What is the ideal size population needed to make a 'successful' permaculture society?
too large - not a community, but now a collection of communities?
what is the optimum size of a population to allow a permaculture-based society to thrive? it would seem easy to do with a handful or couple dozen people, but has there been any attempt at doing this on a large scale? what might the difficulties be with either extreme? how would they be solved?
philosophy of permaculture...
http://permaculture.org.uk/
Answer:
Two views, the traditional Eco Village view which is well researched and the concept of ideal population size is highly contested See paper Eco Village Sustainable Lifestyle
For a typical outcome.
See Key Finding Number 3: 'The size of eco-villages varies
There is no agreement as to the most desirable size of an eco-village.
From the examples visited in Europe the smallest was the Hockerton Housing Project, near
Nottingham in England with only 5 houses, nine adults and a number of children. By contrast
the 4 eco-villages which comprise the Damanhur Federation, near Turin, Italy have a
combined total of 400 full time residents. Within the Damanhur Federation, the citizens
interact on a daily basis with a more manageable unit of people living in 20 houses.
Discussions in Damanhur indicated that this unit for social interaction and decision making
for some matters was now considered to be too large. A more reasonable number of houses
was probably around the 6 to 13 as enabled by Byron Local Environmental Plan, 1988 and
the Byron Rural Settlement Strategy, 1998. Perhaps such a cluster could be regarded as an
eco-hamlet with a grouping of such clusters as an eco-village.
Implication'
The second view is that any size population, few houses, village, city can be made into a successful permaculture society merely by those within it ARE PARTICIPATING IN A PERMACULTURE LIFESTYLE.This model is a better fit for city/town living where ownership is usually a mixture of privately owned, landlord owned, council house owned etc.
The main failing of 'eco-villages' and other commune living is the diversity in opinion, funding, experience, ability, effort etc within that eco-village. This diversity should be it's strength, however, co-ownership often denies uniqueness so many eco villages fail. A city permaculture lifestyle relies on reciprocity but can not demand it. Therefore in my opinion, it encourages diversity and co-operation so is, perhaps, a more workable model.
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