QUESTIONING THE GROWTH ECONOMY
If you have ever driven through rural Kentucky or Ohio or Pennsylvania, chances are you have run across a horse drawn carriage with a group of people who appear to have emerged from the 1700´s. Many Amish and Mennonite communities still ardently and stubbornly maintain a pre-technological and pre-industrial lifestyle despite being surrounded by consumer capitalist civilization.
For many observers, these simple, hardworking farm communities are like a living antique; a surviving relic from bygone eras. Instead of seeing them as important sources of knowledge or bearers of much-needed skills that will be necessary for the construction of a more sustainable society, we see them as nothing more than as a unique field trip for elementary school kids or a place to buy strawberries come spring time.
For many people, though the Amish or Mennonite communities may be interesting, the idea of returning to a pre-industrial lifestyle is considered heresy. We may admire their sense of community and strong ties to land and place, but we can´t imagine living without our cars and smart phones.
The Hutterites are an ethnoreligious group that takes their anti-technology view to an extreme. There over 40,000 Hutterites living in colonies in Canada and the northern United States. Based on their somewhat radical religious theology, the Hutterites believe that all technological progress (from the 1800´s onwards) is a form of sin that goes against the Creator´s plan for the world. Subsequently, they sun any sort of technological advancement and live lives of simplicity.
Appropriate technology does not advocate for a return to pre-industrial lifestyles. While we do affirm that Mennonite and Amish colonies have much wisdom and knowledge and live a much more sustainable and healthy lifestyle than us modern folk, we also feel that technology can offer important instruments to help us in the task of constructing resilient and sustainable livelihoods.
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