The SSA is not ideological or political in any traditional way. It is a local, social and very human scale approach to organising together to achieve mutually defined objectives. It is an approach which has seen amazing accomplishments by people — such as one beacon SSA Village who achieved an amazing 49% greenhouse gas reduction. (this research by Victoria University also shows so much more than just the 49% and is available on the website.) We-thinks that this results more through the inspiration and encouragment of people working closely together rather than through any information in the SSA per se! Except perhaps, that the SSA is totally about inspiring and envouraging each other.
The Approach is relevant to and controlled by us because it’s about our day to day lives, our future, our homes and local places. And an SSA Village is relevant to and owned by us, because it is a blank canvas for our imagination and for what our common sense tells us is obvious. Basically it’s up to us to just get out and do it … and the good news is that relevance and control becomes oh so deliciously self propelling and inspiring. It is so unbelievably satisfying as we take “charge” of the most important challenge in human history.
The Approach began in the Cities of Moreland and Wollongong in 2002. Since then over 200 local communities across Australia have used the SSA to reconnect with their neighbours, learn even more (we each already know and feel heaps) about the Earth and about living more ecologically sustainably together. Jason, a seminal Sustainability Street sage, once observed that, “eventually, Sustainability Street can shift from being something a community does … to becoming something a community is.” The SSA anables us to support and inspire each other to accomplish wonderful things for our beautiful Planet, accomplishments which we rightly become deeply proud of. Participants consistently report three wonderful outcomes …
- Reduction in “ecological footprint,” with 25 – 35% (and much more in some villages) reduction in waste, water and energy consumption. Importantly all of this in the context of knowing about and making personal reconnection with the Earth’s magical, precious biological diversity.
- Enormous pride at having conceived and carried out local sustainability projects together including education events, community gardens, knocking over the back fences to create mutual space for play, chooks, food, etc
- Perhaps above all, folks report a deep, deep sense of satisfaction at have having made new friends and connections in the very local place in which they live. That really counts!
The SSA is not a spoonfeeding, font of information. Getting whatever information you need is why those kids invented Google. Neither is it about a one off campaign on an issue which is not to say that “campaigns” can’t be part of Village life. The priority however, is to create a Sustainability Street Village of social, supportive and like minded coneections. The Village, by its very existance is a living, constant force for re-shaping the old culture which has constantly generated the need for issues based campaigns. By creating both long term lifestyle change and by recognising the power of modelling a different way of living in our Sustainability Street Villages, we influence others and eventually the wider community and the whole society. The great dream of Sustainability Street is to actually make the need for campaigns per se increasingly redundant.
The Sustainability Street Approach is totally about education and the idea that we will all need to keep learning about how to live in greater harmony with the Earth for the rest of our lives. Not in an arduous or high brow manner. More because education, learning and self/group transformation is the crucible of culture change. And, it is simply the most deeply satisfying experience that humans can have. As Rose from Randwick City’s Clovelly Childcare Centre Sustainability Street Village said – “I don’t feel that my life is interesting unless I’m learning something.” What better thing to “master”, than helping each other to help the Earth?
One by one of us and our communities, the effect on society and culture can be so contagious and powerful. Dr. Nicholas Christiakos, author of “Connected: The Surprising Power of Our Social Networks and How They Shape Our Lives -- How Your Friends’ Friends’ Friends Affect Everything You Feel, Think, and Do,” ... is one of the new breed of thinkers and sociologists who is passionate about human connections, relationship and their potential power for good. The Sustainability Street Institute has recently corresponded with Dr. Christiakos who said to us … ‘every thing we do affects not just ourselves, and not just our friends and relatives, but also dozens, or hundreds, and sometimes possibly thousands of other people.’
The biggest thing to get our heads around is that the community making, social change and culture crafting is the deeper meaning and purpose of the Sustainability Streeet Approach. Just as optimism is a choice, we can equally choose to believe in and be energisedn by the nature of and extent to which we can influence others. This shapes how the world evolves and transforms. Your Sustainability Street Village is a blank canvas for a new way of living which can both directly or indirectly, quietly and effectively change the world.
The Sustainability Street Approach is unique in that it provides a framework for viewing our lives from a fundamentally different vantage point. By moving past the old way of thinking, we can view the entire environmental debate, the government, commerce, society, and each other in more productive and fruitful ways. Essentially, Deep Sustainability and Dynamic Capacity Building combined with the SSA “Structure for Change” – 1•2•4•8•5•2•3 – are the tools.
Celebrated American Civil Rights hero, Malcolm X, said … “I for one believe … that if you give people a thorough understanding of what confronts them … and the basic causes that produce it, they’ll create their own program, and when the people create a program, you get action.”