Insight and inspiration in turbulent times.
It’s a typically cold and rainy December morning on a rooftop in downtown Vancouver. The revolving restaurant atop the Harbour Centre skyscraper peeks above some closer buildings to the north, the pious spire of the Holy Rosary Cathedral marks south. Steps away, the concrete roof supports a massive greenhouse filled with plants and machines making noise. This is our next stop on an exploration of the power of local business relationships.
Fermented beverages of one sort or another have played a part in every civilization. The evolution of fermentation by human hands has been a diverse one, too. From what is arguably the first fermented beverage, mead, found in ancient Greek, Egyptian and even Sumerian records, all the way to today’s micro-brewed extreme barley-based ales like Imperial India Pale Ales and 21% abv Stouts. However, the next step in this evolution comes not in the changing of flavors or styles, but the organization behind its creation: behold the grand idea of Cooperative Breweries!
Strolling down Commercial Drive early on a Thursday morning, a sunny-coloured trailer near Hastings Street catches my eye. I’m on a mission to find locally-made treats — and about to get an education in how small-scale culinary manufacturing can be more cooperative than competitive.
The great British economist the late Joan Robinson once observed that the only thing worse than being exploited by capitalism is not being exploited by capitalism. This truth is felt acutely by anyone who is unemployed and looking for work. As the pain of the economic crisis continues and millions struggle to find employment there is an obvious imperative to create jobs—any jobs. But we shouldn’t stop there. In Back to Full Employment, Robert Pollin makes the essential point that “a workable definition of full employment should refer to an abundance of decent jobs.” Poor jobs that keep workers minimally employed but leave them in precarious circumstances and unable to participate fully in civic and political life are better than no jobs at all. But in terms of public policy we can and should aim higher—especially as decent jobs not only benefit the workers that hold them but also the communities in which they live. Absent a stable economic base, community itself is compromised.
The setting is a warehouse in an industrial park in the Vancouver suburb of Richmond. We’re surrounded by big burlap sacks of green coffee beans, stacked several pallets high. The air warms up and sweetens as we approach the roaring roaster. Now and then a circular cooling tray spits hot brown beans into buckets while the machine’s young operators consult nearby computer screens. My tour guide is Salt Spring Coffee president and CEO Mickey McLeod. He’s wearing horn-rimmed glasses and a dark grey sweater over a blue shirt. His upper lip is hidden by a bushy Movember handlebar moustache. He says his company’s sales were up 12 per cent to some $9 million last fiscal year. And that it couldn’t have happened without nurturing local business connections.
•The Trillion Dollar Coin vs. Limits to Growth •Michael Shuman… there’s a local business revolution on the horizon, and we can make it happen •It’s the New Economy, Stupid •Perfect storm, energy, finance and the end of growth
Focusing on talent attraction and retention is what leads to gentrification, the phenomena that people who voice concerns about Placemaking are most often trying to avoid. There is an oft-voiced belief today that there is a finite amount of talent and creativity available in the world, and that cities must compete to draw creative people away from rival communities in order to thrive. But truly great places are not built from scratch to attract people from elsewhere; the best places have evolved into dynamic, multi-use destinations over time: years, decades, centuries. These places are reflective of the communities that surround them, not the other way around. Placemaking is, ultimately, more about the identification and development of local talent, not the attraction of talent from afar.
The biggest problem in many communities—especially low-income ones— is caused by perception more than reality…Yet even in the most economically and socially challenged communities, there are a lot of good things going on—examples of the commons such as shared dreams, community assets and ways that people come together. These are the building blocks to make things better.
For every person who thinks that you can ‘placemake’ unilaterally by dropping in cool amenities, there is another who believes that Placemaking is as much about the discussion that participants have with each other as it is about whether a space contains public art or picnic tables when all is said and done. The physical attributes of the space in question are important, but they are the means, not the end. If you’re not building social capital in the community where you’re working, you’re not Placemaking; you’re just reorganizing the furniture.
It’s no accident that the 1960 film adaptation of The Time Machine opens with host HG Wells welcoming four friends to a dinner party in London on January 5, 1900 to recount events that had occurred since he last met them, on New Year’s Eve, 1899.
One the key insights of Transition is that our local communities are vulnerable to the shocks that will certainly come from extreme weather, volatile energy prices and supply disruption, and global financial meltdown. A full and proper analysis of this vulnerability, in general and in the case of Totnes, is a far bigger project than will fit into a blog post. However, we can easily zero in on a big part of it, which is our dependence on the global economic system itself.
Inspired by the idea of building resilience around local, grassroots economies in response to peak oil and climate change, the transition movement has evolved into a global network of cities, towns, and neighborhoods that self-organize around the principles not only of reducing CO2 emissions but doing it by fostering happy, healthy, and creative communities.
