I’ve been interested in permaculture ever since the late 1990s, when I realized that I didn’t want to be part of a culture of consumption and endless waste. While I was fortunate enough to be able to buy a house when I was relatively young, I had to move away from it for work, and I’ve lived the life of a renter ever since. I know I’m not alone in this situation. In the U.S., home-ownership rates have fallen steadily between 1980-2000, and recovered only partially during the 2001-05 housing boom. 1 Concurrently, millennials have woken up to the fact that our world’s resources are finite, and our worldwide culture of endless consumption and growth is not sustainable.
Permaculture is more popular than ever because it is a viable path forward, in contrast to a dominant culture that has a fetish for apocalypse. But permaculture is inextricably tied to land, and that is the problem that I faced, as one who had no access to land as an owner. The Prime Directive of Permaculture, according to Bill Mollison, is this: “The only ethical decision is to take responsibility for our own existence and that of our children. Make it now.” How are we to fully take responsibility for our existence when we’re still paying rent to a landlord? Yes, we can save our extra pennies for a down payment on some land, but surely there is some other action we can take right now.
Taking responsibility for our existence right now is the point of this blog. We are not helpless just because we are not landowners. There are options we can pursue as renters to do our part to live in harmony with our world. Every post on this blog will explore these options. Can an individual be self-sufficient only by farming from their studio apartment’s balcony? Probably not. But a person’s options are only limited by their imagination, and this blog is a venue to let one’s imagination run free. Let’s explore how we can redesign our lives right now to make the world a more ethical, responsible, and sustainable place.