Democratic Forest Trusts (PDF)in Watson, Alan; Dean, Liese; Sproull, Janet, comps. 2006. Science and stewardship to protect and sustain wilderness values: Eighth World Wilderness Congress Symposium; 2005 September 30-October 6; Anchorage, AK.Democratic trusts with leadership elected by citizen-members promise to solve many of the problems afflicting both traditional government and corporate ownership of forestlands. This article explores these issues in some depth.Complexity and the Dream of Human Control of Eco-Systems (PDF)in Watson, Alan; Dean, Liese; Sproull, Janet, comps. 2006. Science and stewardship to protect and sustain wilderness values: Eighth World Wilderness Congress Symposium; 2005 September 30-October 6; Anchorage, AK.The title captures it. I then explore the kinds of institutions compatible with both nature and the modern world that are implied from this analysis.Rethinking the Obvious: Modernity and Living Respectfully With Nature (PDF)The Trumpeter: Journal of Ecosophy, Winter, 1997.Modernity is usually considered a wrong turn in terms of respect for and sustaining the environment. I argue the reality is more complex, for modernity has freed us from personal dependence on agriculture, ended the economic value of children, radically reduced the likelihood of large scale wat, and shifted much production to intellectual rather than material capital. This partially decouples society from nature, which gives us important opportunities as well as problems.Towards an Ecocentric Political Economy (PDF)The Trumpeter, Fall, 1996.This paper begins my effort at showing how liberal modernity can be harmonized with an ecocentric perspective on our relationship with the natural world. It is a corrective to much “free market environmental” literature that sacrifices Nature to money as well as to anti-liberal attacks by well-meaning but economically naïve environmentalists.Unexpected Harmonies: Self-Organization in Liberal Modernity and Ecology (PDF)The Trumpeter, Journal of Ecosophy, 10:1, Winter 1993This is my initial paper exploring how what I term ‘evolutionary liberal’ thought can be an important means by which society and nature can be brought into greater harmony. The other Trumpeter papers build on it.Deep Ecology and Liberalism: The Greener Implications of Evolutionary Liberalism (PDF)Review of Politics, Fall, 1996.Liberal thought and deep ecology are usually regarded as mutually exclusive. But the “evolutionary” tradition offers a way to integrate the two through commonalties in the work of David Hume, Michael Polanyi, Arne Naess, and Aldo Leopold, providing a stronger foundation for liberalism while strengthening the case for an ecocentric ethic.(Related subjects: Ecology)Saving Western Towns: A Jeffersonian Green Proposal (PDF)in Writers on the Range, Karl Hess and John Baden, eds., University Press of Colorado, 1998.Developmental pressures in the rural and small town West involve three groups: long term residents, new arrivals, and environmentalists. Today their interests often conflict. This conflict is in part the outcome of institutions which prevent harmonizing competing interests. The concept of developmental trusts, both for rural regions and for small communities offers a means whereby these interests can be harmonized for the benefit of all concerned.(Related subjects: Politics)Social Ecology, Deep Ecology, and Liberalism (PDF)Critical Review, 6: 2-3, 1992.Murray Bookchin is considered a leading radical environmental theorist. However, his analysis is incapable of leading humankind towards a more respectful and sustainable relationship with the natural world. Criticisms of Bookchin from both the deep ecology and evolutionary liberal perspective complement one another, pointing the way towards a better understanding of how modernity relates to the environment.The paper as a whole offers an early discussion of issues that are more clearly addressed in later papers, particularly Deep Ecology and Liberalism (1996) and the three Trumpeter articles in 1997, 1996, and 1993. However, there are other ideas in the article which have not been developed more thoroughly elsewhere.
Beltane is approaching, and though I’m on the road right now to Southern California, I will be back to celebrate the dawn on May 1, arriving well before dawn at Berkeley’s Inspiration Point in Tilden Park . There, every year, in no matter what the weather, Berkeley Morris performs Morris dances to ‘bring up the sun’ and honor the day. I have always felt something almost primordially right about this way of celebrating the dawn and the beginning of this season.
I remember one year during a ferocious downpour they danced in the puddles and a decent crowd of us stood under umbrellas to honor them and the date. More often they dance as the light gradually grows until the sun breaks through on the far eastern horizon, bathing us in its gentle light. When the weather is decent, and it usually is, hundreds show up. Not all are Pagans, but they are certainly Pagans at heart, honoring the turning of wheel, the sacredness of this day, and the warmth of community.
If you are in the SF Bay Area, consider getting up at an ungodly hour to be there by 5:20, well before dawn. There is something truly wonderful about the experience. The directions to their performance are here.
And if you are not in the SF Bay Area, check around to see if there is a local Morris Dancing troupe doing the same thing. Maybe some of my readers can inform us of other places where the sun will be danced up. It’s a wonderful way to honor the May.
posted April 28, 2009 at 12:33 pm
Deer Creek Morris Men and others dance up the sun Friday at Beltane at the Baylands, East Palo Alto:
http://www.rgoldman.org/morris/dcmm/gigs.htm#Palo_Alto_Baylands
http://www.rgoldman.org/morris/dcmm/mayday.htm
Morris Dancing all up and down the West Coast:
http://rgoldman.org/morris/mayday.htm
posted April 28, 2009 at 3:38 pm
There’s Morris Dancing in Sebastopol
“Come join us at dawn on May 1 as we dance the sun up. Dancing starts at 5:30 AM and continues until about 20 minutes after sunrise. We’ll be dancing behind the Community Center Youth Annex, at 425 Morris St. in Sebastopol, in the space between the pond and the traffic circle. Park on the street, and then follow the candles. There will be morris dancing to watch and dances everyone can do, as well as wonderful music and singing. We’d love it if you’d join us for this celebration! Dress warmly, as it can be cold in the pre-dawn hours. This is a free event!”