Resilience and Resistance: Building Sustainable Communities for a Post Oil Age
Resilience and Resistance: Building Sustainable Communities for a Post Oil Age is a collection of columns that had their origin in the local Brattleboro newspapers, The Commons and the Reformer. Together with a couple of original pieces, they serve as the contents of this book.
They have been arranged, not in the order they were written, but in a way that hopefully suggests the evolution of Post Oil Solutions over its 10 years. From its start (and continuation) as a community organizing project that operates in the belief that a successful transition to a world beyond fossil fuels involves building sustainable communities whose people are adaptable and resilient, collaborative and sufficient. Then to our good fortune at striking a responsive chord with many folks in the larger Windham County, and nearby Massachusetts and New Hampshire region around local food and the many ways it serves to build community. And then most recently has been our focus with climate change, as well as other political issues, like GMOs and food sovereignty, and social justice, in general. All of these are largely dealt with in the three parts of the body, with a Prologue and Epilogue bracketing them, setting the stage and wrapping things up. Founded by a small group of Windham County residents in June, 2005, Post Oil is a community organizing project whose stated mission isto empower the people of the Central Connecticut River Valley bioregion to develop sustainable, collaborative, and socially just communities leading to a self-sufficient post petroleum society. About Post Oil Solutions: Founded in June, 2005 as a community organizing project, Post Oil Solutions is a 501c3 non-profit whose mission is "to empower the people of the Central Connecticut River Valley bioregion to develop sustainable, collaborative, and socially just communities leading to a self-sufficient post petroleum society." During our nearly 10 years, we have particularly emphasized food security and the building of a resilient and redundant local food system through a variety projects that included bringing the localvore movement to our region; initiating three farmers markets in our area and a CSA; hosting monthly workshops and an annual No Gardener Left Behind Expo about gardening, preserving and cooking local food; running a farm to school program in the area schools; bringing gleaning to southeastern Vermont; starting local food buying clubs; and offering a local food list serve to the public. "In Recognition of Your Outstanding Team Effort to Build Sustainable, Collaborative and Socially Just Communities," the Vermont Sustainable Agriculture Council gave its annual award in 2010 to Post Oil Solutions..We currently have been very involved with climate crisis and amongst other things, host a monthly Climate Change Café on the 4th Tuesday of the Month at Brooks Memorial Libraray, Brattleboro, Vermont.Earn by promoting books
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Founding Director of and community organizer with Post Oil Solutions, Tim Stevenson has done community organizing much of his adult life around such issues as welfare rights, peace & war, box stores, and nuclear power plants. He lives with his wife, Sherry, in Athens, where in their imperfect ways, they do the best they can to walk the talk. He also thinks a lot about his two children and 2 grandchildren living in a world of climate change.
"If you had to pick 4 terms to map the future, you could do a lot worse than 'relocalization, ' 'empowerment, ' 'community building, ' and 'social justice.' This fine volume explains how they could interweave to form the fabric of a working society--in fact, a sweet one." --Bill McKibben, author Eaarth: Making a Life on a Tough New Planet
--Bill McKibben"Tim Stevenson makes a powerful case for both resilience and resistance in the face of our rapidly changing climate. He draws from the work of many others that have documented and decried the self-destructive and delusional path of our fossil-fueled behaviors, yet he also offers up optimism and encouragement by identifying positive actions that can and are be taken to help us change course. Tim speaks to the big picture of climate change politics and science but balances this information with descriptions of local community programs that are so necessary to engage people in action. By weaving together personal, place-based stories with factual, intellectual arguments he has created an informative and inspirational book addressing what is widely recognized as the most important issue of our time."
-Vern Grubinger, Extension Professor, University of Vermont, and coordinator, Northeast Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Program, USDA
"Tim Stevenson's compelling analysis reflects the growing awareness that greed-based, oil-soaked capitalism is perilous to people and the planet. This book lays clean a path to activation, starting at the table, where delicious local organic food starves the beast of our dollars and complicity. As the economy of war and extreme extraction provide a taste of changing climates, mass extinction and untold human suffering, it is ironic that those steeped in living sustainable lifestyles report out its enriching viability. Stevenson is not so naïve to propose that individual action is enough, and not so naïve to imagine corporations and government transforming without massive pressure. At the leading edge of this pressure are savvy, inclusive, caring communities fluent in post-oil solutions."
-Jim Merkel, author of Radical Simplicity Small Footprints on a Finite Earth; founder of the Global Living Project
"Resilience and Resistance defines the power of sustainable communities to address global climate change by how we live in relation to others. Tim Stevenson's work is an important, and very timely, voice guiding us to take care of ourselves and our community; and in doing so, how we can heal ourselves and our planet."
-Enid Wonnacott, has been the Executive Director of the Northeast Organic Farming Association of Vermont (NOFA-VT since 1987
