[PenultimateManStanding]

With the right combination of luck, courage and brains, there may be some viable communities here and there in the world after the full brunt has hit and globalism is dead, powerful central governments have vanished, and localities everywhere have done what they can to get something going that requires no fossil fuels. The odds are heavily against them though and Kunstler, Heinberg et al are selling a pipe dream. This is my contention so let me give reasons and the more optimistic among you can perhaps think about it and give your reasons why you think the outlook isn't this dire. (Those of you who don't accept the premise, we know you are also here in this forum and we know that you don't accept the premise; however, I would appreciate if you would refrain from debating the premiss. What I want to talk about is if locally viable communities can make it after the crash, taking the crash as a given for the sake of argument.) Here are some factors that weigh against the emergence of self-sufficient local communities:

1. Current localities are integrated into larger social systems and are not even remotely close to the ideal of self-sufficiency. They have descended from earlier similar conditions stretching back for centuries. The 'outside world' has always been there like the waters for fish have always been there. Take away the outside world and a town becomes like a fish out of water.

2. Perhaps you will say that people are not fish and that Necessity is the Mother of Invention, i.e. we will do it because we have to. People are born into, conditioned by, and adapted to the Communities that currently exist. If a Committee of the best and brightest in a town was set up and given a mandate to design a new, fundamentally different and completely alien living arrangement for the people to live by, they would quickly discover that they have no knowledge base to work with. The community they would be replacing was not 'designed' in such a manner but rather, evolved through countless previous generations. And furthermore, if in spite of this ignorance, they managed to come up with a perfect plan, the people of the town wouldn't be up to it since they are adapted to the old ways.

3. A complete technological retrofit will prove to be impossible as it becomes apparent that it is not only necessary to reinvent the wheel, but an endless list of other mundane technical processes. Simple technology will turn out not to be so simple afterall.

4. There will prove to be no viable political arrangements.

[Raxozanne]

Yes current-day 'non-civilised' cultures and tribes (currently persecuted today) with little outside contact and traditions that date back thousands of years will the ones who will survive and flourish and lead humanity into the future.

We the 'civilised' 'cultured' but stupid humans dependant upon 'the system' that our wonderful governments created for us will be the ones that perish.

Nevertheless some will survive, probably the most ruthless and backstabbing types but some will survive.

[Russian_Cowboy]

There exists an experience of building tiny subsistence farms or villas in Russia called "dachas". After Gorbachev-Yeltsin reforms, many Russians were left with no income or with very little income insufficient to support themselves. To avoid mutiny, the goverment gave away pieces of agricultural land, about 0.2 acres each, to all those who wanted to build a small house there and cultivate the land using the methods of subsistence farming. It used to be that "dachas" were owned by the few chosen ones and mostly were not used for farming. Now everyone could build his or her tiny (or not so tiny, depending on the income) villa. This quickly became fashionable among elderly folks who could not own any real estate under the communists and tens of millions of people got into the project.

The results of 20 years of building and running these dachas are summarized in a good article in Russian: http://www.kolokolmagazine.com/Kaganski ... revolyucii
Here are the main points of the article.

1) Dachas have been built around big and medium-sized cities everywhere in Russia except for high Arctic and high mountains. Dachas, their roads and communications have occupied a total of 300 thousand square kilometers of land in Russia. Every large city is now surrounded by a 10-15 kilometer wide "ring" of dachas, except Moscow, which is surrounded by a 50km - wide ring.

2) The accumulated countrywide dacha-related construction and land development cost between 1985 and 2003 exceeds a staggering 1 trillion dollars (Russia's annual GDP is about half that amount). The total economic output of dachas is estimated at 50 million dollars annually.

3) The produce grown by dachas was found not cleaner or more organic than the produce grown by professional farmers who use machinery and pesticides. At the same time, dachas caused a significant environment degradation: pollution of land and water, destruction of animal and plant habitats. Any big land development project or creation of sanctuaries near big Russian cities is now extremely complicated if not impossible. Dachas often look ugly and unesthetical and they almost completely blocked the access to the wild nature for the residents of big Russian cities.

4) The "subsistance" farming practiced in dachas is heavily based on mass-produced goods as well as goverment-subsidized utilities and goverment-subsidized commuter buses and trains that run between the cities and dachas.

[killJOY]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'T')ake away the outside world and a town becomes like a fish out of water.

[heyhoser]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('PenultimateManStanding', 'T')he odds are heavily against them though and Kunstler, Heinberg et al are selling a pipe dream.

[Pops]

I’ll go with heyhoser on this. My family survived in the Indian territories a hundred years ago, my wife’s family did the same in the California sierras, we went to a barbeque here in Missouri last night and though there was a line of new pickups in the yard, most folks except us have been here for generations and got by.

Though we’ll always be new here we are received openly but then we are fairly common people. I don’t think any transition will lead to an 1850’s lifestyle in the current generation, but if it is necessary there quite a few that can skin a buck and run a trotline.

[PenultimateManStanding]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('heyhoser', 'I')t's like that Hank Williams Jr. song, A Country Boy Can Survive. Listen to it if you can, cause we can take care of ourselves.

[ArimoDave]

I think that small communities might be almost self-sustaining, but not quite. There will need to be some trade with
communities (and other areas) which have materials and supplies which are not native to the area. I don't think the
trade routes have to be fast -- sailing ships, donkey carts, and the like should be sufficient. However, this probably
requires that the overall population be a whole bunch smaller.

I hope there will be a smooth transition to this kind of life-style replete with some modern improvements. I dont see
us reverting back to the past. A different kind of future -- absolutely -- but not the total collapse of society into the
"New Dark Age" so typified in doom and gloom movies.

ArimoDave

[Ludi]

I got a book on primitive skills which shows how to make tools from rocks, how to make fiber from plants, how to make fishhooks from bone,etc, all based on Stone Age technology. As long as there are rocks and plants and a little knowledge, handy people will learn how to make stuff. There's also no reason why they can't trade with neighboring communities.

[PenultimateManStanding]

One thing those stone age people had going for them Ludi was a thriving ecosystem. We have diverted so much of the natural world for our own cultivation that we crowded out and depleted what the stone age people lived on.

[Pops]

The “skin a buck” thing was simply a nod to Hank Jr. since there are lots more people than deer nowadays.

The point is that all those old skills aren’t necessarily lost and least of all is the ability to trade.

What type of catastrophe will do you imagine will cause there to be a complete end to trade?

There was trade when the highways were only paths through the woods and transport was a pack. Granted the easily mined resources are gone but there are plenty of recyclable materials out there - heck I have several thousand pounds of scrap metal behind the barn LOL! And yes I could turn it into knives given a little time but I can’t imagine why I would have to.

My point is simply that it has been a very long time since communities were even close to the isolation you are talking about (at least in the Midwest) and then it was due to the fact the inhabitantsthere were few and far between.

I’m expecting to see the cost of energy to raise in my lifetime and then a dramatic reduction in energy use in my children’s and grandchildren’s lifetimes. This will of course bring an end to the ability to order just about anything one could imagine and have it on the doorstep the next day. But the way you make it sound, every tool in existence will turn to dust and all our legs are going to fall off in a few years time!

[PenultimateManStanding]

Pops, I know that scavenging will be what people do and the trade that does go on will be in goods that people have salvaged. In time these things will wear out. I'm just trying to point out that self-sufficiency is a lot more difficult than the Kunstlers and Heinbergs are saying. Another worrisome thing is that going back to simple farming has enormous obstacles in the way because we don't currently have year-to-year seed saving as a component of our agricultural methods.

[Pops]

Certainly you are correct that there will be a big transition to be made if there aren’t some good alternatives found soon. If your scenario of complete isolation were to come to pass it would indeed be a tough life.

The biggest worry I have for the very long term is the lack of easily mined ores. But OTOH I imagine one large modern building has the equivalent of many small old hand-worked iron mines. I’m really not sure about how that all plays out but I’m thinking it’s gonna be way done the road.

But just to continue my argumentative bent this morning , I don’t see a big problem from the lack of open-pollinated seeds for larger growers in developed countries for quite a while – although the widespread use of genetically modified crops in undeveloped countries may be a different story. The benefits of using simple hybrids are huge and as long as some type of motor fuel is available their use in Ag is certain.

Having said that, in the mid-term I do worry about the possibility of dramatic increases in the cost of food before transitions are forced on modern Ag, but I’ve blabbed quite a bit about that lately and won’t repeat myself here!

[Ludi]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('PenultimateManStanding', 'O')ne thing those stone age people had going for them Ludi was a thriving ecosystem. We have diverted so much of the natural world for our own cultivation that we crowded out and depleted what the stone age people lived on.

[FarmMama]

Some people will make it, others won't.

It's already been pointed out that there are people living in the U.S. who still don't have electricity. I lived in a small community of 200 souls and there were plenty of people who lived well with no running water to their homes or electricity.

It may be difficult, but it's certainly possible.

As to the seed saver comment......what planet do you live on? I've lived in the U.S. my entire life, am still planting the same beans, peas and potatoes my great grandmother planted to feed her family. Sheesh....

I'm looking forward to the changes as my family pretty much is self-sufficient now. There are a few of us around. Perhaps as it all disintegrates someone else may ask us how we do it. (Though the knowledge is already there).

I'm not saying that I won't miss coffee . . or banana's . . . but I love living simply and sustainably. If things were to stay the same for another 100 years I'd STILL choose to live the way I do.

(hi everyone, my first post though I love to lurk)

[Bytesmiths]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('PenultimateManStanding', '1'). Current localities are integrated into larger social systems and are not even remotely close to the ideal of self-sufficiency.

[Bytesmiths]

[quote="FarmMama"As to the seed saver comment......what planet do you live on?[/quote]San Diego. Somewhere between Jupiter and Mars, when it comes to things of the earth. :-)

Yea, I let that one slip. One of our ecovillage members is a specialist in heritage seeds. These folks are around; you just don't know about them because they haven't been on your Tee Vee! :-)

[Bytesmiths]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('kochevnik', 'C')onsider the earthhaven guys posting this week ... yes they probably have the skills and motivation to create something, but they completely lack the mindset necessary for 'keeping' what they have. The first semi-organized biker gang will put all their well laid plans to waste.

[bobaloo]

kocenvik, I think you're really overly generalizing about people and it hurts your logic. For example, I'm one of those long-hair VW-bus driving types with a closet full of tie-dye. On the other hand I'm spending the afternoon building up a couple of nice Bulgarian AK-74 rifles for my daughters from parts kits and homebrew receivers. I'm the most peaceful guy around, unless you mess with me or mine, in which case I have the skills and training to put down some serious hurt. Don't think all hippies are gentle pacifists, some of us do our chanting to calm our breath for the 600 meter range.

Some of the "violent" types might surprise you. If you ever get to know any real Special Ops types you might find many of them to resemble college profs more than Mad Max. Lotsa guys go in the service wanting to do that kind of stuff, the ones that get selected have the brains and personality types to do it right. Couple of my buddies here in my little town are just that, retired after 20 years, and I'd be most happy to have them on my side when TSHTF.

Finally, no, it's not going to happen overnight. I think your time frame is a little collapsed, making it seem impossible. If it gets that bad there's going to be a retraction / retreat, with substantial dieoff, after which the survivors will have to evolve / invent a new society with inter-community trade as part of it.

Twenty years ago I moved to a small, isolated town and started building my "lifeboat". I have no illusions that things would go smoothly here, but I do feel pretty good that we can pull together and keep everybody from starving, keep them from freezing and provide for the common defense should it be necessary. We'd never be able to do it at today's standard of living, but that's not the bottom line, is it?

[Tyler_JC]

How many of you have seen any of those movies about pioneers in the wilderness? These people look like sustainability. They act like people who care about their environment. However, they are using tools made by factories in the cities. They are using technology that they would be incapable of reproducing themselves. That is the message PMS is trying to send.

That little house on the prairie has plenty of high level technology in it that require a massive infrastructure to produce. The pilgrims of Massachusetts used manufactured goods from England in order to survive. A steel plow requires a city. Very few small towns are capable of building things like harvesters or locomotives. PMS believes that when the cities disappear (we just won’t be able to feed them), this technology will disappear along with it. He’s right to some extent. IMHO, I believe that permaculture will save us from the kind of work that the pioneers had to endure.