Sustainable Democracy

This is one of 3 articles to help introduce and explain the basic ideas and tenets of Sustainable Democracy. The Pillars follow a progression from smallest to largest. From the individual, to the community, to the society. This article will focus on the role of society and some very basic ideas about how small scale models might be used in society. Availability of resources is also based on that of an industrialized nation, the lack or absence of basic needs in developing or third world nations is also an important topic which will be considered.

Both the individual and the community have been considered. The individual can be adapted to work in a more creative and inventive role to push innovation rather than simply production. The community should be reinvigorated, and people and their social networks must be brought back together in their local surroundings to lift the spirit of the individual.

In the long run the society should be much like the community model on the macro scale. Rather than connecting individuals the society should work to integrate communities and develop the networks and support structures to integrate these local communities. This is especially important considering the incredible infrastructure for industry, communications, and transportation that must be supported. In many ways, a number of modern societies are doing quite well at what they are meant to accomplish.

As I see it, the actual changes to society as a whole would be small and made over longer periods of time. Also little radical change would be required in many democratic society simply because, as people and communities change, the people representing them in government also change to cater more closely to those constituents. The biggest change, though, would be moving away from profit and power based models to more cooperative systems. Here is where community model play a bigger role.

While there are a growing number of nations that could easily manage the changes required to reinvent sustainable democratic systems, many more cannot serve even the basic needs of their population. Much in the same way local communities help each other, much broader support networks must be developed. These networks must be aimed at pushing sustainable development rather than merely creating rapid industrial growth. The support of massive industrialization in other countries has already met with many disastrous results, and these could easily have been predicted.

Looking at our own metro areas, the problem of rapid development for profit without regard to community building can be seen. The areas of urban blight did not develop because people hate living in good places, they developed because we wrecked the structures that allowed them to care and foster those social networks. It is by this idea that different types of aid need to be given. Along with food and necessities a greater focus needs to be made on exporting education and developing technologies. We still tend to view Third World Nations as places that are full of ignorant, backward people who cannot learn new things beyond the workings of a sweatshop. This is patently false. Only by believing in the great ability of all individuals to learn and want to become better will we realize that high order systems can be directly moved into developing areas. It will take more resources to teach and adapt these industries or services to their specific needs, but extra support for much greater ling term development should always be preferable to short tern gain with easily predictable long-term loss.

What do you think of these ideas? What problems or stumbling points are apparent?
Let me know and any ideas will be discussed in latter articles!