Introduction

The Emerging, Holistic Worldview

Awakening and Transformation of Consciousness

Reconnecting to Nature

Health and Healing

Socially Engaged Spirituality

The Ecovillage Movement

The Ecovillage Movement is one of the most interesting phenomena in the manifestation of the new worldview because ecovillagers are quite consciously building models of the emerging holistic lifestyle and living them out on the ground, motivated by idealism and personal commitment.

GEDS evolved from The Ecovillage Design Education (EDE) developed by Gaia Education. The curriculum and textbooks are available for gratis download on www.gaiaeducation.org. Hard copies are also available at Permanent Publications, UK. Therefore, ecovillages play a central role in this education.

During the last century, many groups of idealistic people set out to realize their vision of the new civilization on their own as they felt that the old worldview was collapsing and no longer relevant to their lives. Järna in Sweden was started in 1931, Solheimar in Iceland was founded in 1932, Findhorn in Scotland in 1962, Auroville in India in 1968, Damanhur in Italy in the early 1970s. All of these had strong spiritual foundations. Establishing ecovillages often happened on the initiative of women: Auroville by the Mother, Solheimar by Sesselja, Findhorn by two women: Eileen Caddy and Dorothy McLean  and one man Peter Caddy, Ecovillage at Ithaca by two single mothers having walked across the US seeking answers, Hallingelille in Denmark by Susanna Maxen, single mother of 4. This in itself is unusual. The Brahma Kumaris, an Indian spiritual group also initiated by a woman, have built a whole town.

The Ecovillage Movement evolved out of the intentional community movement, and the cohousing movement, which started in Denmark around 1970, based on a social impulse. Many intentional communities were founded in the 1970s and 1980s, often based on an ecological impulse as the environment began to degrade seriously. All of these pioneers listened to an inner voice and experimented with creating communities based on holistic thinking as models for the future. The word “ecovillages” applied to this phenomena was first suggested by Robert Gilman in a report commissioned by Gaia Trust in preparation for the first global meeting in Denmark in 1991 of a number of these communities to discuss strategy and cooperation.  This meeting led to the founding of GEN—the Global Ecovillage Network at Findhorn in 1995.

Ecovillages have been defined in many ways, and no single definition tells the whole story. For example, in 1993, the Danish Ecovillage Association, after long negotiations between ecology-motivated and spiritually-motivated founders, agreed upon the following:

Robert Gilman was the first to try to define what an ecovillage is. In a 1991 article, he defined an ecovillage as:

• List of a few NGO’s
• Permaculture
• The Ecovillage Movement

This Gaia Trust publication was distributed by GEN at the UN Habitat Conference in 1996 and included a $100 million proposal for the United Nations to build 50 model ecovillages across the world to kick start the transition to sustainability.

The Gilman’s Report to Gaia Trust, 1991.

The GEN Founders at Findhorn 1995.

Ecovillage Living, edited by Hildur Jackson and Karen Svensson, is a valuable introduction to ecovillages written by the pioneers from GEN and includes 400 illustrations.