CDU Transition Town story

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“The right not to stay on the tracks” - walk in the dunes of Castricum © Flickr CC, 2013

2013 - AtelierVA


Right to act:

Transition

Town Castricum (TTC) The TTC is a enthousiast group of residents from Castricum, a small village in the North-Holland province of the Netherlands. The members of TTC are concerned about the way their village is developing, and unite on the basis of this. They take pride in the position, that they are “further then politics and markets” (transitiontowns.nl) and therefore go the extra mile to change Castricum. There modus-operandi is encapsulated in the Transition town ethos (and book). Transition Town is a global UK led organization that equip communities for the dual challenges of climate change and peak oil issues. This source of practical and theoretical knowledge functions as a guide to supports the key members to spread their concerns in an oƞen diƛerent-thinking environment. This - as is our point of view - helps them to be self-conƜdence when they present themselves as “change thinkers.” The motive - The core members force on the right to act. They like to make their own village less oil dependent, more sustainable and more social. They do this by starting small-scale, bottom-up and community-based initiatives. There is a local repair-cafe, a permaculture garden and a debating and visioning events scheme. Furthermore they would like to expand the range of projects, from car sharing to other awareness initiatives. But many other project do not make it from the drawing board. The availability of time and passion are the main disturbance factors. The ethos of the Transition Town forwards an ‘organic’ growth. Communities are stimulated to stay close to the perception and understanding of the local society.

How they act The ‘human scale’ attitude is shown in the way TTC organizes their projects. They cooperate in a well-tempered, social way. There are no deadlines or must do’s. Everything is done in a volunteering spirit - taking care of and adapt to, are very important behavior rules. These too are extracted from the transition town guidelines. This might be interpreted as an oppressive frame - which is of course a subjective interpretation - but individuals take a great deal into empathizing with group members. They believe in a heuristic frame, taking emotions and rational opinions as equal values. This much expanded consciousness might feel paternalistic; since it blocks individuals from criticizing others. Besides it cuts of the possibility of individuals to take the lead in reaching the general targets of the community. However this is, as it seems, just the point they are trying to make. New projects are not vertically developed (existing members do more) instead horizontally (new members follow their “passion,” and start new projects). This means there are no admission requirements (open access) and the core members have to trust others, and consequently lose control about the way the community develops.

n this attitude we Ɯnd both the communities’ strength and fallacy. In a volunteering spirit, it works great to conduct diƛerent acts between individuals in the group; everybody blooms in its own way - others try to empathize and be inspired. But this ethos seem to oppose some other values, normally at hand among professional groups, possibly too in the larger Castricum society.


City council community

Associate local community - democracy - sovereignty - consultation - acting on the general interest

other local affiliates - positivism Ȓ 0")# "ƛ& 6 Ȓ 0, & ) ,$+&1&3&16 Ȓ &+1"/!"-"+!"+ 6 Ȓ /"0&))&"+ "

- biosphere consciousness - environmental - self-suƛiciency - independency

TTC community

actor nodes (human and non-human) associations between actors value nodes

- sharing - biosphere awareness a - multiple use s of spaces - meeting off other subcommunities n

The network of cooperation of the Transition Town Castricum community, based on journalistic interview methods and Facebook/Ning network research conducted in April 2013 © AtelierVA

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2013 - AtelierVA


So cooperation with non-insiders (e.g. institutions that do not follow the Transition Town guidelines) turned out to be diƛicult. ur intentions to cooperate with RTVNH (the regional public broadcaster) failed because we could not Ɯnd common grounds. In TTC terminology this means Ɯnding someone with the passion, conƜdence and time to become a journalist and moviemaker. It begs the question if cooperation on the basis of ‘asking TTC to join’ is possible at all. The succes or failure though, might depend more on the (in)Ɲexibility of public institutions to Ɯnd translations, then to the way community-led associations are organized. Adaptability to other communities is a subject which is fundamental when describing the position of community-led organizations within a larger network society. (In network sociological terms; communities are formed by information Ɲows of same value and interest. Societies by the many networks that represent a social structure inherited in information Ɲows (Castells, ǗǕǕǞ). hen the community unites on the basis of challenging, acting or planning in a speciƜc society, one should ask the question what values describe this speciƜc society - and what position the community has within these bounderies. Let us focus on the way TTC deals with this issue. The network of cooperation - The Transition Network proliferates the idea of working on their own within a local group of dedicated people. But also stimulates growth and encourages groups to increase their eƛectiveness by cooperating with the local council and local businesses (Transition Network, 2013). So does TTC, they for example explained their acts to the local council and continu to unfold their projects, cooperating with aƛiliate local communities, government and businesses. They base the cooperation on the value of creating a more resillient society on a local scale. The “elephant in the room” is the “extremely de-

Key issues ș

High Survivability ȡ Low Ɲexibility, of the community network. The codices of the global Transition Town community take a very central position in the network. This makes TTC very survivable, but little Ɲexible, since human actors can leave the network, without implosion of the community, but there are only a few agreed codices – the ones that are prescribed in the guide of the UK based Transition Town movement.

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A lack of support is a threat for individuals to abandon the TTC community (enthusiasts might feel alone, if they are the only one with a drive for certain subjects).

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hen TTC would continue their aim to become a society-wide local network, they would imply the incorporation of institutionalized (solidiƜed) nodes. Un-programmability though is one characteristic of institutions such as government (which are in fact a solidiƜed set of values and interests). The main issue then is how the work ethos of TTC infringes with these solidiƜed codices.


pendable system” of Castricum and its global connections based on global capitalism (TTC, 2011; Nijman, Dekker, Meijboom (2013). In network sociological words; the Castricum society as a whole should build more propinqual structural coherent, degree central ties between social units (people) who are ‘in’. Far-fetched maybe, and a resemblance to 19th century nation-builders, but not a unique point of view when dealing with community-led organizations.

(most of them would be professionals such as politicians and other civil servants), for the sake of simplicity, we single out the one-way information act (Ɲow) of voting one’s every four year.

Society IN/OUT - Now, a new questions arises, because what is the Castricum society? First of all, we are not able to follow the global internet network society by mentioning everybody who has a computer or other device to be IN, and all others are OUT. Primarily because there is no such thing as a Castricum network tool. The Castricum society is not deƜned by its communication platform. Secondly, as 19th century nation builders we would reply by saying that everything and everybody within a geographical border is the Castricum society. But remember, instead of geographical borders, network societies are deƜned by information Ɲows, and interdependency should be seen in terms of having access and control, not in separation acts.

Test-driver - The working ethos describes the way TTC visions this network of nodes and ties that represent the Castricum society. This is a horizontal growth, based on high empathic skills, trust in each other and open access and distributed control. Considering this, the community members are the test-driver of a yet to shape Castricum society; balancing the fragile and undeƜned borders between understanding and perceiving, when empathizing and adapting to what others think and feel. This is, to us, the key issue the Transition Town Castricum community makes in the larger village society.

, 012ƛ - Following these arguments, TTC would like to build more interdependable ties within the local society. Being IN the Castricum society seems to be, to our belief, everybody with access and control to act in the society with a clear message “you can do something” (Nijman et al. 2013) (i.e. being able to create more ties, while acting). This is the claim TTC makes. But if the Castricum society is everyone with access and control to the shaping of the society, then much of today’s Castricum society is limited to just a few nodes in the network

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A thriving and successful local society should be empathic (perceivable and understandable), thus not consisting of long strings of information Ɲows, the way global capitalism is normally shaped.

Artist Impression of a Transition Town vision in Castricum © TTC Facebook 2012

2013 - AtelierVA


BIASES: CONNECT ș

Create ‘devices’ so members of the Transition Town community (and others) are able to better perceive and understand (empathize) with each other in the horizontal hierarchy they operate.

RECALIBRATE ș

Create a better and mutual understanding of what is the Castricum Society. hat are the common values and interests in the society program?

GLUE ș

Create nudges to increase the TTC networks’ relative few multiplexity ties (more than one type of link between nodes, such as colleague and friend, or business partner and TT enthusiast). This would create stronger bonds and a denser more resilient network.

(RE)PROGRAM ș

Start a local discussion about what is the Castricum society. Is it an open-access network? Of which deƜning values and interests (program) consists this network?

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The deƜning values- and interest-set of the Transition Town community is prescribed in the guidelines and ethos of the global movement. The question is whether this set is open enough to allow actors make translations; to create shared space, equivalence and commensurability (Plesner, 2009). To gain more insight into this subject, we would recommend you to read the next chapter about the etering Community.


“The Transition movement is based upon the sharing of ideas between diƛerent initiatives, without a dogmatic or prescribed character. This contradicts to the Ɯrst key issue of TTC described in this document. ithin this organization structure, Ɲexibility is endless and it makes connections with other more rigid organisations (such as government or corporations) possible, also in practice. The core-members recognize in this case, that ‘it’s goes like it is going’ is not always possible. Reaching targets also means, rolling up our sleeves; especially in the situations that inspire us” (translated). Maarten Nijman (TTC member).

“The framework of the etering Community is like an umbrella-organization, under which everybody in the neighborhood can take his/her own initiatives, facilitated by the etering Community, but not guided or controlled as such. This is to my understanding the type of organization (in the making) you advise us to be. Except the S C’s aim to be a self-directed neighborhood. There is no program, there are initiatives that go aƞer their sole goals” (translated). Maartje Romme (S C member)

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