I’ve been interested in bioregionalism and it’s potential to help build a healthier global system.

At first glance it appears smaller than nationalism, as most bioregions contain smaller areas of land than the nations that contain them, but I think it’s bigger than nationalism within the human psyche, with a globally unifying underlying principle. If bioregionalism becomes the dominant form of cultural and political organization, then the focus on how the land shapes our minds and vice versa becomes a common thread among all bioregions. That thread builds the foundation for coordination among bioregions (assemblies, associations, coalitions, etc.) on a global level.

The folks that I know who are promoting bioregionalism, tend to focus on cultivating and highlighting the cultural identity of the bioregion as a way of unifying groups and individuals around the common ground (literal and figurative) that exists. That common ground forms the foundation of working together towards economic, social, and political structures and changes.

I like it because it offers a group identity that’s based on probable common experiences of individuals that come from living in and interacting with the bioregion’s features, with the understanding that the environmental features significantly influence the experience (rather than an adopted socialized identity and prescribed values which claim intrinsic superiority, as is common in nationalism). It seems like a necessary green component of an integral system (which replaces or supercedes nationalism). My instincts are saying that once this group/identity component is established, the individual/behavioral aspects will begin to be enacted. The cooperatives or corporations based on bioregional values and goals might coalesce and coordinate to compete with and even overrule corporate interests.

From my perspective, it fits the described requirements: resists corporate interests by prioritizing each bioregion’s environmental interests, supercedes the nation state through the creation of local and global cultural identities which fit better with an individual’s self-identity due to its basis on common personal experiences, and aligned with the interests of the constituent nation states because the nation state’s interests consist of the sum of bioregional interests that are contained within it.

An example of how bioregionalism can produce coordination similar to globalism: the World Cup (globalist) versus the World Football Cup (bioregionalist)

Is anyone else familiar with bioregionalism? Is it possible that it’s a necessary component of retooling our social, economic, and political systems to be more integral?

I’d say that yes, the need for global governance to balance a globalized economy is a crying need. But I’d also say that we have been slowly evolving in that direction for much of the last century. The League of Nations after WWI didn’t get very far, but then the very horrors of the 30s and WWII gave the push for the creation of the United Nations in 1947, along with the Bretton Woods financial institutions. While there is indeed a lot to criticize in the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, the World Trade Organization et. al., these are movements toward a world federation.

For the very reasons you cite in your post, Corey, I have been watching the European Union experiment with great interest. It is indeed a major push toward a next emergent level, transcending while including the sovereign nation-states of Europe. They are struggling with this but so far hanging on. I find it most interesting that the very part of the world that created the sovereign nation-state, i.e. western Europe, and then spread it all around the rest of the world via colonialism, is now making tentative steps toward transcending its own creation.

Let us remember that sovereign nation-states were the result of the 30 Years War in Europe; part of the crucible out of which the Modern world order arose out of the Medieval. We are now in the midst of a process that looks like it is pushing into the next phase. Which we all fondly hope and expect will be something second tier.

This is kind of rambling, but my general point is that the evolution of the next phase of governance has already begun, and indeed has been in progress for a while now. What the new world order in terms of governance might become, I have no idea, though; my interests and engagements lie mostly in the UL.

Any ideas from any of you LR quadrant savants? What might a second-tier, teal world governance look like?

Hi Corey, For some reason I couldn’t access parts 2 & 3 so I don’t know if Ken gave any concrete examples of initiatives, eg. the Simultaneous Policy (Simpol) campaign www.simpol.org, which are designed to do exactly what the two of you were talking about: i.e. how to transcend and yet include nation-states within a higher, cooperative form of global governance. Ken himself commented favourably on my new book, The Simpol Solution, as did Noam Chomsky, David Sloan Wilson, Ervin Laszlo and many others. My intention, here, is not to blow my own trumpet, but rather to ask: Shouldn’t Integral be moving on from its ‘safe place’ in the field of analysis to adding some intelligent discussion of practical, real-life initiatives, including their merits/de-merits?