Permaculture Cities

Regenerative Subsistence Land
#1

This came up in a thread in social technologies about oracles (long story). However, long story short I brought up the idea that it might be possible after collapse for a few small cities (over 2000 people) to survive based on permaculture.

I don’t think that these could arise ont heir own, but I think that, using the knowledge and refuse of civilization, a few cities might, with the right vision, be able to transition. There is a lot of space in cities that could be used to grow food and though permaculture takes a lot of attention, it doesn’t require that attention all day every day. If people weeded as they passed places, watered every so often, and were supported by a few outlying farms, I think it might be possible.

What do others think, is it a pipe dream or might it be feasible?

#2

Every subsistence method brings with it a particular food density. A field of corn makes for human food about as dense as you can ever possibly get it. A permaculture garden relies on edge, guilds, “zone 5,” and other methods which don’t scale very well. By that, I mean that, for instance, it makes little sense to speak of putting an edge next to another edge, doesn’t it? You can’t make more food with permaculture just by doing more of what you’ve done. And then you have hunting and gathering, where human food appears spread throughout a wild landscape that provides food for many other animals, as well.

The density of food roughly sets the density of people you can have; we can transport food, but that takes energy, and more energy the farther we transport it, so human population density doesn’t have to follow food density exactly, but it can’t vary too much.

From historical examples, we can see what kind of population densities our subsistence methods allow. We have plenty of examples of permacultural societies, called horticultural societies in anthropology, but the methods do not differ, sometimes not even in the most minor details. But these societies only support densities at the village level, a few hundred people at most. To support even 2,000 people has always, in the past, required some level of monocrop agriculture.

Based on that, I would say that a permacultural settlement of 2,000 people seems to defy what we know of permacultural productivity, and seems much more in line with agriculture.

#3

speaking of…

something i’ve been meaning to ask you, do you know what kind of area (in terms of size) various societies needed per village?

#4

My understanding is that Havana, a city of a couple million, produces 50% of its produce within the city (urban/rooftop gardens). That’s really impressive, but it’s still only 50% and probably doesn’t include other things folks are eating (like rice).

#5

My point is that cities, as they stand, have a lot of possible edge, a lot of small spaces that seem to be pre-created to offer the kind of edges and spaces that permaculture needs. The basic idea is not that you are creating more big blanket areas of cultivation, that I agree would be completely impossible with permaculture (well maybe not impossible, it would just resemble more of a park than a field) but to create a large number of fractured areas. I’m not saying that it would look anything like the cities we know with the houses and buildings crammed together as tight as possible and condos rising to the heavens. There would have to be considerably more green space, less paved areas, probably few if any cars as oil would be scarce, as would power of any kind. However, you could still have the kind of things that arise out cities, that kind of city atmosphere. People would have to spend some time everyday working to make their own food, and the government would certainly have to be different than anything most often considered here.

Reading back over my post, I wonder if I am just fantasizing about my dream city. I don’t think so though, I think that in isolated small cities, with the right kind of vision, it could happen. It would need to start happening soon though. However, look at things like transition towns. I could see some of those evolving into something like what I am talking about.

#6

Wildeyes, I don’t know in depth the agricultural or horticultural practices of Havana, but I would presume that there are ways that yield could be improved drastically, both by expanding cultivation area and by using different practices such as stacking and bio-intesive.

I also forgot the possibilities of growing things inside.

#7

I don’t want to deny that it’s possible to reclaim/re-use urban areas for food production because a city like Havana shows that these things are very possible. I can definitely see the possibility of post-civ folks inhabiting the shells of old cities, and that could spring up its own unique afterculture, but I simply can’t imagine a city working in full like we have cities now. Food is not the only issue. Other practical issues (heating/cooling/social control) obstacle that kind of vision from spilling into reality.

We know different cultures have tried cities in various forms and all have failed. Even if the permaculture city were created, with numbers that large we have a complex society that will probably fragment at a certain point. Why would we want the permaculture city – which has never been achieved – when we know of societies who have succeeded by keeping things on small-human scales?

Perhaps a better way to put this: What about a city attracts you and draws you in that you want to see that mode of life continue?

#8

That is a brilliant question, thanks for reminding me to slow down and think.

What draws me to cities is the astonishing compacted diversity they offer. There are hundreds of different ways that people can live in city, hundreds of different small niche groups that just don’t exist in smaller communities - sub-cultures if you would. These subcultures have found new life via the internet, allowing them to spread beyond the cities, but without that, which won’t last too too long, there is no way for the beautiful sub-cultures and extremely devoted groups that I love so much, could arise without cities.

#9

What subcultures do you speak of?

#10

THis for instance, the entire environmental movement for another, the variety of new age groups, steampunk :), the endless assortment of clubs and societies

#11

I understand that; I’ve certainly had great interactions through the internet and love to go to a club for a concert every now and then. But, at the same time, I sense that in a post-civilized, place-based culture, the culture and the land would easily replace the nourishment I receive from these various subcultures with something more filling.

To give an example that may or may not relate, I recently attended a camp in the mountains with a number of environmentalists. One night, while we watched a video (a Derrick Jensen video no less!), a storm came through and knocked power out. Almost immediately, someone pulled out a drum and began playing. Others followed suit, and not long after a number of us were dancing. In another room, folks were sitting around the fireplace, talking, playing banjo and fiddle, and having a good time.

To me, this illustrates how, how these subcultures possess a latent form of a healthy, face-to-face culture, just waiting to emerge when the lights go out.

#12
something i've been meaning to ask you, do you know what kind of area (in terms of size) various societies needed per village?

Most had gardens spanning out from the village in all directions for about as far as someone could walk to, work, and come back from in a day, so maybe 10 square miles?

My understanding is that Havana, a city of a couple million, produces 50% of its produce within the city (urban/rooftop gardens). That's really impressive, but it's still only 50% and probably doesn't include other things folks are eating (like rice).

Last I checked, it stood at 30%, not 50%. Also see many of the ancient Mayan cities, which grew as “garden cities” that really come as close to a “permacultural city” as I can imagine. They still needed huge fields of agricultural activity to offset their shortfall.

I'm not saying that it would look anything like the cities we know with the houses and buildings crammed together as tight as possible and condos rising to the heavens.

OK, so can you see how each of those variables cuts down the possible population density? Yeah, I could definitely see a horticultural village setting up shop in the ruins of some former city (assuming the salvagers didn’t push them out, warlord-style); in fact, I think one of the most likely future scenarios would have increasing permacultural practice leading to more well-defined neighborhoods, that eventually drift into horticultural villages, ultimately ending up with a network of horticultural villages that drift apart from one another and remember their ancient siblinghood. But as far as thousands of people subsisting in any sustainable way in such density, I just don’t see it. We live too far up the trophic levels for that. Imagine if we talked about lions or cheetahs instead; would you think it reasonable then to expect some viable, sustainable way to support thousands of them living in one place? So why humans?

However, you could still have the kind of things that arise out cities, that kind of city atmosphere.

BAM! There you go. That introduces the element in this whole city discussion that just drives me up a wall every time it comes up. Because massive, sedentary populations have nothing to do with the “city atmosphere.” See “The Nature of Cities,” but I’ll quote this part in particular:

But city life itself likely makes up the thing most people will miss most of all: the chance to meet many new people, and to engage in the bustle and frenetic energy of the urban setting. For that, primitive societies had festivals and fairs which would bring together all of a region’s tribes and bands in a single place for a short time. They would trade, meet up, sometimes exchange members, get married, and effectively create a temporary, [i]ad hoc[/i] city life for a few days, before dispersing again, before they began to have a lasting detrimental impact. That kind of “flash mob” approach to city life strikes a balance between our occasional needs for mass interaction, and the ecological (and psychological) strains that such interactions take. Even if we ignore the ecological implications, most of us eventually become stressed and fatigued from the constant bustle of city life, and eventually seek retreat into a more-than-human world to rejuvenate from that. The festival provides everything we love best about cities, without destroying the land that gives us life, or even outlasting its usefulness when it energizes us, to become the hectic urban trap that ultimately drains us.
Wildeyes, I don't know in depth the agricultural or horticultural practices of Havana, but I would presume that there are ways that yield could be improved drastically, both by expanding cultivation area and by using different practices such as stacking and bio-intesive.

Havana already did those. Really, they’ve done something remarkable there. They’ve pretty much done it all. But permaculture never has supported thousands of people, why would we expect it to?

What draws me to cities is the astonishing compacted diversity they offer. There are hundreds of different ways that people can live in city, hundreds of different small niche groups that just don't exist in smaller communities - sub-cultures if you would. These subcultures have found new life via the internet, allowing them to spread beyond the cities, but without that, which won't last too too long, there is no way for the beautiful sub-cultures and extremely devoted groups that I love so much, could arise without cities.

The subcultures of modern civilization really don’t have much variety or diversity, at least not compared to the biocultural diversity that native life requires, where culture varies in engagement with the variation and biodiversity of your bioregional landscape. When they come together in regular festivals, there you see some real diversity!

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#13

The idea of the festival does really make sense to me, and I guess I could see how it might balance the stresses of city life with the advantages. Cities do give the possibility of stability to these kind of things though, they give the opportunity for the interactions to blossom in a way that they couldn’t, even in a few weeks. I think that a city in the midst of tribes would have even greater ability to offer this diversity because of all the inflows of ideas and the greater knowledge of different ways to live.

About the trophic level thing. Wouldn’t it be possible for these city dwellers to intentional place themselves lower on the trophic level - that is how humans have managed to get big groups in the first place, because we’re omnivores.

#14

Yeah, agriculture gets about as close to a vegetarian society as humans have ever managed to heathily pull off. Only in agricultural societies do you find vegetarianism espoused as a value in itself. But even then, well, you see how that works out ecologically.

How do you think cities provide more stability than an annual festival? For example, we know of one festival spot used in the Paleolithic for about 30,000 years. Compare that to the oldest continuously-inhabited city, Jericho, and its measely 11,000 years. You don’t just have a few weeks, because next year you all get together again, and those “weak link” relationships that Jeff Vail writes about get picked right back up again.

How would a city in the midst of tribes stop itself from consuming all the tribes around it? We’ve had cities built precisely with such intentions before, but they always end up gobbling up everything around them, no matter what its people want.

#15

Well, yes, vegetarianism has developed out of agriculture, but I don’t think the two nescessariyl have to be associated. A city wouldn’t have to be completely vegetarian either, you could have a few cows or chickens, and that would actually work better with the gardens.

What I mean by stability is the possibility to have strong links within that diversity, instead of just weak links. So sure, you see the same people again every year, but you only have weak link relationships with those people, instead of in a city where yo could have strong link relationships.

I’ve never heard of anything like that before, could you give an example?

#16
Well, yes, vegetarianism has developed out of agriculture, but I don't think the two nescessariyl have to be associated. A city wouldn't have to be completely vegetarian either, you could have a few cows or chickens, and that would actually work better with the gardens.

But the more of that you do, the further up the trophic levels you go, and the smaller the population you can support.

What I mean by stability is the possibility to have strong links within that diversity, instead of just weak links. So sure, you see the same people again every year, but you only have weak link relationships with those people, instead of in a city where yo could have strong link relationships.

I don’t know if you mean the same thing by strong links and weak links that the rest of us do. Weak links go far afield; they help you get a perspective from outside your local group. Acquaintances have weak links. You and I have a weak link. A tribe or band would have strong links. They’ll stand by you through thick and thin, but because you all have so much in common, you tend not to have much diversity. Your family and best friends will have strong links.

In a city, you have strong links and weak links. You live in the midst of thousands or even millions, but you still only really know a handful of people. Actually, with millions, most of us become increasingly isolated, lucky if we have even two or three strong links. You need both; you need weak links to spice things up and keep you from stagnating, and you need strong links for day-to-day support.

Which actually fits an annual festival model perfectly, almost as if it evolved that way. :slight_smile:

I've never heard of anything like that before, could you give an example?

Try reading Jack Weatherford’s Savages & Civilization; I’ve thought that I should have another thesis, “Civilization may collapse from cultural homogeneity,” based on the arguments in that book. Really, you could trace this line of thinking all the way back to ibn Khaldun.

#17

True, but up to a certain point, having animals involved can actually enhance the productivity of the horticultural system.

I totally agree that you need both weak and strong links, and I mean exactly the same things as you by those terms. I think that in a city, there is the possibility to have strong links, even across lines of diverse opinions. This possibility wouldn’t arise in a small village or a tribe becuase you wouldn’t be able to maintain more than acquaintance type relationships with any different sort of group - you simply wouldn’t encounter them enough. The bueaty of the city is that you can have links for day-to-day support that encompasse and are enriched by the difference in ways of life. IN another way, cities allow people who don’t fit in to easily find anothe rgroup to live with and maintain links with. In a tribe, you are stuck to a certain extent, cultural boundaries often see to that.

Yeah, the whole homogenity thing doesn’t work, which is really why I support this so strongly, I think a world that is populated by a bunch of different types of scoial organization, no just ways of living, is a better, stronger world. Furthermore, the possibility of cities expanding is severly limited, as you pointed out in “It will be impossible to Rebuild Civilization”.

My library doesn’t have Savages and Civilization, and though I might look into getting it (is it worth it?) is there anything else you could suggest?

#18
I totally agree that you need both weak and strong links, and I mean exactly the same things as you by those terms. I think that in a city, there is the possibility to have strong links, even across lines of diverse opinions. This possibility wouldn't arise in a small village or a tribe becuase you wouldn't be able to maintain more than acquaintance type relationships with any different sort of group - you simply wouldn't encounter them enough. The bueaty of the city is that you can have links for day-to-day support that encompasse and are enriched by the difference in ways of life. IN another way, cities allow people who don't fit in to easily find anothe rgroup to live with and maintain links with. In a tribe, you are stuck to a certain extent, cultural boundaries often see to that.

This sounds like strong-weak links, in that you want strong links, that you can easily break and reform with other people, and go about breaking and reforming… I’ve done this all throughout school, though never a strong link, because you just… don’t break those easily… so it just became all weak links, every year I would change my group of friends, or acquaintances, this going through and having no lasting relationships really hits me hard. Ending school with about 2 friends total, enough to allow someone to migrate 2500 miles from home…
You could say I hit that ‘people who don’t fit in to easily’ (quiet and cynical) mark, and I never much found what you speak of there, and the people who I do feel strong connections with end up few and far between (and apart). I do love making new friends, and meeting new people and all that, but I desire the strong link… even though I seem to have broken about everything I possibly could have.

#19
I think that in a city, there is the possibility to have strong links, even across lines of diverse opinions. This possibility wouldn't arise in a small village or a tribe becuase you wouldn't be able to maintain more than acquaintance type relationships with any different sort of group - you simply wouldn't encounter them enough.

Well, firstly, you can only have so much diversity in your strong links, much less than you can have in your weak links. After all, strong links means you have a lot of contact with them and you have a lot of mutual influence over one another, so you need to have a lot in common, and as time goes on, you’ll have more in common. Diversity, to some extent, contradicts strong links.

Among my weak links, I have born-again and Evangelical Christians, with whom I could hardly disagree more. If I tried to become the best of friends with these people, I would need to rely on heavy shared interests throughout the rest of their life, and ignore their religion; in which case, how much diversity really separates our opinions? Or, over time, they would convert me or I would convert them. Strong links erode diverse opinions, because they exist only in intimate social contact, and intimate social contact works to break down differences between people.

But you seem to imply that living in a city, you might have more strong links. Living in a crowded area, though, will not put more hours in the day or increase your cognitive capacity. It takes time and energy to maintain strong links. In fact, the pressures of city life generally reduce the number of strong links we have time to take care of. So distance doesn’t separate you, but time and energy separate you from your neighbor far more effectively than the distance between villages ever could. Thus, historically, city-dwellers have had fewer, not more, strong links than village- or band-dwellers.

N another way, cities allow people who don't fit in to easily find anothe rgroup to live with and maintain links with. In a tribe, you are stuck to a certain extent, cultural boundaries often see to that.

Which has led to the rigidification of social boundaries. Because they can expel you, social groups have become far more strict about what they expect. We don’t compromise, and we never learn to work things out, because we can so easily walk away or expel. Gay? Black? Jewish? “We don’t want yer kind here, son.” Traditional cultures have flexibility in their traditions. Yes, they have gender roles, but they also have so many genders that everyone can find one that fits them. Yes, they have common beliefs, but in a religion that grows and automatically accepts anyone’s new observation. Yes, they often have some ethnic homogeneity, but they define themselves by their language and other signs of their dwelling with the land, not by ethnic traits.

In fact, I would go so far as to say that the ease with which we can abandon one social group and join another lays the foundation for one of our biggest problems. It withers the value of our societies, and as any traditional culture will tell you, the struggle of individual against society does not exist, anymore than an oak tree opposes the soil it grows in. Rootlessness, socially and bioregionally, lies at the root of so many of our civilized afflictions. We think to blame parochial intolerance, not realizing that parochial intolerance grew as we walked away from our traditions, like the bitterness of a spurned lover. Our social mobility erodes the social soil of our ability to express our individuality just as our tilling erodes the physical soil we grow our crops in.

Yeah, the whole homogenity thing doesn't work, which is really why I support this so strongly, I think a world that is populated by a bunch of different types of scoial organization, no just ways of living, is a better, stronger world. Furthermore, the possibility of cities expanding is severly limited, as you pointed out in "It will be impossible to Rebuild Civilization".

Adding something new doesn’t always increase diversity. Maximal diversity has come from villages and bands, while cities have gobbled up everything around them. Putting a bunch of people in one place doesn’t mean you’ve made a bigger community. It cuts both ways: festivals give you “city life” with no city, but look at the villages of the Ik in Uganda, or some of the cities of the Rust Belt. There you have a city with no city life.

Not just expanding, but even starting a city simply won’t work in the world we’ll leave our descendants. You simply can’t support a city on permaculture; it doesn’t produce enough food to support thousands of people. It produces enough to support hundreds of people, a village. By no one’s imagination would a few hundred people make a city.

My library doesn't have Savages and Civilization, and though I might look into getting it (is it worth it?) is there anything else you could suggest?

Well, every history book will tell you the story of how cities have gobbled up all societies around them, but as far as why they need to, that one gives you the best information I’ve ever found tucked between two covers.

This sounds like strong-weak links, in that you want strong links, that you can easily break and reform with other people, and go about breaking and reforming... I've done this all throughout school, though never a strong link, because you just.. don't break those easily.. so it just became all weak links, every year I would change my group of friends, or acquaintances, this going through and having no lasting relationships really hits me hard. Ending school with about 2 friends total, enough to allow someone to migrate 2500 miles from home..

Good point, and it plugs into what I said a little bit ago about rootlessness. A link that you can break too easily can never become very strong. If nothing else, the fear of when you might break it will always loom overhead, warning you both not to put too much into it. Strong links require commitment, freely offered. Why do you think every society has offered some kind of marriage?

Fenris, you sound like most of us trapped in civilization. They’ve actually done studies of social isolation in the U.S., and it keeps growing. Where tribal people will have dozens of strong links and hundreds of weak ones, most of us can barely keep all of our weak links together. You can count yourself ahead of the American par if you’ve managed to hold onto even one or two strong links. Cities don’t encourage a broad diversity of strong links (which contradicts itself, anyway); it encourages a huge array of weak links, and no strong links at all.

#20

[quote=“Fenriswolfr, post:18, topic:774”]This sounds like strong-weak links, in that you want strong links, that you can easily break and reform with other people, and go about breaking and
reforming… I’ve done this all throughout school, though never a strong link, because you just… don’t break those easily…[/quote]
I’m not talking about breaking links, I’m talking about allowing people to find their place, even when their place isn’t necessarily the same as their parents place. I’m talking about allowing people who don’t fit in to find the strong links that work for them - there is a greater chance of this in the city simply becuase you have a greater diversity of people.

I completely disagree with that statement, from my own experience, I have numerous friends that have completely different opinions yet still I can rely on them and be supported by them, and have strong links with them. Maybe we’re talking about different types of diversity, and thinking about it, I am coming to realize that what I’m talking about doesn’t necessarily need a city. The kind of diversity I’m talking about is not superficial, it is deep, but it relies on a common interest - different opinions, but different opinions on the same things - a common frame of reference. Maybe you are right, maybe you do need this common frame of reference to have strong links, and maybe this can exist in the tribe. I think the kind of link I am referring to is different - it is weak, but it is consistent and ongoing and intimate - maybe this is an unhealthy form of link but I don’t think so. These kind of links allow us to expand ourselves and our view points on an ongoing basis. Thank you Jason for forcing me to really figure out what I am talking about.

I understand your situation fenris, I am in much the same situation now, struggling to find strong links, coming up with a few, that feel so good. School does that sometimes, it is annoying, breaking up classes and re-making them all the time. I guess one should be able to maintain relationships in the midst of that but I’m not so good at it.

I agree that conventional, standard living approaches to living in a city don’t work, but I think that I am talking about a really different kind of city. I mean, everyone would have to be involved food production to some degree, things wouldn’t be as tight as they are now. I’m not saying that people would have more strong links, just different types of strong links. Maybe they would have less - it isn’t a life for everybody, but I still think it is valuable.

I set my level that turns a city into a village at two thousand people, and I think that number could be sustained by permaculture - permaculture or forms of bio-intensive have the potential for much larger yields per area than conventional agriculture and if all the space in the city was fully maximized as well as growing things inside, and maybe a small ring of fields just beyond the city walls - but no more than one could walk. This size would also prohibit growth or taking over of tribal lands becuase of the very dynamics of permaculture that it is more labour intensive making it nearly impossible to have an army.