and practice:

144 145 ,

COMMUNES AND TilE GREEN VISION HOWCREEN ARE THE COMMVNES?

Others don't take their personal lifcstyles seriously. I arranged a series McCulloch 1976, p200); but then this was not a sociological survey. of evenings here on personal development and got a poor response. Although the problem of the 'free rider' clearly does exist, in most Yet our AGM agreed that hinged on personal development. The all instances the best seems to come from people because the best is social side is our greatest deficiency. We do little in finding better ways assumed, in a climate generally predicated on trust and optimism, of relating to each other. though tempered by realism. Some non-oppressive devices are

,nd adopted to ensure that work gets done with the least entrenched hierarchy and a maximum ofdemocracy. Periods offrom haIfa day fo rtnight when everyone works together on specific tasks or on They've got the idea of being New Age. They talk ahout it but then get to a offon only one thing. They don't realise that New Age principles maintenance are a fa vourite institution, and the bigger communes apply across the board. They're not New Age people really. like CAT or Findhom have evolved specialised departments respon­ sible fo r particular areas, such as catering or a bookshop. Elsewhere We now consider some problems of living together and how individuals may have specialised roles, but always the responsibility

successful or otherwise communards afC in second order practices. to the larger group is ostensibly understood. Those which they particularly emphasised were work and income CAT also has an ingenious 'ogre' system. A different person each sharing, democratic and non-hierarchical structures and processes, week is appointed as the 'ogre', whose specific job it is to go round assertion of the individual and tolerance of others, and personal checking up on how well or otherwise jobs are being done. They also have to admonish slackers. In this way unpopularity is temporary relationships and conflict avoidance. any and is shared around. As we have said, the problem often seems to be that too much Work and income sbaring work is done for too little reward. Canon Framers and Lifespanners Work in communes divides into three categories. There are 'non­ complained about their coops taking over their lives. At the same specialised' domestic jobs like cooking and cleaning, 'specialised' time people very oftenfelt thatthey did not have much fun together. jobs in the commune such as animal husbandry, and 'specialised' Sometimes this is because they look to fr iends and activities outside paid work outside.Most communes have successfully evolved a way the commune for their leisure. and are constantly going at away of dealing with the first by rota, sometimes voluntarily signed: an weekends. Or it is because personal relationships are quite distant: informal and flexible system. However in two of the smaller groups You'd think people would lower barriers a communal situation. In the more anarchistic approach ofleaving it to individuals to see what in fa ct people put them up to keep a bit of a di stance because they are needs doing and respond conscientiously for themselves has oper­ living so closely. This interferes with the ability to have fun together. �ted. In one case, where members have been together fo r some time. It works: Work outside the commune for income which is usually private can be a bone of contention. It gets increasingly necessary as social It's not hierarchical here; there are no rules or reus. If someone see! security benefit rules are tightened and as people's material desires that bread needs making they make it. No-one lays down the law for increase. Those who are not working outside can feel resenttnent at anyone else, we just live here. Some days the cooking doesn't get those who are, or vice versa, as at Canon Frome where inside done, then we don't have a meal. workers 'build up kudos and status. They are JUU to work, and can tum round and ask why others aren't doing the same. We don'twant In another, newer group it did not work, and there were vast this: we want labour to be shared'. discrepancies in the amount of work different people did. However Total income pooling is now rare, but whether total or not it on the whole we fo und little evidence of 'an endless watching and seems to work surprisingly well in most cases, as at PIC: checking to make sure that one is not being exploited by the very people with whom one is trying to combine - an endless sad It was difficult at first. People were unhappy at losing control over discovery that others cannot or will not give enough' (Abram� and money and there were lots of unhappy scenes. But it's successful now 146 147 HOW CREEN ARE TilE COMMUNES? COMMUNES AND THE GREEN VISION successfullymarginalised by and it has changed attitudes. Everyone fe els equally important and a But this was to lin1e avail and he was left', a faithful reflection of a job docs not carry special status. However there are arguments the hierarchy and stigmatised as 'loony between those who spend every week (on drink and tobacco) and so common in wider society. process ... those who want big things every so often. To share income you must really being ��le to make an lmpre slon IDa This problem. of not , � . trust people. s partlClpanOn,. trUcture ostensibly designed to facihtate everyone about oes recur in many communes. Women particularly complain Parlicipalory democracy �it:

Every commune tries to achieve this by making individuals account- wants to join, and I don't want him to. I'll be difficulties when the X in .. able to the whole group but also by trying to reach major policy time comes to decide. I could exercise my veto, but all hell would decisions through consensus. In this process everyone must be able. break loose. and enabled. to say what they think and to avoid the 'tyranny of the majority' by in efTccl having a veto over every decision. The system In the communes where consensus is most successful a lesson has can work by dint of good chairing of meetings. universally cultivat­ been learned about psychology. When people disagree in meetings. ing awareness of the fe elings of others, and giving way from one's dig their heels in and develop factions, it is co�monly n�t because of position fo r the sake of the progress of the group even if one the issue in question. It is because ofpersonahty clashes, because the disagrees with a decision. people concerned do not like eac other'. conflict resolution � . �hil� Nearly half the communes feel that they have learned the of mechanisms may be applicable Sltuanon, frequendy the art 10 this consensus well, thanks to much hard work. 'Mter ten years, I've resolution comes by dint of one party to the dispute leaving the learnedwhat consensus really is'. They say they are prepared to take commune. a long time (weeks) over decisions, and do not go ahead if there are The question of hierarchies is linked to that of democracy. In all really strong objections from even one person. Here the time fa ctor the communes except the small group at Glaneitw, hierarchies were is usually important; in conventional society decisions are usually admitted to exist. Smallness does not necessarily preclude hierarchy, made (often unnecessarily, but [0 the benefit of the ruling hierarchy) since even at ZAP one person often dominated by dint of drive and against a limited time schedule. Goodwill is also a key fa ctor: ideas, longevity in the commune and doing so much of the work. Most communards see expertise hierarchies as good andJor .meVl­. In consensus we have an unspoken veto. But if you're aware that five table. However at Canon Frome, although 'knowledge is power', it othen want something, you go aJong wi th it. was claimed that expertise hierarchies were not pennanent ; 'tenden­ Consensus works extraordinarily well. A1though sa e politically cies for them to develop are quickly squashed and experts are quickly I di � with the othen, I don't feel marginaJised. reduced to the status of fa cilitators' {helping others to learn ajobJ. 'Fanning here is therefore ine fficient, but we aren't here for effi­ However, elsewhere another individual was experiencingjust the ci ency. but for hobby and pleasure'. But Canon Frome has had many reverse. a relative newcomer he had fo und that despite the veneer As difficulties arising from othe hierarchies, hased on peo le's len � . � of consensus, decisions were really reached by an inner group - a of time at the commune, their degree of artlculacy, and leadershIp� common situation where an experienced old guard is entrenched. instincts. A Lifespanner put the basic problem: Meetings had become struCNrcless and extremely infonnal: Any group that', together for a while adopts a behavioural pattern. We Children, animals, cigarettes. lying on the floor. knitting, reading all have roles within the group dynamic. People who have been here a newspapen. The meetings were known as the 'X and Y show'. They long ti me are powerful and dominant, and the new ones fit in or leave. spent the time telling us what was going to happen. So, I worked to all make meetings more fo rmal. My anarchism tells me there should be This last is not inevitably ttue, for at Canon Frome, it is the 'oldies' underlying structure. People who do not want structure are youthful, _ the fo nner leaders -who had left or were going. zany anarchists. 149 1411

------COMMUNES "''IV TIlE GREEN VJSION /lOWGREEN ARE THE COMMUNES?

To have structure, which all communes increasingly want, is not dismissed as a 'quirk offate, not inherent in communes', and this necessarily to have power hierarchy, and devices such as job swap­ seemed to be borne out at Lifespan where, however, there was a ping can avoid the latter. In general, ho�ever, hierarchies have not majority of women. Lifespan had a high awareness of sexual equal­ been avoided. Skills or longevity hierarchies 11/'/,d not, in theory, be ity, and a tolerant atmosphere. power hierarchies; but once again, what applies in theory does not Why do we find women easier? hold in practice in many of the communes. Sexist reasons. Women are n iu an d Ii te. Me � � � arrogant and know-all- they pass on their kn ledge m a patrOnlsmg way and can be a burden, looking exclusively� to Individuality and toleranee women for emotional suppon. We often tum down men, but few women - unless theyare single parents, A key aspect of high quality of Life in a green society should stem because they need a lot of support. fr om ample opportunity fo r the individual to express him/herself and an individual. This includes having his/her views tolerated be Lifespan is an exception here. Most communes have more men and heard. This principle is important in the communes too: 'The than women. AJthough this does not necessarily stifle women's self­ of communes may be said to be the understanding they importance assertion, in practice it often does and men, together with a sprin­ embody; that personal autonomy is concomitant with personal kling of exceptionaJly assertive women, dominate, There then is reciprocity' (Abranu and McCuUoch, p96). But thi s understanding eated a subclass ofwomen who do feel repressed. Such repression can break down over the issues of privacy and individual possessions. � IS often bound up with a repression of fe elings in unfulfilling While privacy may be sacred in theory, it is easily violated: relationships.

I can fe el lost a.s an individual - friends are shared. It's a loss of all privacy. I'm leaving next year and looking forward to a place of my Personal relatiOll1lbip8 andconffict re80Jution O�. It is i �s area that the gap between green communal theory and � The fe eling that there's always someone outside your door or Ih"�, pracbce perhaps greatest. By living in communes, it is clear, downstairs. is too much. It·s OK when you're up but not when you're IS people do not eliminate relationship problems. They merely swap down. one set of family problenu (nuclear) for another (extended). Most But others, especially women, find liberating. There are communards prefer the latter. However, though their relationships this always (women) companions around. Children are brought up in a were described generally as 'good', they were also sometimes sociable and safe environment, and child care shared -though less thought of as 'shallow' and not as deep or close or satisfying as is than used to be the case. This enables women, particularly, to learn desirable. skills they would otherwise not have learned and gain in self­ Only the two places where New Age thinking is most evident, SO . in confidence. Many women spoke of such a gain. Emancipation, Ftndhom and Glaneirw, did people describe great openness and though, is not an easy process: 'People join communities sometimes honesty in interpersonal dealings, although both communes had h d major problems in the past. While Findhom has many tech­ because they don't feel good about themselves and can't cope. The � challenge can be a disaster unless you are willing to change yourself. niques for conflict resolution, 'the main thing is the aura oflove and openness which exists'. Some Findhomians also believe true to The change often involves learning how to be tolerant of others. ' However, racial and political tolerance are hardly deep issues in the their doctrine of denying conflict, that: communes, where white Anglo-Saxons are almost the sole inhabi­ You can't have conflict unless there's an attraction of some kind tants, while political discussions and strong ideological bonding are between the parties. What you do is sit down and work out the rarer than they used to be (see Ch

150 151 COMMUNES AND THE GREEN YISION HOW CREEI'I'ARE THE COMMUNES?

We're open and honest, and I can tolerate a Iot of ings as long as I Hodgkinson (1990), however, described how the reverse applies at . � can to people. We cillndi sagree, but not n a b ck-walled way. We la/k � � Findhorn, where can define areas for di scussion and not for dlJCusslon, work on the fo rmer iIInd not interfere with the lanet. hugging has become so much a way oflife that it is known as the 'Findhom handshake' ...I've always been extremely wary of'huggy' Elsewhere there often a less rosy picture with relationship issues con lmunities, fe eling that th ey probably fo ster an entirely false is ignored. For instance: closeness between people. But now, having given it a try, I can see why they encourage this kind of physical contact. I discoven:d that

We basically don't talk to each other. You cannot speak to some hugging can quicldy dissolve the deep rniftrust we tend to have of people for four months, because of the style of being very cool and other people. It can give a cohesiveness to a disparate collection of laid back. individuals and aho encourage a kind of group dynamic which enables you to work together ...Hugging other members of my group We don't spend much time on relations. We could be more open, but allowed me to become more sympathetic and tolerant, to draw closer shouldn't be completely so. to them emotionally and physically. Through hugging, we were able We've no set way of dealing with conflict here, e:Kcept accomm�ating to share in each other's triumphs, sadnesses and emotional upheavals to the group who would be hardest to live with they were demed. ...Then: are no power games played between those who are able to if This is a di sgrace. hug spontaneously.

I pressed fo r the therapy day, and got linle out of it. I want to confront However about half the communes relationships were either di fferences between people all the time, but others don't want to. in going badly awry or had recendy done so. Entering a commune fre quendy tests a couple relationship to its ultimate limits and The non-confrontational approach is widespread, although infor­ beyond. One had four couple relationships a year previously, but means ofbringing two quarrelling people together to about mal talk now only onewas left intact.Decoupling and recoupling is common their differences the presence of a third often exist, b cause in � .'in elsewhere. Unlike conventional society, fr iendship has usually very conflicts it's often important to see where the other person s commg definitely to come before a sexual relationship. But this changeful­ from'. But ad hoc approaches, or non-involvement, deeply upset ness does not mean that boredom akin to that of conventional some. The worst example of such angst was: marriage is absent:

At 'feelings meetings' ( voiced my distress at being Uncl05� to people, We don't stimulate each other any more, because we see too much of but others di dn't respond. Feelings mcctings ended last Wlnter. When I each other. It's like being married. We sec each other mundane triedto say how I felt in them, others went to sleep. I don't fe el hea : in . � situations. We need to be tou with outsiders. A major there is no dialogue. (fpeople are upset they Just go away. They don t in ch contributory factor in poor relations is the lack of ability to see outside shout at each other, but they don't hug each other either. There's no the community. (fyou aren't careful the cows and sheep become the physical contact. edge of your world.

This last was echoed in three other communes. 'There should cry Communal break-ups sometimes occur because of this, or be­ be more physical contact here. There's plenty of warmth and love cause a few too-dominant individuals do not anyway get on with here, but you have to show you can e st without it and be firs, each other. Then fa ctions tend to form around them. Elsewhere. emotionally self -sufficient'. Such bourgeOIs� hangups are fo und diversity may be seen as the weakness, with everyone pulling in elsewhere: different directions, and resentment building.

and Conflict resolution by mass exodus of the disaffected group had There should be more physical contact, but if someone �omes up happened in three of our communes over the previous two years, hugs me I feel bad about it. J'd like to do it: it was good In the women's group but I find it harder to be hugged by me , because �f and in one, Canon Frome, conflict we have al ready discussed had not . � . It would be nice It was easier. yet fully ended. There had been a 'gruesome' few years, at least for my past experiences and socialisation. If

152 153 HOWGRE£N AHE THE COMMUNES? COMMUNES .4.ND TilE CREEN VISION beginnings of meetings. and 'feelings meetings'. The therapy advo­ some in which the oldies were pressured out; 'their security, com­ cates point out how such methods challenge belief structures about fo rt, ome, tribe, were under threat'. But after a general c lIapse � one's personality. They are hard work and time consuming. They relationshipsh generally recovered - principally because, said one may build an understandwg of others and their vulnerabilities. and Canon Fromer, people have got on with their work ra er than � then 'It's more difficult to hate someone you understand what dwelling on relationships. True, a therapist was brought �n to deal if motivates them. But you need three months' training to help people with this institutionalised quarTel between the strong-mmded re­ listen to each other without interruption'. mains of a paternalistic and powerful core group and new p�ople to At Findhorn and Monkton Wyld the therapy approach probably wanting rapid change and power devol�tion. d the �ay ofhsten­ held sway. At most other communes it did not. There have been .ng and awareness did bring out some mteresnng� fe ehngs. But the ession had not been repeated. 'We fe lt close but the fe eli�� didn't divisions into two camps, or attempts at building a comprehensive � therapy pro e have been met with sizeable indifference (for last. No-one was really challenged and put through the mill . gramm example, 'emotional maintenance' meetings at Redfield were boy­ cotted by sections of the commune), dismissal ('we have the do-er/ The work· veNUS'therapy controversy talker split at Monkton Wyld too, but the important moments are two schools of th ught on In Canon Frome, we fo und a split into � when people get together to do things - the rest is just ta1k1, or resolution and aVOidance, a fo rging sa-ongrelationships and conflict cynicism ('she wanted some rebirthing to unlock her, but she communes also. On e one divide clearly evident in at least six other � couldn't afford the £20 a throw to do it'). At PIC however both or 'get_on_and_do-It_pull_ hand is the relations-through-work, approaches seem valued. Sometimes relationships held up through is the therapy, or 'two-hour­ yourself-together' fa ction. On the other collective work, but on other occasions stressful undercurrents and school. Clearly, the commu­ chats-over-coffee-to-sort-things-out' personality dashes were reduced by co-counselling. But working each side has some con- nards' use of such epithets indicates that together. under a shared world view, were thought to be the import­ tempt for the other. . . . ant elements in making relationships work. bUild and hold The work school maintains that relanonships There is a political dimension to this division between work and Frequendy its mem­ incidentally through doing tasks collectively. therapy approaches. It was dearly manifested at Redfield, where the bers are the longer-lasting communards: 1970s core group fo unders were Marxist and believed in trying to change wider society by collective (glmlinschaft) approaches to com­ I've been here fo r seven yean ...I want to get into UlurN. Good fe elings should naturally flow from working together .. ' When you munity. However the newcomers' approach to social change was the and sort things out by changing othen to fit a mould .I t goes out liberal-individualist 'personal-is-political'• which therefore emphas­ try all of the window ...We're more cohesive when working together. ised the importance of 'penonal development', and involved open Living day to day is what makes it OK, not our ideals. I'm cynical expression and sharing offeelings and emotions. (fhey have a more , about talking: there', a big di screpancy between people J theory and glSllluhoji view of community.) A Redfield old-guard socialist put their practice. her objections to the therapy school:

Newer members may describe this attitude as

It boring and ignorant. It makes me angry when they say 'y u too helps the in dividual, but nOt the community, and it scares off the � think much'. You can't tell people who've had a profoundly pamful good people. My therapy is being out there and doing the work that experience to pull themselves together. needs doing. Tht;r therapy puts self before community. They are so tuned into their individuality that it's di fficult for them to put the The most common therapies which aim to bring barriers down group first. It's a continual conflict between those who think that SOmeone and fe elings to the fo re are rebirthing, primal therapy, co­ 's fe elings are more important and those who want to push the group along. counselling, encounter groups, 'sharings' and attunements at the

155 154 COMMUNES AND TilE GREEI'- VISION

CONCLUSION

The influx of the 'therapy' school into most communes in the CHAPTER 6 eighties together with the rise ofNew Ageism isj�st part ofa br?ader move away from socialist notions of community tow ards hb ral . � Changing society: or being individualism. This in tum is part ofa trend in wider SOCiety, against which communes are supposed to be part of a (ounltrculture. That changed? trend involves individualism, market economics and a shift ofinte�­ est from 'public' to 'private' realms. We exam�ne it further In Chapter 6 because it relates impo�antly t� the Issue of whether communeS help to transform Wider society. will We can conclude from this chapter that communards have a world This book asks two major questions. Chapter 5 has answered the view that is indeed radically and overwhelmingly green This e first: how green are the communes? We now consider the second : � ,:" lates rather patchily into individual and group pracoce, but It IS question: how important and be, communes leading the tranS are, will in probably true that communes can provide an institutional cont�xt way to an ecologically sound society [9. 11)? which encourages ecologically sound practices. However e SOCIal We ask, fint, how communards themselves see this question: behaviour which accords with green principles is more dtfficult� to whether they believe that social change is happening and what are attain even in a commune. Partly this must be due to the influences the best ways of fa cilitating it. This, their theory of social change, is and s�cialisation which communards bring in from wider society. important. For whether one adopts structuralistor non-structuralist, We now rom to the question of relationships with that society, and and materialist or idealist perspectives, and whether one emphasises how it might be changed to an ecologically sound one in furore. individual or coUective and consensus or conflict approaches, are fa ctors that may materially influence just how effective one is in working for change. This book does not presume (as some commu­ nards do) that aU of these approaches are equaUy valid, as will be made clear. We finish this chapter by addressing practice. Are these com­ munes in fa ct making any im pact on wider society, and what evidence is there either way? Is influence achieved by just bring there, as an example, or is there conscious 'outreach', locaUy or nationally, and is it sufficient? Finally, to invert the question, we consider the problem posed briefly in the last chapter about the relationship between this ele­ ment of the counterculture and mainstream society. Rather than the fo nner influencing the latter, is the process more dialectical. whereby the counterculture itself modifies and adapts to reflect patterns of change in that society which it opposes? This chapter presents material germane to these issues: judgement is made in the next, concluding, chapter.

157 156 COMMVNES AND THE CREEN VISION CflANCING SOCIETY: OR BEINC CIfANG£D? like that'. Herein lies the rub of possible selfdelus'lon, or In reI" ytng THE THEORY on empmc" "a l "deVl ence from one's immediale fi" " -''"d '''"d'' =a"I fi a y p rcelved trend, one can _ � � so easily forgetjusr how limited that Circle 1Ji, and the communards' circle Turning points, hundredth monkeys, Aquarian eOlUlpiracies . could be more InureI" " d.UlL an most. ThiS Redfieldiandid choose and the �more.and·more' syndrome . the example ofh ow mterpersonal" awarenes• s•• skills were being applied along .....':.L. UI consensu deo- " on ma ng. ' • ai' 'We're at a turning point: more and more people realise there's a sl m industrial management - an example . � lifted from crisis'. This answer to the question, 'Is society changing generally Fmdhom s 1988 conference, 'From Orooorusation , . -IC>- 10 . rusm , and towards an ecologically more sound one?' reflects the millenaria­ th" IS F"In dh omlan New Age perspective Q_ga " had spread to individuals in many om unes - nism of much of the green movement. Clearly expressed by Capra � � along with its attendant elitist, anti-socialist! (1982), millenarianism was shared by some communards we inter­ anarchist Vlew of the importance of to" �own r2Uler.L .L !-n an bottom- up change. lt attaches primacy y-u viewed, especially New Agers. Rather like the crudest Marxists, to environmental and spiritual aware­ whom ness mong ,peopl w�o'U they trenchant1y oppose, they saw themselves as part of an � � get into positions of power in the next ten years . From there irresistiblehistorical trend-a 'trend in history towards things getting It wd l ta�e 'fifteen years fo r ideas like wholefood better', as a Redfieldian put it. Many are convinced that change is to spread fr om the muesh belt class . to the working class'. The already happening: 'The whole thing is on the move' ...'a process commu�ard res�onslble for this last remark had been heartened by the readmess WIth which people of changing expectation is occurring, more in towns than the on the street had taken leaflets about Chemobyl countryside'(this last from CanonFrome, set, like many communes, and the US bombing of Libya in 1986. amidst rural Toryism). The t p-down pproach envisages that, ? . � firstly. a small and scat- tered mmonty WIll become imbued " Whether they are overt New Agers or not, many greens display the . , with Ul.Le new conSCIousness (they WIll breathe together', 'more-and-more' syndrome that is part of such millenarianism, and or 'conspire', the Aquarian wind of ha e -hence The Aquaria,. about a quarter of our interviewees used either this key phrase or the � �� Conspiracy (Ferguson 1982)) though the IndlVldual actors may no allied ones of'growing awareness' or 'heightened consciousness' to � be aware of their co-conspirators. Then, when the number of qUiet convey their preceptions. revolutionaries reaches a critical mass about Iifteenpercent afthe � . population,including the powerful and More and more people are growing food organically - and lhe fluentJal) o society will �: . all � be transfo nned. The manner of trans- government's listening. nnallo may Involve some mass � . intuition, or extra-sensory tele­ communlcatton - part of a 'planetary More and more are becoming vegetarian. Mainstream sociery's intelligence' _ rather than a ass consciousness arrived changing slowly. � at rationally as in socialist revolutionary eory. That such a � process does take place is constantly alluded to Consciousness is on lhe tum, away from lhe mechanistic world view. y New Agers, in their 'hundredth monkey' story . of how innova ti on There's much greater awareness than ten yean ago of alternative Was aIle ge dl y Sprea d 10 quantum fas hion amongst geographically medicine and fo od ideas. People power is visible - Sainsburys d"Ispersed monkey is communities (see below). removing additives from its food. A less 8anguine One problem about this last, middle-class oriented, view is that view little evidence is produced beyond the anecdotal to support it. 'The But such Vlews. were not overwhelmingly present. A down-to- question of where society'S going is subjective - you can produce nhness pe ades the quiet � optimism of most communards, which evidence either way', admitted a Monkton Wyld communard, 'and ::n, paradOXically, verge on cynicism. Wild, exaggerated ments assess_ my subjectiveview is that society's entering an Aquarian age'. 'Many ofwhat is happening in society, and the communes' role in it, people are doing things which will suddenly have a big impact', said "'ere few outside the circle of the New Agers. 'Awareness' said one a Redfieldian: 'I've no evidence;just a fe eling- I know a lot of people Canon Fromer, 'dan ' e nI"Ig h tenment' maybe spreading, but probably 158 159 CIIANCING 50CI£T)" OR B£ING CHA,VC£D? COMMUNES "ND THE CR£EN VISION and action strategies related to social change). The attitude to the only to the educ:ucd. People arcgening more aware, but only people I , importance of changing the ideas and values of the individual was know of. I'm lucky to mixwith people who respect nature, but I don t know that most people do. also probed by asking about the role of education in social change. For, to see education as the major fo rce in social change probably was taking place only means rejecting the structuralist/materialist position (where educa­ Another Canon Fromer thought that change smoking', not in people's tional institutions mainly function to peddle the ideas that reinforce in 'less challenging things, like giving up the coUective consensus - and therefore the existing economic! mental state, while a third said: deep social organisation) in fa vour of a non-structuralist/idealist perspec­

from wool from our own heep, tive (where education is fr eer from the socio-economic structure, We sit round knitting Amlinjumpers � going up in flames. We're Just and can be used as a tool for changing perceptions and values). but so what? The rest of the world's mo e pe ple arc ourselves. And while more and However education, in this context, need not be taken merely as the doing things to satisfy . � � pulling in the OppoSite dl fecbon. fo nnal system, but as the whole range of arrangements and influ­ aware, there's another hig group ences which lead people to fo nn world views. Hence, education realism occasionally fo und through people seeing and copying the of those living This suggested a degree of political �xQmplt alternative lifestyles comes into the scope of question. elsewhere, as at Redfield: this It was argued in Chapter 3 that there was a logical connection There's no real social movement for us to change our ways to alleviate between taking coUective, materialist and structuralist positions on the plight of the poor. social change, or, alternatively, takingindividualist, idealist and non­ structuralist approaches. In other words, if you believe in any one of or Lifespan: either 'set' of three, then it would be logical also to believe in the other two in the 'set'. However, the responses from our interviewees Lots of people are more aware, but Ming prepared to del withoul is sometimes challenged this supposition. In particular. they ques­ another matter. tioned the dualisms on which such a scheme is based, arguing, for example, that individual actions, when summed, represent collec­ or Lower Shaw: tive action; or that when people's ideas and values change then they will consequently change their material circumstances; or, similarly, The response to crisis is cosmetic and piecemeal, as witness the that by changing the way individuals see things you at the same Montreal protocol against CFCs. will time change social-economic structures. These refutations suggest­ even hinge on - a liberal conception of society and community as Approacbes to cbanging society little more than the sum of its individual component parts. This underlying political nature of the debate did occasionally interrelated positions o� ��al Chapter 3 discussed twO sets of surface in interviews, and aspects ofit are pursued in the section on were asked an IDIt:lally change. Bearing these in mind, interviewees . political approaches. The political issue was put in its essentials by change towards an ecoiogacally open question on how they fe lt that two CAT members. One was a disillusioned anarchist, now much pro�­ likely to occur They were then sound society was most {S.l). influenced by Findhornian idealism, and the other was an ex-trade �elat:lve expand on Their views on the pted, if necessary, to this. unionist. The fo nner emphasised how 'people' now think about approaches were parncu�arly importance of individual or collective political change in tenns of and how they fe el. Mter a of this issue on th� perceIVed thtmstlvts sought {S.2-.3) because of the bearing revolution, will it feel different? He replied: change. For w�ll e the very (and actual) role of communes in social members that their When I was younger, people talked about political cha nge in order to existence of communes ostensibly suggests . not really be the cas� If, t�at get social justice. No longer. Now it's about alienation and fe eling fa vour a collective approach, this may :- mdlvlduallsts. alive - now we're talking about the (environmentalJ problems of the are little more than a con�ction of is, the communes not the poor. lacking common purposes rich, who are weakly bonded (in other words, 161 160 CIIANGING SOCIETY, OR BEING CIIANGEO? COMMUNES A.NDTHE: GREEN VISION Tahle 17: Summary of vie... on lIO(:iaJ change felt that because of this, The fonner trade unionist, however, 1. has primary role (setting examples. raising and communards are INOIVI�UAL 40" 01al/ ffISPOt'Ises environmentalists consaousness. promoting spiritualism - 'lhe personal is political') inst. the po li tical fo rce$ they're up aga out of touch with the nature of 2. CCJ:LLECn YIST llppI'oaches mostImportant (via political 13" of all responses c fa e n are smplini . They don't � actiOn, national and local strikes, demos, coops and The solutions of people livi g here too i Talking to )0,000 black kids communes) up to reality, and lack class consciousness. the EVENTS will be most important (Iaaelng to indivK!ual and all responses about compost 1005 is not addressing 15" 01 in inner city Bimlingham 3. collective actioos and different social organisation) resting without doing much hann. iS5ue. My coming here is a foml of 4. EDUCATION (about 'facts', for cooperation, for beller 9" of all responses and we shouldn't overrate its CAT is margina1 to social change ideas) importance. 5. CONSUMER PRESSURE (leading to greater environ­ 4" of B1Iresponses mental conSCiousness)

6. TOTAL MIX [ampossible tosingle outany ractor) I '" 01al/ responses 7. CHANGE WILL NOT HAPPEN 6" 01 allresponstlS ndividuawt approaches 1 to social change were Table 17 suggests, individualist approaches As per cent who stressed the role overwhelmingly favoured. The forty degrees ofref erence to the wider The real politics is inside mysel£ The only power I'm interested in is a ofthe individual did so with varying most attention was fixed on the magical power: the power of mysel£ My hope is in mysel£ society. At one end of the spectrum, inuer selfas the fo cus of change: is a hope of true revolution: 'A social change comingJro rnp�ople, h people changing themselves as not relying on government to do it'. Hence people must take more Wider change is pOS5ible only through ecology kingdom come but responsibility for their own lives. For instance,women can take back individuals. You can tell people about till good about it. What stops people their power rather than blaming men fo r the state of the world. This they won't do anything till they fe el ildhood and pre­ are inside themlClves - ch of course assumes that individuals can take back power, rather than laking action blockages I've seen fa nwti(: changes in people its being deeply embedded in social-economic birth traumas for example. structures. If the They've gone on to change through re-cvaluation and co-<:ounselling. latter were true then collective action might be the only way to wrest the world. power from structures and organisations where it lay, but the 'ex­ treme' individualists expressly rejected this route: of non-structural fa ctors; This statement refers to the importance childhood or, as another put it, Collective action isn't taking responsibility for behavioural patterns established at our blame, which lies in the significance of therapies a lack of respect fo t others. Ifwe haven't disarmed ourselves we cannot 'social and family conditioning'. Hence di sann the world. ' helping to change oneself: I know it s a middle thing to say, but /3nyMe help to relive early experiences in class can which change - there's a voice ide us that can't stopped anything. ins be by more it reflect out. People The more I can change myself, the will Ind ed, this sentiment be an example of middle class preoc­ acknowledgingwhat they are. � empower themselves through . cup (ould enabhng them tJons. The conviction about one's own guilt reflects, perhaps, back to people a sense of themselves, � Rebirthing gives ne � s relatively comfortable position in The guilt is transposed to take back their [political] power. life. I �O taking blame onto oneself fo r the wider ills of society. In a way t� s . s­ � IS a modern version, too, of the medieval ideas of the self as a is the essence of alienation for so many communard Here, then, tnlcrocosm with their of the wider world, reflected also in Roszak's influential been removed from or robbed ofcontact a sense ofhaving e by conven­ P ra.s 'person/planet': some communards put it almost exacdy in power over their own lives (perhaps true selves and their th�IS way: tional fa mily life, and conditioning). So, 163 162 CHA.NCING SOCIETY: OR BEING CIIANGED? ;lND TilE GREEN VISION COMMUNES believe example can lead in one of two To in this power of DCL_ c: WlU" rhtpJatrtf one must directions, On the one hand it may imply an idealist position - the mus/ ' .L'n oneself. To change Change .r om !lorion that people can be diverted fr om their set ways, and the individuals fi rst. change ideologies that support them, by the power of example, logical �:�;�:� in. it's partW °h If YO: T� You arc part of the world and reasoning and penuasion, On the other it can be to propose that . P� me!>Sage 'h e I I Impo�ant5 �f the green,� the when sufficient changes in material circumstances have taken place n chan ..'ng yoursdfand changing There no dI VIII' on b,""ce people will be looking for new ways to live, and then, at such a time, world. the it is important that living, working examples of ecologically sound th they might contain suc 5enn. . e The trouble with � � :� social lifestyles should be available. We explore the latter position �:C t terial break in the will mp ion th ' h·re St pres� r � , ;� assumptions; shortly, but firstwe note some fe atures ofthe extremelyindivid­ p ctical and even elitist will ThIS Iead S ;� 7; � ualist penpective of New spiritualism, This, in Findhom, conhnuum. 1 w ke d a hange Age in inne ci es can O for instance that 'people � supports the sovereignty of the individual while also attaching � � �d :o t�:t ;e; know should gro e O their lives. They ' ' s of importance to the idea of the collective, enshrined both in its own ggest that the realitie ements� 1 ke ��: what's involved'. Stat . community and in concepts like the 'planetary village'. However it fo rgotten. . stratification arc bemg motor socal an d oHoca! sclf. also explicidy rej ects the idea of the collective as the of social P i power rooted in the see th e locus of political These peop e ther change. much on e 'd al kept this fo cus very , d' But while some r s c llec­ the spec! ::.U o: � � were a little fu rther along individualists I IS' poI'tical' I , ' aphorism 'thepenona Bringing in the New Age To h.m the much-used nVlsm, , ' ofa society, but that the individual is part New Age thinkinghinges on the idea that spirirual fo rces underlie all ac knowI. d.. "ng that , ' meant fint They life; therefore social change must be at the spirirual rather than r of vi t t r anaiyses material level. Already the 'spirirual is getting into politics', we were e b � �;;�; ��: 7;� �C:� �� �:��:�;� �:� action: told. The changes in Eastern Europe were attributed by all the : ::1�;;change through individual social Findhomians we interviewed not to material, economic circum­ stances (namely that the USSR could no longer afford the cold war). I does not conflict with Collective htoe o ro � way, That polincal, ' actIoro"t �s , , itical Rather, together with spirirual movements and communities in the dI,Vl uaIs , because collective pol the intportanCe of charogtng US, they stemmed from an Aquarian energy from beyond Earth of individuals, actioro stems from a group , which was expanding people's consciousness - their 'global aware­ cr do a; ythmg themselves b�f�Inr� ttt.7 People must fe el better about , ' ness' or consciousness of the 'noospere' (a term coined by Teilhard must fe ci then Vl ua powe about the environment, They I de Chardin). 'There's a deep moving spirit which shapes events' said thenfo llows, collective action . ' I' one Findhomian, explicidy acceptingHegel's idealism and rejecting I mt Those now m more into individualism, Marx's materialism; 'It comes from people's collective conscious­ used to be a coIlecbVlst: . be right, W!.th. the personaI ght B who say wider political change starts ness, y working with it you can have an enormous influence for uncommon, Some , 'defection' which is not . change', As CAT's Findhom 'representative' put it: 'consciousness ThiS la�t re presents a disillusioned with revoluoonary not economics is the driving fo rce of history'. communard s ,••• 'ex_collectivists' cus on m IV I"d u al ,penonal who now prefer to fo , d" Findhom is one 'hole' or 'light centre' whereby Aquarian energy­ or party po I.._" , 1" the moving spirit - enten Earth. There are other such geographical change. and the between the penonallindividual 'cosmic conduits'. while each individual who gets the New Age spirit For some IS I"10 ' th " k by I . the norion of change txal'llpt. also becomes an energy channel If individuals get their channels political/collective lies in together, the resultant hole gets bigger, It does so by a power of two, is all you can so onc individual allows one energy unit through, but two allow four a model available to society, Individual charoge, to make units through. Here, incidentally, is an acknowledgement that the do" colle can ctive effort is more than the sum of its individual components, estyle, one caro show others what If one can individually adjust lif be done, 165 164 CHANGING SOCIETY, OR BEING CHANGED? CQMMVNl>SAND TIfF: GREElY Y1SIOiY good. 'Better not to take conscious action to improve the lot ofth The process which admits this energy ofchange to Earth - 'allows less fo rtu ate', it seems to say. 'imprOving your own sense o things to occur' - is meditation. In it, people direct thoughts and . � wellbemg IS the best you can do for them'. � fe elings towards an object, 'altering the fr equency of vibrations . This kind of sentiment came through in responses to our ques­ around it' (energy is vibrations). Meditation can change material nons on what one does about unemployment: events. It can lower the crime rate in an area (see Chapter 4), bring

'light and love to Nicaragua', remove apartheid or the anns race: 'It's We di d advertisement programmes to help the unemployed to change a directing of thought and wishing fo r things'. their. val e systems - IIi good about what we were doing � rhis nuJde Jttl "41 At first the meditarional process is a concentration on oneself: [emphaSIS added] .

Don't wony about unemployment. This and other problems willgo . . . then on things going on around you. You get to know you're away whe":enough people tune into their spiritual benignness. They connected with them. The deeper you meditate the more you m�$t n t ,:ew poverty as a drudge but as a gift. Some of the best recognise your bonds with everything, in flashes of insight. They get � things In hfe are leamed when you are poor. more intense, buil di ng up to peak experiences.

We have already noted a similar response to the problem ofThird These resemble religious ecstasy - fo r accounts, see Caddy 1988. . World explOitation. So, once more, changing the wider world starts byfocusing on and ence the in vid� does not attempt to change other people, or changing oneself. Detractorsof the New Age wonder ifit really goes � �i soclal-eco omlc pohncal� Structures, by material action in conscious fu rther than this. Such scepticism might be justified by one Lau­ � concert With others: 'We can't do it as a collective . Only as individ­ riestonian, who had devoted his life at one stage to fo llowing a yogi. ual w o recognise what good stuff they're made of'. Yet it is 'My hopes (for social change] pinned on meditation, in spiritual � are mamtamed� that others change - partly through contact with New life, and my yogi's teaching', he told us. 'It's such a positive thing in do Agers and following their example (here. the communicative power my own life. But don't I can change the world. Individuals are 1 think of new technology, such as satellites, is invoked). People change also up against a machine and can't cope' . . . through the mt· UltlonaI spread f New Age consciousness. When And while in one breath they talkedof worldwide change, in other eno�gh people - the 'critical mass'0 of fifteen per cent referred to parts of the interviews Findhomians told us: earher - have gained such consciousness, suddenJy there will be wholesale ch n e an most people will gain it. This is how monkey It's a ptrJo,1a1 empowennent. People take responsibility for themselves; � � � popula .ons, It IS churned, learn new habiu such as washing their not for anyone else. � �oo . First one monkey stumbles across an idea, and communicates Because Findhom'$ a light centre, people grow and cleanse � thtnlJdvtJ It directly to others. Then. after a symbolic 'hundredth monkey' has of what's not 'hannonic', i.e. flowing with nature. I�amed it, entire populations of monkeys geographically separated What can I change? Nothing outside ofme, but I can change me. I s�multaneously start to do it. By the same token, it is no coincidence can't control anything outside myself; even my child has its own t . at new scientific discoveries are often made at the same time in kanna. If you tty to change the world you're disempowered and different places on the globe. frustration startS. I get a new V1liue system and start to send out love. it all relates to the monistic 'morphogenic theorv'-J • whereby Then others get changed by my energy and my power to th oughts are togs and energy is matter, which we described in communicate. th ' . Ch apter 4. CalT}'1ng tS I°d ea one stage fu nher, we can say thot . ,. tho 0 0 somethmg 'n ew 15 not reall y new - It eXISts in the cosmos all the of New Ageism which collectivists, struc­ . . Herein lies the fe ature lscovery of'new' things or ways ofliving and perception is in might particularly object to. For the D: turalists and political activists tt'".�.a Ity Just 'tapping in' (through insight) to thought/energy fields ofAdam Smith's 'invisible fo nnula seems to be a spiritual equivalent �at selfishness are already there. The New Age is a process of increasing their individual economic 0 0 hand', whereby liberals justify numbers ofp eop e tappmg m, or gathering insight; suddenly they into a fo rce for collective I on the grounds that it somehow 'coheres' 167 166 COMMUNES AND TlfE GREEN VISION CnANGING SOCIETY, OR BEING CIIANGEfJ? will open up such a big hole, or channel, that Aquarian energy will simultaneously transfonning society. While we have acknowledged pour in to affect everyone on the globe (see Lyall Watson's Lijtfidt, those communards who see no incompatibility between the two 1980). This critical mass theory means, for some Findhomians, that: appr�aches, we found that a smaller group (see Table (7) did speCl �cally reje� individualism and self-change, while also ad­ It's OK that we're the privileged middle dass. You needn't try to vocanng collecnve approaches. This minority was mainly drawn change everyone. We're a v;mguard - a group who are waking up: fro m e lon er-stay communards, who had been part of the first, dreaming dreams that other'S can't comprehend. But we're not that � more �IdeolOgically motivated (to the left) wave in the mid-seventies special-just different from others. and were also part of the relationships-through_work schooL

The elitism of this bothers others. As Bloom (1987) put it, New We have already touched on some of the objections which this

Agers can 'seem irrelevant' in the midst of a 'poignant planetary group has towards individualism. They include its perceived scenario' involving starving children, resource maldistribution, war selfishness; and 'the greenery of the planet being stripped away': I'm no � convinced by the person-is-politica1 argument; it's just a way of making comfo rtable. With our circle dancing, meditation and personal processes, we appear yr.IUru/f like any other alienated social group seeking solace in the emotional Changing thc world through individual 'consciousness' raising is a prop of an illusory but comforting belief system. We can be accused of solution. You only wony about the problems ofthe world as rtacliollory being the middle classsixties generation seiling a cartoon reality. you relate to them.

But currently Findhom directs much effort towards a critical mass its 'apoliticism'; of politicians and business executives: 'Acting on them - the key The we're-all-resporuible-for-ourselves attitude is way of e$Caping people - you can get business to do different things'. Business can a from political action, whereas we do need to confront things. 'change its relationship to the planet', as the oft-quoted Body Shop is thought to show. And, 'Yes - you can even change burger-ehains to its 'arrogance in thinking people beconverted by example­ new values. Even nuclear weapons manufacturers put social will ),our will n fact individuals can change themselves, but not others'; and its consciousness into what they're doing'. � Ineffectiveness; Lots of Japanese and US businesses are already, we were told, adopting New Age cooperative, consensual techniques in 'win-win' Revolutionarie� are into the notion of external enemies, while Taoism management: those lower down the finn are made to feel part of the tclls us to look Into ourselves. The latter isn't enough. The radical

whole, which is no longer split into workers and management, mov�menu of the sixties melted away into therapy and inward_ winners and losers. They have realised that personal empowennent looking. of everyone in the organisation leads to higher creativity and higher I� ;as pOifited out that in working collectively profits, and 'there's nothing wrong with profits, with people's , fo r political change i . ndlVlduals III any case change themselves. afthe creativity being rewarded by money'. One Findhomian told us that possible collective approaches, political campaigning &om the top evidence of businessmen gaining New Age consciousness came in - 'by such people as Bruce Kent or Petra Kelly' or 'via socialism and the Labour Party' the fo rm of an organisation with the startling title 'Millionaires fo r _ ere :-v fa voured by only two or three people. Localised and World Peace'. Clearly, theories of structural violence have little " . decentral- 1st 'pa mClpanve socialism' and pressure groups and political cam- place in New Age thinking. . . paigning were hardly any more popular. via Doitl•" th -- COrnmunes d in _ Collectivists an coops, was seen as a betterway of'taking control' in the anarchist we have said, at one level all communards are collectivi sts. But sense, as part of a voluntary, devolved fe derated and As non-exp loitative green society. 'You have to co trol - you within the ostensibly collective fr amework overwhelming import­ tokt , can't set up a po mca' system which : ance is attached to changing the individual self as a method of ,. 1 thengrallts you that control'.

168 169 -

COMMUNES AND THE GREEN I'ISION CUttNGING SOCIETY, OR HEING CUANGED?

yuppy bubble bunts and they want something more, we be there Others in this group linked their collectivity clearly to structural will to offer something else. The cycle isn't totally repetitive - more and material perspectives, by emphasising the need to change eco­ helical. Communes have died away in the eighties but there's more nomic power relationships, since these arc also political power ecological awareness now. relationships. Here, demonstrations and strikes were regarded as important tools, for itwould be a matter ofremoving capitalism. But Inertia while collective 'revolutionary' action might be important. neither it Such historical detenninism borders on fa talism, and just a few nor quieter. example-setting communes and coops would succeed communards displayed this. Fatalism's anarchist fo nn took the line without accompanying material changes. For instance, people wiD that: have to reach a certain level of afDuence before they can think and act in ecologically sound and socially just Alternatively'things wilt There won't be a collapse; too much energy is put into sustaining the ways. have to get worse and worse: this is what initiate social change'. system. The on1y answer is not to participate - get into alternative will communities, the black economy and squanen. The society I'd like to Event, see isn't attainable. I'm an idealist - a romantic. About onc in six interviewees. whether collectivists or individualists, The New Age form might be astrological: stressed this importance of material changes as a vital trigger to changes in social and economic-political organisation or individual Social change is a bit of a chimera, because the astrological charts and mass values and attitudes, or both. show that people have certain potentialities which no amount of influence by others can destroy. Disaster and crisis will take society in the way I'd like it to go. You must change yourself as well as getting political change. My solution is Or it might see the Aquarian Conspiracy as predetermined: to experiment with ways ofliving as an example to people - but they have to be disillusioned before they wil l fo llow the ideas. That's the way it is. There's nothing anyone can do about it. But there Lack of social deprivation equals lack of revolution. Social change will might not be any problems. Nothing might happen. They might put come through famine and the breakdown of the world banking the rubbish into a rocket and shoot it into space. Yes, I'm fatalistic. all systenl. The only way new ideas spread through major upheaval. Whatever happens, happens. will is The pres.ent system has so much inertia and things aren't bad enough to move people out of it. Fatalist tendencies are perhaps more common than our cate­ gorisation suggests, as is sheer puzZlement. Sometimes. after a long Some spelled out a series of cause and effect 'reactions'. For discussion on social change mechanisms, people would say (in their instance, increased pollution would lead to changed consciousness anxiety to get to dinner?): 'I don't know the answer: Ijust worry'. in individuals, who would then come together to effect change. Or a similar sequence would be triggered by a specific disaster, leading to Optimistic idea.li.sm flowering of the 'Aquarian Conspiracy, with education and TV chipping away at people's consciousness, and producing social If the above seems a trifle pessimistic, the views of those who saw change without revolution'. Orthere be a 'sudden environmen­ will education or consumerism as moton of social change gave the tal event producing a final flip to a different society - most social reverse impression. Some saw rationality, with 'correct' ideas and change happens by accident: that propounded by institutions has values, as a major fo rce; 'We'll get there via education' because itwill never turned ou[ as intended'. tell people 'the fa cts'. Thus equipped with greater 'environmental For New Agers this fits into their millenarian perspective. all wareness' young people will 'change the mode of production and However, a different historical model offered by an anarchist! � was mdustry' towards cooperative working and sharing. As we have seen materialist communard: (Chapter 4) many communards criticised education for tlDt teaching the values of cooperation and sharing. Just a few believed that I believe in historical cycles. The bubble bunt on the fifties, then fu nd e sixties attitudes came. The cycle's almost repeating itself. When the am ntal value changes come through education:

170 171 COMMUNES AND TilE GREEN YISION CIIAJ\'GING SOCIETY: OR HEING CUANG£D?

You can'tjuu change the economic sySlem through revolution, environment suffer' said another. A third emphasised the 'ne­ will though I used 10 be li eve this. You must change people's by cessary' short-term penpective idtllS first. of the system. changing the structure of education towards cooperation. Then they'll followed fo r some that revolutionary change is needed: change their minds. h Given that people at the top level have a vested interest in the Status Education for basic values - health, Third World, all living th ings ­ the only thing do is get rid of those at the tOp. Non-violent lead to indivi duals changing. They will fonn local groups which quo, 10 will direct action is not very effective, so we may have to use fo rce. A slow, become political movemenu. will gradual move to communal ways may nOI be enough. I have a sense of You can't make people do what they don'l want. It's done by urgency. educating people 10 know they can control their own lives. The difficulty of removing the resource-owning class, however, The educational orientation of communes is less strong now than was underlined. 'It's difficult communicating ideas to the working their fo unden might have wished. But it is still there in nearly half classes', said one revolutionary, while another bemoaned fa lse con­ the communes from our small sample (see Table 4). Hence the sciousness whereby the exploited are bought off with material above sentiments are not those of such a minority. The world view of goods, and working class people vote Tory rather than in their own this highly-educated group of people (see Table 8) must inevitably interests.Because Western capitalism 'can keep itsworken happy, it have implicit faith in the power of education, and this was reflected will not fo under on class struggle'. For this reason one communard in most of our convenations. Very few, however, were prepared to had visited Nicaragua to support the revolution there: 'I've put my say that education constitutes a main motor of social change. energy into changing Third World society, because if this happens Surprisingly, for a group which itself has moved a few steps the elite in this country would fo under. If the Third World is fr eed, towards the consumer society (see below), even fewer people saw this will have a profound effect on Britain'. Another had withdrawn consumer pOWer as of any great significance. Just two or three from the sttuggle, while a third wanted voluntary, not imposed, thought that 'consumer pressure and the influence of the market is a commun{al)ism. This would, hopefully, achieve common owner­ major fo rce for social change'. They had the current popularity of ship ofland, a solution which all the communards had opted for in green consumerism in mind, and were optimistic enough to believe practice in their own lives, although surprisingly few saw it as a key that fo rce eventually produce an ecologicallysound society fa ctor in achieving their preferred fu ture on a wide scale. this will _ a society which paradoxically not be a consumer society at all. Others accepted capitalism, with its class divisions, as significant, will but did not see possibilities for other than limited action to change it. For one, the underlying truth of class analysis held, but, perceptively, Capitalism and c1a88 confljct she saw limitations in applying it because 'people don't see them­ To probe fu rther their support fo r structural or non-structural selves as part of a distinct class, and if people don't have class penpectives on social change, communards were asked whether consciousness they're alienated from what should bind them to­ they supported the idea that environmental and social problems gether'. For othen the class system in Britain was 'incredibly strong'; stem�ed specifically from the capitalist fonn of economic organisa­ although it might be fo rced to change, or burnitself out because of tion, and if they believed in 'class analysis' -i.e. that society is divided environmental contradictions, there was litt1e that class conflict significantlyinto economic classes, and that conflictbetween them is could achieve to help the change. a key to social change [8.SJ. Less than one in three did support these contentions in any strong Capitalism has many self-perpetuatingvested interesu, who aren't going the way. Those that did drew attention to the need to grapple with to allow threau to status quo. economic relations that, in their view, presently give capitalist Violent revolution might be a solution in South Mr ica, but the English entrepreneun no choice but to produce in environmentally hannful syslem seems to bend towhat people want. ways. 'You don't make money out of environmentally benign Only a limited fight - with limited success - for workers' causes wi thin goods', thought one. 'Where profitis the moS[ important motivethe capitalism is possible. We must be pragmatic.

172 173 COMMUNES AND THE GREEN VISION CHANGING SOCIETY, OR BEING CIIA NGED?

A third group held that capitalism as it stands is to blame for many People aren't good enough (0 go along with Marxism. environmental and social ills, but they hoped that 'capitalism will be h's human nature, not capitalism, which is the environmental bogey. flexible enough to provide for more sophisticated market desires, Private enterprise is about individual expression. We don't want to such as anti-pollution measures and vegetarianism'. Such self­ oppose this, but greed. This is where anarchism comes in. confessed 'revisionists' accepted that can't get away from the big 'we I don't believe in class struggle or conflict. Seeing things in these tenns boys who command the heights of our economy'. They also saw means that one doesn't blame oneself, but one must take responsibility signs of'some big industrylooking to the longer term'. These people for oneself. included the Findhomians, discussed above, working to encourage live quite soundly under communism or capitalism. It's not 'holistic' attitudes in business. We could this but greed which is the issue. They would probably agree with the Crabapple member resigned to the fa ct that: Finally, there is the total rejection of conflict - with economic structures, between classes, or within oneself-which is seen in the Capitalism's obviously fun for some people, so they're going to go on New Age view. wanting to do it. Hence there must be room for capitalism in an ecological society, though I don't think there ought to be. But it has to We must If people are angry, they send out angry energy. be a controlled and responsible capital ism, though I don' t know if avoid conflict. The New Age movement puts out love energy to counter this. Anger there is such a thing. I'm im potent in any class struggle, because I'm just promotes defensiveness and more anger. You have to make from the dominant class. But Britain is class ridden and the green people change energy and stop exploiting nature, and you do this movement must meet the working classes half way. Iheir by showing them how much love nature. That's what's wrong with you the anti-nuke movement: it's anger and hate. There's no difference For the rest, the majority, capitalism or communism were irrele­ between an angry government official and an angry anti-nuke penon. vant. One in fo ur used a favourite green phrase: 'they're as bad as We're -brothen and sisten on planet Earth. Greens must stop ont each other'. Economic class was also held as immaterial. The class being anti - must stop trying to stop the old. We New Agen are division between men and women was more significant; 'Ifwomen building the new.

had more power, you'd have less capitalism'. If we capitalism hinden us, it will. We only give away our power think Class distinctions, in this view, are not necessarily denied. They do to the extent that we think we have. exist, and it may be important to eliminate them. But 'having a classless society not, of itself, produce an ecologically sound One communard who worked in Milton Keynes Cooperative will society', and 'class struggle does not achieve relevant social change; Development Agency had successfully applied this philosophy. He shared you won't get a stable society through revolution'. Predictably, officeswith 'anti-coop' people and made it hisjob 'to contact environmental ills were blamed on 'industrialism' per se, rather than their chief executive and talk to him. He's now flipped to the other on capitalist industrialism, by some who were active in green poli­ extreme and is enthusiastic about coops. The reason people are as they tics, while anarchists blamed the nation state. Most ofthis group are is because of their early life experiences. It's deficient ideas that blamed people's ideas, values and state of environmental and social are to blame'. consciousness. Again, these are non-structural, idealistic perspectives on change. So idealistic are they that they maintain: 'You can yourself out What caused consciousness to be as it is was not always explained, Ihitlk though a popular line was to blame 'not capitalism or communism' of a class if you want'. They refuse to but 'human nature', 'greed', not being 'good enough', or 'fear'. address the capitalism-communism thing. Socialism forces people to Thus, very often the argument was thrown back from structural to do things; I'm into running the planet by the power of the spirit. No­ behavioural, psychological explanations, or even to explanations in one is fo rced to join in . The teons 'capitalism' and 'communism' are terms of 'original sin' or 'hubris' (insolent pride, or presumption, Outmoded. We now need the model that when the individual is that leads to downfall): nourished the group is nourished.

174 175 COMMUi'tlE:S AND THE: CREEN VISION CHANCINC SOCIE:TY, OR BCING CHAIVCt"O?

Here is the essence of the New Age conception of 'group' and Tahle 18: Altitudel to conventional politic. 'community'. It is a mirror-image of the sociaJiS[ idea that when the Rejecting convenliooal 43" group is nourished, so too is the individuaJ. findhornians accepted politics absolutely about 22" that 'capitalism must change, but Russia has fa iled too though it's CynicsVdOCJbtful politics GreenParty member or Supporter 18% fu ll offeminine energy. A marriage of the two is needed, a third ' Lsbour member way . Of supporter 13" This phrase - a 'third way' between capitalism and communism ­ Ubera/member/supportllf 15" memberlsupportllf is beloved of greens, as Bramwell (1989) has noted. Used here, it Conservative 15" signified a search for something between socialism and capitalism, where the fo rmer suggests state bureaucracy and the latter the 'free' somehow embraced anarchism's cherished beliefs but then market. It is, at best. an ambiguous concept. At one time it was used perhaps they partly do). _ by decentralist sociaJists after World War I and again in the sixties he anti-p li cs/ideology school divides roughly into two cate­ new left movement to support their contention that 'people should � gones,� anarchisnc� :,""?d New Age. Anarchists stress their rejection of shape their own destinies' (Barbrook 1990), but it was aJso a slogan of the concept of pohncal power and its cOlTUpting effect: fa scism. and led to the very opposite of such self-r ealisation (Bram­ weU 1989). Because politics in volves power, automatically ii's nOl an acceptable route to change.

Conventional poUlics [8.6.}0] I'vc no ti� �o r conventiona.l politics. Anyone who wants to be a top­ � notch politiCIan must be very egotistical or narrow minded. FoUowing much of the above, it is predictable that two-thirds ofour interviewees were either cynicaJ or doubtful about conventional Most na�onal P.D.liticiaru are megalomaniacs. PfCS5Ufe groups and commuruty politics are, subject to the problem that you can't politicaJ routes to sociaJ change or rejected them totally (see Table 100, tell people what to do. 18). For them such politics represented essentially coUective ap­ proaches which simultaneously relegated the importance ofindivid­ Political wer meam centnlised power is corruptible. � - this uals. 'The personal is political' was held to have no role in �veryone s open to corruption but when you concentr.ue people's conventionaJ politics. whose adherents clearly do not usually live up Interests at one point it's easier to corrupt.

to their grand principles. Scorn was particularly directed at nationaJ P�li�cs of any son isjust a form of control. Pressure groupsjusl party politics, whereas people had more time for pressure group rrurruc those who oppress them. activities. Many were, or had been, in Greenpeace, Friends of the Th NewAge � view closely relates toits rejectionof conflict. Earth or the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament. Given the anar­ . and its hl StoncaJ determinism: chistic leanings of about a fifth of the sample, and the green or socialist views of many more (Table 12) it was a little surprising that Findhom's apolitical and this is good. We shouldn't expend our energy support for change through local community-based politics was on what's going to change anyway, but should buil d the new. slight. wouldn't make the system worle ta on. The government About one in three did have some time fo r conventionaJ parties, r tryto byagi ti can create only a certain number ofjobs. lead the meditations on mainly Green and Labour. And although a sizeable consensus was I government and the political process. I get our group to send out built around anti-Conservatism. especiaJly anti-Thatcherism, none wav�s to theplanet about thingswhich need change. I don't want to theless it was quite common to hear support fo r the Thatcherite get IRto sanctions South Africa. Sending energy the inner againn ' Victorian virtues of'standing on one's own two fe et', 'taking respon­ word, is more valuable. I wouldn't picket or take sides. sibility for one's own life' and making the state's institutions appar­ endy accountable to local communities (there was a perhaps By no means everyone in rejection-of-politics school has such this mistaken impression that the Thatcher versions of these shibboleths a clear position. There is quite a large group who simply say, third 176 177 COMMVN£S AND TII£ GR£EN VISION CHANGING SOCIETY, OR BEING CIlA,VGED? damental issues like 'I'm not interested in politics and know nothing about it', or words common ownership ofland'. They are alienated Labour, to this effect. from as many socialists have been down the years, but Among the more political minority, there is probably more sor­ c�nnot stomach the Greens. One ex-Labourite summarised the row than anger about the labour movement, together with a fe eling di lemma: that its politics are somehow outmoded - or, as greens often put it, feel incredibly nlUddled �nd po i�cally ineffectual. The Green Parry are about 'the old' politics ofleft and right, not the 'new politics of � . � U 50 far from effectmg major POlibcaJ change. II is n't red enou and life'. Labour was seen as 'stuck in its ways', 'bankrupt' and failing to gh the Labour Party isn't green take up 'new' - black and women's - issues. 'Trades unions are still enough. built on racism and sexism', said a male ex-trades unionist, while a Greens, however, were at times hardly less muddled: fe male who had never belonged to the movement (but 'wouldjoin to kick Maggie out') thought it 'encouraging that union leaders are I'm in the Gre�n Parry, but I'm not political. The Green Party won't . talking about bringingwomen into the movement'. She went on to ge t ID. I vote Liberal. �bour as bad as the Conservatives. They're is regret that the so-called 'loony left councils won't make it, because both about confrontabon and malting enemies. I don't agree with Mn the Conservative-backed tabloids are too widely read'. Others sim­ Thatcher, but she's sincere. ilarly baulked at the weight of an establishment which had, for them, Though there also some confidence that the fu ture did "ot lie nullified the unions: was with Labour:

Trades unions are unlikely to be a force for change. They've done Die

Others were slight1y more optimistic but still tentative: But then confidence in the Green Party was also less than total:

Environmentalists should work on the unions. They're a good idea I'm not sure about their social policy. even though undemocratic. But it is difficult to change the movement It's too party-oriented, instead of having close links with pressure via infiltration. You're banging your head against a brick wall. groups. I work fo r Labour because they would provide a better framework for They constitute a useful voice, but as 500n as they get po li tical success cooperatives. But you won't get social change from one Party. I won't have any faith in them. Labour be a way fo rward, but its history doesn't give me much mig/It They have some righ t wallies standing for them. hope. A lot of impetus for the seventies alternative movement came from di sillusionment with the political parties, and wanting to go out and at least to build islands of socialism in a sea of capitalism. How importanl are communes? [8. 11] rry We've done it, but we're more a pebble than an island. If conventional politics areout, and collective solutions are second­ ary t individual And so it probably remains in the nineties. Despite the ideological � self-change, where do communes fit in? This qu snon, 'How important fr agmentation and diffuseness discussed earlier, there is still a � are communes in leading the way to a SOCially more groundswell ofsocialist fu ndamentalism in the communes. 'But the just and ecologically more harmonious society?' was central to this Labour Parry doesn't represent socialism', is the common study (see Introduction), and it was pllt directly. "Ollr" . The 'green' academics, complaint. theorists and visionaries cited in Chapter 2 I t be surprised While the Green Parry resonates with the concerns of so many by the anSWer. It was that while they, who do �IVe� "Of In communes, are communards, socialist communards think it lacks 'policies on fun- 'likely to suggest that something like a

178 179 COMMUNES AND TIlE GREEN VIS/O/V CHANGING SOCIETY, OR BEING CIIANGED? fe deration of communes is the only viable political-institutional example to others. But it would be impossible for all society to live fo nn for the sustainable society to take' (Dobson 1990pl23-4), those like this. There aren't enough seventeen-acre houses to go round'. who do live in communes are most unlikely to suggest this! Over six Another thought that they could be a leading edge, but are prevented out of ten of our interviewees thought that communes are not fr om so being because the communards do not get the time to important in leading us to a green society, and do not constitute a broadcast their existence and lifestyle to a wider world. A third significant part of the blueprint fo r survival. Less than three in ten explained that Britain does not have enough communes for them to thought that they might be significant, and under one in ten was lead the green movement. Out of 47 in the Communes Network prepared to be enthusiastic and unconditional in supporting the only fifteen write regularly fo r the Furtbennore, thou Newdet/er. gh idea. communes might be 'Yes, they are central to change', said one of this minority. 'The Aquarian society will be made up of communes like these', said the best way to a green society, it true that the bulk of the work is another, 'especially if they abolish money. Ifpeople can't get money which gocs o� in th �m is what conventional people do only at or power they will not be COITUpt - they'll help each other and live week�nds or In evemngs - gardening and cleanng. These things take In communes, which is diffi for those ofi 115 who see more to together'. Here, of course, is the anarchist and pure sociali st view. A over cult life. ou spend ost of your lifetime keeping going, or having more 'mainstream' green view was that 'our commune [Redfield] is : � meetIngs to de de to how tokeep going. The place can attract people quite compatible with green values and gives people a chance to live � who aren ,t motIvated to do much else, then it gets motiveles.s and goes them out'. While a Lauriestonian acknowledged 'slippage' from round in circle,. green practices, she, too, believed that For rather more people such drawbacks outweighed the advant­ despite this I'd hold this alternative community up to the green ages, making communes of limited or no influence in the green movement as an example. We're showing that it's possible to il ve venture - certainly not as effective as other fo nns of community. outside the system. It would be possible to run the whole country like this, but the present system would have to col/apst - not just change ­ Mos Quarry members, fo r in stance, saw CAT as simply a demon­ � . and be replaced by a society of communes. stranon, to gIve urbanites in particular some ideas and stimulation. And it is a way for people Characteristically, half of this small group of eight unqualified already into social change to renew their batteries. But optimists were Findhornians. 'We're just trying to build a new it', not a way to socie . I'd like � the �een movement to promote COmmunes, civilisation', claimed one modesdy. 'We're not JUSt a replay of bchua��et It s more lIDportant for It to get political power. nineteenth-century communes, we're part of a new spirit and people are here because they fe el they are making a difference', claimed 'We're hardly the start of a revolution', said one Canon Fromer. another. The others thought it would be possible 'to have the , We don't anywhere near reach our potential to change things', said country made up of small units - it could be done, with another. 'We're not a serious alternative that everyone can do,just a commitment'. small demonstration ofwhat might be possible. Urban cooperatives Of those generally in fa vour, some did not see communes as Would have more influence'. complete blueprints. Rather, communal living fo sters elements of a Others enthused about street level communities 'but green society, such as honest and open human relationships - and not lots of �ommunes with people living in the same household'. the 'green movement does not pay enough attention to social The most hkely fu ture communal fo nn, which environmental relarions' -or 'being in tune with nature'. Hence communes be a problems and will the diSintegration of the family would help, but they also have lots of problems, so constitute only indirect strongly encourage people to adopt, was seen as something of the order of a street or neighbour- ways fo rward. In particular they do help to change individuals who '" hood compnslng Ind" "dua I dwelling5 might later go out to forge the green society. ' IVI but with resource .sharing and ommunal Some enthusiasts saw very practical drawbacks however. 'Com­ . � spaces (for instance the Rainbow Housing Coopera­ tive ID Milton munes are a leading edge of the green movement', said one, 'and an Keynes). Communes might thus be one fe ature, but

180 181 COMMUNES AND TilE GREfN YISION CHANGING SOCIETY, OR BEING CIIANGED? not an absolutely I used to think the aruwer was to live like and people would join necessary one, of a green society. The stumbling this block to going any fu nher than street communities, many agreed, is in. It'i striking that in the dght yean since I've been on the scene the problem of the interaction ofpeople. Put euphemistically, 'A lot unemployment has risen, and this ha.m'lled to more people living cO nally: in fact the reverse. of people can't handle the richness of the relationships in com­ OlnlU munes'. Put more bluntly; don't many people would want to 'I think The class barriers ofBrirish society were deemed relevant. For one live this way. They'd want more domestic control than we have, and thing, it economically impossible for most people in Britain to buy not to be 50 close together'. is enough land. But also: One of the People In Common group suggested that the ideal size fo r communal interaction depends on activity, but it is not more Unlike the middle class people who fo unded Laurieston, the working than eight fo r cooking and eating, or twelve fo r unstT'Uctured meet­ classes do not have a sense of being able to break out. ings. And even with such small numbers private space is also There's a lot in the idea that communes are mearu whereby white essential. Another communard proposed that communal villages Anglo-Saxon protestants solve their personal problenu. You won't get might be more visible than communes. With these, and common communes on a large scale in Britain. The more difficult things get land ownership, the countryside could be more people-intensive: here, the less kelyli that people will want to go in to communes. Class however no were seen of fu lly achieving the green dream of ways differences are a major problem. Communes in other countries -Israel doing away with cities altogether. and Scandinavia - are not predominantly middle class, as her . [In fa ct e Among the most negative responses, this was one theme - they are predominantly middle class nowadays - see BBC 1989.) reflecting the sheer lack of room in Britain to create a commune­ One Monkton Wyld member's class consciousness extended to based society a III Kropotkin: 'We're the elite here, we have nearly an acre per head, which is not possible for most people. We're very suggesting that 'we're an example, but not a particularly sparkling

fOmlnate'. And 'There isn't room to live aswe do. We're privileged'. one, and if we did become extreme enough to threaten the ruling Anotherwas that the Iifesl)'le would not appeal on a mass scale to the elite then ...well, the history of these places ends with the troops British, 'who like urban life and anonymity'. 'Not many could live as coming in'. we do, relinquishing control over our personal life. It's an experi­ Others, too, saw communes as insufficiently'threatening', in the ment. but not the answer for the whole world'. And, the lifesl)'le is sense of lacking dynamism and a high public profile, 'We're not 'so frantic - it's hardly ideal'. Or 'lots of people find it difficult to strident'; 'People don't hear about us-British communes' publicity cope with all the power you're given'. is pathetic'. And, 'The communes don't evolve because we keep The British also would not like sharing income, one Findhornian going back to involve new people'. pointed out: There is a sense that at the root of this problem lies an isolation fro m the rest of the British people. People get pocket money and so are $eparated fr om the products of their labour. But if people should be re$pol1$ible for their own li ves To change society you need to be closely involved people, but thi$ mearu they $hould have their own money. Here they don't get with we, re detached. enough money back from their work. It's tOO collective. Isolated communities won't have influence. It's important to change 'Ifitwas a better way then more people in Britain would do it', said �e System from within. We must get in touch with people and a Lifespanner: 'In fact few do it, because sharing only really works Integrate, at least partly, with conventional society. when you're on rock bottom. The answers which communes give I don't see us having a commune-ist society. In communes we have just aren't appropriate'. This cultural dimension came up repeat­ con ttol over our own lives, but what's the point if we don't control edly. Other cultures could be based on communes, we were told; . S��ety? Communes don't confront the power structure of society. Bangladeshis who came to Britain had a communal culture, and liVing like thi s is a political action, showing there's an alternative. But were trying to maintain it in a country where communes are but 'a We can get out of touch with the problems that are out there. Now and drop in an otherwise unfriendly ocean'. then you need to go back and live in grotty conditions.

182 183 COMMUNES AND TilEGREEN I'/SIOt\' CII"NC/,,'C SOCIETY, OR BEING CII"NG£I)J

The trouble about being in a community is that you can't get much tenlS for Mongolian nomadic herders). And there is a shop and cafe involved outSide. We grow our organic fo od but it doesn't change in nearby Machynlleth and an offshoot of Dulas Engineering in things. And when you've been here so long, you lose your way and Aberystwyth. can't sec th e wood for the nees. You assume that things outrageous Notwithstanding all this, a fe eling that it was unviable for the and rev olutionaryare the norm. They are not the norm for outSide. 'enterprise' - for such it is - to stand still led to a decision in 1989 to We're out of touch with re�l life. pursue a massive growth project: in order, as coordinator Roger Kelly put it, to 'offer our visitors in the nineties a "total experience" This is a fre quent charge, which outsiders usually level at com­ involves all their senses and emotions'. well as upgrading the munes that dare to suggest they might be part of a social change that As exhibits and expanding the there be a centrepiece water­ movement. It was echoed by a member of Redfield: cafe, will powered railway. The whole proj ect is blessed by Prince Charles cliff To change societyyou must live in it. Weju$l createour own society and the Welsh Tourist Board and supponed by a £1m issue on the here. Stock Exchange and the attainment of 'public limited company' statuS (Blackwell 1990). While most CAT members have some Now we will explore how much this is true or whether there is in misgivings about this 'Disneyfication' project, many are also acutely practice an attempt at effective outreach to the 'world outside'. aware of being 'out of touch' with their public. 'People are inter­ ested, but they realise it's another tribe's domain'. The complex displays which describe the exhibits have to be radically changed in THE PRACTICE the new scheme, fo r they epitomise this barrier with the public:

Active outreach [7.1-11] They are like books on walls. There are lots ofintellectuals here who make the classic mi stake of assuming that everyone else is at the same Nearly aU our communes' fo unders imagined that their projects level. would in some way impact on wider society as well as bencfitting It's sad that CATians spend so much time living up to their principles those who were part of the group. This would be achieved par­ that they don't have rime for people outside- even the CAT children ticularly through educational projects (see Chapter 4). Today, just don't have a clue what it's all about, they're embarrassed about seven actively pursue Outreach with any vigour, ironically, of the two bringing their mates to the Quarry. most active, CAT and Findhorn, the laner did not start with outreach in mind. CAT's Success in becoming a display centre for alternative Hence the perceived need to put visitors in a more receptive mood technology 'to educate ordinary fo lk' has, on the face of it, been and promote a 'soft' image, though one CATian wanted to sell resounding. 55,000visitors a year go to the site and see examples of 'harder political conclusions on collectivity'. Promoting this side of soft energy generation, organic gardening and fanning, recovery of the Quarry's work is difficult. 'The tT\uh is that simple things like energy and materials from 'waste', and recycling. They may visit the eating together probably contribute more to energy saving than all thriving wholefood restaurant and bookshop - or ask questions the machines we use. But people like seeing new machines and about community and cooperation, though people rarely do this gadgets. You can't put the community on displays', said Roger latter. There are education services - GreIm Teacher magazine is run Kelly. by people connected with the Quarry, and a new complex of CAT also has the same problem as most other communes con­ timeshare chalets is used by schools doing some of their standard cerning relationships with local people. Overcoming a 'hippy in the 12-15 year olds' curriculum studies on the site. There is also a hills' prejudice is exacerbated by the commune's position as an virtually continuous schedule of educational courses _ mainly prac­ 'English' enclave in rural Wales . Some Quarry people think that tical - for schools, colleges and the public. Dulas Engineering relations with the locals are good - there is participation in local develops 'electronics for enviromnentally sound purposes', espe­ music making and the schools - and others think they are bad. 'It cially for the Third World (e.g. portable windpowered battery does not cross locals' minds to come and get our advice on matters sys_ 184 185 ,

COMMUNF.S AND TilE: CREE:NYISION CIIANGING SOCJF.TY, OR BF.:ING CflANGED?

like barn . ,hildren at home), co-counselling, Tai Chi, circle dance and conversions and energy conservation', said one, while th el r others of Loving' , for example. Their twenty-two courses on offer thought there should be open days to promote organic 'The Art fanning February and September 1988 cost between DO d £180 and windmill use by local peopk But local outreach is between effective with Findhom, there was the concern about exclUSIVIty,�� and by comparison with other communes, partly because local eac h . As bringing in enough city people or the underprivileged. Also, people are employed at the Quany and because they generally not with locals are tricky, partly because of the 'tearaway' approve of the influx of tourists attracted by CAT. relationships reputation of the original school and partly because the courses do Of the other 'outreach' communes considered here, Findhorn, M nkto not appeal: 'Our one-day workshop on aromatherapy for locals was � n Wyld, Lower Shaw and Laurieston produce a plethora of . not successful. Reichian therapy is threatening to the man in the resldennal courses in deep eJ:clogy, therapy and healing, creative street'. But efforts are made; a winter solstice ceilidh and ajumble arts an related themes. To a large extent they are, unlike CAT, � sale had brought people in. preachmg to the converted, as many of their members admit. Laurieston and Lower Shaw told similar stories. The fo nner's Findho ' ou each efforts are prodigious. The outreach , depart­ �� � 'People Centre' ran twenty fo ur counes in 1988 (costing from to ment s bnef IS to share the Findhorn principles with wider society'. £50 It £180) on Gay Men, Selfheal Training, Polarity Energetics, Reichian promotes specialist publications (books and calendars) and a range Bodywork, The Wildman Within and Deep Ecology. By no means of ew Age paraphernalia. The audio-visual department promotes wn� was there total beliefin this outreach attempt, which partly involves ng for TV and film to publicise the message, and 'New Age mU�lc'� merely malcing premises available to outside groups, and when our products. For visitors, there are youth programmes, tours, fa interviews were occasionally punctuated by the fa r-off sound of mtly weeks or caravan holidays. And on 'experience weeks' 'living in the visiton' 'primal screaming' this provoked mirth. Some commu­ co munity' months and being a 'departmental gu st' you wry could pa � : nards here, and elsewhere, fe lt that !, m 1988, £165 or 050 or £125 respectively, fo r the privilege fspen dl llg t least half yourtime working for your board and keep. ? . more than outreach, it's important to preserve our way oflife. I'd Work IS an mtegral� part likr ofJife here, through which many spiritual others to do it but I don't want to proselytise it, or spend more time I ssons are I amt', says the brochure, perhaps warding off objec­ defending my way oflife. I don't want lots of new people looking at nons.� 'For � thIS reason the working sessions are an integral part of the UJ. I get fed up of explaining and repeating myself. programme'. Other central parts of the educational outreach arethe two This does however contrast with those, particularly in the low- or international conferences per year, and the residential work­ no-outreach group, who mainly felt endangered by isolation, and shops and course . There were twenty-three of these in springl � wanted outreach. In addition, Lower Shaw people, who again summer 1988, cosnng £175 to £350, on topics like 'Nuclear Energy: New fac ilitated but did not organise their courses, fe lt encroached on by Clear Energy', 'Creating Your Reality', 'Oevas, Fa Own iries and Angels', suburban Swindon. 'We've lost country, fields and privacy. A pagan 'Being a Couple' and 'Listening to Love', as well as on dance, song, art and theatre. men's group with ritual, drums and way out things is not now so The ob possible'. But there is a desire to relate locally, which the yoga, �ect is to demonstrate 'what it is like to work every day with love and light'; however, 'we're massage and shiatsu, craft, meditation and circle dance weekends open to anyone, but a lot can't afford (nine in spring 1988 at to £40 each) do not do. to come to us'. Mindful of this, some interviewees were unhappy £30 about Lifespan's outTeach used to hinge mainly on hosting visiton - 150 exclusivity and fe lt a need to reach out to 'Mail and Sun rea per year - and working in Sheffield's fe minist, anti-nuclear and anti­ �er:' �y spe lcing to them without jargon, and generally 'inter­ �a clng soclety-� not to mention racist groups. But now there is a 'lack of time' - a constant theme Wlth influencingmass building finns like here because of the energy needed for the printing business. This at Barratt and Wimpey: 'Get them here cooperating with nature and building ecologically sound homes'. least enables other radical groups to publicise their message, but Monkton y d's ourses re similarly spiritually fo cused on deep now conventional economic pressures mean that some work is taken ecology, reblrthmg,� � �Education� Otherwise' (helping people to teach on which is considered unethical. 186 187 COMMUNES ANO TilE CREEN VISION CIIANGINC SOCIETY, OR BEING CIIIlNCED? Something similar partly applies to ZAP. In • 1990, nearly three IS years after the first interviews O r purpose 0 sel an example to those outside in the move 10 a there, we learned more u of abol t irs shift d I ISr Cd Britain but we're so busy keeping ourselves fo cus. The desire to change l voluntary, ecena-a ' sOciety towards 'green economics' . . remains, but the educ.ational gOlflg we don't have the tIme. programme is much diminished. ing fo od is now Seil_ d the means whereby it We nee more social contact wi th outside. is hoped to diven money away fr om the mainstream market economy and . into ciliries like ours should be used by the local commumry. native' the infonnal, 'alter_ Fa sector. The outlets are . a wholefood cafe in Binningham Wl JO (low-cost vegan and We should be less insular, a'ld have peop Ie ·th · bs who are changlflg vegetarian, for people without and a travelling much money), the world staying here. catering business, selling at fe stivals (such Ifl I en . al Glastonbury) and other gatherings, as Here, I'm almost bac k· 'he rut which was in in conv tion like motor-bike ralJies. Most the fo od is 'ethical', much of society. Coming from ZAP's own a1lobnents. there is less fa stidiousness But here than thereused to And there .S th e penistent reference to concem , these rural chocolate be (see Chapter 5); I . in bars are now a sideline. and some fo od comes centres, about the relanons h'tp WI·th the locals. Some people are not cans. Much attention from tin is fo cused on making money. ovenly worried: exploit themselves, The core group aiming to pay themselves to use profits a basic wage and then to support other cooperatives T de drugs in the 'Radical Routes' he hippy image haunts us. We use and people outside don't network. At Manchester there is veganic gardening, at Northampton respeci this. a collectivelyrun school, in Hull a house restoration unempl�yed Concernfor the Olhcrs arc worried: and homeless. And the original purpose of buying more houses to add to the network also remains. . Wit Outreach We have a negative. Im ge . h s0 e people round here. It's pardy our among the other communes � ",l A is sporadic and sometimes fault: we've e ed a h r puta on lot of the original people half-heaned. arn iPPY c . 'When people visit and - trtl m know us, bits of what we're dressed b ad1 y Earth mother stu ,ragge d cJo. es There has been no doing rub ofT on them' t , . was a typical but to SOCla eXI here which is conservative. question lame reaction to attempt face up 10 the . I con Or there was commonly this with p.111· reference to interaction the community through sending Over the decades the balance of opinion about the desirabili children to the local school, . .. : where the commune children meshmgmWllh conven ti nalsociety hasprobablyswung away t7ro can be regarded suspiciously . school mates. by their 0 d �"atofthe second-part But most people in this group IheperspectIve of he fi rs t statement towar 5 m conceded that they do � . less than the original fo unding ofa larger process m the lenSlon be tween changing society and being group intended, or that anyway community is there principally the changed by it to benefit the people . outsiders. Crabapple's in it and not wholefood shop in slightly Shrewsbury centre is different, being seen as a 'publicity Nudging the already-converted centre fo r green values'. Both Crabapple and Redfield have run poorly-attended . . On the whole open days. Evidence is shght that the outreach communes areactually changmg the groups are too busy with the need • and eam to survive daily many people ,.s VIews or 1 estyles beyon d.u.L elr doo"".� . The two major enough money to keep going. Hi involved Individuals do still get Communes, Fmdhorn. a CAT rovided interesting contrasts in with local pressure groups, � but this has fa llen off, and � The fo rmer's members were about actively supporting ideas their attitude towards thiS Issue (9 .1 ). urban political movements . . . . . P-2. dered have floun­ oficn initially qUlle certam and stnd ent m. asse."":ngu that they wcre through the problem oftransport . to and from a rural location. affecting people: . a pos ·tion wh' IC h owe d lottically from their A sense ofisolation and guilt at 1115 . r II o' all this may persist: � dh . ns10 became circumspect when millenarianism. B�t even In omla probed about their effect on the and paltern of social change . Communities like this should . be in cities and be Thus: 'Humanity is on the verge maJ evolutionary step' is oriented. mote politically a fo llowed by 'bul we do appeal to a 0�very sma�; , select group', and 'A 188 189 CIIANGING SOCIETY, OR HEING C1fANGED? COMMUNf.:SAND THE GRE"·'" )'/5101\' days later like lambs - if not convened, at least more big shift in consciousness is happening on the planet' becomes, on leave a few and curious. fu nher reflection, 'Maybe I'm changing and nothing else is'. Of open-minded the latter state ofmind that people should visit It is perhaps only in cou e, many visito� and Students on the courses do pass through � communes. The well-known phenomenon of 'viSitor the site annually. ThiS provokes some optimism that 'nomlal every_ most orner coupled sometimes with an outward appearance of day people, from housewives to kids to businesspeople from the US alienation', unkempt premises, could otherwise turn offthe uniniti_ and Europe' are being affected, and that 'it's spreading- the people scruffy and Once sympathetic visitors do come, the analysis we who come here say they're working on fr iends and relatives'. But ated for ever. Wyld seems to hold for the communes: Others are aware ofa large 'preaching to the convened' element, and heard at Monkton all th �t 'the people who come here are limited to white, well-educated Wc gct a lot offeedback from people who go through personal change middle classes'. Perhaps most typic..1 of this commune was the after conling here. We're having an cffect. We haven't changed wider response: 'The evidence is in the way I have changed _ but I also see society mueh but have made visitOfS thinkabout their lives. And people people changing and growing around me ...I hope for the hun­ respond to our example by asking to live here, or coming as dredth monkey thing'. volunteen. We influenee them on lots of small points, like income Quarry members were far less sanguine and more down-to-earth sharing, which they see can work. about their experiences with a less select public. And CAT was the But, the important rider to ..11 this is that it concerns 'people alrtady only commune to have attempted some market research. Their view looking in our direction. We give them a nudge'. Anything more of this was laced with typical Quarry downbeat humour. 'We have than this seems unrealistic, pious hopefulness and a minority view. cards that visitors in voluntarily. This produces a totally biased fill For example: sample of interested, articulate people who like filling in cards'. . Eight out often responses had said 'interesting' and were positive, The very of our community must have made some marginal txisttnct but the Quany people's concern was more about those who had not di fference. fille in cards. 'On the whole I'm sure people don't like, respect or I'm setting an example to the people who know me. admue� our work ...I've overheard things and seen the way people look. We have done surveys, but people are too polite'. 'We don't If we fe lt it wun't having any good effecrwe wouldn't be doing it. impinge in the slightest on people who control our lives. except perhaps Prince Charles', said one, but another pointed out, cor­ recdy, that establishment and decision makers are now more 6rnu BEING CHANGED, 'THATCHERISATION' OF THE receptive to alternative technology than when the Quarry started. COMMUNES The renewables debate is on the agenda and CAT has certainly played a role in it, panly through constantexposure on the media, as this study progressed, an aspect ofthe dia1ectic of soci..1 change witness the increasing market for CAT's products. As became clearer. the interplay of opposites which move society The view that 'this is just a Mecca for the converted' is probably In through change - the interaction of the 'thesis' and 'antithesis' - the too harsh and lessjustifiedhere than for any other of our communes. wisdom and lifestyles of conventiona1 society are at odds with those Certainly, our own ten-year experience of taking classes of under­ of the counterculture. But because this is a di..1ecrical relationship graduates on short courses to the Quarry suggests that irs members between the two, they are constandy a£fecting and are, indeed, part have great talent for reaching out to 'ordinary', un-green and . � of each other. Hence, in this issue ofsocial change we cannot merely SUSpiCIOUS people. This is achieved through a mixture offrankness examine how much communes might change wider society: we seeing issues fr om the perspective ofthe conventional wisdom bu must also consider the reverse, a 'counter-revolutionary' process quietly insisting on the need for change, admission of obvious� Where communes may change in sympathy with trends in conven­ human fr ailty and respect fo r others. The greal majority of the tional society. By analogy, we have seen how the resurgence of'free' students approached CAT over this period as bigoted lions, only to 191 190 COMMUNES AND TilE GREEN YISION CIIANGING SOCIETY, OR BEING CHANGED?

described both by reference to a previous rime spent living in market liberalism in the 1980sset the agenda for its opponents in the political mainstream, as witness the ludicrous and embarrassing Crabapple from 1980to 1984. On the plus side: ideological contortions of Kinnockite Labourism to capture the 'middle ground'. So too has the agenda of the counterculture There were good exciting things about it. You could work through fr ustrations and the chaos filth and trap. There was a fe eling of pig changed in the eighties, mirroring the shift in the 'centre of gravity' , shit and tontennnenl. You had to be involved in the basics like of political debate. A trend that we can conveniendy call tooking. There was caring and nunuring and people gOttogether to Thatcherisation' has set in. share problems. Sharing was a maner of coune. We noted fo ur main related elements of this trend, reflecting directions in mainstream society. They are privatisation, rampant Then bad fe elings crept in. They were individualism, materialism and profit seeking via managerial effi­ ciency. Of course, such trends can partly be accounted for by the to do with penonal irritation between fo lk and petty irritations - the attainment of 'late youth/middle age' by a substantial group of 'top of the toothpaSte syndrome' - and lack of privacy. I couldn't move without telling another dozen people why. And felt resentful about communards, for as most of us get older, radicals or not, we are more I having to share income with people who di d not work as much as me. drawn towards creature comforts. But a substantial part ofthe trend seems to relate to the ideological direction of wider society. Similarly, after the communal phase at Laurieston, people

Privatisation andindividualism fe lc constrained and wanted to be individuals. Most people didn't like each other very much. The worker did not like the lazy penon; the Many communards have tended to withdraw from the 'public' to the single penon did not like the family. 'private' realm. This partly means a retreat from the high political­ ideological profile of the fo unding wave and its evangelising intent And there had been a gradual slippage where people fo und it to change society. It also means a 105s of collective activities, fo cus­ 'more convenient' to work outside fo r cash rather than in the ing more on the importance of the individual and relegating ele­ community. People no longer wanted to fo llow socialist principles ments of community and sharing. and eliminate income disparities. The new liberalism was encapsu­

The most marked example of the latter has been at Laurieston, lated by one Lauriestonian who had joined when she was sure it was which stopped being a commune and cooperative 1987 and not going to be a commune, on the grounds thatshe did not want to in became solely a cooperative. At that rime eleven people lived as the share income with those who lacked the same 'money sense' as her. commune within the wider housing coop, sharing income, and six and another who said, 'We're cooperative, not communal. We're others lived in the spacious grounds of the large house or its fr ee as individuals - free to drive our own car'. outbuildings, non-communally. But six commune members On our firstvisit in the experimental year, 1988, communality was 'wanted their own car, and not to income share or eat communally still clearly apparent, with fifty per cent of meals being taken all the time or have rotas', we were told. The process ofbreakup and together (though there was also a 'sense of relief that 'we can have , change of direction was achieved without the mass exodus which our own breakfast and tube of toothpaste ). On another visit, in 1990, many communes periodically experience, even though some com­ we had the impression ofless communality, with independent living munards (who had already detennined on leaving) did fight to retain units well established in the house, each with separate kitchen and

the commune. 'It was smooth, not catastrophic, through a carefully eating arrangements. Only those who ran the People Centre still organised series of meetings. This was gratifYing. Laurieston's a very took communal meals 10 any degree. mature place with smart, intelligent people. There are no fo ols here'. At Canon Frome, too, people spoke of a retreat from sharing; the It was the culmination ofa gradual process of disenchantment with community had become a collection ofseparate living units, with a 'excessive communality', the advantages of which became taken for common meal only once a week. At Redfield and CAT many meals granted while the disadvantages became magnified. A Lauriestonian are still taken together, as are grand policy decisions. But some

192 193 COMMUNES Arm TilE CHEf-N VISION CIIANe/NC SOCIETY, OR BEINC CIIA NCED?

Redfieldians bemoaned a loss of collective responsibility and pur­ However, others see hypocrisy as extending beyond 'hippies' to pose. 'I thought communal responsibility would be indigenous middle class communards. At Lauriesron we heard: when Ijoined. but it isn't: It's all down to the individual in the end'; They say they'd like to care for the environment but can't afford 'People originally wanted communally to promote ideas, but now, to­ in order to defend their driving to Sainsburys and buying avocados for most, it's just a home'. from Israel. A similar turning inwards 'from changingthe world to therapy and personal relations' was colourfully described at Monkton Wyld: At Lifespan:

Everyone is really into themselves. They have no bloody time for Thinp that are supposed to be important about living here take a anyone else ... [the second-generation communards are) a self­ subsidiary role because we spend a lot of time increasing our standard orienting, free-choosing, ecologically-minded, freedom-living, anti­ ofliving and developing the material fo undation of the place ... This establishment bunch oflayabouu. is obviously what people want. The temptation of money ve strong. Living here is very different from what I imagined isit wouldry be.

Materialism and creature comforts While at Crabapple:

There is growing desire fo r the creature comforts associated with the The fo unders were very anti-materialist - they were more radical than high-consumption lifestyles which radical greens often decry. This us. As wi th most communes, we have moved closer to the society we extends to a deepening concern with appearances, so that 'pig shit' live in. Communes are leu radical but more comfortable places now, and 'contentment' no longer go together. Though still a minority of and more appealing to people ouuide. the communes were tidy and 'attractive' in a way which would appeal to middle class suburban values, some communards across Similarly, at Monkton Wyld, 'ideas of simplicity have changed. It the board hankered fo r such attractiveness: 'look at the state of this was spartan and cheap to visit in earlier days. Now it's comfortable place: it's a disgrace', was heard more than once. and there's no self-sacrifice to principles'. In Laurieston, again, the move to Thatcherite values seemed well Someone who had joined Lifespan from a lesbian separatist advanced: commune noted that 'by comparison, we do nothing here to im­ prove on the patriarchal capitalist culture of conventional society ­ There's a general tendency to more materialism and cash income. we're hooked in to consumerist values. Women here are strong but We've done being fr eaky; we want to be nonnal now. are competing to be more masculine'. I'm not critical about conventional society. In many ways I'm still living in conventional society. Pro6t-making and manl18eriai efficiency While, at Findhorn: We have already noted how ZAP, in 1988, anarchistically rejected We're more establishment. We desire more material thinp and acc::ept conventional market economics. Now, in 1990, it has moved towards that it's OK to make life more comfortable. It helps others to have a acceptance of a perceived need to make profits in order to promote living if you buy things. iln economic thinking which relegates profit-making in favo ur of environmental and social goals. So far so 'good', though ZAP could And at Canon Frome: be treading a well worn path on which the next step, for many other Communes, has come when the 'need' to make money to achieve We don't want squalor, sharing a dirty bath or kitchen. We don't want financial 'viability' has largely taken over fr om the ideological poverty, or to live with free-riding ex-hippies, exploiting people they live with. want material thinp too, but pay lip service to pu rpose. alternativeThty ideas. lience, at Lower Shaw:

194 195 COMMUNf;SAND TilE CREEN VISION CIIANGING SOCIETY, OR BEING CIIANGED?

We now do financially less risky things than we used to. What we have At CAT, however, some members still talk uneasily oftheir basic in common is juSt that we can manage to live here ...There's no purpose having been 'compromised because of the need to make a common ideology now. It's got more huy. Now we are primarily a profit', especially by the Disneyfication scheme and share issue business ...we're very confused ...we don't know what the purpose referred to above: of what we're doing is.

The contradiction for CAT (as for most other communes disc ussed While at Lifespan: here] is that its survival depends on economic success n conventional i teons. So, day to day, ideology is of no benefit. Agreed, The print business success has really confused a lot of people. It's this is ecocapitalism. between CAT come at a tinle when we've started behav.ing in a way which is very and there's not now a lot of difference the Body Shop ... area. acceptable to the state. We're doing exactly what Thatcher's Britain and It's a capitalistic community in a tourist wants us to do, which is running a successful small business, working With thatbusiness opportunity it's doing very nicely. long houn for low wages and not taking any state subsidy. We're no longer idealistic ...realism has set in. For longer serving Quarry people like Peter Harper this retreat from CAT's anarchistic roots has been essential to avoid the failure For some, rejection of state subsidy is largely pragmatic: it is now associated with so many otherseventies radical ventures (Landry et a1 more difficult than a decade ago to get it. For others, the rejection is 1985). He describes how 'things which haven't stood the test of time' more ideological. For instance at Laurieston: have been abandoned, including

There's a part of everyone here which wants things to be more self sufficiency ...radical arcadianism ...deindustrialiution ... commercial. People from a middle class wealthy background, beards and sandals ...don't-need-experts-it's.all.mystification· especially, like to earn cash and thinkit's wrong to get state money. anyone.can-do-anything ...don't·bother-abou t--arganisational­ 'Individual liberty', 'entrepreneurial spirit' and Thatcherism have come structures.things-wil l.work.themselvc:s--out-spontaneously ... to Laurieston. Growing herbs for sale, in a way which erodes capitalists invariably have top hats and cigars and their sale purpose is communality, is the latest idea. to exploit worken.

While at Findhom the 'free' market liberal version of 'taking In their place have been adopted 'ideas or practices we woulan't responsibility fo r your own life' is celebrated: have been seen dead with ten years ago'. They include some very

We're much more part of mainstream society than we used to be: it's Thatcherite elements: not that we've changed so much, the rest of the world is catching up. profits ...interest ...markets and marketing ...the importance of Many Findhomians have left the commune to become indepen­ good management ...the bourgeos vinues of punctuality, i thrift, dent from its income sharing element (everyone gets pocket money order, cleanliness, due process and efficiency (Harper 1990). - £75 a month in 988 plus £35 per child - though some have t private incomes). They live in the local areas as part of the small business While these elements of his list might be part of some green complex attached to the Foundation. 'This is good', said one on­ visions, they could also be interpreted as a reneat from green siter, 'Capitalism grows here'. The associated capitalist fe ature of radicalism - particularly that anarchistic fonn which insists that growth and agglomeration to large monopolies process necessarily as important as end result. This would hold to would, however, be is avoided 'because Findhom capitalism is practised with spirituality, the value of consensus decisions as against 'representative de­ whereas Thatcherism does it without compassion or spirituality'. mocracy', even if'efficiency' is the price to pay. At CAT the fo nner However, Thatcherite language has certainly crept in. 'I want to get still ostensibly holds for major decisions, but Harper places the latter outto people beyond here, to market the product', said the producer on his 'acceptable' list. It certainly seems that in many communes of New Age music albums: 'You've got to put entertainment in the POWer has devolved from the consensual mass meeting to specialist message'. 'departments', 'topic groups' or whatever. This may have been

196 197 COMMUNES AND TilE GREEN YISION

necessary for good management, but it may also have led down a slippery slope towards Thatcherite notions of power being accept­ able - as is obviously so in the response of one Lauriestonian, which CHA PTER 7 might have been scripted by the Iron Lady herself: vanguard for Ecotopia? You shouldn't worry ifsomeone has more power than you. Power is A responsibility, it's work, it's energy. You certain fo lks to take nati responsibil ity. We allh ave our little places.

We have fo und that the ('olmmunes we visited do have Over­ whelmingly green values and attitudes which they do try to put into practice. Therefore communes could be a significant, even major, part of a green society- ofEcotopia. But they probably will not be so, nor are they likely to constitute a leading edge in any move towards radical social change. Chapter 4 showed that when these communes were set up, mostly in the seventies, many of their fo unders shared the concerns of the time about imminent environmental crisis and limits to growth. Such concerns were part of the first wave of post-war popular environmentalism - an outgrowth of peace, hippy and other sixties countercultural movements, of which the second wave came in the mid eighties. The fo unders generally saw their communes as part of a trend of needed social change towards a greener society, a trend that also implied more social justice and better social relations. such, they As echoed the nineteenth and early twentieth century back-to-the-Iand movements, with their emphases on organic fa nning and gardening, self-sufficiency, holistic lifestyles and mysticism, mixed with in utopian socialist or anarchist ideas. Though anti-urban, the seven­ ties communards were not escapist romantics, as wimess the strength of theirintent to set up educational centres: they wanted to proselytise with their ideas and their example. Since then, with successive waves of newcomers and a fa l) in the numbers recruited, evangelising zeal and ideological intensity dissi­ pated, while the importance ofindividual fu lfilment through escap­ ing the alienation of mainstream society - especially the nuclear fa mily - increased. In the late eighties there was a fu rther drift tOwards loss of collectivity and sharing. the rise of private over public domains. and a perceived need to earn a financial surplus, some of which would be spent on increasing creature comforts. Despite, or as part of, these changes, the communards have some very green

199 198 A YANCUARD FOR ECOTOPIA? COMMUNES .4NI) TilE GREEN YISION Most no longer have a clearly defined ideology of which they ideas, and have been strongly influencedby green writers and media constitut a lived example. nor do they worry much about ideologi­ coverage. They strongly support radical ecocentric positions on � cal coheston. There are advantages for internal relationships in not human-nature interdependence and ethical treatment of nature. doing 50. but it is correspondingly less clear to the outside world Other popular green ideas - of environmental crisis and oflimits to what they are trying to achieve. growth, tinged with Gaia, mysticism and anti-urbanism - are also Related to this is a fo urth criterion of effectiveness: how much will wi dely held. people sacrifice individuaJ desires for a collective goal? By and large. And there is an impressive list of ecologically sound practices the 'p �ssessive individuaJism' and shunning of collectivity which, which most communards have some commitment to (see Table 16). accordmg to Abrams and McCulloch, sixties communities dis­ They try to be environmentaUy aware in what they do, while their played, reasserted itself in the late eighties. This is part of a poten­ institutional context of sharing and low material lifestyles also tiaUy major weakness which the communards seem to share with militates in fa vour of ecologically sound practices. much of the wider green movements. This lies in their theoretical and practical approach to social change. As Chapter 6 shows, it is THE POTENTIAL FOR CHANGING WIDER SOCIETY idealist rather than materialist, so it emphasises changing people's ideas and values and relegates the importance of changing, for the majority in society, the material reality on which those values are However, by their own admission they often fa ll short in living up to fo unded. It also favours non-structuralist, behavioural! this awareness. As ever there are particular difficulties with what we psychological explanations of what is wrong, which revolve around call 'second order' environmentally sound practices to do with assumptions of hubris and original sin, rather than interpreting harmonious, loving, peaceful and cooperative social relations. All conventional anti-social anti-ecological values and behaviour more this constitutes one form ofimpediment to being effective agents for in terms of their supporting social and economic structures. And it social change. It means that the 'example' which communards might regards the individual rather than the collective as the fu ndamental want to give to wider society (of course. some of them do not unit of social change. Some objections to this idealist-individualist_ particularlywant to provide an example but others do) is diminished consensual approach have been outlined in Chapter 3. in its exemplariness. Therefore their credibility as part of an Ecoto­ etweaning individualism seems paradoxical for people who pian blueprint is also lessened. . O: lIVe m communes. But it is understandable when one recalls the Secondly. we find that contact with a wider audience through middle class liberal backgrounds and upbringing of so many com­ effective outreach is generally lacking. This is the same problem munards. and that, inevitably, people will bring with them to the which Rigby identified in the seventies. he said. it stems partly As collective life the attitudinal baggage of their previous conventional from a fa ilure to channel enough energies into making connections existence. The privateness of that existence with its counter­ with other radical social change movements (such connections seem revolutionary implications are captured in Sennett's (1978 pp4-6) to have diminished), and partly through being so thin on the ground eloquent prose: that there is not enough person power left over from the pressures of daily living to spare fo r concerted outreach. a Glaneitw commu­ As Each person's selfhas become his principal burden: to know oneself nard succinctly put it: ha� become an end, instead of a means through which one knows the world ...The obsession with person ar the expense of persons is like a Glaneirw. Canon Frome, Crabapple -we're all suffering from lack of filter which discolours our rational understanding of �odety; it people. This problem ofinsuiTlcient support must be solved before obscures the continuing importance of class in advanced industrial communes can play their rightful pan in leading the way to a new society; it leads us to believe community is an act of mutual self d society. �sclo�ure ...Masses of people are concerned with their single life hiStones and particular emotions as never before; this concern has A fu rther criterion of effectiveness as agents for social change proved to be a trap rather than a liberation ...Western societies are moving from something like an other-directed condition to an inner- concerns ideological clarity. Here again, the communes fa ll short.

200 201 COMMUNES AND rUE GREEN VISION A VANCUARD FOR ECOTOP/A?

directed condition except that in the midst ofself-ab sorptions no­ indeed conducted very much within these bourgeois parameters. - one can say what is inside. [This is aJ romantic search for self­ This was especially true where New Ageism was prominent. Here realisation. there may well be what Sennett calls a 'discoloured' sense of com­ munity based over much on 'mutual self disclosure' and a world view Sennett (PplO-ll) describes the state of narcissism which 'enters posited on the self as starting point, i.e. on the liberal values of the systematically and perversely' into conventional Western human conventional culture. Thi� was the essence of objections which the relations. It is an obsession, in dealings with others, with the ques­ doing-things-together school raised against the relationships-by­ tion: 'What does this person, that environment, mean to and it is mt', exploring-feelings school: the first desired relationships based on part of a search for selfidentity. Hence relations of communality with collective action, the second emphasised collective being and the strangers for social ends are not really possible. Group activity and abandonment of social-economic 'text' (Sennett p238). identity, every time, is 'perverted by the psychological question': that is, people cannot relate unless they get to know each other as persons, or individuals. This process involves acts of reciprocalself ­ THE CLASS PROBLEM revelation, mutual 'open-ness' through disclosure of intimate details about the self, and the like. Without them, relationships cannot This study also supports Abrams and McCulloch's findings about proceed. Impersonal relationships seem to offer nothing of value. the class background ofthe communards. and confirmsthat they feel Sennett points out that this is a process analogous with 'market alienated fr om capital but lack affinitywith labour and its tradition of exchange' where one is calculating one's own benefit all the time, a collective political action. Again, there is a strong parallel with the process based on the same assumptions as material exchange in wider green movement. capitalist society. Seabrook (1990 p12) also thinks this, and he draws Scott (1990 pp145-7) describes the paradoxical nature of this for attention to the very vocabulary of this perversion of human rela­ greens who are, he says, largely third-generation displaced working tions under market liberal philosophy. It resounds with notions of class. They are from relatively privileged but not over-wealthy market exchange: we talk of the 'returns' we get from relationships, backgrounds, and highly educated; but lacking power and excluded and whether they pay 'dividends' or are 'profitless'; of our 'stock' fr om political negotiation. In neo-corporate states like Britain (and with others and our 'assets' oflooks or brains; and indeed whether even more strongly on the European mainland), Scott says, power we are in the 'market' for an affair. This is perhaps not t ti ch g m ns aft srili lies largely with groups such as industrialists or trades unionists. communality, but gtselIschaJt: seeking a mutually beneficial contract Decision making is still technocratic, based on what has been a stable with others, and like all contracts there is u�ually an expiry date, and agenda fo ralong time (in which economic growth is the main item). we look over our shoulders to see ifwe should have got, or could get, Real disagreementhas been swallowed up in the apparent consensus a better deal elsewhere. It is not that enriching synthesis of the self between narrowly circumscribed groups fr om capital and labour. with others which true communism is about. To the extent that Excluded groups therefore tend to mobilise at grass-roots level. there is a sense of collectivity -it is what Sennett calls - agemeinsdwft Having a high proportion of tertiary sector white collar profes­ 'destructive based on collective rather than collec­ gemeillsc!wft': btillg sionals, they make up pressure groups on behalfof a range of causes: tive action in pursuit of true economic class interest. civil rights, women's liberation, peace and ecology - what sociolo­ The narcissism of such relationships, says Sennett, is also under­ call 'new social movements'. And they fe ed into the new lain by insecure notions of selfjustificarion and ratification: concern gists 'classless' political parties like the Liberal Democrats and Greens, with the question 'Am I good enough/adequate in the eyes of and into others?' And this, he fu rther points out, is the 'most corrosive the lifestyle movement ofwhich communes are an ultimate expr element of the Protestant ethic', far removed fr om any 'alternative', ession. P more liberating set ofvalues. erceptively, Scott suggests that their predilection for green cau We came away fr om many (but not all) interviews with the ses is strongly rooted in ecology's anti-industrialism, which is impression that many personal relationships in communes were therefore anti the main actors in capitalist industrial society and pro

202 203 COMMUNE:SAND THE: GREEN VISION A VANGUARD �'OH ECOTOPIA? the new middle classes. In Ecotopia, by contrast, these people - which produces social change. The problem arises, however, when academics, teachers, carers and community activists and planners ­ that process goes a stage fu nher, and the counterculture is actually would effectively be the most politically influentialpeople. If Scott's nullified - coopted or gobbled up - by its opposite. Bookchin (1980 materialist analysis is right, then, it is no coincidence that so many pp12-13) put it thus: writers and commentators on green issues finish their works by stressing the need for more research, education and caring, and that The market has absorbed nOt only every aspect of production, consumption, community life and fa mily ties into the buyer-seller these activities should have more status and financial recognition. nexus; it has penneated the opposition to capitalism wi th bourgeois Take, for instance, the call which Trudgill (1990), a soils and en­ cunning, compromise and careerism. It has done this by restating the vironmental researcher and academic, makes for more research and very meaning of opposition to confonn with the system's own teaching as the Iynchpin of a strategy to solve environmental parameters of critique and discourse. problems. Scon's conclusion is that, paradoxically, new social movements Radical ecocentrism does constitute 'opposition to capitalism', and like the greens will be agents for social reform, but not tral1Jjormlltiol1. many elements of the capitalist philosophy of market liberalism are For although they seem to challenge society's whole basis, they do now being taken on board by at least some communes. The logical not really do so. Instead, they articulate the grievances ofexcluded corollary of this is that such communes no longer constitute opposi­ groups in an attempt to end their exclusion and gain acceptance. tion to capitalism. They have abandoned their original intended role This being so (and it is a moot point), integration into mainstream as part of the counterculture to capitalism. society and the ultimate disappearance of the movement would There seem to be three stages by which such a position is reached: become the criterion, not of failure, but of success. 1. Intent to bypll5S Ihe system by setting up an alternative social and Where communes might fit into such an analysis is fu rther dis­ economic organisation as self-sufficient and independent as possible below. But we have indeed fo und that their effectiveness as cussed fro m mainstream society. This anarchist approach intends that agents of social transfo rmation rather than refonn is questionable. mainstream society will ultimately be brought down and changed For reasonsweD documented elsewhere (Weston 1986, Ashton 1985, through more and more people joining in the bypassing processes. Ryle 1988, Dobson 1990), their politics ofwanting to by-pass rather For this to happen it is held essential that revolutionary thought and than confront the powerful economic vested interests that are in­ deed will not be compromised by any attempt to make a financial grained in socio-political structures are not likely to destroy those surplus to sustain daily life. Any discomforts, practical fa ilures or interests. incompetences which stem fr om this lack of'realism' are deemed a More than this. however, we have already seen that a process of fa ir price to pay fo r preserving an ideal. assimilation, if not total integration, is in fact happening. 2. Intent to list the system as a means to subversive ends. This can mean a range of things, from drawing social security benefits to working ASSIMILATION INTO CONVENTIONAL SOCIETY on purely income-generating proj ects while also working towards the ultimate goal of overthrowing the paternalistic state and the materialistic society which it supports. At this stage there is still a Perhaps the greatest potential barrier to communes acting as agents clear vision ofends, although it is convincingly and rationally argued for radical rather than refonnist social change towards an Ecotopian that compromises are necessary and justified in the cause of an society is the process whereby they become absorbed into conven­ ultimate revolution which may take a long time before it comes tional society, that culture to which they have previously run about. counter. We have discussed how it is inevitable and appropriate that any 3. Less consciously, perhaps. becoming part of the syslem through counterculture will be coloured by the mores of its opposite - acti ng increasingly in response to its demands, so that eventually the 'conventional' or 'mainstream' society - in a dialectical interaction values of the system are taken on. As Chapter 6 suggests, a growing

204 205 •

COMMUNES AND THE CHEEN VISION A VANCUARD FOR ECOTOPIA? realisation of a 'need' to generate financial surplus to achieve things, zeal occasionally experienced elsewhere in the world. But it is by no together with a more down-to-earth tiring of constant material means an exclusively British phenomenon. deprivation - these have played their part in 'Thatcherising' the Take, for example, the kibbutzim in Israel. They started in 1909, communes. and developed as attempts at new fo nns of human settlement; Some have completed this Animal Farnr-like sequence and have socialist collectives based on the ideas of social justice, self­ accepted the liberal values of rampant individualism, profit chasing, detennination and self-motivation, with no bosses, no wages and abandonment of sharing and collectivity, and privatisation. common ownership of the means of production. Many of their One communard described communes as now 'divided between intended fe atures were similar to those highly regarded by seventies the more radical left/green types and those which have become ecological communes: participatory democracy, lack of hierarchy, privatised'. Another confimled that process basically involves a this people before profits (e.g. willingness to employ aged people even left-right political distinction: though this reduces 'efficiency1, the extended family/tribe and small-scale organisation (humility before nature or respect for wo­ The socialists wane a caring community and say we should take responsibility if something goes wrong with the individual: men were not conspicuous, however). Their claim was to have conservatives sympathise, but say they have their own problems. They created a society without class, poverty, crime, unemployment, have pulled out fr om collectivity, own can and houses and go on homelessness or snobbery, and in the 19805 this prospect attracted holidays. 128,000 people to live on 280 kibbutzim. Now, however, much of this has changed and the kibbutzim have increasingly taken on the Of the communes studied here, Glaneirw and PIC seem to be fea tures of the society in which they are set (BBC 1989). The original somewhere between stages and 2, Redfield and Crabapple are at t stage 2. Lifespan, CAT, LSF, Monkton Wyld and Findhom are desire, to change that context, has gone, and people join largely to fu rther along, between stages 2 and 3, and Canon Frome and enhance their own quality of life, as an escape from a competitive Laurieston have virtually arrived at stage 3. The lastmoved percepti­ and soul-less urban life. Longstanding communards assert that bly 'rightwards' in the less than two years between our original visit among this new generation the original cause has become an embar­ and a revisit in 1990, while in the same period ZAPalso moved, from rassment, and real socialism and community aredisappearing. Most stage towards stage 2. kibbutzim have become materialistic, and increasingly part of the t The implication is that those at stage 3 are no longer actors in the surrounding economy (hiring outside workers for cash, for movement to establish a radical ecological society, while the group of example). five communes behind them could soon cease to be. This does not Many kibbutzniks complain about working too hard for insuffi­ imply that they not continue to play a part in social rtJonn. will cient money, but they may have their own private sources and bank Findhom, Monkton Wyld and LSF, for instance, may successfully accounts. Indeed, some groups are trying to save their kibbutzim occupy a niche in the green consumer/Nc:w Age movements, from bankruptcy or lack of new members through individual incen­ usefullyhelping to 'clean up' capitalistsociety, especially spiritually. tives. No longer are people 'confined' by a pocket money system, CAT may perfonn a similar role, though at the more practical and they can earn wages for doing at least part of their fo nnerly unpaid technological end. As such, its acceptance into the bosom of the ork. implicationsare heretical, involving rejectionof a collec­ establishment may be aU the quicker (see Dobson 1990 ppI47-9). '; The ve Perhaps it has already arrived: PLC status and the £1m share offer in � disciplin� in fa vour of the needs and wishes of individuals. 1990 were augmented by the ultimate in assimilation: a July Sunday ndeed, one kibbutz now earns money fr om a fa shion and costume morning slot on comfortable, middle class Radio 4's 'Week's Good design business and holds fa shion shows fo r its own members catering _ Cause' appeal. (It did however net £8,000, which no sane revolution­ for individual wants to an extent that was previously shun­ ary would sneeze at!) ned and regarded as ideologically unsound. The parallels between Assimilation ofopposition is, par excellence, a process used by the all this and the individualism, privatism and conventionality now British establishment to avoid the excesses of popular revolutionary appearing in our sample of communes (Chapter 6) are obvious.

206 207 COMMUNES AND THE CREEN YISION A VANCUARD FOR ECOTOPIA.? though thcy large y ac ept arx's analysis CO��IUNESAND THE NEW SOCIAL MOVEMENTS . . ! � � of capitalism. In particu­ lar, there IS dl ssallsfacnon With the notion DEBATE of the working classes as social change agents (see, for instance, Gorz 1982). Some have therefore rejected class analysis in Marxist terms, without All of this is of considerable interest to social change theorists. As necessarily or totally rejectingMarxism's structuralistapproach or its 'modern­ Chapter 2 demonstrated, academic writers on green issues have ist' search for laws and principles of social change: they include the queued up in the past to hail communes as harbingers of eco­ so-called 'neo-Marxist' or 'Frankfurt' school, whose theoreticians Nirvana. And, sometimes embarrassingly, many still do it. Thus include Marcuse, Habermas and Touraine. (Others such as Smith Young's (1990) came out just when CAT's POJt-EnllirOl1melllaiism (1984) perhaps rightly refute the notion that these are in any sense share issue was getting maximum media exposure: however that Marxists, since they reject Marxism's central tenets of class analysis book described alternative communities, particularly CAT (PIc), as and conflict.) testimony 'to the survival and re-growth of an inherently subversive To this school, new soci31 movements are (or are to become) the ideology in the minds of the Chernobyl generation' (p175). The prime agents of soci31 change, replacing the working class in this author wrote: 'A large number of experimental and educational rolc. Scon (ppl6-23) gives a detailed definitionof new social move­ organisations in Western societydo excellent business undermining ments. They are 'primarily soci31 or cultural in nature and only the ethos of capitalism. The Centre for AlternativeTechnology ... secondarily, at political'. This means that they arc less con­ if all , is one of the best known'. cerned with politicalpower than with values and life-styles, and they Young could be described as 'post-modernist'. This term means see the struggle as less fo r control over economic processcs than over many different things in different contexts. Here it implies an end to the 'cultural' realm and particularly the production and dissemina­ the search for grand theories of history, and of how social change tion of information and images through the media. They are happens - an end, therefore, to the 'goals and theories of the Enlightenment'. No longer are laws of social motion and change little concerned to challenge the state directly. Their aim is in stead to defend civil society a nst encroachment from the increasin believed in. Rather, the post-modem, post-industrial society will be gai gly lechnocratic state (Touraine), or from 'inner colonisation' by the created by a plurality of groups and fo rces, each operating within state's technocratic substructure (Habennas). their own contexts and not part of any grand movement or design, conscious or unconscious. These groups are seen as not necessarily So their technique is to tty to bypass the state, by 'creating other driven by rational considerations (such as the utilitarian attempt to relation networks which radically oppose the "mass" and its atom­ maximise material wellbeing). Indeed the 'fight ofwomen and gays isarion', and to 'bring about change through changing values and fo r a legitimate social and sexual identity outside the parameters of developing 31ternative styles' and through 'the discursive refor­ life male heterosexual vision and the search fo r alternatives in our mulationofindividual and collectivewills'. Indeed, the distancing of relationship with nature' are regarded by post-modernists as a these movements from politics is seen as a very condition of their 'critical deconstruction of Enlightenment rationalism' (A Huyssen, Success. Instead, they emphasise 'such psycho-social practices as cited in Frankel 1987 p 184). consciousness raising, group therapy, etc: the anempt to create a fr ee Of course, one grand theory of history is that of Marxism, where social and geographical space for cxperiments in life style'. Personal thc conflict between economic classes in society is regarded as the autonomy, 'the personal is political', 'insistence on the indepen­ motor of social change, and the working classes (more strictly the dence of their concerns fr om those of thc male or white working proletariat - those who have only their labour to sell) will play the class' and non-hierarchical, network, grass-roots organisation are major role in instigating the revolutionary transitionfrom capitalism fu rther important principlcs. This 'loose organisation and a fo cus on to socialism and communism. Many social commcntators, while a limited spectrum of issues does not require a high dcgree of they have reacted against the conventional fu nctionalist/pluralist ideological agreement, or agreement on ultimate ends' (p31). model of society which underlies the parliamentary system, have This description quite clearly tallies in detail with the approach also expresscd doubts about this Marxist model of social change, and beliefs of the great majority of those whom we interviewed.

208 209 COMMVl"ES AND TilE GREEN VISIO," A VA,"GUARD FOR ECOTOPlA?

Thus the communards, like the larger green movement, constitute a initially resonates with our view of the communards, fu rther reflec­ . 'new social movement' in the descriptive sense at least. However, tion shows serious disjunctures In particular, the widespread 'Find­ . when one examines the communards in relation to the potennally hornian tendency', with its reconstruction of myth and religious rellolutioll!lry rolt5 ascribed by various theorists to new social move- experience and its stress on 'traditional' communalfextended family ments, the correspondence is less striking. values bucks the rationalist evolutionary trend and strongly em­ . . Marcuse, for instance, believed that new socIal movements In the braces romantic anti-rationality. It may reject state authority, but it sixties, students and other 'privileged groups', were among those cheerfully accepts that of gods like Shiva or Gaia. most oppressed by capitalism's creation of fa lse needs and suppres­ Hence, the theoretical revolutionary potential of new social sion of real needs. Therefore they were most likely to fonn the movements in these various neu- or post-Marxist models is not one vanguard of a new, post-capitalist, unalienated society. Our i ter­ � that we have strongly identified in prilltising communards. Still less views however, showed that most communards. except the Fmd­ would it be possible to see communards as part of a revolutionary horni ns, are very unhappy with the idea of their being part of any proletariat, in any more orthodox Marxist scheme: the majority of vanguard� for social change. . . answers to the questions in Section 8 of our interview schedule rule Touraine's criterion fo r successful soaal movements, those wht this right out. engender social change, is that they should identifywith and fig t�h m One social change (or adjustment) model which might more aptly the interests of a clearly defined social group, should engage With� a fit the communes as they now are (rather than as their fo unders defined enemy, and should have an alternative, not 'regressive', intended) is that offunctionalism/pluralism. In this model society is model of modernity to the technocratic one widely offered . .Not a responsive democratic system made up of a plurality of interest being regressive suggests that the struggle is to cre�te a new soaety, . groups that co-exist in dynamic equilibrium. When one group is not to be integrated and legitimated into the eXlsnng one. Scott particularly dissatisfied, it sets up stresses in the system by articulat­ considers that whereas Poland's Solidarity movement fulfilled ing dissatisfaction and possibly behaving in a subversive way. The these criteria, and was thus successful in Touraine's termS, the ann­� whole system then accommodates in response; some of what is nuclear/ecology movement was not: it failed to meet the first two demanded is granted, and refonn therefore takes place. The pre­ criteria. By exactly the same token, our researches suggest that the communes do not constitute a 'successful' social movement. viously alienated group is now more accepting and accepted. As For Habennas new social movements indicate that there is a suggested above, at least some of the communes, such as CAT, 'legitimation cris s' in late capitalism. Habennas' evolu�onary view Canon Frome, Laurieston, Monkton Wyld and Findhorn, could be i . seen as actors in such a refonnist scenario. They would accord with of history sees it, in a modernist way, as a process of tncreas m ly developing rationality. As a result, libertarian and secular morabty� Scou's view ofnew social movements as groups of alienated middle (which is rational) has gained ground universally at the xp�nse of class people struggling fo r integration into conventional society. At � deference to authoritarianism (which is irrational). Herem hes late the same time,some ofthe counterculture values that communards capitalism's contradiction, for it requires the state to control the embrace are gaining more popular currency in the mainstream economy's mechanisms, and it needs people to kow-tow �o the state, sOciety - alternative technology, 'sound' consumerism and so fo rth. in other words to accept authority from above. Yet ranonal argu­ We can also agree with Scott's representation (P32) of the new ment suggests the need to be self reliant, and not to accept any social movements as ideologically and politically heterogeneous, if authority unchallengingly. New social movements therefore natur­ the communes are anything to go by. This, for Scott, 'produces . ally rebel, and also express disillusionment with the parap ernaha f problems in, and limitations to, the development of new social � capitalism: its fam ilial-vocational privatism, its consumensm� and Its tnovements into the kind of coherent oppositional force which achievement ideology. They embrace what are, for Habennas, the analysts and some movements hope to expect'. This is exactly the 'new politics' of quality of life equal rights and p cipation and same verdict which we have expressed above on the communes in : . . � individual self-realisation. WhIle there IS much tn thIS model that particular.

210 211 COMMUNES AND TilE GREEN VISION A. VANGUARD FOR ECOTQPIA?

MOBILISATION THEORY AND CONSCIOUSNESS· longer apply. It is a society made up of diverse, decentralised, de­ RAISING massified groups which no longer cohere by virtue of socio­ economic class but simply express idealistic unity in vague obfusca­ tions like 'planetary consciousness'. Says Frankel: Scott does appear to believe that the effectiveness of new social movements is increased by dint of a collective consciousness which Socialist society is conceived as a tranquil. simple harmonious answer they fo ster, whereby individuaJs do not simply act so as to optimise to the complex, conflict-ridden. burcaucratised, monolithic and their own advantage: 'free ricling' individuaJism is not nurtured. alienated present. The 'basic commune' basic iu very euence ­ u in Rather, an 'alternative collective will ...takes shape, which provides back to nature, back to basic needs, back to fa ce-to-face relations, back a basis of solidarity and self-identification with the movement'. The 10 small communal experiences and peace ...what is mi ning from individual is bound to the movement through 'cultural practices these utopian longings is an awarencs.s that life may nOI be able to common within social movement spheres, ranging fr om the dis­ become so uncomplicated, so free from culfUnl contnldictions. semination of ahernative infonnarion to consciousness-raising and To Frankel, these post-modernist dreams of the end of conflict fo nns of psychotherapy' that lead to self-understanding. Further­ and ideology in such fo nns as communes are unrealistic.He says that more 'loose social movement spheres provide fr iendship networks. it is one thing to reject the 'negative legacies of the Enlightenment', They guarantee the individuaJ contact with others who are likely to but: share their interests and values' (pp124-S). All this, Scott thinks, helps to mobilise people in the movements It is quite another thing to believe that, once women, and to become more effective sociaJ change agents. 'By providing indi­ gaY' environmentalisu have defined their values and priorities (which is viduals with alternative lifestyles and identities, social movements what communes are about, in a pnctical wayj, all questions of break down barriers to collective action, challenge "civil privatism", rationality, equality, democncy in the public, as well as interpenonal and substitute values of solidarity fo r instrumental rationality'. private spheres, disappear. There seems to be a tendency to believe Our work suggests that communes cannot be perceived in this that,just because social movemenu articulate legitimate values and way. Cultural practices such as consciousness-raising and psycho­ concerns which arc not identical with those of the tnlditional labour movement, then somehow these women, e s etc., are not therapy have been sources of dissent and division rather than group all gays, gre n living in the same society, not encounlering similar problenu ... solidarity, except in Findhom perhaps. Instrumental rarionaJity and civil privatism have been on the increase, with a corresponding We acknowledge the accuracy of this: not to do so is unfair to the perception that collective action has been on the decrease. communards themselves. This, as we have stressed, is because communards are no more capable than anyone else of 'making their own history', to use the Marxian phrase, in a vacuum. Their actions and thoughts reflect the THE PRACTICE: STRATEGIES FOR INCREASING values of the culture they have left, but are still surrounded by. In EFFECTIVENESS Marx's fa mous dictum, 'Human beings certainly make their own history, but they do so not under conditions of their own choosing, Of course it is easy fo r comfortably-off academic 'radicaJs' to be rather under conditions given and transmitted fr om the past'. idealistic; or equaJly for them to be cynical when the theoretical Too many commentators have simply forgotten this dictum. when they have eulogised the communes movement as 'builders of social change potential of communes is not borne out in practice. the new dawn'. Frankel (1987 p178), however, has not fo rgotten it, And those who are sweating it out at the 'doing it' end are entitled to be and he chastises the 'mindless pluralism' of post-modemwriters like correspondingly irked, and to ask: 'What else do you expect? What do you think we do?' Bahro and Tomer and many anarchists, environmentalists, Maoists call and utopian socialists. They fo resee a 'post-industrial' society in 'Very little' is the probable answer. Nearly everyone in the com­ which the old ideological problems, divisions and conflicts no hlunes we visited already works extremely hard and thinks sincerely

212 213 COMMUNES AiVD TilE GREEN VISION A VANCUARD FOR ECOTOPlA?

p but practically about radical environmentalism and righting the otential projects must be evaluated, then, not just fo r their wrongs of mainstream society. But in the end they put a priority on lOoney-making potential, but also for their 'political advantage'; that their own lives, as nonnal people do. As Chapter 4 clearly shows, is, their revolutionary as opposed to reactionary potential. If under­ , they then represent a stride fo rward fo r the movement social change came a very definite second in the priorities of most taken will people when they joined their commune. The improvement oftheir itself, and not just towards a refonned and more effective capitalist own lives came first. It ne::ds to be stressed that in these tenns the system in which the counterculture has unwittingly and unpaid. as communes are, by and large, extremely successful. For most people Landry ef at puts it, done much of the research and development for who have experienced commune life, the experience has been capita1ist finns to come along later and capitalise on (as has been the enriching in some way. Even though they may not have wanted to case in aJternative technology, organic husbandry and consensual put up with the disadvantages of commune life longer. they have management). But when politicaJ advantage to the movement is any often carried with them, on rejoining conventional life. the good unlikely to come, the enterprise must be deemed less justified than effects of their experiences. Hence, in this sense there is no need here when it does and probably not proceeded with. To assess this. a to suggest how communes could be more 'successful'. However, as return to the 'old days' of regular discussions about overall purpose we have also shown, the social change fu nction is also of potential and stTategy has to be contemplated. The absence of these in many interest to a sizeable group of communards. For them it is valid to communes today, while understandable. is a weakness as far as the ask: What call be done to make communes more effective agents in political effectiveness of the communes is concerned. and it is not the green movement's drive to establish Ecotopian society? Two good enough to take aims and ideologies simply as read. This in tum broad approaches are worth mentioning. has implications fo r recruitment strategy. The first is a fonn of the old 'networking' theme, which radical Of the communes we visited, ZAP's work seems most to corres­ movements ofthe sixties onwards always seem to have come up with pond with the approach we have out1ined. For does noework in ZAP as a panacea for all problems. But. as Landry et al (1985) suggest. and isolation, but attempts to build economic solidarity with other - as this is critical, it should first and fo remost be an ecollomicnetwork political partners in the Radical Routes network - the basis of an of near as possible to an 'alternative political economy', capable alternative politicaJ economy. Of course, all the other communes capitalism' in sustaining itself (a) by interaction with the 'sea of (except Findhom, which is pan of its own international network) the network's which it is set. (b) by economic interchange between belong to 'Communes Network'. But reference has already been with other elements of an members and (c) by such interchange made to the moribund nature of this grouping. As the Communes for instance as part of local green currency alternative economy, Movement. its membershipjumped from 24 to 340 people between 1986 - we have been told of one such well systems (see Ekins 1968 and 1971 (Wood 1989 piS). The Movement intended to be a developed system that already exists in the hinterland of one of the ightly -knit fe deral society of communities, and it started a fund to studied here). This network should attempt to maximise t communes buy property. But, says Wood: the communes' potential for economic productivity and generate enough surplus to pay people adequately, so that communards do as a campaigning organisation the Communes Movement petered out not have to be boundlessly energetic, enthusiastic and willing to by 1975. It was besel with organisational, admininralional and financial exploit themselves the time to be effective. Generating surpluses problems, most ofwhich it brought on itself ...In addition, no all by interacting with those afloat in the capitalist sea runs the risk, as cohesing ideolOgical basis emerged upon which a campaign could be we have seen, of ideological slippage, revisionism and eventual based. What the groups had in common was a commimlent to communal living, not a common agreement about what the assimilation. Hence the need always, 'as in political warfare', to be 'Alternative Society' would be like. careful to assess

In truth. the communes do not seem to have been very good at the strategies and tactics of these relationships [with capitalism] in Collective solidarity, as witness a fu rther fa ilure of an attempt to do tenns of how far they allow us to retain economic advantage while extTacting the maximum possible po li tical advantage (Landry p98). what Radical Routes is now trying. In 1981 there was a seven- tr III

214 215 COMMU,VES AND TilE GREEN VISION A YANGUARD FOR [COTOPlA? member network (including fo ur of the communes in this study) Another should be to strengthen the hand of those who mind the called Fairground Cooperative Ltd. According to the prospectus its assets and their ability to increase them. This amounts to working on purpose was, along Mondragon lines, to create; the economic and political structures of society through collective political action. Nothing less suffice. Wall (1990 p63) tellingly will As a secondary housi ng cooperative providing a range of services to its puts it: member coops, including advice on le l and financial problems. ga support for major maintenance or construction projects, and a Green politic s is about collective action. Personal change. heroi c u it pressure group to represent t.;e interests of communes; may appear to its exponents, is not enough. Individuals should support an alternative financial institution in which people can safely invest and empower each other ...Rather than expecting ever greater their savings where they be used to buy cooperative-owned will sacrifices from the unwilling and undeserving, greens should ai m to prope rty; change structures so that living non-exploitatively becomes euier. a fe deration of independent communes.

This means, fo r Wall. working in various grass-roots movements, This project appears to have sunk without trace, fo undering on largely predicated on liberal green politics. However, it must also be that lack of solidarity and sound management which sinks so much necessary to bite the bullet and to build up the affinity with labour radicalism. and its tradition of collective political actionwhich so many greens More, then. would be needed to propel any alternative political and communards are wary of. For this tradition is likely, even today, economy towards a breakthrough to a radical ecological society. A to provide some of that more sympathetic context for communes. second, parallel, approach is needed. This involves working on the ' This applies to local. municipal socialism rather than the national (Otl/txt in which the communes operate to help to transform it into a Labour Party, of course, though as a communards realise, in more supportive political and economic environment. In such an few order to strengthen the fo rmer it is still probably necessary to environment, the need to generate a surplus would not always be support the latter. paramount. This capitalistic sillt qUII of radical 'anti-capitalist' well as working outside the political mainstream, therefore, it non As activity was in fact overcome to an extent in the days of the Greater would be desirable for communards to grit their teeth and overcome London Council. That body subsidised. politically supported, and their antipathy towards working within the conventional political gave a voice and some political power to many countercultural arena, by engaging in a dialogue with the actors in party politics. groups. It allowed them some autonomy, so that they could 'extract pressure groups and. perhaps most of trades unions and com­ all, themselves fr om the prerogatives and priorities of the dominanl munity groups. capitalist system' (Landry III p99). But they have as little time to spend on this as on other fo rms of tt aU Today, from Glasgow to Liverpool, from Bradford to Wales, intensive outreach. Hencethey greatly need reciprocal support from elements of this supportive environment are still there. But both labour and green movements if they arc to be an effective political fo rce. These movements should publicise and subsidise ...many of the [counterculturall groups and proj ects have not what the communes stand for and do. There should also be contin­ in about the economic and political power at thought strategic tenns uous personal contact and liaison between the movements. And their disposal. and so fae have missed the opportunities of mobilising labour and green movements should be more encouragingin public that power in concert. They have at their di sposal a number of pronouncements and policies towards communes and coops. At strategic assets - these include the consumer-based cooperative least the same orders of financial subsidy which are available to supemlarket chain, the 'Co-op', the purchasing power of certain people who set up homes and businesses in the mainstream econ­ Labour-controlled councils, the in vestment fu nds of trades unions. elC. (Landry tr

216 217 COMMUNES AND TilE GREEN VISION A VANGUARD FOR ECOTOPIA?

More collective, materialist and structural perspectives on social economics amply demonstrates. Such action would represent, as change are needed. Unfortunately, as we have said, the wider green Porritt acknowledges in the quotation that introduces this book, a movement, like the communards, tends to shun such perspectives. move leftwards, for by invoking democratic communalism Ecotopia back to a popular theme in socialist utopianism. The extent to which the New Age idealism ofFind hom penneates DI/ harks comers of the green movement is substantial, which is one reason The communes movement could be part of such a move, but our why this book devotes a fair space to describing such ideas. While survey has suggested that at present the drift is in the opposite elements of the 'New Age tendency' are to be admired. on the whole direction, towards becoming part of the society they were originally the critics who describe it as a counter-revolutionary tendency are set up to oppose. This is a problem for those inside and outside the probably correct. Rather than promoting a genuinely new age, it has communes who see them as potentially a leading edge of the radical more to do with sustaining the mores of the existing age. green movement. The dilemma was apdy summed up by a Lau­ riestonian, with whom we leave the last word:

LETTING comruNALlSM SUP To move to the left is difficult- you have to push everyone else. To move to the right is easy - aUyou have to do is opt out of the collective struggle. And in the end you think: 'Fuck it, it's easier to opt The notion that the ecological fu ture will be secured by proselytising out'. with New Age ideas is a weak one. Nor is it likely that many of the public want to fo llow the practical example set by the people will considered in this book, and live in communes. This much is clear fr om the responses of the communards themselves. While it has its rewards. commune life is too difficult for most of us. While it is a 'green' lifestyle. it is not necessarily the most appropriate green lifestyle for most people. Communes could usefully figure more prominently in the green movement for social change. but they will not constitute a leading edge of that movement. Nor they be will major elements of an Ecotopia. Most communards not. think But despite the firmness with which our research has driven us to these findings, such a conclusion seems partly counter-intuitive. For. as Chapters 1 and 2 show, someJorm of collectivity and commu­ nality, ifnot fo rm, is a central part of the green vision. However, tllis conventional society is presently so removed fr omgemtinschDjtthat it is hard to disagree with those communards who believe that only material events like Chemobyl or the build-up of greenhouse gases will give a significant impetus to people to radically change their ways and, simultaneously, their ideas. These events will not be very pleasant, especially fo r those of us who have been spared 'environ­ mental crises' up to now (and since the Industrial Revolution, ifnor before, only minorities, at first in the West and now in the Third World, have not suffered fr om degraded environments). To avoid or mitigate the harmfulness of such events, prior politi­ cal action towards a more communal society seems urgent, as Johnston's (1989) recent analysis of me dynamics of contemporary

218 219 A.PPENDIX I COMMUNES A.ND THE: CREE"� VISION APPENDIX 1

Communes and radical environmenlalism: inlerview schedule

Many of these questions were not asked direcdy, but the answer to them often came out of the convenations. Tile significance oj critical utopian socialism alld communism bears an Section History and type of commune inverse rdation to historical devdopmetlt. In proportion as the 1. 1.1. Could you tell me what you know about the fo unding of this class slmggle develops and takes definite slrape, this ja ntastic modern community and its history? What was the group like who fo unded it these jm rtastic attacks on it lose all stmlding apart jrom tIle comest, - what did they believe in? the practical value and theoretical juslificatiotl. Therejore, althougll 1.2 Was it fo unded mainly fo r reasons to do with the individual (to originators oj the5e systems were, in many respects, revol14tionary, provide a sanctuary for alienated/dissatisfied people) or with the their disciples have, in every case,jormed mere reactionary sects .. general state of society (to promote social change)? They still dream oj experimetltal realisation oj tlleir social utopias 1.3 Was it fo unded specifically as a route to establishing an ecolo­ gically more sound society? ...and to realise all tllese castles in the air Illey are compelled to 1.4 Therefore how would you describe the commune -was it meant app eal to Illeje elings and plmes oj the bourgeois. By degrees they to be an 'extended fa mily' or a 'purposive' commune? sink into the category oj the reactionary conservative socialists ... 1.5 Did it have the characteristics ofa (quasi-)mystical commune? 1.6 How important was ideology - was there a specific ideology Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, Manift5lo of lhe Communist Pllrty, intended to unite the memben and form a common bond? (Was it an part III. environmental ideology?) 1.7 What is the situation now - have any of these things changed? 1.8 How? 1.9 Why? 1.10 Has any ideological intention and/or unity been fragmented, dispelled, diffused or totally lost? 1.11 Ifso, why? 1.12 How often do you about your aims, purpose and principles? talk Section 2. Individual motivatum 2.1 Tell me about how and when you joined this community. 2.2 From what background, and education did you come? (Age? Place? Parenes' occupation?) 2.3 What were your reasons? 2.4 Were your reasons mosdy to do with yourself as an individual? 2.5 What was it about your life which dissatisfied you? 2.6 Were your reasons mosdy to do with a concern about society? 2.7 How would you describe your most deeply held convictions ;!.bout society? I.e. what sort of things do you fe el most strongly ;!.bout?

221 220 COMMUNES AND THE: CRE:F.,V I'ISION APPENDIX I

2.8 Are you an anarchist? Jf so, what kind? How would you define (Checklist of ecocentric beliefs in Appendix 2) anarchism? Section Ecologically sound practices 2.9 Are you a socialist? If so, what kind? How would you define 5. socialism? 5.0 What practices in the community fo llow direcdy from the beliefs 2.10 How much did any concerns about the society-environment you have described above? relationship motivate you to join? 5.1 To what extent are those which are observed, wholly or in part, 2.11 If so, what made you initially concerned - how did it come observed specifically as a result of the community's beliefs about about? what is necessary fo r an ecologica1ly sound lifestyle? 5.2 Are of the practices you describe part of the code of 2.12 What books and people have most influenced your views about any grollp the society-environment relationship? practice: or are theyjust observed by you, or other specific individ­ 2.13 What is meant by 'the environment' in your mind? uals or groups within the community? 2.14 Should environmental concern be mosdy to do with 'nature' or (List of ecocentric practices in Appendix 2) with the socially produced environment? Section 6. lntenliom and outcomes Section Critique of conventional society 6.1 What practical difficultiesare there for the community as a whole 3. 3.1 What are some of the main things which you regard as wrong in fo llowing any of the above practiceswhich relate particularlyto an with or improvable about conventional society? ecologically sound lifestyle? 3.2 What do your fe llow members of the commune think are the 6.2 What difficulties arc there for you? particularly wrong things? 6.3 Do other individuals share your problems in living up to the 3.3 Specifically, what is wrong with modern economics? principles? 6.4 Why there clashes between intentions and outcomes, there 3.4 Specifically, what is wrong with modem society? are if 3.5 Specifically, what is wrong with the nature of work? are? 3.6 Specifically, what is wrong with modem education? Section Relations with conventional society 3.7 Specifically, what is wrong with modem technology? 7. 3.8 Specifically, what is wrong with the way we treat nature? 7.1 How much do the difficulties arise because of consttaints im­ 3.9 What is wrong with the attitudes to nature? posed by the wider conventional society? 3.10 Why are these things wrong? 7.2 To what extent do difficulties arise because of the attitudes and habits brought in the members of the community from conven­ 3.11 Won't human ingenuity and technology be able to find ways out by of any environmental predicament which we may now be in? tional society? 7.3 Are there economic problems in keeping the community Seclion Ecocentric beliefs going? 4. 4.0 Tell me about your beliefs concerning: 7.4 Would you like to be more independent from conventional a) the relationship between human society and nature SOciety, or doyou think it essential for the community to be a part of b) the implications, if any, which these have for human that society, as much as is possible? behaviour and for the nature ofa fu ture society (what it 7.5 In what ways do you not relate to the wider society, but think that y should be like). ou should? 4.1 Tell me, first, about those beliefs which you hold most strongly. 7.6 Would you say that the community is here mainly to benefit the 4.2 To what extent are they shared by members of the commune? people in it, or those outside it? 4.3 Are there any which strongly shape the life and work of the 7.7 Should this community's outreach consist mainly of preaching community - to the extent that they might be part of its written or and teaching (ecologically sound) values and practices to the outside 'unwritten' constitution? World?

222 223 COMMUNES AND THE:GRE:EN VISION APPE:NlJIX I 7.8 Should outteach be attained principally through conversion by 9.2 How? What is the evidence? example? 9.3 Is society changinggenerally towards an ecologically more sound 7.9 Should outteach principally consist of joining in with local one, where nature is valued more for itself? community action (e.g. to improve the environment and social 9.4 What is the evidence for such a change? problems) and/or instigating it? 7.10 Will you improve the environment in which local people live by action directed specificallytowards environmental improvement, or through seeking to solve or ameliorate social problems? 7.11 Can you giveexamples of actionyou have taken with and for the local community?

Section Attitude.! to economic and social change 8. 8.1 Could you describe how social/environmental change in the direction you most wish to see is most likely to come about? 8.2 Is individual consciousness raising and reform ofyourself the first or most important roU[e to social and environmental change? 8.3 Is collective political action more or less important? Or is it doomed to failure? lfso. why? 8.4 Is education a main motor of social change? 8.5 What is your attitude towards capitalism and the ownership and owners of capital, as agents of change towards a social/ environmentally better future? Do you believe in a c/tlSS analysis of society?

8.6 What is your attitude towards organised labour as an agent of change etc. f:!.7 What is your attitude towards conventional political parties as agents of change etc.

8.8 What is your attitude towards The Green Party as an agent of change etc. 8.9 What is your attitude towards community/municipal politics as agents of change etc. 8.10 What is your attitudetowards pressure group activity as an agent of change etc. 8.11 How important are communes in leading the way to a socially more just and ecologically more harmonious society? 8.12 Which is more important- socialjustice or ecological harmony? To what extent are they separate?

Section Degree of JucceSJ 9. 9. How much have you changed or influenced people and the t society in which you operate?

224 225 APPENDIX 2 APPENDIX 2

Ecocentric principles Firlil order

Directly concerning nature Bioethic - respect fo r/worship of nature. Need for spiritual I. communion with. Moral obligation towards. 2. Holism - interdependence with nature. Humans a part of natural systems, not divorced fr om or above them. A hannonious relation­ ship of stewardship required.

3. Nature may be seen as fe male (Mother Earth, Gaia). 4. Anti-urbanism/pro the pastoral. 5. Nature is strongest in diversity and variety (plenitude) •. 6. Ecosystems should be stable·. 7. Interdependence. We are part oCa global ecosystem -whatwe do affects the environment globally, and we bear responsibility fo r much environmental degradation elsewhere. 8. There are ecological laws of carrying capacity, which are being exceeded. There are limits to growth (population. economic).

9. There is an environmental crisis (poDution, resources, population).

Second order

Direct implicatiorufor society and lifestyles 1. Social behaviour and personal morality should observe ecological laws (like those marked · above) and/or nature is a model for human society. 2. Fundamental changes are required in attitudes and values, and social organisation. 3. This will entail fu ndamental changes in human relationships. 4. We should be non-violent towards nature and ourselves. 5. There should be a better balance between yin and yang. fe minine and masculine:

Ftmil!t Masculint contractive demanding responsive aggressive cooperative competitive intuitive rational synthesising analytic

227 COMMUI\'F.:SAND TilE GR EEN VISION APPENDIX 2

25. Meaningful work (as distinct from employment) is a human 6. Economic accounting should recognise and fe ature environmen­ need. tal fa ctors - it should be holistic. 26. Work should not be degrading, boring or alienating; it should 7. Outer ecology should be respected and valued: inner ecology combine hand and brain, involve not emphasise the division of should be the same (health; wellbeing of humans). craft, labour and not be governed by the cash nexus. 8. Nature is non-hierarchical (?) - we are not at the top of a natural 27. Society should be a genuine participatory democracy. hierarchy, but are a link in the chain of being. Society should not be 28. There is a need for collectivism - in the sense of community and hierarchical either. extended fa mily, by which people take collective responsibility fo r 9. To have minimal impact on ecosystems, society should be small­ their lives (environment, health and welfare, production). scale. 29. The state is an enemy. 10. We need low-impact, non-polluting technology (human prod­ 30. Private or state ownership ofresources (land), and private enter­ ucts should be biodegradable), and soft, renewable energy - and an prise or state socialism are incompatible with an ecologically sound economics which fa vours this. society; unless they are small scale. 11. Western society must de-emphasise materialism and consumer­ 31. Educationis a motor of social change, but itsrefonn is needed to ism to stretch the planet's resources less. emphasise ecological imperative. 12. There should be population control. 13. Self-reliant, self-sustaining communities/countries are less ecol­ Sources: O'Riordan, Capra, Pepper, Porritt, Ekins. ogically demanding and more stable, and they make for greater human cultural variety. 14. The economic dependency of the South on the North must cease; the fo nner should have independent development. Ecocentric practices 15. Better resource distributionand more social justiceare necessary to solve environmental problems. First order 16. Anti-industrialism, anti-mechanical society, anti-giantism, anti­ 1. Sharing resources for greater efficiency (conununal eating, organ­ high technology. ising as a cooperative) More indirect implicatiom, and quality of life 2. Recycling resources - e.g. waste (using recycled paper and prod­ 17. Personal lifestyles are important; the personal is political. ucts - reusing materials). 18. There is a need for self fulfilment and self-actualisation. 3. Vegetarian/vegan - consciousness about food and health; inner 19. We must take personal responsibility forouterandinner ecology. ecology. Consumer ecocentrism includes buying 'sound' products, 20. The subjective, emotional and spiritual are underrated and fo r health and non..-exploitation, esp. ofless industrialised countries. 4. Home-produced fo ods and - moving to a self-sustaining should be elevated. crafts 21. Feminism and fe minist principles are advocated. economy. 22. Inner-directed philosophies and practices, mysticism, philoso­ 5. Using soft, renewable energy sources. phies emphasising the unity of humans and nature, should be 6. Using less energy in lighting/heating. embraced. 7. De-emphasise cars; emphasise mass-transit, cycles, walking. 23. Well-being and personal satisfaction should be important eco­ 8. Non-polluting practices e.g. biodegradable cleansers. nomic parameters. All human activity should be incorporated into 9. De-emphasise consumer goods. Living on litde money. Food coops/city-country exchanges. economics (infonnal economy). to. 24. Human needs should be satisfied by the economic/social system, 11. Using and developing alternative technology. rather than wants being satisfied through the market. Many wants 12. Using alternative medicine. are artificial i.e. generated by the market. 13. Organic gardeningffanning.

228 229 COMMUNES A.ND TilE GREEN YISION REfERENCES

Second order: Quality of life REFERENCES

I. Less division of labour. Abrams P and McCulloch A (1976) Communes, Sociology and Sodny, 2. Combining hand and brain. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 3. Work sharing, work tokens, rotas. Albury 4. Expertise does not carry connotations of authority. D and SchwartzJ (1982) Partial Progress, London: Pluto Press. 5. Democratic participative sttuctures and processes; e.g. consensus A1laby M (1975) Tire Sl4rvival Handbook: SelfSr ifftciency Jor Everyo/le, decision-making. Emphasis on cooperation. Non-hierarchical. London: Pan. 6. Non-sexist, non-racist: diversity of beliefs tolerated. Ansell V, Coates C, Dawling P, How J, Morris W and Wood A (1989) 7. to Diggers ,ltId Dreamers: Tire G'4ide 10 Communal Livi/lg, Paying attention to quality of relationships. Time taken fo cus 1990/91 specifically on relationships. Emphasising gendenessflovinglnon­ Sheffield, Lifespan Community: Communes Network. aggressive. Facilitating others to assert themselves. Ashton F (1985) Grtell Dreams: Red Realities, Milton Keynes: Network 8. Assertion ofthe individual. Consciousness-raising, speaking one's for Alternative Technology and Technological Assessment. mind, expressing fe elings and emotions. Bahro R (1986) Building the Green Movement, London: Heretic Books. 9. Liberated attitude to sexual relationships and proclivities - Barbrook R (1990) 'The third way', in Ground, 25, 12-13. New pennissiveness and tolerance. BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation) (1989) Henven 011 Eartll, in 10. Mechanisms to avoid conflict - group dynamics considered 'Everyman Series', BBCI. important/consensus decisions/co-counsellingltherapy sessions. Blackwell T (1990) 'Shares and share alike', in Tire Cuardielll, 23 11. Taking time for communal activities; eating, playing, campaign­ December, 27. ing, working. Bloom W (1987) 'New Age- any meaning?' in One Earth, 7(4), 6-7. 12. Collective or individual mysticism (to emphasise spirituality and Bookchin M (1980) Towards an Ec% gial/ Society, Montreal: Black emotions, and/or to express unity with nature and Earth). Rose Books. Ceremonies/activities involving meditation/transcendentalism. Bookchin M (1982) The Ecology oj Frudom: the Emergence and Dissolu­ lioll oj HitTi:zrchy, Palo Alto, California: Cheshire Books. Bookchin M (1987) 'Social ecologyversus deep ecology: a challenge for the ecology movement', in Crten Perspectives, 4 and 5. Bramwell A (1989) Ecology in tilt Twentielh Century: a History, London: Yale University Press. Caddy E (1988) Flight illio Freedom, Shaftesbury, Dorset: Longmead Books. Callenbach E (1978) Ecotop ia, London: Pluto Press. Callenbach E (1981) £colopia Emerging, Berkeley, California: Banyan Tree Books. Capra F (1982) The Turning Poi"" London: Wildwood House. Christensen K (1989) Home £(alogy: Makillg YOllr World a Better Piau, London: Arlington Books. Cosgrove D (1990) 'Environmental thought and action: pre-modem and post-modem', in Transactions, Instilllle oj British Geograp hers, 15(3), 344-58. COtgrove S (1982) Catastroplre or Cornl/copia? Tire EIIViro1lllle"" Palitics alld tire Future, Chichester. Wiley.

230 231 COMMVNF.SAND TilE GRf;EN VISION REFERENCES

Cotgrove S (1983) 'Environmentalism and utopia', in O'Riordan T Harper P (1990) 'Told you so', in Cleall Slate, 2, 4-5. and Turner K (eds) At! Annotated Read" it! Enviromtletl/al Platlt!it!g Hay F (1989) Settillg an Example: Communal Livillg and Environmelltal and A1allagemerlt, Oxford: Pergamon Press. Awarelless, unpublished BSc Hons dissenation, Sunderland Devall B and Sessions G (1985) Deep Ecology: Livitlg as if Nature Polytechnic. Mal/ered, Utah: Gibbs M Smith. Hays S P (1987) Beauty, Health and PtTmant1lce: Envirollmen/(JI Politia ill Dobson A (1990) Green Political Thought, London: Unwin Hyman. /he US, 1955-1985, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Ekins P (1986) (cd) The Livit!g Economy, London: Roudedge and Hawken P (1975) The Magic of Filldhorn, London: Fontana Books. Kegan Paul. Henderson H (1981) The Palili,s af the Solar Age, New York: Elkington ) and Burke T (1987) The Grut! Cap italists, London: Doubleday. Gollana:. Hodgkinson L (1990) 'Gripping yams', in The Guardian, July 10, 38. Elkingto n) and Hailes ) (1988) The Green COt!sumtT Gl4jde, London: Johnston R (1989) Ellvironmen/(Ji Problems: Nature, Economy and Stale, Gollana:. London: Belhaven. Elsom D (1987) Atmospheric Pol/u/jot!, Oxford: Basil Blackwell. Kamenka E (ed) (1982) Commullityas a Social Ideal, London: E Arnold. Ferguson M (1982) The Aquariall Cot!spiracy, London: Paladin Books. Kanter R M (1972) Commitment (Jlld Commullity: Commltnes and Utopias Fox W (1984) 'Deep ecology: a new philosophy of our time?' in The ill Soci% gic(J1 Perspettive, Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Ecologist, 14, 194-200. Press. Francis D (1985) 'New Age or New Right? Findhom: a fe minist Kanter R M (ed) (1973) Communes: Crtating alld Mallagillg the Collettive view', in Grt/m Lille, May, 4-6. Life, New York: Harper and Row. Frankel B (1987) TIle Post-Industrial Utop iat!s, Cambridge: Polity Kemp P and Wall D (1990) A Grtell Manifesto fo r the 199Os, Harrno­ Press. ndsworth: Penguin. Fromer R (1989) 'You are what you (don't) eat', in The Guardiall, Kropotkin P (1899) Fields, Factories alld WorkJhops TomotTow, London: April 27. Freedom Press (1986 ed). Fromm E (1956) The Sane Society, London: Roudedge and Kegan Landry C, Morley Southwood R and Wright P (1985) What a Way Paul. 0, To Run a Railroad: An Analysis of Radical Failure, London: Comedia. Fry C (1975) 'Marxisnt and Ecology', in The Etologist, 6(9), 328-332. Lovejoy A (1974) The Great Chain of Beit!g, Cambridge, Mass: Har- Goldsmith E and others (l972) 'Blueprint for survival' in The Ecologist vard University Press. 2(1), 1�3 Lovelock) (1979) Gaia, New York: Oxford University Press. Goldsmith E (1988) The Creat U-Tum, Bideford: Green Books. Lumley-Smith (1978) 'The road to utopia', in New Ec% gist, 1, 13-16. GOI'% A (1980) Etology as Politia, London: Pluto Press. McLaughlin C and Davidson G (1985) Bl4i1dm of the Dawn, Mas- Gor.!: A (1982) Farewtll to the Working ClasstS: at! Essay on Post Itldustrial sachussetts: Sirius. Socialism, London: Pluto Press. Mercer J (1984) Communes: a Social History and Guide, Dorset: Prism GOI'% A (1985) Patlls to Paradist: On the Libtratiot!from Work, London: Press. Pluto Press. Merchant C (1982) The Death of Nature: Wornell, Ecology Q/ld the Gould P (1988) Early Green Politics: &ck to Nature, &ck /0 the umd twd London: Harper and Row. Socialism i,1 Britain, Brighton: Harvester Press. ScielltiJic Revolu/ion, Hall P (1983) 'From ideology to utopia: towards fe asible solutions fo r Milbrath L) (1984) Envirollmelltalists: Vallgllard for a New Society, 2000 in O'Riordan T and Turner K (eds) An Amlotafed Reader Albany: State University of New York Press. AD', in Ellviromllrutal Mallagememalld Pla/ming, Oxford: Pergamon Press. Mosse G L (1982) 'Nationalism, fa scism and the radical right', in Hardy D (1979) Altertla/iveComnllmities in Nineteellth-Century Ellglatld, Kamenka E (cd) Commrmity as a Social Ideal, London: E Arnold, 27- London: Longman. 42. Harper P (1986) 'AT and the Quany: looking fo rward and back­ Murtagh ) and Robinson K (1984) Livillg Simply: Hall' alld W1ly We ward', in QI4arry News, Aurumn. Came to Believe ill all Allfi·Materialist Lifwyle, Manchester: Whose

232 233 COMMUNf;SAND TilE GREEN VISION REFERENCES

World?, c/o The Old Vestry, S[ Ambrose's Church, 395 Liverpool Ryle M (1988) Ecology and Socialism, London: Radius Books. Street, Salford, M6 SRU. Sale K (1980) Humatl Scale, London: Seeker and Warburg. Naess A (1988) 'The basics of deep ecology', in Resurgence, Sarkar S (1983) 'Marxism and productive fo rces: a critique', review of 126, 4-7. Nash R (1974) Wildernw and the Ammcarl Mind, New Haven, Con­ Ulrich (1979) World Standard: In the BUrrd Alley of rllt IrrdllSrrial System 0 necticut: Yale University Press. German), Rotbuch Verlag: Berlin, Alttmatives, 145--76. (in in IX Nicholson-Lord D (1987) The Gretlling oj the Cities, London: Rou­ Schumacher E F (1973) Smoll is Btautiful: &ollomics as if People Really tledge and Kegan PauL MautTed, London: Abacus Books. O'Riordan T (1981) Emtiromnema/islll, London: Pion, Second Schumacher E F (1980) Good Work, London: Abacus Books. Edition. Schwan W and D (1987) Breaking Through: Theory (lIId Prattice of O'Riordan T (1989) 'The challenge fo renvironrnentalism', in Peet R Wholisric Living, Bideford: Green Books. and Thrift N (eds), Ntw Modtls in Geography, London: Scan A (1990) Ideology and the Ntw Social Movements, London: Unwin n-I02, Unwin Hyman. Hyman. Osmond j and Graham A (1984) Alttrnativts: New App roa(hes to SeabrookJ (1990) The Myth of the Market, Bideford: Green Books. Htalth, Education, EntTgy, the Family and the Aquan'all Agt, Well­ Sennett R (1978) TIle Fall of Public Mall, New York: Random House. ingborough: Thorsons. Shenker B (1986) Inletlrional Communes, London: Roudedge and Papadakis E (1984) The Grun Movement in West Germany, London: Kegan Paul. Croom Helm. Simon j and H (1984) Tlrt Resourceful Earth, Oxford: Basil Kahn Pearce D, Markandya A and Barbier E (1989) BlueprinlJor a GrUII Blackwell. E(onomy, London: Earthscan. Skinner B F (1948) Walden ll, New York: Macmillan (1976 ed). Pepper (1984) The Rools oj Modern Environmemalism, London: Smith N (1984) Unevtll Development, Oxford: Basil Blackwell. 0 Croom Helm. Tomer A (1981) The Third Wa ve, London: Pan Books. Pepper D (1985) 'Determinism, idealism and the politics of environ­ Trevelyan G (1987) quoted in 'Sir George, bright-eyed leader oCthe mentalism', in ImernationalJournal oj Environmental Studits, 26, movement', in The Guardian, 19 August. tt­ !9. Trudgill S (1990) Barriers to a BeUtT Environment: What Stops Us Solving Pepper (1988) 'The geography and landscapes of an anarchist Environmental Problems?, London: Belhaven. 0 Britain', in The Raven, 1(4), 339-350. Van der Weyer R (1986) Wick wyn: a VisiOl1 ofthe Future, London: $PCK. Pepper D and Hallam N (1989) 'The Findhom tendency', in New Vogel S (1988) 'Marx and alienation from nature', in Social Theory and Ground, 20, 18-20. Prattice, 14(3) 367-88.

Phillips A (1990) 'The kids are alright', in Wttkend Guardian,January Wall D (1990) Geuing Thm: Steps to a Grten SMiety, London: Green 13-14, 2-4. Print. Porrin J (1984) Suing Greetl: the Po/iti(s of Ec% gy Explaitled, Oxford: Watson L (1980) Liftride: the Biology aJ Consciousness, New York: Basil Blackwell. Simon and Schuster. Rigby A (1974a) Alternative Realities: A SWdy oj Comlmmes alld tlreir Westonj (ed) (1986) Red and Green: the New Politics oJ the Environment, Members, London: Routledge and Kegan Paul. London: Pluto Press. Rigby A (1974b) Commllttes ill Britaill, London: Routledge and Kegan White L (1967) 'The historical roots ofour ecologic crisis', in Science, Paul. 155, 1203-07. Rigby A (1990) 'Lessons from auarchist communes', in Contemporary Wood A (1989) 'History and overview', in Ansell et al DiggtTS and Issrles iI, Geography alld Ed ucatioll, 3(3), 52-62. Dreamers: The Gllidt to Commlmal Livitlg, Sheffield: life­ 1990/91 Robertson j (1983) The Satle Alternative: a Choire of Futllres, Iron­ span Community. bridge, Salop: james Robertson. YoungJ (1990) Post Envirotlmtlltalism, London: Belhaven. Roszak T (1979) Persoll/Planer, London: Gollancz.

234 235 INDEX

Ahr

k- O-lllIIu,t Ck - /0-1 ht-Iand 189, 190, 193, 197, 206,208, 211 "IIC t IEm IIIl1l'tllltlll 25, 26, 28, 29, 30, 42, Chamr 88 53 65, 66, 69,71, 89, 92, 136, 199, thi/d(lIft 71, 95, 142, 150 213 Clrrisunstll K 23 25, 36, 37, 38, 41, 58, 64, idtlllily oj COlllmUlI/lrriJ 41, 57, 59, &fhrt) R dllss 212 62, 86, 87-9, 94, 140, 143, 158, Bllr",ook R 176 163, 168, 183,201, 203-4, 211 Birdlwood Hall 133 class (co/UiiCl) /llld SII(illl (h llllgt 48, "ia-dYlIlIlIlic 92, 136 52-4, 57,62, 157, 172-6,209 "ionhic/allimal riglus 10, IS, 16, 17, class rOIlJ{iouJlltJS 57, 58, 162, 173,

237 COMMUNES AND TilE CREEN VISION IND£X

183 craft productiOlt 13, 26, 28, 29, 40, 42, jo mily: grten cllllwmmsm 23,58, 138, 172, {ollttti"t (Ol1sn'ousntss/politia 48, 49, 43,71, 86, 106, 132 tXltndtd 14, 26. 38, 43, 71, 96, 206 no, 51-2. 58, 62, 157, 160, 161, 163, eriliud mass thtory and social (ha"gt 130, 151, 207, 211 gTtl'll critique oj (onvtnlional/Wts/mr 164, 165, 166, 168-170, 176,203, 159, 167, 168 IU/C/tar la, 22, 32, 33, 41, 43, 55, socitly 7, 8-10, 32, 89, 112-115, 207, 209, 212, 2t8, 219 70, 76, 89,95, 96, 104, 113, 117, 119-121 (olltc/ivism/wl/wivt (lwllnslJip 20, 22, Danillg/all mavemell/ 76, 115 151, 193, 199 grttll lifts/ylts alld prlll/im 20-24, 30, 30, 42, 55, 61, 62, 63, 7t, 79, 8t, dtlmtralisa/iOlt 36, 38, 40, 42, 43, 45, ja scismltwzism/NaliOllal Frolll 30, 38, 33,41, 56,60-1, 70, 72, 132-139, 65, 106, 107, 131 165, 200,218 t04, 142, 167, 182, 194, 199, M, 67, 97, tal, 104, 169, 189, 213 no, je 8, 13, 45 201, 203,206 detp tl% gy 14-17, 29,38, 65, 69, millille valuts Cretll Party 2, 33, 52, 102, 106, 117, 3, 12, 13, 14,30, 32,38, 44, (omtmmards' ,ri/iqut rif(ollvenliollal 105, 106, 107, 108, 112, 118, je millism 131, 176, 178, 179, 203 51, 59, 89,94, 97, 103, lOS, 126, soritty 7, 8-10, 32, 89, 112-115, 127-9, 186, 187 grull valuts; 130 119-121 dtmomlCY: dirtll/participativt 21, 30, oll llaiurt 10-12, 15, 89, lOS, 123-9 Ferguson M 159 rommullards' lifts/ylts 20-24, 30, 33, 31,37, 43, 45,55, 64, 146, on socitty 12-14, 15, 89, 129-131 fi"llnn'alprtssurts 139-141 41, 56, 60-1, 70, 72, 132-139, 165, 148-ISO,207 Filldhorn 2, 3, 5, 15, 38, 69, 70, 72-3, Hllbmruts) 209, 210 ZOO,218 Dtlloll B Illld StsSions C IS, 16, 75 74, 75, n, 50, 81, 82. 93, 96, 99, HIl((ltei E commul1ards' valuts: llivas 109, 128 44 all Il<:llUrl' 10-12, 15, 89, lOS, 123-9 tOO, 108, 109, 110, 112, 113. 114, Hall P43, 44 Diggers 26, Otl society 12-14, 15, 89, 129-131 28 1t6, 120, 127, 128, 129, 133, 135, Hallam N 58, 110 Dobson A 10, ISO, 204, 206 (omm,lI/es: 136, 137, 138, 141, 142, 147, lSI, HOfdy D 27, 29, 30 dualism 108, 109, 110, 117, 126, 127, bifare 25-6 153, ISS, 159, 161, 165, 166, 168, Harpt1 P77, 78, 79, 197 1800 161 dtjil1i/iall 4 174, In, 180, 182, 184, 186, 187, Hawktn P 74, 109 Dulas Ellgillterjllg 184, 185 nillt/tnllh al1d tarly twm/itlh 189, 194, 196, 206, 210, 21t, 212, Hay F79, 133, 138 cmtury 27-31 215,218 Hays S 88 tfoctntrism/tfologism la, 121, 126, 31-5, 48, 54, 59, 62, 64, 69, Fi"dhom Fl'u"uliOll 50, 81, 133, 196 H(gtl C F 109, 165 1960s 130,135, 145, 200,205 81, 93, 201 Filldhom ItIIlitlll)' 17, ItO, 211 HtndmDn H 44 tlonomia: Commu1lts Nt/worlt t81, 215 Fox W 15, 75 hinarchy (rtjtClion of) 13, 16, 26, 30, (onvtnliolUfl 29, 113-14 (onftitt rtso/u/ion 149, 151-4 Francis D 75 58, 61, 64, 65, 71,75, 76, 89, 103, grun 26, 33, 39, 74, 89, 114, 188, (onstnsus dtlisions 21, 31, 41, 48, 71, Franltel B 64, 208, 212,213 tOS, 112, ItS, 146, 149, ISO, 207, 214,215 Frome SocitlY 71, 78 SS, lOS, 107, 130, 148, 149, 159, 209

238 239 COMMUNES "ND THE GREE:N VISION INDEX 203, 206, 218 211, 217 mllTke/ economy 41, 43, 103, 156, 176, PDrriltj7, 12, 17,219 News Jr om NDwhert 29 PDSt/ip Hall 71 illdlls/rill/ism 9, 1 I, 28, 46, 55, 120, 188, 196,202, 205 /lew sDcill1 movemellts 203, 204, 208-12 123, 130, 174,203 Milrxism/Morxisu la, 14, 17, 29, 33, posi-modemism 208, 212, 213 NiciIDlson-Lord 36, 45 pragmatism 81, 82, 83, 86, 106, 107, 50,52, 58, 64,85, 103, 106, 109, D mltleilr powerhmclellr slate 76, 115, jO/WS/IlU R 14, 218 117, 118, 155, 158, 165,175, 208, 143, 145, 173, 196,205 209, 211, 212 122, 175 prwure groups 51, 57, 92, 94, 144, lIudear weapcms/dsarmiIJnenti 33, 92, Kamenkll E 63, 64 mllsculille values 126 169, 176, 1n, 217 13, 121, 168 privlltt alld public domains 61-2, 142, Kilnler R 4, 26, 30, 45, 63, 114 nUl/erialism (ccll5umtrism) 3, 8, la, 12, 25, Kelly R 79, 185 14, 22,24,32, 37, 40, 52,70, 87, 143, 150, 156, 192, 199,201, 207, orgllnicJa rmillg/gardenillg 3, 27, 30, 44, 210,212,213 Ke.np P lind Wall 217 89, 116, 123, 130, 138, 140, 141, D 46,65, 71, 72, 74, 76, 92, 132, kibbutzim 31, 39, 60, 207 171, 194-5, 205, 207, 210 privaliSlltion 192-4, 206 133-0, 143, 186, 215 Krop a/kin 29, 30, 40, 66, 182 maln-ia/ism, his/oricaI 50, 58 profil making 195, 197, 206, 207 mlll(fialistperspectives (an socilll O'RiDrMn T I, 7, 16 proteslant (work) elhic 51, 202 Osmrmd j IItld Grahllm 46 labour movemmt (and trades ullions) 52, change) 48, 50-I, 53, 54, 57, 64, A psychology: behavioural, and DJ Dutrtll(h 144, 184-192, 200, 217 53,64,80,178,213,217 lOS, 110, 112, 157, 161, 165, 170, perception 49, 55, 74, 118, 174, DVerpDpulaliDH 10, 11, 12, IS, 39, lAbour Pllrty 53, 102, 106, 169, 176, 201,218 92, 201,202,212 117, 123, 130 178, 179, 216,217 meditation lind social ,hilllge 109, 128, Owen R27, 56 lAndry C et 11/ 197, 214, 215, 216 166, 168, 177 quality oJ life 13, 15, 22, 37, 130 lAuriest"n H1I1I 3, 46, 70, 71, 72-3, Mercer J 26, 30 pll sm/nonvioleHu 3, 26, 30, 32, 33, 79, 82,83, 85, 86,93, 112, 117, Merchant C 7 (ifi Radical Rautes Network 3, 188, 215 50,57, 73, 92, lOS, 173 Rainbow Hausing CDoperative 181 122, 133, 135, 136, 137, 139, 142, Milbrath 1 paganism 33, 65, 106, 109, 187 Raine 143, 166, 180, 183, 186, 187, 192, millenarianism 38-46, 158, 170, 189 P 79 Papadakis E 52 193, 194, 195, 196, 198, 206, 211, mabilisation theory 212-3 rebirthing 76, 154, 155, 162, 186 Paris Commune DJ 1871 64 219. manllsticism 23, 38 mycliHg 12, 20, 42, 45, 76, 132, 133, Pearce D 22 136, 143, 184 libtrillism 17, 20, 29, 45, 48, 49, 51, Mandrllgon 31 People Cmtre, Lauritslon 72, 78, 187, 79, 82, 52, 56,57,61, 62, 63, 67,78, 95, manism 44, lOS, 127-9, 167 Redfield 3, 71, 72-3, 74, 78, 193 103, 113, 121, 155, 156, 166, 192, Monkton Wyld 2, 69, 70, 72-3, 76, 77, 85,86, 87, 92, 93, %, 133, 135, PeDple in CDmman 3, 46, 72-3, 76, 77, 193, 196, 202, 203, 205, 206,217 SO, 82, 84, 85, 87, 95, 112, liS, 136, ISS, 158, 159, 160, ISO, 184. 80, 84, 94, 132, 139, 147, 155, 182, Liberll/ Pllrty 52, 93, 179 132, 133, 135, 136, ISS, 158, 183, 188, 193, 206 206 rejDrmism 204, 206, 211 Lifesp lln 3, 46, 72-3, 83, 84, 122, 133, 186, 191, 194, 195, 206, 211 Pepper 2, 7, 16, 29, 31, 58, 110 Reich W/Rtichiatl therapy 58, 76, 187 136, 139, 144, 147, 149, 151, 160, Marris W28 D personal is pDliticIII 14, 51, 56, 87, ISS, relaliotlShip1: perSDHal/c()JnmunaI 21, 182, 187, 195, 196, 206 M()JJe G 65 163, 164, 169, 176, 217 Ligh/moor45, 106, 199 mOlivation for joining (ommunes 89-100 209, 30, 32, 33,37, 42,46, 54, 55,60, phases oj commune devtlDpmml 84-6 limits ta grewth 70, 92, 200 muitinilliomll (ompanies/corporatiollS 9, 66,76, 77, 82,89,129,130,141, Phillips 70, 71 146, 147, 151-4, 155, ISO, 194, local lIutharities 52, 56, 177, 216 16,23, 113, 117 A planetary village/culture/Ilwarfness 75, lacal wlrIomy/wmmunity 137, 144, Murtagh J IlndRobimon K 23 200, 201, 202 108, 109, 127, 159, 213 rfsouru sharing 93, 130, 132, 138 176, 181, 185, 187,189 mysticism 17, 27, 32, 33, 44, 65, 131, pluralism 53, 208, 211 responsibj/ilyJor self103, 163, 166, Lovejoy 44 136, 200 A po/lutiDH 9, 10, 11, 21, 36, 37, 53, 70, 169, 175 Lovel()(kj 44 76, lOS, 121, 132, 170 fevisionism 79, 214 Lower Shaw Farm 3, 46, 70, 71, 72-3, Naess A IS, 75 pDliti(1l1 ideolDgies; SO, 82, 93, 133, 136, 160, 186, 187, Nash R 31 revoluliDn 48, 51, 56, 58, 60, 61, 62, alld communards 100-110, 130-131 195, 206 flell-marxism (FrllllkJu rt SchoDI) 209, 82, 163, 164, 170, 172, 173, 174, and community 62-7 Lumley-Smith R 55 211 205, 2OS, 210, 211, 215 nelwDrks 209, 212, 214, 215, 216 alld the greens 17-20, 48 Rigby A 3, 4, 27, 31, 32, 33, 38, 47, politi,s: parliamentary/pany/ MaclAughlin C alld Davidsoll G 3, 81 New Age 3, 5, 16, 27. 38, 43-0, 47, 54,55,56,57,59,61, 66, 200 ((Invellli()J1Q1 51, 57, 60, 164, 169, Robensonj mallilgerilli eff uiellcy 195, 197 75, 17,95, 108-110, 127-9, 146, 40, 41 176-9, 217 mOllifesMtioll 108, 109, 128 156, 158, 159, 165, 166, 167, 168, romamics/romanticism 27, 28, 29, 42, populatiO/t: Stt Dverpop"lalioll 63,65, 92, 93, 102, lIS, 121, 126, Ma"uu H 209, 210 170, 171, 175, 176, 177, 186, 1%,

241 240 COMMUNES ANI) nIt: GHEf:N VISION INDEX 136, 171, 211 WWOII 48, 204 socialisll"d grulu 16, 27, 48, 62, 64, J 102, Roszak T 26, 163 t02 WI,ilf L 7 Ruskin) 28 sofr f'IItrgy 12, 42, 74, 132, 137, 140, tV1IOSt World? pfDjW 24 Russtll P 125 18' Willillglo" S 74 Rylt M 20, 64, 204 spirilllQlismlspirilual relltlarioll 26, 32, Wood A 215 36, 38, «, 46, 58, 65, 73, 75, 76, IlIOrk sharillg 146-7, 154, ISS, 171 Salt K 31,39,45 80, 92,93, 99-100, 105, 108-110, Wtytr R IIall dtr 41 Sarkor S 112, 116, 142, 159. 165, 175 43 S"mmach� E F39, 120 Sltrtolyping: of social ,olrs 32, 61, YoulIg) 17, 22, 38, 55, 208 89, Schwarz W amI 46 105,126 D A Sdtrllific world IIitw 8, 108, 117, 120, stnlCluralism 48,49, 53, 54, 116, 117, Z 10 Projtcf (New Unillmily 13\ Projrcr) 3, 69, 72-3, 74, 95, 157, 161, 163, 164, 166, 174,201, n, 89, ScOft A 203, 204, 209, 210, 211, 212 209, 218 115, 133, 137, 138, 149, 164, 189, StabrooltJ 47, 52, 202 sustainabililY 70, 123 195, 206, 215 self: juljilmtntlasstrtionldiscolltT'f 14, 22,26,32,41, 54-5, 61, 66,69, 76, Itchnoctnlric I, 16, 115, 121,210 85, 87, 100, 109, 110, 113, 129, lechnology: 89, 150, 151, ISS, 161, 162, 164, 166, high 9, 40, 1 IS, 130 169, 170, 176, 194, 202, 203, 210 ailmurtilldinlfflnediatdapprop rialt 212 16,21, 26, 43, 46, 70, n, 92, liS, st/fsuffidtncylrtlianct 29, 36, 39, 41, 123, 132, 184, 190, 211 215 43,45, 47, 69, 72,73, 76, 82,43, Thalchtrismlisalion 50, 103, 176, 89,92, 107, 124, 133-6, 144, 199, 191-8, 206 210 thtrapy 21, 58, 73, 82, 85, 94, 110, Stnntl/ R 201, 202, 203 154-6, 162, 169, 194, 209 Stymour) 69, 133 third way 176 Shtnkn 8 4, 55, 60, 61, 82 Third WorldlNo rth·Soulh rt/at;onships Shindig 133, 139 9, 13,21, 23, 41, 110, 114, 122. Sltinntr8 F 49, 74 123, 124, 138, 167, 173, 184, 218 Sitolimowski H 74, 120 TojJltr A 40, 212 small·scalr organiS4tion 12, 42, F 63 43, 65, T0l111irs 102, 103, lOS, 130, 207 ToufDint A 209, 210 Smith N 209 Iraditional/lrib41 socitlies 22, 38, 55, 65, social changt 32, 44, 45, 46, 47-68, 107, 122, 211 33, 69,76, 109, 110, 116, Irulhedge plal1h'ng 132, 133 n, 84,86, 118, 157-197, 199,208, 209 Trtllt/yan G« social tcology 16, 17, 106, 112 social justiet 12, 13,36, 64, 101, 102, IItganism 11, 21, 30, 36, 82, 132, 143, 130, 161, 207 144, 188 socialism 8, 14, 17, 20, 27,28, 29, 30, IIegelarianism II, 27, 30, 72, 82, 97, 32, 33, 36, 38, 40, 42, 43, 47, 48, 124, 128, 132, 135, 140, 143, 174, 53, 56,57, 62, 63, 64,65, 66, 67, 188 70, 78, 84, 85, 87,89, 95, 101-4, IIilalism 44, 128 105, 113, 121, 122, 130, 131, 136, Vogt' S 17 155, 169, 175, 176, 178, 179, 180, 193, 199, 206, 207, 208, 212, 213, Wa ll 52, 217 D 217,219 Wo tSOl1 L 168 Socialist Parly of Grrol 8riloill 43 We lmMSI

242 243