The Forum Series is designed as a means of generating public education and dialogue around key principles of social ecology, while demonstrating some ways that these principles are relevant to issues both local and global. We also aim to link each forum with specific actions and projects that Islanders can take to help build healthier and more ecologically sound communities.
The discussion section is organized around key questions raised by our public forums on Vashon Island: anti-oppression work, building alliances, ecological citizenship, and direct democracy. Send us your responses and we will begin an online dialogue on these difficult but vital questions. More questions will appear as the dialogue develops.
Social ecology argues that the project of dominating the natural world stems from the domination of human by human. Social ecologists therefore oppose all forms of domination and oppression, and support all movements toward human liberation, self-determination, and self-management through the development of directly democratic institutions to the greatest extent possible.
Accordingly, through the winter and spring of 2008 SEEDS offered a series of four forums on the first Sunday of four consecutive months beginning in February, at the Havurat on Vashon. The February forum centered on anti-oppression work; the March forum on the meaning and critique of social hierarchy, the April forum on ecological citizenship, and the May forum on direct democracy. The forums are partly inspired by the series of world and now U.S. social forums, and offered a mix of educational talks, art presentations, workshop activities, open discussion and dialogue, information on relevant local community projects, and networking opportunities.
Institutions or counter-institutions that provide for direct democracy will be very limited in advancing the goal of a truly just and ecological society if the ignorance and prejudice spawned within the cultural apparatus of oppressive forces are not counteracted. If we were to magically be given the means of self-governance tomorrow, the results might not match what many of us have dedicated ourselves to. Throughout much of history, social movements have been the singular cultural means of education toward ideals of freedom and social justice. SEEDS offers these forums as a local means of prefigurative public education toward a comprehensive and participatory (and always evolving) social and ecological ethics. Ultimately, we aim to offer practical means for a process of community development in general alignment with the holistic perspective of social ecology. We also wish to provide an ongoing local vehicle that may inform social movements for fundamental social change.
