The New Optimism | 21 Stories for Transition
Via, Resilience.org
November 1st sees the publication of a landmark new publication from Transition Network. ’21 Stories of Transition: how a movement of communities is coming together to reimagine and rebuild our world’ is published in advance of the COP21 climate negotiations in Paris in December, and is a joyous and inspiring celebration of what the Transition movement has become. Here Rob Hopkins, who harvested the stories contained in the book, introduces it:
It tells 21 stories of 39 Transition projects in 15 countries, drawing out some staggering insights into their impacts (for example, between them, our 21 stories alone have saved car travel equivalent to driving to the Moon and back 3 times, installed renewable energy equivalent to that needed by 4,000 homes, put over £1 million of local currencies into circulation, and generated over 18,500 hours of volunteer input). But those are just the measurable impacts. So much of what these groups do is much harder to measure, but just as important.
The stories are:
- The Million Miles Project, Black Isle, Scotland
- The Rise of Community Energy
- REconomy in Luxembourg
- EcoCrew Environmental Awareness Programme, Greyton, South Africa
- The rise of local currencies
- The Pasadena Repair Cafe, US
- Fishguard’s Surplus Food Cafe, Wales
- The Casau Community Garden, Salies, France
- Caring Town Totnes, UK
- Zarzalejo Futuro, Spain
- Lambeth Local Entrepreneur Forum, London, UK
- Transition Town Media’s Free Store, Pennsylvania, US
- Aardehuis Project Olst, Netherlands
- Greenslate Farm, Billinge & Orrell, UK
- Potager Alhambra, Brussels, Belgium
- Compagnons de la Terre, Liege, Belgium
- Harvesting Rainwater in São Paulo, Brazil
- Crystal Palace Food Market, London
- Transition Streets in Australia
- Scaling up Transition in Peterborough, Canada
- Ungersheim, Village in Transition, France
Told in the voices of the people making these projects happen, ’21 Stories for Transition’ also tells of the challenges groups face, and the strategies they develop to ensure the resilience not just of their projects, but also their groups. It’s the most heartwarming, diverse and colourful Transition publication yet. It will be published in both an English and a French edition.
The English edition will be published on November 1st. The French edition will follow a couple of weeks later. Over the 21 days before COP21, Transition will be publishing one of these stories every day, as well as sharing more news on Transition-related events that will be taking place in Paris during the conference.
Addendum:
One of the stories featured in the book is about Media, Pennsylvania’s Free Store, an initiative of Transition Town Media. Our digital editor Rhonda Fabian is involved with the Free Store and contributed this video to the Transition Network.