Principles of Sustaining Human Communities  (Capra)

• Interdependence

  • All members of a community are interconnected in intricate network of relationships
  • Existence based on relationships to other things
  • Mutual dependence of all life processes on one another
  • Success of whole community depends on success of individual members and success of member depends on success of community
  • Awareness of multiple relationships among its members
  • Systems thinking: from parts to whole, objects to relationships & contents to patterns

• Recycling

  • Relationships are nonlinear, involving multiple feedback loops
  • Feedback loops are the pathways along which nutrients are continually recycled
  • Closed systems w/ respect to matter & open systems in terms of energy

   

• Partnership

  • Cyclical exchanges of energy & resources are sustained by pervasive cooperation
  • Democracy & personal empowerment; each member plays an important role
  • As partnership proceeds, each part better understands the needs of the other and they co-evolve

   

• Flexibility

  • Consequence of multiple feedback loops, which tends to bring the system back into balance whenever there is a derivation from the norm
  • The more variables are kept fluctuating, the more dynamic the system; the greater it’s flexibility, the greater it’s ability to adapt to changing conditions
  • Lack of = stress; pushing variables to extreme values over long periods of time induce increased rigidity 
  • Conflict better resolved by a dynamic balance; both sides of a conflict can be important; contradictions within the community are signs of its diversity and vitality

   

• Resilience

  • Reaction to outside disturbances & adapt to changing conditions

   

• Diversity

  • Many different relationships, many different approaches to the same problem
  • Diverse community is resilient, capable of adapting to changing conditions
  • Contains many species w/ overlapping ecological functions that can partially replace on another