Bioregionalism
The term was coined by Allen Van Newkirk, founder of the Institute for Bioregional Research, in 1975,[4] given currency by Peter Berg and Raymond F. Dasmann in the early 1970s,[5] and has been advocated by writers such as David Haenke[6] and Kirkpatrick Sale.
A bioregion is defined along watershed and hydrological boundaries, and uses a combination of bioregional layers, beginning with the oldest "hard" lines; geology, topography, tectonics, wind, fracture zones and continental divides, working its way through the "soft" lines: living systems such as soil, ecosystems, climate, marine life, and the flora and fauna, and lastly the "human" lines: human geography, energy, transportation, agriculture, food, music, language, history, indigenous cultures, and ways of living within the context set into a place, and it's limits to determine the final edges and boundaries.
This method highlights the interconnectedness of the region's natural systems and human communities, offering a holistic view of the landscape that integrates ecological data with cultural and historical insights.
This approach empowers individuals to contribute to the documentation of local knowledge, history, and cultural significance, thereby creating maps that are more inclusive and representative of the lived experiences within the bioregion.
Bioregionalism, while akin to modern environmentalism in certain aspects, such as a desire to live in harmony with nature, differs in certain ways from the 20th century movement.
[23] According to Peter Berg, bioregionalism is proactive, and is based on forming a harmony between human culture and the natural environment, rather than being protest-based like the original environmental movement.
[23] In this way the sentiments of Bioregionalism echo those of Classical Environmentalism, and early environmentalists such as Henry David Thoreau are sometimes viewed as predecessors of the Bioregionalist movement.
They envisioned a positive, place-based[clarification needed] alternative to mainstream efforts within a capitalist framework, or those of nation-states or other international bodies.
[24] This included many different individuals, including "Peter Berg, Judy Goldhaft, Raymond Dasmann, Kirkpatrick Sale, Judith Plant, Eleanor Wright, Doug Aberley, Stephanie Mills, Jim Dodge, Freeman House, Van Andruss, David Haenke, and Gary Snyder", working together through the Planet Drum foundation, and similar groups to create a new place-based philosophy they called bioregionalism.
[24] Bioregionalism also directly grew from a relationship with the civil rights and American Indian Movement, and efforts to reclaim their languages, territories and maps, and what bioregionalists saw as the global collapse of traditional ecological knowledge, language suppression and revitalization, and a hope that maps reframing names from "North America" to "Turtle Island" would help bioregions become frameworks for decolonization, as well as more accurate cultural representation and recognition of Indigenous sovereignty.
[34][35] Helping refine this definition, Author Kirkpatrick Sale wrote in 1974 that "A bioregion is a part of the earth's surface whose rough boundaries are determined by natural rather than human dictates, distinguishable from other areas by attributes of flora, fauna, water, climate, soils and landforms, and human settlements and cultures those attributes give rise to.
Each envelope would contain many different pieces of poetry, art, writing, science documents, and place-specific technology booklets, articles, maps, posters, photographs, directories, and calendars.
During the 1960s, he worked at the Conservation Foundation in Washington, D.C., as Director of International Programs and was also a consultant on the development of the 1972 Stockholm Conference on the Human Environment.
"This article defined bioregions as distinct from biogeographical and biotic provinces that ecologists and geographers had been developing by adding a human and cultural lens to the strictly ecological idea.
Drawing on earlier traditions beginning with Ecology and Revolutionary Thought in 1964 Bookchin argued for the reorganization of American society based upon a decentralized regional model which would each encompass a single bioregion or ecosystem.
For Bookchin, a bioregional approach to economic development accepted one of the basic assertions of Social Ecology that a human community is fundamentally a part of a total ecosystem.
The idea of bioregions, and their uses was again expanded by Donella Meadows, author of The Limits to Growth in 1972, and was the primary premise for her to launch the Balaton Group in 1982.
In her words, the purpose of a bioregion was to:[64][65][66]Help people and cultures all over the world develop and express their own capacity to solve their own problems, consistent with their own needs and with the ecosystems around them.
There would need to be many of these centers, all over the world, each one responsible for a discrete bioregion.North American Bioregional Assemblies have been meeting at bi-annual gatherings of bioregionalists throughout North America since 1984 and have given rise to national level Green Parties.
