The draft of FixGov.

This chapter examines how directly democratic organization of society can bring people into better harmony with other life on the planet while avoiding the damage caused by large-scale exploitation of the environment. Based on a summary by Bill Ellis in Maine, USA.

Some of the thoughts presented here were inspired by E. F. Schumacher’s 1973 book, Small is Beautiful, and the lecture Bill Ellis gave before the E. F. Schumacher Society in 1998.

Today the people of the world are challenged with unprecedented problems as improper care for the earth's ecological systems threatens the planet’s life support system and has brought us to the brink of collapse. At the same time soaring population places increasing demands on these fragile and interconnected systems.

In addition, technological advances have made human labor forces increasingly irrelevant to the production of goods and thus delinked from the financial markets. As civilization proceeds from the industrial age into the age of knowledge millions of people may be left behind with no means of sustenance.

As detailed in previous chapters, the powerful are proceeding down the path of globalization, disregarding the needs of people and the environment while enhancing the fortunes of the few (see Chapter 4). This has resulted in most of the world's wealth being concentrated while many millions of others worldwide suffer from unbearable poverty with hardships bordering on deliberate inhumane treatment.

Under what some refer to as the “dominator paradigm” prevailing over thousands of years, economic needs supercede the natural order of earth needs. Modern attempts to increase food production by the sale and use of chemical fertilizers, pesticides and herbicides, monocropping, and intensive meat production are largely responsible for increasing desertification as a result of worldwide topsoil losses. Since civilization itself is dependent upon the topsoil on which it rests, we are digging the foundation out from under our home.

Now, inadequately tested bioengineering practices (genetically modified products), saturation of live stock with antibiotics, irradiation, and use of hormones to increase milk production introduce possible new dangers.
As these problems become more evident, millions of individuals around the world are beginning to question the stability and security of our present systems and join with like-minded others to explore the situation. As a result there is a movement toward the creation of “sustainable living” societies based on decentralized financial systems, governance through bioregionalism, and lessening of dependence on world trade.

Such people are sometimes described as “inner directed,” “cultural creatives” and/or “integral culturists.” They believe that competition is antithetical to sustainable living and insist on cooperation. A turn in the direction of sustainable living requires that society examine its old thought patterns and adopt lifestyles that more nearly fit the needs of today. Although such sustainable local or regional communities tend to be restricted in size, they can be linked with other communities in cooperative networks that have unlimited potential.