July 30, 2013
Dear Reader:
Based on my experience as a regional planner and agency
director, 1973 -2008, and in recognition of emerging "regional
communities," I developed three thoughts about community that
relate to the challenge of working across-boundaries as greater or
regional communities. The thoughts/theses apply for communities at the scale of
bonding or bridging social capital as defined by Robert D. Putnam,
which is alternately local or regional. (Link below)
As of 2011, considering the global financial crisis
brought about by pursuit of the "profit motive," it struck me that
this has come to dominate modern life. This is a relatively new invention of
civilization and wasn't a concern for most of the time that Homo
sapiens has been on the planet.
The three thoughts below that had emerged in my
experience of working on regional cooperation now represent what I
now posit as the "community motive." Concern about “profit" can
emerge within an established community over time, but, to my mind the
"profit motive" does not exist in the wild.
1) Community precedes cooperation.
2) Community is how life solves all problems.
3) Security is the primary purpose of community.
These three thoughts, theses if you will, are the basis of the
"community motive. “Following is some exposition about each one.
As I see it, security has always been the priority for
humans since the plains of Africa. That's why communities first seek
to establish defensible boundaries. After the basics are in place,
security focus shifts to the social and economic. Boundaries work
like the membrane in the osmosis experiment most of us have seen in
a science class. The membrane is a filter that lets the good things pass
through, but keeps unwanted things out. (Osmosis -YouTube - 45 sec.)
The evolved political boundaries of today have
consequence. The rules change when you cross them. Though marked on the ground
and fortified in some instances, they are conceptual, as pictured to the
right, with Universe Man and here in a PDF. The boundary divides the space between local, that within, and
regional, everything outside, as labeled in the second panel. The third panel
repeats the image within, to show, without graphic elegance, that the
land on which Universe Man sits is regional at another scale, as
determined by other boundaries, and another area that's local. A territory
is both local and regional, depending upon the perspective.
Communities of communities, “regional communities” are
greater communities organized to solve a problem, be it managing a
watershed, strengthening an economic cluster or ensuring peer
competition for school sports. Regional boundaries can be imposed for administrative
purposes within states, but for these to be a basis for effective cooperation;
a greater community sense is needed for that geography among the
people. This is true for multi-state and multi-national regional
communities as well. The leaders with such a vision can build
a regional community by finding that which is already in place.
This is not to suggest that community is easy to build
in order to solve problems. In a crisis, humans of any culture,
belief or politics can quickly come together and self-organize to save
themselves and others. It was the on-the- ground response to the 9/11 attacks
that demonstrated to me the deep responsiveness of human community, as well as
the fundamental importance of security. Community is how humans have always
survived. This, I think, extends to all life forms.
The "community motive" comes into play when there is a
problem to be solved. In a monetized civilization, the "profit
motive" may be an incentive for some action, but most of the problems of
life don't have a check at the end for their solution. They are things that
must be done. Because this is the case, humanity has been able to perpetuate. To solve problems then, regional/greater community motivation
activates in one or more individuals.
We must thank Aldo Leopold for the term. He wrote: “Acts of
conservation without the requisite desire and skills are futile. To create
these desires and skills and the community motive is the task of education.” —"Conservation: In Whole or in
Part? (1944); RMG 319
The concept of “community motive” did not take hold, but it should
have. It is now more important than ever, since the “profit motive” requires
regional/greater community management at wholistic scales.
Thoughts welcome.
Tom
Tom
Christoffel, AICP, FeRSA
Regional
Intelligence - Regional Communities, LLC
Box1444 *
Front Royal, Virginia, USA (VA 22630)
