i
Journal of the Fourth World
Volume 7 No 5 (issue 59) November-December 1976
Editor Satish Kumar
Editorial Group Antony Brackenbury, Geoffrey Cooper, Herbert Girardet, Steve Lambert, Ian Leese, June Mitchell
Associate Editors Ernest Bader, Danilo Dolci, David Kingsley, Leopold Kohr, Jaya Prakash Narayan, John Papworth, E.F. Schumacher Cover Rachel Bray Layout Tony Colbert, Bill Hamblett Printer Graham Andrews,Web Offset, Reading h i f !
*
Annual Subscription £3.50 (Overseas $10, A ir $15)
All correspondence should be addressed to Pentre Ifan, Felindre, Crymych, Dyfed, Wales contents
Advice to Authors Reflections on Community
The Ark The Ashram
The Farm Twin Oaks Yamatoyama
The Community at Fachongle Isaf
Communities or Perish Monastic Community
End of an Era
2 Geoffrey Ashe 6 George Ineson 7 Lanza del Vasto 10 Satish Kumar 12 Ian Leese 14 15 Mose Matsuba 16 John Seymour 18 J.G. Bennett 21 Peter Abbs, Graham Carey 22 E.F. Schumacher
FO C U S
Towards Stoneground 24 Hugh Coats
Homegrown Theatre 25 Kelvin Hall
Comment 26 PresterJohn
B O O K S
Men of Action 27
The Unfulfilled Promise 28 Directory of Alternative Literature 29
Before the Revolution 30
Last and Least 30
The Great Goddess Rediscovered 31
Food for a Future 32
David J. Harding Antony Brackenbury Herbert Girardet Guy Dauncey Timothy Hyman Geoffrey Ostergaard Kathy Jones Colin Blythe
V iew of Communities We live in a machine civilisation which is based on money, power, comfort and exploitation of people and nature. Such a civilisation is bound to fail, particularly in terms of human satisfaction and spiritual fulfilment. We are living in the jungle of mass-society. Realising this state of affairs, many individuals and groups have come together to learn to live in harmony with each other, and re-vitalise the concept and practice of communitarian life-style. In this issue of Resurgence, we have collected a few examples of such a life-style from different parts of the world. Although the com munities reported in this issue are very different from each other, nevertheless they have a very strong common thread. All of them are engaged in producing the basic necessities of simple life —food, clothes, shelter —by themselves. They are preserving the most fundamental and practical skills, which would other wise be lost from the lives of many people. They are the Arks for saving human, spiritual and communi tarian values, leaving behind the money-motivated cult of material success. It is true that some communities start and do not last for very long, but that is true of almost any venture and experiment, especially when such a venture is to swim against the current of the general mass- culture. But it is most encouraging to see that so many communities have survived so long and so well. In my view, there is only one recipe for the survival of a community, and that is almost devotional love and respect between the members of the community. Just intellectual agreement on certain ideas, or just rejection of the competitive world outside the community, is not a sufficient basis for a community to last long. Achieving such a deep and devotional love, care and respect is not so easy. It is an art to be learnt. £2
Satish Kumar
3
