Relocalization is based on a systems approach that doesn’t solve one set of problems (peak oil) only to make another problem (climate shift) worse.
Relocalization is based on an ethic of protecting the Earth System--or Natural Capital-- knowing that despite our cleverness, human well-being is fundamentally derived from the ecological and geological richness of Earth.
Relocalization starts from the premise that the world is a finite place and that humanity is in a state of overshoot (relying on an oil-based economy and resource consumption levels beyond the planet's carrying capacity). Perpetual growth of the economy and the population is neither possible nor desirable. It is wise to start planning now for a world with less available energy, not more.
While we can’t know future threats precisely, scientists do agree that creating a carbon-cycle neutral economy should be the dominant task occupying our minds. This is exactly what Relocalization aims to do.
Relocalization advocates rebuilding more balanced local economies that emphasize securing basic needs. Local food, energy and water systems are perhaps the most critical to build. In the absence of (past) reliable (but now exhausted) trade partners, whether from peak oil, natural disaster or political instability, a local economy that at least produces its essential goods will have a true comparative advantage.
Relocalization takes a different perspective altogether. Instead of working to keep a system going that has no future, it calls us to develop means of livelihood that pollute as little as possible and that promote local and regional stability. Since much of our pollution results from the distances goods travel, we must shorten distances between production and consumption as much as we can.
Then given the processes involved, What is Relocalization?
Relocalization is a strategy to build societies based on the local production of food, energy and goods, and the local development of currency, governance and culture. The main goals of Relocalization are to increase community energy security, to strengthen local economies, and to dramatically improve environmental conditions and social equity.
The Relocalization strategy developed in response to the environmental, social, political and economic impacts of global over-reliance on an oil-based economy. Our dependence on once cheap non-renewable fossil fuel energy has produced climate change, the erosion of community, wars for oil-rich land and the instability of the global economic system.
Urban planning and design must be ordered by the watershed. One needs to insure that survival of civitas will be dependent on having close-at-hand access to (work, food, water, energy, shelter, clothing, health care, education, culture). Bio-regional determinism effected by the process of Relocalization will define watersheds as the basic political governing, economic and social units where the grassroots governs from the bottom up.
