New Thesis Explores the Transition Experiment in Ungersheim

A fascinating new piece of research on Transition has just been published, entitled Transitioning towards Sustainability: What are we waiting for?. The Masters thesis explores Transition in Ungersheim, a fascinating village in the Alsace in France which is home to a remarkable experiment in Transition. 

Community Museum Showcases Washington, DC’s Long History of Activism

Since its founding 50 years ago — when it became both the first Smithsonian museum located off the National Mall and the first federally-funded community museum in the country — the Smithsonian Anacostia Community Museum has served as an interactive space, engaging local residents in the power of neighborhood storytelling.

The Green Party’s New Conversation: A Report from the US National Green Gathering

Electoral engagement and social movements are the twin pillars of Green activism worldwide, and individual activists tend toward one or the other, but in their hearts most Greens I know see the combination of grassroots activism and the uphill struggle to defend democracy at the ballot box, especially in the United States, as complementary identities that lend each other synergy. 

Catastrophe, Technology, Limits, and Localism

Charles C. Mann’s The Wizard and the Prophet, published earlier this year, is a fabulous book. Not a perfect book; sometimes, in order to bulk up this two-pronged thesis, he will throw in supplementary material that threatens to bog down his central investigation. But that investigation comes through loud and clear all the same, and it is one worth looking at closely.

Shepherding in a New Reality: The Context for a Shift in Values

As resources become scarce, A New Reality uses a pattern seen in nature – decelerating growth in the second part of the Sigmoid Curve – to display a shift that must happen in order for human kind to survive, referred to as Epoch B. In Epoch B, people recognize the limited nature of resources and human values adjust toward equilibrium, balance and consensus – interdependence.