Citizens Participation University
Hungary 2011
Fra oljeavhengighet til lokal motstandsdyktighet
WHO ARE WE ?
• Our mission is to encourage
the local communities to
generate sustainable ways
of living through the design
of integral sustainable
systems “permaculture” and
the creation of ecovillages.
In addition, we promote
realistic and concrete
alternative.
CO2 level the last 60,000 years
381 ppm
(2006)
Ron Oxburgh
Transition Training 2007
The north pole is smelting
Transition Training 2007
Climate Change – The debate is over
Upsala Glacier, Argentina
Peak Oil

98 oil producers
Peak Oil

64 post peak producers
Where are we going?
Techno-Fantasy
Peak
Energy?
•
•
•
•
Green-Tech
Stability
Energy use
Resource use
Environmental degradation
Pollution
Earth
stewardship
Post
Mad Max
Collapse
Pre-industrial
culture
Historical Time
Agriculture
10.000yrs BP
Industrial
Revolution
Baby
Boom
Great Grand
Children
Future Time
Peak Oil & Climate Change
PEAK OIL
(a la Hirsch et al.)
 coal to liquids
 gas to liquids
 relaxed drilling
regulations
 massively scaled
biofuels
 tar sands and nonconventional oils
 resource
nationalism and
stockpiling
PLANNED
RELOCALISATION
 local resilience
 carbon reduction
 consume closer to home
 produce closer to home
 play closer to home
 decentralised energy
infrastructure
 the Great Reskilling
 localised food
 energy descent plans
 local medicinal capacity
 local currencies
CLIMATE CHANGE
(a la Stern et al.)
 climate engineering
 carbon capture and
storage
 tree-based carbon
offsets
 international
emissions trading
 climate adaptation
 improved
transportation
logistics
 nuclear power
How are they organising?
Transition Model

Understanding:
• PO + CC ≠ “business as usual”
• Adaptability, creative
• NOW
7 Principles
 7 Buts
 12 Steps
 Transition Network

Transition Model – 7 principles
1. Have a positive vision
2. Give people access to good information and trust that
they make good decisions
3. Inclusion and openness
4. Sharing and networking
5. Build resilience
6. Internal and external restructuring
7. Proximity principle: self-organization and decisionmaking at the appropriate level
Transition Model – 7 “buts”
1. We don’t have funding
2. “They” won’t let us
3. Turf wars with other green groups
4. Non one cares about the environment
5. It’s too late anyway
6. I don’t have the right qualifications
7. I don’t have the energy to be doing that
Transition Model - Step 1
• Set up an initiating group and design its
transformation from the outset
– humility
– reforms from subgroups
Transition Model - Step 2
• Awareness raising
– allies and networks
– prepare community
– movies
– talks
– events
Transition Model - Step 3
• Lay the foundations
– other groups
– existing projects
– official bodies
– businesses
– collaboration
Transition Model - Step 4
• Organise a Great Unleashing
– coming of age
– powerful, passionate,
informative, inspirational
– timing
– content
– making connections
Transition Model - Step 5
• Form “working groups”
– starting new groups
– bringing in existing groups
– guidelines
– training
– working groups and the
steering group
the journey to transition
Energy descent
Form initiating
group
Awareness
raising
Working groups
Hand over to
new group
Initiator
Deepening
Initiating group
Unleash!
Working
groups
Awareness raising events, widen participation
Build partnerships
Reskilling events and workshops
Open space, form working groups
Projects
Central
Centralgroup
groupdeepens
deepens
Project support
“Core” group
forms & steers
Transition Model - Step 6
• Use “Open Space”
– shouldn’t work!
– one long coffee break
– World Café
Transition Model - Step 7
• Develop visible practical
manifestations of your project
– not a talking group
– team building potential
– getting dirt under your fingernails
Transition Model - Step 8
• Facilitate the Great Re-skilling
– eg WWOOFing
Transition Model - Step 9
• Build bridges to Local
Government
– don’t wait too long…
– open door
– Community Development Plan
– elections…!
Transition Model - Step 10
• Honour the Elders
– elders as a community resource
– 1930 to 1960 – moving from oil
scarcity to abundance
– oral history
Transition Model - Step 11
• Let it go where it wants to
go…
– focus on the questions
– unleash the community
– any sense of control is
illusory
Transition Model - Step 12
• Produce and start to implement
the Energy Descent Action Plan
– assess current situation
– create 15-20 year vision for all
key areas
– integrate with community plan if
possible
– identify steps needed to get there
– start the work
13. If it is not funny, It is not sustainable….
(Change the World)
What’s an official Transition Project?
Paradigm shift
Relocalisation
Support on many levels
300 official transition initiatives..
Several thousand mulling
Transition Town in the World
Norge: Stavanger, Bergen. Sagene, Landås, Sandøya
WHAT DO WE DO:
 Programes on education
and training
 Consultative and
follow-up local projects
 Help to self-help
 Innovation appropriated
technology
 Network with different
organizations and
movements.
CTWs Partner
organisations
Educational Tour Around Norway 6 years
Work with municipalities in Norway and Latin America
Guatemala: Workshops and seminars
Chile: Workshops and seminars
Colombia: Workshops and seminars
Work with municipalities in Norway and Latin America
Permacultural structures in public spaces with youth
Designed and implemented of a park with Kid
Designed and implemented Centre for Sustainable Development in Norway
All is possible!
kontakt@transitionnorway.org