Protopia or Utopia? Which is more solarpunk?
And which has the greatest potential to help our movement?
[IMAGES: Olalekan Jeyifous,Crown Heights & Robert McCall, The Prologue and the Promise]
What do you think of when you hear the word ‘utopia’? - a better world? A perfect one? Or a nightmare?
Solarpunk is sometimes called utopian, but most people also stress it’s not a perfect society. Maybe the better word we’re looking for to describe our movement is protopian.
This term was popularised by Kevin Kelly who argues the opposite of dystopia is not a utopian ‘perfect’ society. He says it’s one that is progressively moving to a better world. This is the essence of Kelly’s protopia.
The philosopher and writer Hanzi Freinacht has developed Kelly’s idea further. In an in-depth online essay he agrees with Kelly that utopia has lots of problems as a term.
Freinacht says it implies a state of cultural and political perfection which can easily become tunnel-visioned. It’s idealised future infers a static end-state, which when achieved, will never need to be altered.
He says it’s why utopianism has been criticised by conservatives and anarchists because they both believe;
‘all societies have grown organically and not according to schemes, never entirely according to the plan of an architect. If the project is to recreate society in the mental image of a few visionaries or leaders, it always leads to disaster.’
Protopia, for Kelly and Freinacht, offers a more attractive path. It doesn’t say everything will be perfect for everyone.
It’s a more diverse and inclusive “vision of visions”. It focuses on the possibility and shared capacity to move in mutually desirable directions.
Freinacht argues Kelly’s version of protopia is too incrementalist to be inspiring (we’d add it’s too slow to avoid climate breakdown).
The philosopher says there should still be a broad vision of what the systems of a radically better society could be, without being a fixed utopian blueprint.
I feel for these reasons and others this makes protopian a better way to describe solarpunk than utopian.
Now you might say, “Well that’s not what I mean when I say utopia. I don’t mean this rigid 20th century thing, I mean something more like protopia.”
The issue is when most people hear the word ‘utopia’ they think it’s one of two things that can undermine solarpunk’s potential to create the radical change we need.
One it that it’s an impossible to achieve fantasy. The other is it’s a well-intentioned plan for perfection that will end up leading us all to soviet style work camps, or worse.
Another reason why I think protopian is a better way to describe solarpunk than utopian is it’s new. Like the very term solarpunk itself it’s more of our time. It’s not dragging the baggage of the 20th century with it.
What do you think? Is solarpunk protopian, utopian or something else?
We’ve just scratched the surface of Hanzi Freinacht’s long article. Do you think there are any other parts of it that are worth highlighting?
Let us know in the comments below.
And…
Reasons to be Letchworth: what can we learn from the garden city movement? @ Reasons to Be Cheerful
What went right this week @ Positive News
Power and Progress review – why the tech-equals-progress narrative must be challenged @ Guardian
This House In London Is Covered In A Unique Terraced Green Roof @ Contemporist
Possible Worlds - @London Elektricity @ SolarPunk Stories Playlist
Until Next Time
That's all for this update. If you like what we’re trying to do here and know someone else who might do too then please share.
See you in the sunshine,
Alex Holland
Founder, SolarPunk Stories
I prefer the term created by Alvin and Heidi Toffler, "practopia" "A practopia offers a positive, even a revolutionary (vision of the future) between utopia and dystopia, within the range of the realistically attainable.”
The Third Wave, Alvin & Heidi Toffler. 1980
It implies a future that requires us to stretch to our furthest abilities and results that can be measurable.
I'm not aware of any that talk directly about Practopia. For some reason the term never caught on, but I still think it deserves being spread. Yuo can check out our website www.practopiaproject.com as one example of how I believe it can be used.
Another great Toffler term is imaginative centers- the idea that we should create public gathering spaces for people to come and imagine possible futures using the tools of foresight as their guide. That alos feels very solarpunk to me.