ReInhabiting the Urban Village by Jamaica Stevens
Adapted Excerpt from the book “ReInhabiting the Village: CoCreating our Future”
“WE CAN BEGIN BY DOING SMALL THINGS AT THE LOCAL LEVEL, LIKE PLANTING COMMUNITY GARDENS OR LOOKING OUT FOR OUR NEIGHBORS. THAT IS HOW CHANGE TAKES PLACE IN LIVING SYSTEMS, NOT FROM ABOVE BUT FROM WITHIN.” Grace Lee Boggs
Many have dreamed of a place called Utopia. Since first written about in 1516 by Sir Thomas More, idealists and visionaries have waxed poetic about such an existence, the perfect world, a social and political system at peace, a life of abundance for all.
With more humans than ever living in urban environments, where resources are dwindling, existing infrastructure is already taxed and population is rising, some would argue it is an impossible fantasy, a dangerous distraction from dealing with everyday challenges that we face. And some others would say their version of a utopic scenario is already a lived experience and, while perhaps not perfect, it is possible to create harmonious and robust living scenarios.
Somewhere in between lies the potential that by applying visionary imagination and leveraging successful models from antiquity, along with current innovation and technological advancements, we could see positive improvements to our current urban scenarios creating liveable and vibrant cities, even with the unprecedented challenges we face.
This will require a paradigm shift towards mass adoption of achievable regenerative practices based on a life-affirming ethical foundation that considers and serves the wellbeing all of life now and into the future.
Over 54% of the world’s current populous lives in an urban environment. It is projected by 2050 that number will climb to 66%. That’s almost 6 billion people living in urban environments.
“Managing urban areas has become one of the most important development challenges of the 21st century. Our success or failure in building sustainable cities will be a major factor in the success of the post-2015 UN development agenda,” John Wilmoth, Director of UN DESA’s Population Division.
“We have to adopt a post-2015 development agenda that is holistic in nature. The agenda should put the well-being of both humankind and our planet at the centre of our sustainable development efforts. Through these efforts, we should bear in mind that profound changes in attitudes, behaviours and policies will be required to create a world in which human beings live in harmony with nature,” Sam Kutesa, President of the UN General Assembly.
With our mazes of metal and concrete we must remember that everything we have built, every city, every building, every machine, every freeway has come from the substance of the Living Earth. Reconnecting to the living organism and ecosystem all around us, we see that underneath the concrete there is a heartbeat, a pulse, an inherent regenerative capacity that is louder than any street noise, car, or the hum of electricity. Since we built the walls of our current world we can also take them down and re-create them.
All of our life is lived at the crossroads, the intersections where your stories brush up against another’s, and the common ground that connects us is we, of course, are not islands. We are deeply influenced and impacted by each other.
By tearing down fences and linking backyards, creating gardens in empty parking lots, reclaiming intersections as public and pedestrian space, opening our homes as community sanctuaries, sharing our skills and resources, sharing food and ideas, creating neighborhoods based in connection, safety and respect, by opening hearts, rolling up our sleeves, we can nourish our inter-connectedness and create the conditions for thriving communities. Through rebuilding our neighborhoods and re-inhabiting our common spaces, we can recreate, retro-fit and re-design our Urban centers to be thriving Villages once again.
Piazzas, a term originating in Italian culture, Agoras in Greek culture, and many other names for the shared public square, have long been the center of any bustling village. This was the community’s meeting grounds and marketplace for exchanging goods, services and ideas. This is where celebrations were held, news was shared, and also where unrest was expressed, where protesters gathered, where revolutions began.
There are so many modern-day examples of successful and essential public space in our Urban environments. With the rise of the placemaking movement, we are seeing a renaissance in the intentional design, management and use of public spaces. It means designing for people, not for cars. It means protecting green spaces, wild lands and integrating the local ecology into civic design. It means that a neighborhood has claimed public space as a central hub for its inhabitants, promoting engagement and connection, placed-based knowledge, familiarity, a sense of safety, well-being and belonging. It takes into consideration the needs of the local populous, the environmental factors of the place, and the nexus informed by the unique reflection of a culture or intersection of many cultures.
Through our service, direct action and participation in growing our healthy communities along with advocacy for inclusion and consideration of all voices and perspectives, equitable opportunities for a diversity of people to access resources and create resilience in their lives, we can transform our urban environments into flourishing epi-centers of human society in balance with ecology of place.
This will require cooperation from grassroots efforts, NGO’s, civic leaders, and engaged citizenry to work together to steward wisely the “common wealth” of an area while transforming the underlying conditions that perpetuate separateness, economic disparity, injustice, scarcity, greed, fear and disregard.
The most stable ecological systems are ones where the diversity of life intersects and interrelates to create connection points of coherence. Applying permaculture principles in an environmental and social context to our urban landscape, we can adapt our concrete grids into flourishing centers for the full expression of art, culture, prosperity, intelligence and celebrate our realization of potential as humans learn to live symbiotically with each other and the Earth.
“OUR CHOICES AT ALL LEVELS — INDIVIDUAL, COMMUNITY, CORPORATE AND GOVERNMENT — AFFECT NATURE. AND THEY AFFECT US.” David Suzuki
Jamaica Stevens
Jamaica Stevens is Author and Curator of the multi-media project “ReInhabiting the Village: CoCreating our Future”. As an Organizational Design Consultant and Steward with VillageLab, Jamaica works with Regenerative frameworks and Whole Systems principles to empower people, projects and organizations to THRIVE!
She is also an experienced event producer, workshop leader, group facilitator, educational program designer, community organizer, project manager, writer and life coach. She is currently the Educational Program Manager for the Lucid University and has been the Co-Founder of Protectors Alliance, Program Manager for Lucidity Courseweek, Creator of Tribal Convergence Gatherings, Co-Founder of Tribal Convergence Network, Educational Program Coordinator with the Novalis Project, Executive Producer of Awaken Visionary Leadership Summit, as well as a Contributing Producer with Lucidity and other festivals. Passionate about earth stewardship, collective evolution, village ethos and collaborative culture, Jamaica is in service to supporting the conditions for planetary flourishing and a regenerative renaissance.
