Re: ecovillage and sustainability

Salut Jean-Claude, I'm responding to your posting of 10 April.
You ask a relevant question, one that is seriously being asked in many
other quarters: "What exactly is an 'ecovillage,' anyway." I like to ask:
"What is it about an ecovillage that makes it a VILLAGE?"
Robert Gilman provided the first definition for 'ecovillage' in the "In
Context" of Summer '91: An ecovillage is:
* a human scale
* full-featured settlement
* in which human activities are harmlessly integrated into the natural
world
* in a way that is supportive of healthy human development
* and can be continued into the indefinite future
Sounds good; but the truth is there does not yet exist anywhere in the
world a settlement that can fulfill these criteria. Of course there are
some really outstanding proto-models (see GEN's website), but even the
most impressive of these are still, I would say, aspiring to grow INTO
genuine, full-featured ecovillages. Of course, not everyone would agree
with my assessment. Many people use the terms 'ecovillage' and
'intentional community' interchangeably, so that currently there is an
enormously wide range of sustainable living experiments - of all shapes
and sizes - calling themselves 'ecovillages.' I would say that all
ecovillages are intentional communities but not all intentional
communities are ecovillages. What are the distinctions (the differences
that makes a difference), for example, between an ecoVILLAGE and an
ecoHAMLET and an ecoENCLAVE?
At the Village Design Institute we're approaching the question, "What is
an ecovillage" from an 'ekistics' perspective, ekistics being the
scientific, multi-disciplinary approach to human settlements. We believe
the distinctions are important because different scales and different
functions have different design criteria, challenges, potentials, and
emergent properties. For some writings that address these issues, and also
address the question: "What makes ecovillages a sustainable solution?",
please see www.villagedesign.org (a website under construction).
VDI defines 'ecovillage' as the sustainable 'unit' of human settlement in
a theoretical ekistics for the 21st century.
Good luck in your inquiry,
Chris Mare


<[email protected]> writes:
> 
>
>
>i would like to hear your answers to the questions :  what is an
>ecovilage ?
>                                                                      
>what makes  ecovillages a sustainable solution.?
> 
>If you know any papers that gives good answers please share .
>thanks 
> 
>jean-claude
>






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